fear and loathing of diets

[piranha]

there is some form of diet talk in here, so beware of potential triggers.

jesse asked about it, and yeah, i've thought of giving gloria the HAES materials now, but i really don't like proselytizing, even if it is for a good cause (of course all proselytizers think it's for a good cause). so i am gonna wait until she brings out actual "yay, weight loss, good for you" talk. i think. it's a bit ironic because she is clearly struggling with her own fat, because it's not at where society thinks it should be for a fitness instructor, so she could possibly use the information now. i need to think on it a bit more. maybe we need to have a more honest talk about her assumptions for me. it's all still new, and i primarily want her to teach me about strength training, so i am shying away from ancillary talk (which will aggravate me, and heck, possibly her too). we're not friends, you know?

also, i AM losing weight right now, if not on purpose. shifting to a mostly vegetarian diet, eating more mindfully, eating out very rarely, and consuming lots of nutrients in raw veg/fruit smoothies means that i often inadvertantly take in fewer calories than would be maintenance. trying to eat more "mindfully" means actually paying attention to what/when i am eating instead of shoveling it in while i am distracted by reading, so i've become more conscious of satiety clues. i'm keeping a food diary for nutritional purposes and i can see how it happens (and i am careful that i don't get caught up with the numbers). so my body is doing the officially expected thing -- fewer calories + more physical activity = weight loss.

except i know that will stop quite some time before i reach any officially sanctioned "ideal" weight or "good" BMI, and i am honestly fine with that. i've never been skinny in my life, not even when i was very healthy and working physically all day; i just don't think it's in my genetic makeup. i am expecting my mindful eating will get to a point where i won't need a food diary -- i know i could try without even now, but i really, really do not want to get diabetes, i feel i need to learn more about vitamin and mineral content of foods as well, and i've got terrible habits from growing up re preparing nutritious meals. yeah, that is still "diet talk", i know. but i think i need to do it for my peace of mind. i am pushing back as hard as i can against the idiotic "war on obesity", any harder would be counter-productive.

i believe i am not putting too much pressure on myself because it doesn't feel the same way as it felt when i was dieting; i am not feeling deprived, nor on edge about food all the time. when i want to eat a carton of that fine raspberry truffle cheesecake ice cream, i eat a carton of ice cream (actually i don't ever eat the whole thing at a sitting anymore, because allowing myself to just eat it instead of carefully controlling portions seems to remove the desire. funny how that works.). i know it's still dangerous, which is why i want to talk to a fat nutritionist, who knows about all the pitfalls and can help me watch out for them.

but yeah, it feels like an odd time to talk to gloria about HAES. it's not really, but it feels it would be more natural if my body had settled into its perfectly happy, fat stage where i am not gaining or losing while eating what i want and being as healthy as i can be. i was there once, before american obsession with dieting and pseudo-health infected me, so i am hoping i'll still recognize it when i get there.

Comments

[jesse_the_k]

This sentence: i am pushing back as hard as i can against the idiotic "war on obesity", any harder would be counter-productive says it all.

I am truly sorry I made you feel that you weren't trying hard enough. I don't want you to get hectored by anybody, of whatever size.

I am so impressed by what you're doing! I also got a "diabetes soon!" warning from my doc (+celiac, +lower your cholesterol!), and implemented massive what-I-eat changes, and I know how difficult it is to undo the habits of a lifetime.

I hope you and gloria achieve excellent communication re: strength training.

I apologize for derailing you.

[piranha]

oh, nonono! you didn't make me feel i wasn't trying hard enough! sorry if what i said led you to believe that. you just made me think about why i was avoiding giving gloria some HAES material. which was not a bad thing at all.

the rest of it was mostly internal dialogue (internal now; but people have brought up variants of all those things in the past). it's tricky to find a happy medium -- ever since basically accepting HAES as the best way of dealing with size/weight i've felt weird about contemplating any weight loss, even when i only wanted to do it because my ankles hurt. or modifying the way i eat to avoid diabetes; it's all so damn close to diet talk that i won't bring it up anywhere but my own journal, and even here i feel a bit like a potential traitor.

*gah*, yeah, changing the way one eats is horribly difficult, isn't it. especially with stuff that was formed in childhood. it takes much longer to create new habits. or at least it feels that way.

about celiac -- has there been an increase in people with it over the last couple decades for so, or is it just that it simply wasn't diagnosed before?

[jesse_the_k]

*phew* I am relieved.

I've shared that ambiguity. After six months with my new way-of-eating, I'd lost a significant amount; none of my clothing fit. Ninety percent of the folks I encountered at my pool were "Wow! Good job! You lost a LOT of weight!" 4% were "you look different, are you well?" and 6% didn't comment. The latter 10% were fine to deal with, but the 90 gave me the creeps. (I responded with "Hmmm. Hmmm. (nod) Hmm." They quit talking about it.)

Was I betraying my fat friends? My initial weight-loss goal had been the modest 10% for which there's good evidence for diabetes prevention in metabolic syndrome. I hadn't wanted to become a "thin person." Although as a believer in HAES, I knew I should not judge a "thin person" any more than a "fat person."

This is so fucking fraught!

Change in celiac diagnosis is very weird. Here's some insights I've got from voracious reading: Until around 2000, celiac was rarely considered in US medicine. It's more common among English/Scandinavian/German peoples, and there have always been higher incidence rates in those countries, which US now approaches. It's another autoimmunity issue; these seem to be on the rise. Doctors in US were taught the classic presentation of celiac is a 0-12 months infant with diarhhea. Fat premenopausal women with abdominal pain, constipation aren't on their radar. The celiac blood test provides false negatives. The most accurate test is an intestinal biopsy.

There's a better chance of diagnosis if one has the rash, but then there's a poorer chance of remission even with no gluten.

In my case, since I was changing what I eat anyway, I thought I'd try eliminating gluten as an experiment. I felt so much better that I was unwilling to go back to eating gluten for two months so to beat down my intestinal villi enough that the biopsy would prove the diagnosis.

[serene]

Also, I think it's cool to save your limited energy for helping yourself before you spend it on someone else's growth. You rock.

[ephemera]

I wish deciding to embrace HAES was just a magic one-off decision that made everything around bodies and so on easy and straight forward, but it's very much been my experience that that it's not that simple. Incredibly helpful, yes, but not a magic wand.