You cannot get to my weight without realizing you have a problem. How can I justify being the weight I am when I have been blessed with limbs that function as they’re meant to, information on countless ways to exercise, including access to inexpensive ways to keep fit (walking, jogging, using an exercise mat and weights at home, renting exercise dvds from the library) as well as the gym I recently decided to quit?

As I think is often the case with people who are both plus size and jiggly, food issues more than exercise are the main reason I am overweight. Do I love and eat most vegetables? Absolutely! Will I eat lean cuts of meat, cut the fat off food that I know to be fatty, cook with little fat, or use olive oil? Sure! Do I drink lots of water daily, 1% milk with my cereal and shun carbonated beverages completely? Definitely.

Good habits, but when they are only a small part of my healthy eating plan, there will be problems. Clearly I’m not doing everything right.

I eat candy and enjoy donuts, cookies, icecream and most of these treats’ relatives. I don’t want to know how much money I have thrown away over the years on sweets. My problem goes beyond simply liking candy because there are plenty of people who like sweets who are not plus size or unhealthy in any way. Clearly the problem is how this love of sweets manifests itself in my dietary life. I choose not to control my portion sizes when it comes to sweets. I always want a large slice of cake, another cookie, the whole bag of sweets. If it is before me, I will eat it.

I have a compulsion to finish a bag of candy once opened, no matter how big the bag is. Some can open a bag, remove a portion of its contents, seal the bag and not return to it for days. I find this hard to do and am most satisfied when I can make an open bag empty as soon as possible. This is not healthy. It had led to me eating more than one (or two…or three) serving(s) too many times to count.

I crave sugar, and feel deprived when I don’t have any. I also think I should not have to restrict myself when it comes to sweets, as if along with the right to vote I also was given the right to eat sweets in inhuman quantities. I get cranky, irritable and unpleasant if I go more than 48 hours without sweets. If I’m desperate enough, I’ll ask my sister if she has some chocolate. You have to understand the gravity of this: I’m not a chocolate fan. If you give me some fine chocolate and tell me not to eat it for a year, no problem. Unless I run out of a better sugar source, I will leave your chocolate alone.

My mother is diabetic, and some might think the fact that her health is a constant concern of mine would mean that I’d be able to divorce myself from sweets more easily. Sadly that has not been the case. I noticed a while ago that if, while eating candy or contemplating eating something sweet, I ask myself if I want to risk having to deal with diabetes in the future, my appetite for sweets disappears or is suppressed. So I stopped asking myself this question. Interesting eh?

But there is hope. I have reduced my consumption of candy significantly in recent weeks, a decision that was brought on by fear and a little bit of eccentricity (more on this another day). As you know, over five months after the fact, I still hadn’t done the bloodwork component of my medical physical exam out of fear that I might be ill with something, brought on by a solid 15 years of excessive candy consumption. This is not new: I feel this way every year after my physical exam. I was genuinely worried that the effects of these poor choices would catch up with me in a serious way and I’d have nobody to blame but myself.

For a week or so before I went to get the bloodwork done, I worried. I didn’t snack at work, and I started walking a bit more frequently, even though I knew this action was a case of “too little, too late”: any existing blood defects would not be mitigated by a couple of 45 minute walks, no matter how brisk, but you know how fear works. I had decided to do the bloodwork last Monday, but I ate late so I couldn’t fast for the required amount of time. I was tempted to eat especially healthy the night before the test but I decided to just eat normally.

I went for the bloodwork the following day, on Tuesday. Waiting for my turn was agonizing, but once I gave the blood, I relaxed, feeling like it was out of my hands (hehe, literally?) and there was nothing I could do now. I was told that results should be sent to my doctor by the end of the week. I got a call last Thursday, a mere two days later, saying that a doctor would like to see me. I wasn’t worried at first because my doctor always wants to see me as a follow up. Like I always do, I asked if I could get the results over the phone, even though I know that they don’t do that. The receptionist told me that a doctor will need to see me in person to discuss the results and help me figure out a course of action. I thanked her and hung up the phone.

And promptly freaked out: “help me figure out a course of action”? That’s not good news!

So I called back and asked the receptionist if she was looking at my results when she called me earlier. She said she was. “So that means something’s wrong, right?” I asked. She told me that I’d have to discuss it with the doctor.

So I freaked some more. I was shaking, my fingers went cold and my face went hot. I imagined all sorts of scenarios, tried to rationalize away each one, admitted that I would deserve anything that happened to me due to my poor habits. I could barely focus on my work, and I cancelled my plan to go for a drink with colleagues after work because I knew my mind wouldn’t be there. Since the clinic was open until 8pm, I went there directly.

I had to wait almost 1.5 hours to see a doctor. I tried to read, I doodled, I prayed. Oh, how I prayed! Final result: everything is ok, except for a common condition that I’ve had since I was 11 or 12 years of age. I guess the receptionist wasn’t familiar with my file so she was not aware that it was nothing new. I am sooooo thankful for how things worked out.

I realized that:

• being able to eat as much candy as my heart desires is not a right. Many from a young age have to curb their desire for sweets for health reasons (diabetes, for example). Eating whatever you want without concern for your health is not a right of most people in this world, but more importantly, it’s not a very adult way to live. There are consequences for actions. I have been blessed by being able to incorporate a lot of crap into my diet for these past 15 or so years without it having a lasting effect on my body biochemistry. This is a gift, and one that could change next year, so I need to be grateful for the good times I had with candy and smarten up.
• exercise is meant to be a part of our lives. I cannot spend evenings sitting in front of my computer yet refuse to spare 30-60 minutes for cardio or weight training exercises. I have sneered at friends who genuinely enjoy doing exercise, and others who just fit it into their schedule as an essential part of their life in the past but I get it. Even if I didn’t eat so much candy, my body would still need toning. You can never really sit back and relax, confident that your body is 100% ok: you must always be doing something to keep it stay in good shape. For me this means continuing with my walks, checking out those workout videos, using my mat and weights more consistently, and taking advantage of other opportunities to exercise. Maybe I’ll even join a new gym, with a commitment to regularly.

But perhaps the strongest argument for me to be more mindful about what I consume is how I felt last week and the week before, in the time leading up to the bloodwork, and then in the hours after receiving the call from the doctor’s office. Those feelings of panic and anxiety, and the physical manifestations are not worth the candy. Ending an addiction that has been with me for over half of my life won’t be easy. I will eat candy again. I will eat baked goods again. I will even overeat. But I will be more mindful. I will force myself to remember my panic and fear and think of the risks before deciding to overindulge in sweets.

Filed under: Introspective, flab gab by jummy