World Famine?

I always wondered what would happen to me if the food shelves emptied out? As people here can tell I am not someone snoozing about the world situation, I believe it is dire and believe that the US economy is collapsing.

I can't stand the UN but I'll take their word for it on this one:

UN warns of looming worldwide food crisis in 2013

We are facing at least in my area, food running out on store shelves, going to the store does not mean they will have what they usually carry. Overall abundance still rules, but the times I've gone to pick up what I want to see an empty spot where the product usually is, has added up. The tendrils of the collapsing American economy can be seen now in the town I moved to six and half years ago from the one that basically shut down with its thousands of abandoned houses. Here the rich keep a few downtown businesses open, but the closed storefronts, restaurants, and other places are started to add up. It's deja vu all over again. One's days are filled with pulling up in front of a favorite shop to see it closed. Just about everyone you know is underemployed or unemployed.

My own personal economy has collapsed twice. If the store shelves were empty for weeks,would my diabetes make it so I passed out only acouple days in and slipped into a coma? I have thrown up enough from being ill and been sick enough not to eat for 12-14 hours straight but that time, the world started to spin, and I drank some cranberry juice in desperation, which probably got thrown up too but at least held back low blood sugar thing, and I don't think the results would be that great. Would I maybe with a small food store, the left over green beans and rice in the cupboard, be able to take things so low, the body would adjust? One thing when I get sick or eat very little or diet severely, and don't eat from illness, I get very very cold. I've told doctors this. I FREEZE. I think my body shuts down the metabolism even further. A 95 temperature is not an unknown if I am not burning up from fever. Of course I have shared on here enough times, my dumpster diving and hungry days. Yes I know ironic. We bought food the other day, and the prices were so high, I thought I'd faint, and they are getting higher and higher.

So what happens to really fat people in the event of famines or other world events when food gets wiped out or even completely inaccessible?I believe if everything hit the fan, the lack of medicine probably would be enough, within days. I have to take so much thyroid medicine to stay alive, that alone would affect me adversely and really fast. I wonder in world history did being moderately fat, people who can still walk and function, help one survive this stuff? I mean that is the reason we are given for fat after all, supposedly for human beings to survive famine. DID IT WORK? 

Another Interview with a Friend: Fat From a Male Perspective

When I was doing interviews with Pam, I had acouple of other friends jump on the recorder later. I started talking to my friend Don, about the time of my 400lb weight gain. Now part of this conversation is kind of telling, the part where he says I barely looked female. He was absolutely correct. At the time, they found that I had immense testosterone going through my body. Even at smaller sizes as a teenager girl, I never looked feminine, when I had the weight gain this severely worsened. In fact, going on one drug I am on now, that helps the heart and also feminizes a person, Spironolactone I forget how much of my appearance changed since being far more swarthy and masculine looking. The androgens were coursing through doing their damage. The discussion of steroids, too is of interest as I was on steroids constantly for severe asthma, and later what would become COPD, and even am on one inhaled steroid today. Another interesting part of the discussion is when we cover weight and the affect of sleep deprivation. This interview is circa 2004/2005.

MEMORIES OF THE SICKNESS: FIRST IMPRESSIONS

[FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP starts by asking Don what symptoms he noticed about her illness.]

DON: Well, let me think…I do remember, amongst other things, you had no problem moving around. You were pretty big, but you had no problem moving around. I did notice, A), you tended to get bigger, [it was] much harder to move around. Towards the height of your weight illness, you barely were able to get up and down the stairs – it was a good thing the cars I had were able to fit you in.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Any other symptoms?

DON: Tiredness; and I would say, towards the height, a definite androgyny came over you. It got awfully hard to be able to tell whether you were male or female, just by looking at your face, and such – you almost had to depend on the clothing [to tell]. I also think part of it may be, as you pile on weight above a certain level – I notice that also w/guys.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Am I much more feminine now?

DON: Oh, definitely female, no problem telling there. I also think part of it was, you get above a certain pound of weight – or you get below a certain level, gender differences do come out.

MEMORIES OF FAT-RELATED INCIDENTS

DON: Well, basically, it was like you just said: people were very mean towards you. Especially in [name of huge city I lived for a time], I think, people were just basically mean towards you – that may explain part of your [past] involvement w/NAAFA, because suddenly, there was this safe zone for you. I also think that part of it was, again, you got above a certain level – and I do think that people -- at a certain point -- sort of think, when you get above a certain weight, you’re supposed to hide yourself away. Not necessarily out of shame, but – out of the simple fact that, above a certain level, it takes so much for you to keep your body alive, that you walking around would be a physical impossibility.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Did the weight loss from the 600s, near 700lbs(pounds) to 500 range help?

DON: Yeah. You get above a certain level, I don’t think people expect you to move around. Also, the androgyny [was a problem]: at a certain point, people want to know whether you’re male or female. They tend to base it on obvious physical characteristics, or your dress.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Do you remember some of my emotional outcomes when I was having this weight gain? What would I say about it at the time? What was my manner? You can be honest in this.

DON: I’m trying to remember, that’s the problem. Not only that, but I don’t think I saw you that often. If you see somebody on a constant basis, you may notice something, but it’s much more noticeable than if you have a two- or three-month period [between visits]. I do know you were talking about why you were putting on so much weight. I think you were putting on…30 pounds [a month].

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: That’s almost like a pound a day.

DON: And I do remember, you were always talking about your asthma: I remember, it started w/your asthma, now that I think about it. You were complaining about having to do asthma [treatment?] for an extended period of time, much longer than people suggested – and that, I would say, crosses all borders.

I remember I’d been having some trouble w/my eyes, before I figured it had something to do w/allergies. I remember getting these droplets, and basically sticking it in the eyes, and they’re some sort of steroid. Basically, they cleared the stuff out. A little bit later, I’d go through this stuff, and the lady [WHO?] said, “Don’t use it, throw it away! Keep using that stuff, you may get cataracts.”

And generally, they say, steroids are best for short-term [use]. At the time, I wonder how much of an effect on the weight gain that that stuff [prednisone] had.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I think it actually triggered a lot.

DON: Yeah, ‘cause you’re talking [about] long-term use of a steroid.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Also, I know towards my late twenties, as my asthma got worse, I couldn’t move around as much.

OTHER REACTIONS TO THE WEIGHT GAIN

DON: There’d be friends and family, I’d put them on the line: “This is FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP, she’s awfully fat, she’s suffering from a few things,” and they always took my word at it. When I was much younger, there was this woman named **********: very infamous. You mention that name, it’s like [sounds “Dragnet”-style music]. You knew this was a girl to be feared – I think somehow, I spotted her, and she was very overweight…to the point, again, of androgyny. [Was in elementary school.]

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Was she tortured in elementary school?

DON: By the fact that her name had with it, a lot of infamy based on it, I’d assume that she was tortured, and picked on. For some strange reason, I remember just looking in a classroom, seeing this overweight girl: “Oh, that’s **********.”

HOW SOCIETY TREATS FAT PEOPLE

DON: I think part of the problem w/society right now is, we’re in a very odd, very unusual situation. Historically, fatness has always been the exception, not the rule, but there’s been a major change, starting in the ‘50s – when you had this image of the “ultimate,” Marilyn Monroe, statuesque, extremely built – almost manic, you’d say. And it happened, during that period of time, actually matched up to where women were able to develop in that sort of situation. Also, remember, we had gone through the Depression, and World War II – two periods of starvation – and suddenly, we got plenty, like you wouldn’t believe. And since then, the ideal has directed itself towards thinness.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: The focus on thinness actually makes people fatter, because it brings an over-concern w/food.

DON: I think our diets have changed: It used to be, women would stay home, and cook food. We used to have smaller portions, and we used to eat in the home; nowadays, we drive in our cars, we stop off, and everyone’s working. What’s really interesting – look among the rich. Women who can develop careers and run companies are actually staying home, raising their children. They’re choosing it. If you were able to choose it, they choose it. Because, basically, you’re eating at home: there’s something about women that they actually enjoy keeping house more.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Actually, I had so many problems the work world. I felt forced to be a hyper-feminist by my family with none of the benefits – I was rejected on one level, because of “you being an art teacher”; that’s kind of a female profession.

DON: Well, teaching has been considered a female profession – basically, anything to do w/nurturing generally is considered female. And I think there’s some aspect about that, I can understand you feeling like you were forced to be a feminist – basically, you want to protect yourself. You have to get out in the work world, and it’d be a good thing if you could rise up in that world, take on more responsibilities…

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Well, a lot of my friends felt like we were set up – we were told, “You can do all this, and have all this,” and it turned out to be a bust for most of us.

DON: Well, what they didn’t really tell women is – basically, you could choose this, or you could choose that: the idea [of], “you can have it all, bigger and more is better, blah-blah-blah.” Life is a definition of choices: every choice reduces the amount of freedom, ‘cause it forces you up on one line. The only way you could maximize possible freedom is to just keep yourself undecided as long as possible, and even [in] that [scenario] – time starts closing down stuff, eventually.

MEMORIES OF OTHER FAT PEOPLE

DON: Let me think: I had a friend named *******]: he was sort of fattish. He developed this fantasy world where he made himself out to be much bigger than he actually was – and he was much better at it. Your husband is not the thinnest person in the world. He made himself out to be much different than most people.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Would say being fat has some people form more distinct identities?

DON: Having weight, ‘cause some cases, if you develop fatness, it can cause a withdrawal.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: What differences do you see in me, from other fat people?

DON: Well, basically, you seem to be out there more than most fat people. I don’t think you grew up w/the stereotypically fat profile, which is “Keep on being beaten down and up, you just withdraw.”

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Yeah, I had some years of normalcy.

DON: The thing was, I don’t think you were specifically fat, until you moved to [big city I used to live in].

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Until I had the huge weight gain – yeah, I know. I was considered “large” or “Amazonian,” by most, but not “huge fat pig,” or anything like that. I wasn’t really noticed.

DON: I think part of it is, “fat” itself is sort of a loaded term. The idea is, you’re talking about all this weight pressing down – part of the definition of fat is, so much weight pressing down on an inner mass.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Yeah, that’s true.

DON: And it is kind of interesting – I look a little bit fat, but most people don’t notice it, because I’m still able to move around quite a bit.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Yeah, you have gained some weight. I’m not trying to be mean, or nothing, but you have in the last year…

DON: Well, right now, I’m up to 265, 270 pounds. I had been steady around 260 since, I would say – since the second year of living w/my girlfriend, that’d be ’99, 2000, and I’d been around 240, 250 before that.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: That makes sense, yeah – see, you can carry it, because of your height, too. But if you were to gain 50 more (pounds), you would enter “Fat World.” You know what I mean? It is kind of almost a different existence. I would say “Fat World” came for me when I hit 320, and then, of course, it went up, and up, and up.

DON: It depends on how you carry it – one thing about guys versus gals is that guys tend to carry their stuff around here [the waist], whereas, w/gals, it’s lower down.I think, in some ways, it is an adaptation – but, like I said, it’s kind of weird how you can get around growing fat, too. I remember, before I had my pneumonia, I think I was around 240, and I lost some weight because of the pneumonia…recovering from that…recovering from the weight loss, I think I sort of overshot to about 250 [pounds]. So, maybe in some cases, the dieting is there, but you’ve also got all the food you eat – to be honest, for your average person, if you want to lose weight, you’re going to have to do some heavy duty adjustments to your diet, and such.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: That’s true.

DON: The thing is, most people – you lose weight, and it’s like, “Good, I can relax”…

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: And they go back to the way they did before. In my case, if I ate fried chicken every week, I’d be dead.

DON: Well, basically, w/most people, your comfortable weight adjusts upward…in fact, one of the things I noticed during the first couple months I was living w/my girlfriend, I sort of leveled off around 260.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Can you understand why people get themselves off the diet rollercoaster, though, and just kind of give up on that whole world, to some extent? Well, I have some health problems – that’s why I’ve refused to get weight loss surgery. It is difficult, ‘cause they always expect you to be on the constant diet.

DON: You do have to have constant vigilance, even if it’s just the idea of portion control – as Americans, we’ve grown used to eating so much, and we’ve also grown used to, when we feel the least bit hungry, we snack.

THE LOST GREAT AMERICAN NAP

 FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I think the whole American lifestyle is messed up. I know, for me, when I was gaining the weight, I had no time to relax – especially during that job – no time was mine. Never could cook. I didn’t even have the right facilities to cook!

DON: I’ll bet you part of your problem was the weird time, because I do know that people who have trouble getting enough sleep, they tend to fatten up, because you’re taking about cortisol – basically, from what I can guess…I’m not gonna say I know everything about it….but my understanding is, it basically makes your body burn energy efficiently.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: There’s a hormone that’s released during sleep, and I even have that in my theories about weight gain; there’s a hormone that’s released when you sleep. I know people who’ve had serious sleep apnea, have gained 200 or 300 pounds. I know – for me – I have the sleep apnea finally treated and it seemed to be another factor in not gaining weight anymore.

DON: And, basically, ever since the wide distribution of lightbulbs, Americans have had one hour less sleep per night, on average, than they used to get.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I think it’s even worse than that, now – people brag about having no sleep. Now, I can sleep as much as I want; that’s one blessing of disability [laughs], ‘cause [what] I remember, for years, is being absolutely sleep deprived.

DON: Well, I would say, not being sleep-deprived – but I’m aware that my body, if given the chance, would happily drift over to ten hours of sleep a day. I know eight is generally the average; some people can get less. But, generally, the average most people get is six [hours] – you know there’s massive amounts of sleep deprivation going on in this society today.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: OK, well, thanks for the conversation, Don.

DON: You’re welcome.

Natalie and Me

When I was a young fat girl, The Facts of Life was one of my favorite TV shows. I even recently watched a few of them, and it brought back some old days. I wished I got to live at their school even doing chores under the watchful caring eye of Mrs. Garrett.  Even to this day, while re-watching this show, I remember my thoughts at the time. Natalie, while overweight was accepted, loved and cared about by the others. Sure her Mom sent her off to boarding school and her father had died in the show's plot, but she was valued as a person and a human being. .

Some may ask what does this have to do with Natalie? Well I would watch the Facts of Life and saw this young vivacious fat girl with friends and people who loved and cared about her and thought, "Well this is a possible. That is how things are supposed to be". Yes I knew it was fiction but it at least gave me a ideal.

I also knew even as a young fat girl, that I should be valued as a human being despite what weight I was, which I already knew by an early age, my body was not working like other people's. I exercised constantly, rode my bicycle for miles, and still was fat. I also was facing other challenges and very negative messages around me. There was no one telling me I was a okay person. I would find supportive people later but did not have them at that time. So in a strange way, Facts of Life served as encouragement to me as a teenager. Maybe that's a bit cheesy but it's the truth. I liked all the other characters, Blair was my least favorite while I liked Tootie and "Jo" as well.

In a way it lifted some of the self blame for those around me who considered my weight as making me worthy of rejection. Natalie had best friends who cared about her. Now Natalie did lose weight as the show progressed, she was "smaller" then me but fat enough to have been considered the "fat girl" in the earliest seasons. Now TV shows even lighter ones of the 1980s were notorious for "short-hand" and even this one could approach the 'afterschool' specials kind of flavor but this show was encouraging to me. Today all the TV shows everyone is THIN, at least in the 1980's things were still more real.

Unknown Facts about Mindy Cohn

An Interview with a Friend About Life, Fat, and Supersized People.

INTERVIEW WITH PAM

Pam was a friend of mine now deceased. I miss her very much. She did endure a lot of what I have and at one point was near 700lbs as well. She knew what it was to face severe weight issues into her 60s. She was a very funny, kind and loving woman. We shared many struggles and she was a life line to me for very years. It was a blessing to know her.  I remembered I was interviewing her in future hope of writing about weight, which I obviously did on this blog. :) I still own the tape and transcript typed out back then, and decided I'd share it here. At the time she gave me permission to use this for any writing. I am happy to share her words here. The conversation brings back fond memories for me not for what we went through but that that we were there to support one another. Of course since 2004, some of my views have changed which is the year this interview was done.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: How old are you?

PAM: How old, or how moldy?

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: [laughing] No, how old?

PAM: Old enough to know better, but too young to resist.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP [laughs]: That’s funny. What’s the highest weight you’ve ever been?

PAM: Boy, this is a personal interview – is this gonna be on “20/20”?


FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: No.

PAM: My highest weight was 600-plus in 1980, but they weren’t sure…one doctor said, as far as an actual weight, closer to 700 [pounds], and congestive heart failure, and they’d mainline Lacix – which drew a lot of water off of me in one week’s period of time.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: OK – yeah, you said you got lots of water taken off of you.

PAM: Uh-huh. I didn’t know I had congeestive heart failure. I was 33, at that time.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: OK. OK. And what’s the lowest weight you’ve ever been?

PAM: You mean, birth weight, or adult weight?

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP:  I was two pounds in the womb! I was born weighing 200 pounds [laughs] – that’s what I’d tell people!

PAM: As an adult – I think when I was 19, 18 ½, I was going to a doctor that was giving everybody all these – you know, it was like a diet clinic, and I got down to 123 pounds.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Wow, you’ve been smaller than I ever have…

PAM: Very, very…I was skinny, but I got pregnant, and I gained 60 pounds with the pregnancy…that was with my son, and, after that, I just kept going up. I was at Weight Watchers, and Overeaters Anonymous, to try to – you know, stay around 250 [pounds], because I was selling ads, and you have to make a fairly decent appearance, plus, you’re on the go all the time.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Yeah, that makes sense…what have been some of the challenges to you, in terms of being overweight?

PAM: Well, employment, housing – now, because I’m in a wheelchair. I don’t have to be in it all the time, but – getting older, disabilities are harder to deal with, as you age.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: That’s true.

PAM: That’s a big challenge, aging; I’m facing that now – I’ve outlived a lot of people that are in a similar situation, that I knew. I’ve watched people just dwindle down, you know, under a system that’s not too kind. There’s not a lot of help for women in my age group, in the 50s – you know, if you’re disabled, if you don’t have a spouse with a good job, or a family that can help…and a lot of people don’t…or they have ‘em, but they’re not willing to get involved…so that can be quite a challenge to be in this age group, before retirement age.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Kind of like, you fall through the cracks, right?

PAM: Right, and fall through the cracks of what’s happening now…I just read an article about a county out here in rural [state] – the waiting list for people that are of retirement age, that are on Social Security, and not because of disability, but need services because they’re aging…they have medical needs…the waiting lists are getting longer and longer, because of the aging population. So, by the time I get into the next age group, if I live that long, I’ll be just one of those people on the waiting list [laughs] – so, I don’t know what it [the solution] is.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Let me ask this question – what would you say are the special challenges of the supersized, the 200- to 300-pound person? {I consider supersized to be 350lbs and above today}

PAM: That’s supersized?

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Yeah, the supersized, the people who are on the upper end of the scale, like me?

PAM: You mean, 200 to 300 pounds?

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Yeah, people who aren’t 200 to 300 [pounds]?

PAM: People that have lived at 600, 700, 800 pounds? I don’t weigh that now, but that could happen again in five minutes – you know, once you’ve been that big, you could go back there, because of medical conditions, food-related things, whatever…I’m not real clear on that question. Do that one more time.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: OK. What would you say are the special challenges that the supersized fat people have to deal with…

PAM: That the moderately overweight don’t have to deal with?

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Yeah, that the moderately overweight don’t have to deal with. PAM: Well, I mean, like we’ve talked about – personal things, personal hygiene. It’s amazingly hard for moderate overweight people to realize that people, once they get up over 400, 500, 600 pounds, that there are landlords – if they see the person, they’re gonna assume that they’re not gonna pay their rent, that they probably don’t keep their apartments clean, because they’re too big to run a vacuum, or whatever…

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: That’s true; they won’t rent to you. {I was refused an apartment once due to weight}

PAM: There’s rental discrimination…there’s people that are supersized, and they keep their apartments immaculate. You know, I’m not supersized – well, I’m borderline supersized – I consider anybody over 200 pounds to be supersized. But, super-super-sized people…it was a struggle to do some of the things thin people take for granted, when they clean, or bathe, or have a bowel movement. You know, we talked about the toilet paper sponges, for the reach, and the bidets, for the overweight – even umbrellas. An umbrella for an average person won’t keep a supersized person dry.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP [laughs]: Yeah, you’re right, I was thinking about that – you’re right, it won’t.

PAM: Yeah, when it rains, and you use a regular umbrella, all it does is bring the rain down on your shoulders, and it drips down on your body.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: That’s true. That’s actually something that frustrated me. I didn’t know anybody else that noticed that.

PAM: There’s all kinds of different things…thank God that people challenged it, and there’s more big people now – there’s money to be made off of us, so the fashion industry opened up, but it still has a long way to go -- there’s things that I need, that I can’t from Roman’s, and Lane Bryant’s. They don’t seem to carry pantyhose, and brassieres, and girdles that’ll fit real big women -- or women, even my size, with the loose skin. I still need a gigantic girdle, if it’s gonna be on me, and support me, but you can’t buy them.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I know, they just don’t have them – I had to give up wearing bras long ago. Do you think discrimination against overweight people is getting worse?

PAM: I think, because there’s so many overweight kids and adults – you would think it would be getting better, but I think it’s an unpopular group to be associated with. People, even if they are heavy, or supersized – they may find friends in that weight range, they can relate – but I think the discrimination is still there. You know, if we walked in on an interview, and had degrees, and a thin woman that had the experience, and [only] some degrees, based on appearance, they’d pick the thin one. I mean, it’s been proven.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Yeah, they have done studies on that – they have done studies on that, and they’ve definitely have always picked the thin one.

PAM: Well, they did a study, too, with little children – five-year-olds – and they used dolls. One doll was disfigured facially, like a burn patient; the other one was without limbs. I forget the others. You know, there’s different disabilities that can come upon a human being…and then one was just huge, just a big fat doll baby. Of all these disfigured dolls, even though the obese wasn’t burned, or limbless – the one that none of ‘em wanted to be was the obese doll.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Oh, wow…

PAM: They would rather be without arms and legs, facially disfigured, whatever, than to be obese.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Hm – that’s probably because of some of the messages they hear about how bad fat people are, over and over…

PAM: Oh, sure. And then, all this stuff about the restaurants downsizing food portions – I don’t see any of that stuff happening. I don’t know what the answer is.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Actually, it’s not happening – did you know Hardee’s actually released a 1,400-calorie burger?

PAM: Oh, mercy!

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: That’s pretty bad, isn’t it?

PAM: Especially when they’re hyping all this, “Oh, we’re gonna try to help,” you know, especially with the next generation – which I do see some improvement. But there again, there’s gonna have to be more support groups – and God forbid, maybe even the only way that people would ever cut back, if all this stuff is gonna continue to be available, and so many people are insulin resistant from eating this way for so many generations – that it might take, whether it’d be a famine or something, for a couple generations to get back to where they’d have to plant, and harvest. Like the Bible says: “You work by the sweat of your brow.” I mean, people don’t have to do anything!

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I know, that’s kind of why we’re all getting messed up…’cause, then, you burned it all off.

PAM: Everybody’s at the TV, or computer…yeah, you see some people jogging, and walking, but – you know, once you get to a certain point – whether it’s just the natural aging process, or you’re obese along with it…I mean, you’re limited how much of that you can do safely.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I actually have the belief that if you don’t exercise enough as a kid, and your life’s sedentary, you never can get to the good part. Does that make sense?

PAM: Yeah. Well, and I think, too, some people are heavy because of illness, even, from birth on – they don’t ever feel well enough to exercise. And there’s the other side, too – the other side of the coin with people – where getting that habit ingrained in your mind [is difficult]. Once you feel better, I think if you can keep with it, maybe get some support, get involved in a sport, or something – if that’s even possible – it’s just not even possible for a segment of this society. They’re not mobile enough to do it. But there’s decent exercises – there’s depression in there, too, people are battling that. A lot of times, obese people are isolated, alone in apartments, where even the most optimistic person – over the long haul, day in and day out – would be wore down.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Well, here’s the thing, too – I almost think, when there were more people around, they were a more closer-knit society. That actually gives you a chance for more movement. Does that make sense? ‘Cause you’re moving around…

PAM: Before the automobile? You know, I mean, it’s not been that long ago, maybe there weren’t even bicycles…I don’t know what the history is on bikes, or things with wheels, but you know – basically speaking, it was the only wealthy that had things like this. Your feet got you there, and maybe somebody might have an old wheel, but I don’t think they really rode ‘em – they used ‘em for farming, or transporting goods.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I think they walked.

PAM: They walked! And women lived and died within a mile of their house – I’ve read that over and over. People were born in a village, and if they maybe went to town once a year, there’d be a homecoming, or something – that was as far as most women went. A lot of ‘em didn’t know how to read, a lot of people didn’t know how to read. Maybe the priest, or the pastor, or a lawyer in town would do all the documents – poor people, especially, just the average man on the street was not that educated.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: That’s true. You’re right. OK, let me ask you a new question…there’s some good stuff. Let me – I was gonna ask you about size acceptance. What do you think of the size acceptance movement?

PAM: Over the last 30 or 40 years, whenever it started – I think it’s probably getting close to 40 now, but…

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Wait a minute, just a second, whoops…my microphone fell off, just a minute.

[FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEPstops to get another piece of tape to hold her microphone in place.] [break and off subject conversation]

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I always wonder, though, if both of us worked – all these errands, and crap, and cooking, and stuff –

PAM: Well, what happens if people don’t work on their marriage, and take time for themselves? That’s what it becomes.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I know – I don’t know how these people have any time.

PAM: They don’t.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP [laughs]:’Cause, I’ll tell you what, Pam – during the day, paying the bills, making the food, making sure there’s groceries, laundry, all the medical stuff, that takes up enough time, where I’m like: “What if I had a job? We’d never see each other.”

PAM: Yeah, you know, you have to be real mobile to do that, and some people do get way behind. Their kids suffer. A lot of women that are out there working are not making any money, if they’re paying babysitters…

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I know – I actually think they should be allowed at home. You know what I've said about the two for one deal the corporations got, when one income used to support a family.

PAM: There are ways to have what you need, and still stay home, and be a mom to your kids – and it’s too much, ‘cause it’s the woman that ends up paying ‘em [babysitters, daycare, etc.].

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I know. I think feminism screwed us [laughs], I do!

PAM: OK – you take a situation, if a woman can handle all that – of course, if you wanna get yourself into that, a person should be allowed. I don’t think there should be any restrictions set on it. But I just think a lot of women didn’t realize what they were getting into, and once they got into it…

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: They can’t get out.

PAM: Yeah, it’s like an addiction – it can be more fun to go to work, than taking care of two- and three-year-olds – preschoolers, you know? It’s hard work. [(337 feet): Discussion turns to difference between modern life, and level of activity in older, agrarian-based society.]

PAM: Today, if you use a towel, then it goes in the laundry, instead of hanging it up, and using it for a week – because it was clean when you use it. Unless it’s like a hand towel…

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I know – I do too much laundry, ‘cause I always have to wear different clothes – I smell really easily, so I can’t even repeat a wearing of anything.

PAM: They say it’s the foods we eat, and if you take medicine, and have illness, you’ll have a body odor difference, sometimes.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Actually, I believe PCOS makes you stink, especially if it’s uncontrolled. It makes you smell lot. It really does.

PAM: Huh! I don’t perspire, or anything – sometimes, because you’re round yourself… [Of subject conversation PAM says. “Some of these people are so competitive, even if it’s to advance the cause…”

PAM is more enthusiastic about nominating MICHAEL MOORE: “He’s a tub! He’s one of our brothers in fat. I tell you what – that man could help us.” PAM and FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP then briefly talk about merits/demerits of weight loss surgery, before going back to list of interviewees.] PAM [after suggesting Ricki Lake, who’s gotten heavy again:] There are people, believe it or not – I know a couple of ‘em – they’ve finally got a handle on it, finally got some kind of exercise in their life…


FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I think if people have an eating disorder, and just eat too much, and they don’t have the metabolic issues – if they get treatment and are able to quit eating too much, and they exercise, they can get at least some of the weight off. But if it's metabolic it's far far harder.

PAM: Yeah, I think so, but if there’s a lot of medical history – and also, if you get to a certain point where you lose mobility, it’s hard to ever get it back, or keep it.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I know. Look at me, with all the breathing problems, and stuff – how am I gonna go burn it all off?

PAM: Yeah, if you don’t move around – I mean, can you imagine how many calories you burn, just walking to get out of your apartment?

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: Probably a lot.

PAM: Yeah, you do. My doctor told me, just to be alive – when you’re over a certain amount of weight, the tremendous amount of calories [needed] just to keep this machinery going – the breathing, the digesting of the food, all of it, any movement at all…like, say, when a thin person gets up off of a chair, it’s nothing.

FIVEHUNDREDPOUNDPEEP: I know – I do move around a lot for someone [my size]. I’ve been told that by people at offices. I’m kind of a fidgety person – like, even now, I got my leg hanging over the end of the bed, going back and forth.

PAM: Yeah, well, you probably have a lot of energy trapped inside of you, you know, where…

Fat Love

I've been with my husband a long time, we are hitting the 20 year mark together next year. I was single long enough to remember when Valentine's Day could be a Charlie Brown affair, with the empty mailbox. Over the years time does change things, we never had children but you think back on all this time together and it is interesting to think about how long we have been together. We haven't had an easy life, and things even got tough when I wanted to move back to my old town and suffered from the grief of that. We have stuck together through a lot of things from my severe health problems to the economic leveling of our life.  Enough time passes and you are with someone who knows you like few others. There is a closeness and different kind of love built in history together.


Being fat did affect my love life, though I've asked on this very blog, was I the world's fattest bride? It seems I was, given that someone in my weight category was given the title. I am not one to seek out publicity or a look-at me kind of approach, so I don't mind I missed the Fattest Bride boat. 

When I and my husband married, I was expected to live only a couple more years, since I was near 700lbs. It did change the formula. Ever see one of those soap operas where the man marries the lady on her deathbed, or vice versa. It was sort of like that but in a more extended form. We did not expect a long future together. At the time I married, I was disabled and had very few medical answers. 

As I have asked over the years, "was it fair to marry someone being so disabled?" The question has been given to him too direct and he says he would have married me anyhow and that he loved me.  

One thing, both sides of the family were against us marrying, some of my relatives for his being poor but more so on his side, his family was upset that he was marrying someone so fat and his family did not show up the wedding. His father told him point blank I was too disabled and even a few years later, said "You can move home, if you want out!" Even some of his friends said, "What are you doing? You are insane to be marrying her!" Ah life can get complicated for us super-fat people. Even on my end, my father said, "Don't marry him, he is too poor!" Relatives refused to come to the wedding since I had left my families church, and he grew up in another church. At the time, we were like the star-crossed lovers determined to be together no matter what. 


 I hated the meat-market dating world and was conservative. I found myself wishing for the Victorian era and that I had lived in the time where women even fat ones were respected and not prone to sleaze balls out for a quick romp in bed. I knew I believed the sexual revolution to be a joke, a Baby-Boomer scourge on the world as it tore down the walls between men and women and destroyed the sexual mores in between. I definitely was not perfect as I ended up living with my husband for a couple years before we were married, this before I became a Christian but remember feeling out of the whole dating loop. I didn't meet him before I was 25 years old and I had gone without any serious boyfriends for quite a long time. 

  

To be sure dating and being fat is a loaded situation and I agree with this. I remember when I was young and single and I decided to go to a singles bar. At this time I weighed around 260lbs. I remember watching the other people at ease, they all seemed so carefree and without difficulty in picking up a dance partner. No one asked me to dance all night and when I asked one man who I thought was nice-looking he scoffed at me as I walked away to hide my feelings of rejection. The only person that asked me to dance was a one-armed man that took pity on me. I could tell he was doing it because he understood my rejection. We danced stared at by all the other chattering fools. I never went back.

While I was glad to be finally dancing, his pity made me uncomfortable. He was drunk and slurred to me. “Hey we are more alike than different, I cant get anyone to dance with me because of my arm!”

I had believed if I had exuded enough confidence, and was proud in my appearance that I would not have a problem getting up on the dance floor. 

In my leaving I had felt defeated and no one but the super-fat person knows the rejection that is waiting for them in the singles world. As I left the bar that night a man yelled, “Hey more cushion for the pushing~!” Sigh.

There was someone years before I wanted to date and was friends with, and well, in this case, he informed me I was too overweight for him and choose my best friend that I was rooming with instead. More rejection. Sigh.

By my experience fat women have taken either three choices in the dating world. Some withdraw never to marry and either live alone or with parents. Some make judicious use of single ads, internet dating and matches and perhaps even now the fat acceptance social world to find their lovers and others overcompensate to prove to the world that though they are fat, they still are sexy and desirable.

Superfat and even midsized fat people are uncomfortable in a world that shows only skinny people deserving of love. Even the average and the plump suffer from the discrimination of the media where never a fat woman is the object of desire. This has only started to change but the stereotypes of fat women as perpetual virgins unworthy of marriage and or sex pots willing to hand themselves over to any man willing to have them prevail.

Often many fat women end up in these predicaments with the societal messages constantly being pounded into their heads that thinness equals love. It’s the reason why “Cathy” in that old comic strip world starves herself for “Irving” and worries constantly about her eating habits. Fat woman either give up, continuously diet or take what crumbs happen to fall off the table.

  

Fat woman are told over and over they are unacceptable in this culture. From Broom Hilda to the Bundy’s extremely fat mother-in-law, fat women are never portrayed as an object of love.  I experienced my own period of no dating through high school and even later when I was 19 and weighed 240lbs-280lbs depending where I was diet-wise. I was told by my parents that to ever get married I would have to lose weight or end up in fat depressed spinster-hood forever, I was told by the media, no man would be attracted to me. My sister and mother banned me from even being a bridesmaid in my sister's wedding at the age of 19 because my then 250lb body was deemed "too fat". I lived in a strange world. Women were supposed to be pretty, thin, petite and gentle, I was none of these. I had exotic looks, black hair, porcelain  white skin but I ignored these assets as time marched on.

I was a fat teenager separate from the dating world where I was more an object of indifference or teasing rather than of lust. I was far from the fattest kid in the school, several other girls outweighed me, but at a size 22, any girl over size 16 was automatically kept out of the dating game. The positive side was that I did not have to face the dangers of teen pregnancy nor venereal diseases but the damage done to my self-esteem in my dateless world would last at least ten years. 

I had learned my lesson well suffice to say and all around me woman had boyfriends, husbands and lovers. I didn’t know any other nineteen-twenty-four year olds who had never been kissed or asked out on a date. I felt weird that something was plainly wrong with me. I was not only fat but a strange "nerd" that was interested in things many others were not.

Love seemed to be another door that had been slammed shut in my face. After all my sister had found someone to love her, all my friends had boyfriends, relatives my age and younger seemed to be all getting married. I was left out in the cold alone, never having even been kissed. Add to that a picture of a non-emotionally supportive family and it was a nightmare.

Small wonder then why many super-fat women bow out of the dating game all together.

Fatness can complicate a love relationship for people in that even the one who loves the fat person is perceived to be unhealthy in themselves why else would they love a fat woman. Thin men who marry fat women are seen as seeking either a relationship of control or one of mothering. Fat ones are couched as fellow "food-addicts". It is impossible for others to see that even fat people love the same way.

After all I was a  29 year old, nearly 700lb bride. I weighed this much on my wedding day as I got a custom-made wedding dress with a veil that reached to the floor and a bouquet that I had hand made out of silk flowers being allergic to the real ones. In a way it was ironic as I stood next to my three good friends to be photographed. All thin, educated, lovely women.  I was the first to marry but some of my closest friends never would marry which I understood.

 Single ad dating to me was  a hobby during that year of 1994 when I got laid off from my teaching job. While I did not expect marriage necessarily, I knew I finally at the age of 24, I wanted a boyfriend. After all I was curious and ready to get on with it. 

The week I met my present husband, I went on two single ad dates. One was with a man that was very slow. To be kind, he seemed to be of a 12 year old age mentally not necessarily chronologically. He worked as a security guard and acted as if he had reached his peak. The other a short Paul McCartney look-alike was an out of work architect that kept talking about his mother and father and how they were so close. I almost did not show up on the date that would guide my life totally in a different direction.

I met my future husband at the Olive Garden. I weighed somewhere in the middle 200s and noticing that my weight was getting harder to control. I was there first always having been rather punctual. He walked in and I was immediately attracted. Things would proceed from there. We would be kissing by the second date.  He was tall, and around the upper 200s in weight. He had golden hair, lighter than I ever had seen before, blue piercing eyes. His legs were thick and powerful looking. He had a kind face. He wore an interesting outfit that fit my then more alternative tastes. While I sat their in a mildly Goth outfit, black fitted tunic and black pants with flats, he was dressed in black chained boots, in jeans and sweater [hey this was the early 1990s afterall] 

We started to eat and then started to talk. He was intellectual, smart, artistic, wrote poetry and music and worked as a newspaper reporter. We were able to talk about everything and anything.  On the phone I knew that we had held many things in common, but are attraction seemed to be beyond mutual interests.We started kissing by our second date. This May will be our 15th wedding anniversary. 

I am glad I have not had to go through all these things alone. He has stuck my side even through all this illness which has shown true love and loyalty. Even last night, he told me as I was getting frustrated about being housebound not to blame myself for being sick and gave me other encouragement. I do not take that for granted not at all. 

  

Beauty on the Inside?

Everyone here knows I don't go along with the think positive school of thought, where if you dream or think something it comes true, but there is truth here, where the "insides" of someone does come through, and that means a lot more then being "fat", "ugly", "having buck teeth", or "bad skin".We need to go back to the days where Beauty on the inside counted for more.  The Bible even says that beauty is vain.  Even the whole diet industrial complex runs on the bars being slammed down around us of that prison. 

A Picture in Anticipation of Spring

Just a picture to help you get through the rest of the snow and ice in February, I took this picture some months ago. :)