Is size acceptance too generous?
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| Image by Edith Dohmen |
The amount and intensity of denigration the bloggers (nearly all women) recounted was heartbreaking: snide jokes, insensitive "advice", exclusion: an Artesian well of pain, endlessly flowing, often pumped and bottled by family.
The poster at left, by Dutch fashion stylist Edith Dohmen, is from her series, "Musthaves in fashion", retrieved from her blog, Style Has No Size.
I eat up the size-positive material out there, pun intended. When I see a voluptuous woman in a body-hugging red dress, I beam at her. Sorry if I seem judgmental; it's just such a relief to not see women castigated for their size.
But then, I asked myself, is there a limit to saying any body size is OK?
Being overweight (at least up to the point of Stage One obesity) will not affect mortality, according to a widely-reported study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). (Readers of the NYT's article on the study note some flaws in the methodology.)
However, when a moderately-to-severely obese woman hits late adulthood, she faces a reckoning. She is at increased risk for many illnesses and conditions, faces decreased mobility, and might endure minor but uncomfortable annoyances like chafing. Whether the reasons attach to lifestyle, genetics, or medical issues, a woman can hit her 50s or 60s carrying considerable extra weight.
One day, such a woman might say, that's it, I've had enough.
I'd like you to meet her.
My friend, Connie, has lost over 150 lbs.—over half her heaviest weight—in about two years.
When we met, she had dropped 100-plus lbs. by eating consciously, but her history of knee problems made her skeptical about exercise. We discussed how she might edge into brief walks; she was also inspired by her daughter, a marathon runner.
She's now walking for nearly two hours most days, dividing time between early morning at her company's gym and using the stairs, and after work in her neighbourhood. (Yes, she works full time, and then some!)
We have pondered the process of casting off shame, despair and self-loathing; she is funny, insightful, committed. We have celebrated the ability to wear out your dog or just stay outdoors on a beautiful day. Her knees are fine.
An avid cook, Connie swapped out some recipes for healthier versions and rarely even tastes the rich desserts she used to enjoy. Like me, she logs her calories and plans for treats like a Girls' Night Out, but she does not follow a specific diet, just "lavish on the vegetables and lowish on the carbs".
She says her journey was not about vanity, but rather about health; she felt that if she stayed so heavy she would truly jeopardize her time left. (But she looks pretty cute in her new jeans, about seven sizes smaller!) Her favourite new accessory is her Fitbit.
When I asked to tell her story, she at first demurred, saying lots of people have done it. And in fact, I have other friends who have achieved triple-digit losses. But I also know some men and women who have not yet summoned their intention, and are even gaining as the years roll on and they think they're too old to change so deeply.
Connie attained her goal without a personal trainer, meetings, diet books or supplements, not that there is anything wrong with those supports. She just made her choice and got on with it.
I am deeply grateful that she did.
Ta-da! Here she is— and this photo is a gift, because she's humble and low-key. ("But Connie", I begged, "how else will people know you're a real person?") She's chic in an orange quilted jacket and black jeans,but what's more important is that Connie can walk about in that jacket for hours, without feeling exhausted.
That a plushly-curved woman in a mini feels good about herself, I like. I applaud campaigns that show women of all sizes and shapes, and fashion writers who speak against the cult of super-skinny. I wish people wouldn't beat up themselves or others about weight.
But at the farthest reaches of the scale, where the body has a struggle sustaining vitality, I hope a post-50 woman takes herself in hand, and loves herself enough to step on the road of change.
Comments
C.
At last someone had the courage to address this topic publicly and I applaud you for it. There is such a thing as body acceptance and then there's obesity and health hazard.
I really loved reading Connie's personal journey towards weight loss and healthier lifestyle. As someone who comes from a family where obesity has led to a permanent health deterioration I only wish more people would talk about this publicly and share stories like Connie's.
You must be a determined and strong woman to tackle this alone. You look very fit and you must be proud of yourself too. Losing that amount of weight deserves applause. Standing ovation maybe, if you were at the WW meeting we would all be cheering your success.
Like you I had pain with the extra weight I carried and am feeling a sense of freedom now that I can walk for an hour a day. Losing weight was not on my radar until my doctor told me I had high blood pressure and losing was the best thing to do for my health.
I "bought into" the bigger bolder body image as self preservation when I really should have got on with the job of losing a decade ago.
une femme: Sassy! She'll enjoy reading that.
C.: It's a delicate balance. Casting off shame is freeing, and why shame someone for the way she looks? So the question is, how do we get rid of the shame and degradation but still acknowledge the risks that arise in later life?
Mme. : One of her great qualities is that she tries new things, so she started quite slowly and before I knew it she had built from a half-hour to an hour, and never looked back.
MJ: You have to do something you enjoy (or at least can stand, at first). I noticed a ParticipAction campaign has recently launched to get teenaged girls to move more.
coffeeaddict: Thanks, the topic has been on my mind for the last year, during my own loss.
materfamilias: As Connie and I have said to one another, sooner or later (if you live that long) mobility is challenged by things you cannot control, so let's make sure we move while we can.
hostess: Did not realize you had same motivator as I did, high blood pressure. Scary, because you can "feel fine" but there it is. Hope your bp is normal now, it is no small achievement.
Anon@ 12:36: I hope health professionals make it crystal clear to elders what risks they are facing' my doctor did. There is also an attendant cost to the taxpayer, as with any lifestyle-induced or exacerbated illness. So while a person's weight is not my business, the cost of health care is.
I am the daughter of an obese mother, who was tormented by weight issues all her life, including a yo-yo history that had her going up and down 50 pounds at a time and even, at one point, losing 125 pounds (half her total weight at 5'1"), only to put it back on a year later.
The effects of obesity eventually killed her.
For myself, I've also lived with challenges from the time I was a child, and as an adult I've been everything from a size 20+ to a zero, and I'm not quite 5' tall.
Ultimately, the battles can be terrible and affect our lives in so many ways. Some of us will battle forever, but a healthy weight - whatever that means and especially as we grow older - certainly makes the outlook (and daily life) easier and more pleasant.
Brava to Connie, and thank you for writing her story.
Connie and I talk about this sometimes: it seems there needs to be a 'click in your head', a moment when you realize you simply cannot live a certain way, because that leads to those outcomes.
Now, there are more tools to support both conscious eating and activity (Fitbit, online support via sites like MyFitnessPal,which we both use) and also more known about the science of nutrition and weight.
And ultimately living differently means every meal is a choice.
Women of several generations have been taught that "slim-looking" is the •only• desirable body type- and that belief is still rampant. The PE teacher's insensitivity is only part of the problem.
Terrific example on how culturally-blinkered thinking contributes to a young woman's worries about body image.
It's great you and Connie have been able to support each other in your fitness endeavors. I'm trying reach fitness/weight goals as well, but none of my local women friends are inspired in this way. Most have decided to live with the extra weight. It would help to have a buddy to keep me motivated.
Also, if you join MyFitnessPal, you have an opportunity to ask for online Friends, but only if you want (and you can accept or decline their invitations.)
But for real women, I suggest you look to your community, WW, the Y, local hospitals all are good places to look for weight loss groups. Even if you join an exercise class you will be around people with the same intention of getting in shape.
MD: I too have a major thing for Queen Latifah, and love Adele's elegance. And if your health is sending you signals, time to admire, but not necessarily emulate them.
I was generally fine with some extra weight and felt strong- exercised nearly every day. Then my dr. took my blood pressure during a routine physical, super high. I kept re-taking it (hoping it was a freak reading.) Nope. It was then a simple decision.
There can, with some luck, be lot of good years left at 58, and I hope you do what it takes to enjoy them.
It is a tricky issue, but another thing to bring into the mix is Type 2 Diabetes - it's a modern epidemic and it is causing a rise in blindness due to Diabetic Retinopathy. A healthy diet and exercise brings the risk factors for this disease way down.
I'm certainly focussed on spending the rest of my life trying to keep my weight down, eating reasonably healthily and keeping my body moving so that I can feel comfortable and be as healthy as possible for as long as possible.
Some persons carry way more weight than the medical community thinks is optimal, and have no health problems. (And there is a contingent who protest conventional medical norms.) But aging changes things, and not just for obese persons.
I am the aunt, by marriage, of two teenage girls who have been in the morbidly obese category since they were tiny. Their mother is very large, with gathering health problems. The youngest girl is developing multiple issues, diabetes, hormone problems, joint problems, and spine problems because her young frame cannot take her weight.
Why is nobody saying that this is no way to raise children? I accept that older children can go and buy unhealthy food, outside of the control of the parents, but in this case, each child was severely overweight at the time when every scrap of food was being provided by the parents.
They are beautiful, funny, lovely girls, but with a very poor future in front of them.
Yet my husband and I do not say or do anything. Should we?
To raise an issue that has its roots in parent's choices is to be on very thin ice indeed, and yet I am not saying, Don't have it. You will need love and compassion, and even then what you say may be heard as shaming (a terrible motivator for anyone.)
The key question is, what can be done going forward, and who is best positioned to point out the present reality. The prediction of serious health issues at some later date is not usually a powerful deterrent for teens.
It's also hard to say what's the root cause; sometimes a familial predisposition to easily gaining is then exacerbated by the parent's choices.
Very, very few parents deliberately jeopardize their childrens' health.
Imagine if mother and daughters could join together in a reasonably-paced, supportive program!
But I've occasionally seen people argue that as a society we owe it to society to be non-accepting of the overweight--basically, that shaming based on weight, including hiding the overweight and making a point of labeling overweight people as unattractive, is a way of communicating good values about health.
Don't misunderstand me: I'm not accusing you or anyone here of saying that. But people have said that. And if we don't make a point of distinguishing the issues, it can be easy to slide into a tangle of cruel illogic.
We (that is, "we" meaning the majority society opinion) don't say that extremely tanned people are unattractive. Or people who are extremely thin, model-thin. Both of those states can be a result of unhealthy choices, but our society instead deems them to be attractive. Sodium is supposed to be bad for us, but we don't try to foster low sodium diets by encouraging people to say "I hate to watch those ugly salt-vampires just shovelling the salt into their gullets." Our duty to shame the unhealthy is apparently not applicable in these cases.
Again, I know that no one here is advocating shaming the unhealthy. But I still think it's valuable to straighten out the tangles.
Melissa McCarthy--for example--is simply beautiful on that Elle cover. She's more beautiful than most women of any size are in real life. If we saw more women her size, on more magazine covers, we'd be much more inclined to understand that large women can be beautiful.
And that would be a good, not a bad, thing, even, in fact *especially*, if it makes a lot of large women feel less ashamed of their size. Shame is never a valuable motivator for change. Caring about your health starts with loving, not hating, yourself.
This is the heart of social policy, and resulting laws are continually in flux as times change and we accrue more evidence of what actually happens- not what people like or think, or convention.
When you encounter those who you believe show a "duty to shame the unhealthy", I hope you express your concerns.