I have been feeling un-postish lately, however, I was just sitting here checking email etc and turned on the 80's radio station that Lazuli recommended and now they are playing 'Break my Stride' by Matthew Wilder (who incidentally had some other great songs too), so I need an excuse to sit at the computer longer. So, here, read this :)
My mom is a great cook, a GREAT cook. She doesn't really make dishes that you could serve in a restaurant. Instead she makes things like homemade macaroni and cheese and wieners (Paul says that is perverted and that we should call them hot dogs, but I maintain that hot dogs include the buns, thus the tubes of meat are just wieners). But it's REALLY GOOD mac n cheese and wieners and often is accompanied by homemade buns and homemade iced tea. So, anyway, we eat a lot at my house and we eat crap. High fat, fabulous crap.
As my mother's daughters are now all overweight adults, she sometimes feels really guilty about that and in fact often now includes, get ready, salads with her meals. We didn't have none of that green shit at our table as a child. We had big meals and dessert, always dessert. And ice cream wasn't enough, it was usually ice cream with homemade chocolate sauce and crumbled peanuts (my dad's one indoor job was to shell peanuts, I have so many memories of him doing that).
My roommates often marvel at and/or mock my eating habits, but the other day I inadvertently shocked them to the core. I toasted 2 Eggos, then I broke them up into a bowl, then I put two scoops of ice cream on them. I sat down at the table where they were and began to eat. I may well have been moaning. After a few bites I noticed that they were both staring at me, Paul's hands were in fact poised above the keyboard, not moving. Josh snapped out of it and said 'fat kid special?' I laughed but said that this was standard at my house when I was a child. It was often lunch, the whole lunch, and my mom added homemade custard and other accoutrements to it as well.
I mentioned this to my mom a few days later and she said, huffing slightly, 'yes, but it wasn't for dessert, it was the main course!' She thought that made it BETTER!
I think about this kind of thing a lot lately. This is what we grew up with, yet we must change it for our children. One of my sisters has two girls still at home and one is chubby and one is slim. When the skinny one asks for 'thirds' she gets it, the chubby one doesn't.
As another example, a family member of mine used to be rather skinny and when she would come to our house to eat, she would either arrive in sweat pants or would have to open her top button half way through the meal. We all thought this was hilarious. As she got older, she began to gain weight and still did the same thing, yet it wasn't funny anymore, it was sad. So, in other words, in our home, like in many, it was funny to see someone eat until they felt literally ill, because she was slender. Yet, when she became overweight, it was 'oh dear, that's terrible'.
My point, I guess, is twofold. The first is that everyone should be learning healthy eating habits and size should have nothing to do with it. Three scoops of ice cream for dessert is inappropriate whether you are Kate Moss or Camryn Manheim.
I'm plus sized, but fairly comfortable with it. If I have a little girl, I would like so badly for her to be healthy! If she's a 'big girl' like me, I want her to love her curves. If she eats proper food and exercises every day, and loves herself, I will have achieved my goal, whether she weighs 110 pounds or 200 pounds. And that is my second point. Screw what the media says is appropriate! LOVE YOURSELF FOR WHO YOU ARE! Being chubby (or even perceiving that you are) is not the reason that you do not have a boyfriend or the life you want (I hear that from women -all the time-). Hating yourself is the reason.
Just yesterday Paul and I were lying in bed and I said, conversationally, 'what do you love about me?' And out of all the things that he could have said or even made up, he rubbed my tummy and said ' you're all chubby and soft and warm and I love it'. I wouldn't have a man like that if I didn't love it too.
3 comments:
Being brought up by parents who lived through the depression, we were made aware that we had to eat everything that was put on our plates. And then we were members of the "Clean the Plate Club". Which for us was good, because we didn't get dessert until we finished everything on our plates, too. Sadly, most of the seven of us grew up rather chubby or had to buy in the (and there actually was one department at Sears named thusly) the "Chubbette" Department. Somehow, the two sisters who watched what they ate, exercised regularly, etc., died at early ages of cancer (one 40, the other 48). The three fatties are still alive and kicking, though we raised our children the same way we were brought up. In fact, when my oldest was in sixth grade, he developed a nervous throat-clearing sound. All EENT's, and other specialists could find nothing anatomically that was causing this and so the school counselor suggested that I promise the oldest an extra dessert if he got through the dinner hour without clearing his throat. So how did that fare for the younger brother who saw his older brother getting seconds for dessert? No way would I give either of them seconds for dessert, so most of the time they snuck it behind my back. I guess the whole point here is that we crave what we are denied. And I guess it boils down to moderation in everything. I can't eat four or five desserts at Golden Corral anymore (I really can't eat much of anything with the stomach surgery), but hopefully, the next generations will outgrow the depression era upbringing and have healthier kids. Does any of this make sense? Mom2
I was also brought up to clean my plate, especially if we wanted any dessert and we always had something for dessert. When I decided it was time to lose weight, before I got pregnant, it was a very difficult thing to do. I had gone so long with just eating whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted. Seconds, dessert, whatever. Growing up, same thing, I didn't really need to watch because I was so active as a kid. As I got older and didn't maintain that activity, obviously it caught up to me. While I am not completely happy with my body now, I'm much happier than I was. I make better choices with food, have a lot of salads, am working on adding more veggies and limit, not deny desserts and other goodies. It has worked to the effect that after gaining 50 pounds when pregnant and having 25 of them stick around afterward, I am now lighter than I was before even getting pregnant. Not too sure what my point has ended up being. I'd like my son to be able to make the right choices as he grows up, but who knows.
Anyway. I'd glad you are happy with yourself and even more so that Paul loves you just the way you are.
Have a great week, hon!
" LOVE YOURSELF FOR WHO YOU ARE! Being chubby (or even perceiving that you are) is not the reason that you do not have a boyfriend or the life you want (I hear that from women -all the time-). Hating yourself is the reason."
That is so true. You really made me think, here. I've been feeling so bummed this past week, and feeling sorry for myself. Your advice is perfect for many situations.
How can I hope to find someone to love me as I am, if I don't even like myself?
Why would some awesome, cheerful, ray of sunshine want to get to know me better if I seem so miserable everyday?
Good words, good words.
Thanks,
J
Post a Comment