Sometimes fat has more to do with what’s going on inside a person’s head than what’s actually going into their mouth. After all, it’s not without reason that creamy, cheesy, calorie-dense fare is known as “comfort food”. For some adults — and some children, too, I suspect — eating is a way of appeasing a different kind of hunger, an emotional need more than a physical one.
Granted, not everyone turns to food to make themselves happy. Some turn to gambling or sex, others to drugs and alcohol. There are even some people (much as I do envy them) who turn to exercise as a way to make themselves feel better. Fat people merely show the effects of their own self-comforting techniques, whereas the effects of the other ways are so much more easily disguised.
Sometimes, though, it all starts coming together: a person who’s been struggling with their weight suddenly has an AHA! moment in which they realize that what’s triggering their eating isn’t a desire for food, but some other less obvious desire.
It’s not always about comfort. Sometimes it’s about insulation — from our own inner turmoil, from the stress of daily life, and sometimes even from those around us.
One woman spoke of being plagued by obesity. She described how she worked hard at returning herself to a healthy weight.
She succeeded but now feels much more vulnerable, as if the layers of fat were a suit of armour worn to protect her from the intrusions of the outside world. When she was fat, people gave her a wide berth at the shopping centre; now they brush past her, invading her space and making her feel exposed.
Losing her armour was a double blow, for previously, she could overeat in response to her distress; now she has lost both her protection along with her means of dealing with anxieties that get through her weakened defences.
I can almost pinpoint the exact date on which I began gaining unwanted weight. I’d gone out for the evening and found myself subjected to repeated, aggressive advances from a very drunken man. Although everything turned out all right, it rattled me. It was traumatic enough that I knew I never wanted to go through it again, and afterwards I found myself hypersensitive to the mere threat of similar incidents.
Sure, I could’ve opted to hole up in my house and never worry about those risks. But as a SAHM, I need to get out of the house and socialize with grown ups now and then. Making matters worse, my husband and I didn’t have a reliable sitter: if I went out, I went alone and that meant I continually felt like potential prey for all the whackos out there.
I tried at first to curtail my need for socializing. I went to the library. I window shopped at the mall. I hung out in coffee houses and chatted with those sitting around me until they politely cleared their throats and made a point of turning their attention back to their newspapers or laptops. With my need for social interaction unmet, I began turning to food for comfort.
As the pounds piled on, a strange thing happened: I began growing increasingly “invisible” to all but overweight women and the elderly. Oh, I could order a drink and make a wise-crack that would still bring in a few smiles around a bar, but afterwards I’d be left alone to enjoy my crossword puzzle and martini.
Thanks to fat, I didn’t need to worry about being hit on anymore.
Of course, it’s one thing to realize what caused it and quite a different thing to not just stop the pattern but reverse it. To put the cake down and walk away. To get off my butt and exercise. To say “Ok, jiggle belly and thunder thighs, thanks for your service. You may leave now.” That would require work on my part, after all. Exercise. Self-discipline. Acceptance of temporary deprivations in glad pursuit of an eventual goal.
And what if — I think a small part of my brain wonders — what if I worked that hard at losing weight only to wind up in the same damn situation all over again? What if I, like the woman above, found myself dealing with people invading my space, violating my boundaries? What if I put all that time and work into paring down only to the whole thing happen all again?
Ay, as Hamlet said, there’s the rub.
Hmm…. rub…. ham….
I think I’ll go have a sandwich.
Steve (oh my gosh, a man!)