weigh-2-go.org

I’m not talking about the Beatles’ song, but “The Biggest Loser.”

I started watching the show online as a matter of research for this blog. I mean really, how can I blog about weight control issues without knowing what this show is about?

Host Alison Sweeney introduces the fitness challenge with high drama.

It didn’t take long for me to form strong opinions about the advice and role models Americans are getting from this show.

Yet, I keep watching episode after episode.

Oh, I shed a tear when Sherry got voted off. And then I really sobbed when O’Neal and Sunshine had that heartfelt father-daughter talk. Then O’Neal walked up the steps to the scale, finally light enough to take pressure off the knee injury that has crippled him for years! Michael is showing real character, still shedding major pounds even while his Grandmother is dying. And wow, Sam is looking hot!

Oh yeah, I’m a loser all right. Reality TV has got me.

Here’s the stuff that makes my eyeballs roll back in my head. Bob, the trainer, takes aside one player in each episode for some serious health advice coupled with an awkward embedded product advertisement. As each player is voted off, it is foreshadowed with some melodrama that I suspect is incited by the producers of the show.

What I fear “The Biggest Loser” is teaching Americans is that it’s healthy and normal to lose 5-10 pounds per week (after all, Dr. H is on campus supervising everything, right?); that these intense workouts (“Last Chance Workout!”) are good for everybody, even the most obese; and that what makes good TV makes good practice for weight loss. I have serious doubts.

Yet, I keep watching. I’m a loser all right.

This morning on NPR’s Morning Edition, I was half-listening to a report that Air France has decided to allow large people to occupy two seats on a plane for free. This is a reversal of a policy to charge for the extra seat, which had earned the company “the ire of obesity defense groups,” said the reporter on my radio.

“Obesity defense groups” tugged at my ear. Research!

But first, a statement of values is on order. Where do I stand in defense of obesity? What bias do I have? (And I do have one, as I will demonstrate.)

I put being overweight in the same category as the following:

• parenthood
• using mind-altering drugs
• collecting guns
• attending crafts festivals
• reading porn magazines
• working in food service
• swimming laps
• watching Bill O’Reilly

I know people  who practice these things, and I defend their right to do so. But experience and instinct tell me they are not right for me.

What Book Are We Reading?

Brief tangent: I was at a book club meeting to discuss “The Awakening” by Kate Chopin. Spoiler Alert: The main character, an affluent mother with a working husband in New Orleans in the late 1800s, quietly rebels against convention, but becomes isolated from love and society, and commits suicide. At our meeting, Jennifer was very upset. “She could have started a salon to discuss great ideas! She could have become a painter or a musician! She had children to raise! She didn’t have to kill herself!” To which Sally answered calmly, “Jennifer, that’s not the book we’re reading.”

Being thin? As a society, that’s not the book we’re reading. Oh sure, we have options, but we take the options we take, because we live in this world, here, now.

And it’s a weird world where statistically “normal” weights are rising, but being large is alternately normalized, then marginalized by our culture in a bipolar way. The message of diet books, Jamie Oliver, and The Biggest Loser is: everyone would be better off thin. Sponsored by TGI Friday’s, Burger King, and Comcast with 250 channels. Those shows don’t really have those sponsors, but we all see those ads–they’re in our culture and our heads–and they resonate with our familiar lifestyles.

What would happen to the economy if 80% of Americans cooked–really cooked–18 meals per week, and replaced 5 hours per week of TV/video/gaming time with exercise? That’s what it would take for American’s to be fit. That’s not the book we’re reading.

And, as a former borderline-obese person, who has: been rudely blown off by the rail-thin retail girl at Victoria’s Secret; sat in theater seats obviously not designed for the width of her butt; and huffed and puffed like the Big Bad Wolf after climbing office stairs behind thin coworkers; I remember being marginalized.

I do believe that obese people require defense.

But I admit my bias in the “everyone would be better off thin” camp. Here’s how I demonstrate my bias: I really enjoyed Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution (watch entire episodes and video shorts online). But here’s a scathing review on the Shakesville Blog that I can’t entirely argue with, either. Wow–as in politics, we hear and see the same things, and come away with totally different opinions. Based on whatever book we’re reading.

I just read a weight loss book that I was hoping to like, but didn’t. No use ragging on it by mentioning the title–in fact, you might run across it and like it.

It isn’t a how-to book; it’s a how-it-feels story, by a person who blogged her weight loss (a little like this blog, only with attitude). I really wanted a happy ending. As a matter of fact, I wanted an ending. I was disappointed.

Then I caught up on her blog today. Her life has just gone right along without the happy ending I hoped for. She even gained her weight back.

You mean, dear Successful Book Author: this isn’t a fairy tale? Dang.

But seriously folks, my naivete surprises me. I read this book looking for something impractical–a happy fairy tale, happily-ever-after ending. What was I thinking?

What disturbs me is that if I was looking for that ending in this book, then I am looking for that ending for myself. I should know better.

Will losing twelve more pounds, and achieving Lifetime status in Weight Watchers, really make all my dreams come true?

Mmm, the wholesome natural goodness of corn. “You call it corn. We call it maize.”

For people of European descent, like me, the history of corn only goes back a few centuries, when Columbus brought the first corn plant to Spain. It became a food crop in Europe in the 1500s, and spread to Africa and Asia as well. But in evolutionary time, 400-500 years is not very long. I  venture to say that except for Native Americans, who cultivated corn for millennia, corn is a novelty to our bodies. Like kudzu in Georgia, it’s a foreign species. We haven’t evolved with it, so we don’t digest it well. [This is my own theory--I'm researching it. This article is close but doesn't quite support my "foreign substance" hypothesis.]

Oh, I love corn. I ate a bunch of corn tortillas as I wrote this post, just because I was thinking about corn.

<Homer Simpson voice>Mmmm.  Corn.  <Gluttonous drool>

Corn is a trigger food for me. If I leave it alone, I don’t think about it. But once I have it, I crave it continuously. Like kudzu in Georgia, it dominates in a foreign environment.

The only remedy is to consciously, and uncomfortably, force myself to stop, until the call of corn fades away. Not just corn on the cob and popcorn, but cornbread and those terribly tempting bottomless baskets of corn tortilla chips at Mexican restaurants–even when they taste like cardboard!–call my name.

<Homer Simpson voice>D’oh! Don’t take away my corn!

I often hear friends say that when they diet, they refuse to allow themselves to feel deprived, so they “never say never” to any food. I get this. The world would be a dismal place if I told myself I could never, ever again eat chocolate, doughnuts, little chocolate doughnuts, or even corn.

Even so, the world, for me, is a better place, when I “buck up” against the fear and frustration of feeling deprived. It is my duty to myself to Just Say No to corn.

Be alerted, gentle readers. This post contains an inconvenient and painful truth.  (It’s painful to me too.)

As my posts under the category of “philosophy of weight loss” will attest, I am interested in the personal philosophies and psychological aspects of weight loss. But I have been dancing around a fundamental point. I found a blog post from a motivational speaker in Australia, Craig Harper, who put it right out there.

One of Craig’s readers, Mandi, writes [condensed here]:

Please, please, please, please help me….I currently weigh 104 kilos and often cry when I look in the mirror. As you always say “I know what to do but I don’t do what I know.” I am so sick of myself and the way I constantly shoot myself in the foot that I don’t know what to do any more….Why do I continue to self-sabotage when I hate the way I look and feel?…

Mandi’s lament sounds familiar to me–painfully familiar. She describes a vulnerable, stuck place that makes me ache.

Craig gives a long and thoughtful response. The full post is here. But this excerpt cuts to the painful truth:

…you need to want it enough. You might think you want it enough now but I can tell you, you don’t. When you associate more pain with staying in your current condition than you do with throwing that chocolate in the bin (or feeding it to the dog), then you’ll get the job done and find your way to your best body. As with any change process, you will always be the problem and the solution. [emphasis mine]

Wow. Craig’s reply sums up the answer to my question, “Why?” It’s about priorities: wanting it enough.

Perhaps you have read The Secret. The “energy frequency” premise is, for me, too far-fetched to be useful (for the short version, skip to 5:50 in this video), but an inversion of The Secret makes sense to me:

When I want to reach a goal, and I make it a priority over other goals, then my real-life actions and decisions automatically take me there.

The angst, like Mandi’s, simply vanishes. My behavior leads me in the right direction. Things fall into place.

This truth applies to all my goals. As an unmarried middle-aged suburb dweller* who is 15 pounds above goal weight, I wrestle with painful truths. But if I want to make progress on all my goals, I am only dancing around until I ask myself honestly, “Do I want it enough?”

When the answer is “no,” I always have strong arguments to defend the reasons–sometimes outdated and laced with shame, but strong nonetheless. So then, the real work of weight loss, or achieving any goal, is not to collect healthy recipes, join a gym, or join Weight Watchers. All that will come in its time and place. We know that stuff already. As Craig says, we are the problem and the solution.

Instead, the real work is breaking down the arguments that defend that vulnerable, stuck place.

Ouch.

*David Byrne sings, “How did I get here?” The whole song is so awesome.

The idea of having two minds (see my last post) is certainly not new. However, in all the literature I have seen on weight loss, I have not seen much that acknowledges the dichotomy of the brain. Most of the literature assumes that if you want something, by gosh, you’ll go for it! That if you dream it, you can do it! These people assume that humans stay on the conscious, adult, “Marge” side of the brain. They don’t assume that there’s a “Homer” to interfere.

And come to think of it, people who write books are probably typically pretty conscious, adult, people who are self-disciplined and know how to do what they dream. How else could they get a whole book written? So people who write books probably don’t even understand Homer. They don’t listen to Homer. Good for them–but not very helpful to the rest of us.

The idea of two minds is very well explained in a book titled The Happiness Hypothesis (see my Amazon widget on this blog, or http://tinyurl.com/HappinessBook). The author, Jonathan Haidt, uses the analogy of someone riding an elephant (instead of Homer and Marge) to describe the relationship between the two parts of the brain. The rider is the conscious, adult brain, trying to steer. The elephant might or might not pay attention. The elephant simply wants what it wants, and it lumbers along. The elephant is aware of the rider, and knows that it can avoid a kick in the ribs if it follows the rider’s vague commands. But the (human) rider and the elephant do not think alike, and they often want different things.

For example: the rider wants to lose weight. The elephant wants a chocolate chip cookie.

I read The Happiness Hypothesis a few months ago, and the implications of the rider-elephant dichotomy are still sinking in. And I haven’t seen any of this philosophy applied directly to weight loss or maintenance. In fact, quick Googles and a search on Amazon.com bring up a bunch of old stuff.

Food for thought, as it were.

OMG, I figured it out. The answer to life, the universe, and everything. Seriously. It’s blowing my mind. (And it’s a whole lot better than “42″.)

At least, this is the answer to my life and my universe.

“What the Sam Hill is she ranting about?” you ask. “Has she found religion, or some controlled substance?” No, afraid not.

It’s some mixture of psychology and philosophy. And you have probably heard it all before. For that reason, you won’t have the same “OMG” response that I have had. But it does answer the questions: “Why me, why now? Why was I suddenly able to lose 80 pounds when other attempts fail every day?”

Here it is: I have two brains.

We all have two brains. Call them the id and the ego, the child and the adult, the limbic system and the neocortex, whatever you like. You already know this. So did I.

I’m going to call my two brains Homer (id/child/limbic) and Marge (ego/adult/neocortex).

Marge has a million great ideas every day. Marge is logical and responds to real-world stimuli. Marge wants to act. Marge says, “let’s go!”

Marge’s big problem is that she has to bring Homer everywhere she goes. And no plan goes forward unless Homer is on board with it.

If Homer and Marge disagree on what to do, Homer will whine and whine and lag and get headaches and complain, and even fall asleep, twist his ankle, or get into a car accident to avoid doing what he really doesn’t want to do. And Marge can’t stop him. Marge can only try to talk him out of it. The only tool Marge has is reason, and reason doesn’t always do much good. Especially if Homer is covering his ears and singing “La! La! La!” which he does a lot. (Remember, Homer and Marge are specifically my brains. So I can speak with authority about Homer’s bad behavior.)

So, “why me? why now?”

Homer was ready.

So my posts on this blog have slacked off lately, but for a reason which in hindsight I believe is a good one: I didn’t know what to write. Now I believe I do know.

My purpose for this blog has always been to answer the questions, “Why me?” and “Why now?” Why, among all the people who try so hard to lose weight was I able to do it successfully, and why, after so many attempts, did it finally work for me?

I am getting closer to an answer, I think. I was afraid that the real answer was too personal and too complex to blog about, so I stopped blogging. But now I think it might be perfect for a blog.

I don’t have the answer fully figured out, but my initial premise is: it isn’t as complicated as many of the how-to books would have us believe. Yes, physiology and psychology have advanced to make weight loss more efficient, more intelligent, and maybe a bit easier. The bookstores are filled with new and improved diets, systems, and workbooks. Even Weight Watchers has recently updated their program. All these tools are useful, but having or not having the right books doesn’t explain why some people lose weight and others struggle, or why to stick with the program.

Tools, systems, and other answers to “how” did not enable me to lose weight. “How” is secondary. “Why” comes first.

Once there is a “why”—a purpose and a motivation—then all information about “how” is abundant, and one only has to select a method that makes sense and sounds feasible for them.

So I will blog about “why.”

I’m enjoying Facebook, where one of my Friends posted this on December 10:

cbs5.com – Talk Show Host Oprah Winfrey Says She Weighs 200 Pounds, Concerned About Rapid Gain 4:48pm

“I guess the Acai berry diet* and the being filthy rich thing didn’t work out.”

Here is a resource to add to my collection: a web page and book from the Mayo Clinic on the subject of Weight loss Maintenance, which is relatively rare in a sea of web contant about regular weight loss:

Weight maintenance: Keep the weight off permanently
MayoClinic.com

There is a book ($30 from the Mayo Clinic Online Bookstore) that goes into the details.  I haven’t read the book, but the Mayo Clinic is a pretty reputable resource.

Judging from this web page, I don’t have high expectations that the advice in the book is anything earth-shattering.  The kind of advice that I find the most helpful is along these two topics, both taken from this Mayo Clinic article:

Assess your goals and motivation. How you approached weight loss — both your commitment and your plan — goes a long way toward keeping you on the road to success. First, take a look at your motivation. What prompted you to lose weight? If you make a long-term commitment to your health and well-being, rather than losing pounds for a special event, you’re already ahead of the game.
…
Create a support network. Getting support for your efforts, whether through a friend, family member, trained professional or group of fellow travelers on the same path, can ultimately mean the difference between success and failure.

I like these particular tidbits because they go beyond the usual advice, which can be summed up: “move more, eat less.”  Other than that, I’m afraid that all the Mayo Clinic can offer is the same old thing.