Fat and Healthy

I'm fat and healthy.  That's right, you heard me.  Fat and healthy.  I just came back from my physical exam with my medically educated, thin doctor, and after examining my blood work, my body and my interview questions she determined that I am healthy.  Healthy as a fricking horse. I'm also fat, I don't weigh as much as a horse, as a matter of fact I have no idea how much I weigh, but I'm a size 18/20 at 5'7" and I'm sure my number is a good bit over 200lbs, and my BMI...please.

Me, fat and healthy, oh and happy

Maybe you've only heard the words fat and healthy together when describing a baby, or maybe you've never heard them at all.  In either case, it's time you heard that they can be liberally applied.  I'm no anomaly, there are lots of fat and healthy people on this planet.

Even though I've been healthy for most of my life, the sizeism that is almost inherent in the medical community had me believing otherwise for many years.  That same sizeism left me with a deep and abiding shame when I left the medical office of almost every doctor I saw.  Ironically, it also often left me with no help for the symptoms I was experiencing. Symptoms that, guess what, thin people also experienced.

Not today.  Today, I walked out feeling good about my choices and my life.


At the tender age of 3 before putting my toothbrush into my mouth, I looked up at my mother with my big brown eyes and asked, "How many calories is toothpaste?"  This moment is a sad foretelling of my relationship to food and my body for my childhood, adolescence and young adulthood.

In the sixth grade before a 5" spurt in height, I gained significant poundage.  I remember trying to sneak makeup in to school to disguise my face on picture day, and not being able to look at that photo after it was taken, (even asking my mother to burn every copy), because I couldn't bear to look at that fat cheeked pre teen.

By 7th grade I had visited a nutritionist, who said to me "You wear or rather hide your weight  well, I would never have guessed you weighed this much."  Which I understood was supposed to be a compliment, and I also understood that my weight was something to be deeply ashamed of.

I spent the early years of my marriage prudishly withholding sex from the man I adored and found sexy as hell because I didn't want him to see my body.

As a new mother I agonized over every bite, dismayed that I may become the lady that got fat after the kids.  And I did, I did get fat after the kids, which caused great shame and disappointment in myself and my body.

All of my adult life as I've sought treatment for maladies the first thing a doctor would say before asking me about my diet or exercise or lifestyle at all was, "Well if you'd lose the weight..."

And did I try....  I ate more cabbage soup, limited my fat, increased my "good" fat and watched my carbs, STEP AEROBICed, DANCE AEROBICed, POWER 90ed, ZUMBAed, YOGAed, ran miles and miles,  and still...  I was fat.

While I was running, I got a pain in the top of my foot.  It hurt so badly I thought it might be broken.  I mentioned it to my doctor multiple times, at one point even insisting on an x-ray.  I told him "I started running a while back and this pain developed after that.  It's worse when I run."  He looked me up and down (the look said, "you're a size 18, no way you're running everyday."), looked in my chart (I'm assuming at my weight), and said, "I don't know what to tell you, there's nothing wrong with your foot."  Knowing he was wrong, (I couldn't even tie my shoe at that point from the swelling), I sought out a second opinion.

My world changed.  I went to the new doc, told him about the pain, and the running.  He examined my foot, and said, "This is a really common sports injury, definitely caused by your running.  I'll get you some anti inflammatories, you make sure to take  a week off of running, and it'll will heal beautifully."  He never asked or mentioned my weight.  Never told me my injury was caused by my fat, and I realized that I could have interactions with doctors that were not full of shame, and where they actually helped me.

Fast forward 6 years or so, I hooked up with some ladies who were actively talking about body positivity, and I learned that I had to seek out body positive doctors.  That sizeism and fat bias were extraordinarily prevalent in the medical community, and that I would have to work to find a doctor that was right for me.

I did.  Much like a Bridget Jones novel, I went through a lot of Mr/Ms. Wrongs before I found Ms. Right, but I'm so glad I did.

I'm glad I can go to my doc, have an honest conversation, evaluate my health with her in a judgement free way, and walk out more often than not feeling great about my health and my body.

There is a lot of information about being healthy at any size, and I urge you to seek it out.  As for me, I'm just going to skip along on this sunny day, whistling a merry tune, and loving myself.

Never Stop Improving...Or maybe do

Last week I was asked to sit on a panel by a young professionals group in our community.  The panel discussion was about board service, and the idea was that the panelists (myself included) would serve as mentors for the young professionals interested in serving on boards.

I've been serving on a local city commission for about a year now, and the only other boards I've participated in have been PTO  boards.  So while I had some experience I'm not sure I was necessarily at experience level; mentor.

You're probably thinking, "Well, shit, Angie.  Then why did you agree to sit on this panel?"  I'm still figuring out how to say no.  As one good friend put it, "We feel so flattered that someone asked us to do something, we can't turn it down."  Yep, that's about it.  Also I fed myself some bullshit about how it would be a learning opportunity for me.  It would help me improve.

Well, I got there, shaking in my conservatively chosen nude pumps.  We sat down, and as the organizer introduced each panelist, she put up on the projection screen behind us the list of boards, commissions and organizations we are all part of.  Little did I know that people include any organization they'd ever, even remotely, ever in their life, been associated with. 

You get where I'm going with this.  The other panelists had LONG lists, like really long lists, like Santa's naughty and nice list long.  I had two, the PTO I'm on, and my favorite Facebook group (mind you it's an amazing group that's doing amazing work in the arena of the body positivity movement).  But my list was short.  Embarrassingly short, like so short the organizer made mention of how she was sure I was involved in other organizations short.

After this humiliating introduction came a series of questions I could not fucking answer.  I don't mean when you take a test, and you thought you got a C, but you end up with an A,  I mean, I thought I got an F, but I probably got an F-.  There was one young professional in the audience who after I answered the first question, LITERALLY rolled her eyes every time I began another answer.

I got through it though.  I could put it on my list next time.  That's really what I took away from the experience, that I could put it on my list.

I went home to my family that I had neglected for the evening.  To my husband who had to take off work early and run everyone around to their different appointments and activities, and I thought, why the hell did I do this and how do other people do this?  Two of the panelists had raised families, and I could not understand how they did it, and grew their lists.  I also thought of all of those ambitious, driven young professionals, and I admired them (and was disappointed in myself for not being as ambitious and driven at their age), and thought about all the time they dedicated to learning how to make impressive lists like the ones the other panelists had.  I was left feeling not good enough.  Like I hadn't spent enough of my time improving my list.  But why?  Why did I feel the need to have a long list, why did they feel the need to build their lists, why does anyone feel the need to have a long list?

I only had to look as far as a Lowe's commercial for the answer.

Never stop improving.

That's right.  That's what we're supposed to tell ourselves.  I could be better.  I could be thinner, smarter, faster, more knowledgeable, make more money, get a promotion, be part of more organizations,  be funnier; you fill in the rest.

What if I couldn't? What if I didn't really fucking want to? What if I was already everything I could be?  What if there was no room for improvement? What if I was already good enough?  What if little old me, the dumbass with the two organization list, who couldn't answer the questions, was already good enough?  Even in that moment?

Well guess what?, I was.

I wasn't wrong to spend the majority of my time on my kids.  It's ok that I spent my early twenties dreaming about babies, drinking with friends, taking too long to get my undergrad, getting married too early, instead of attending meetings on board service and how to succeed in the business world.  It's ok that I spent my thirties raising the babies I dreamed about, drinking wine while I watched them play in a wading pool, spending way too much time hanging out with my friends, and helping build a business that had nothing to do with anything I'd ever planned or mapped out for my future.  I was good enough all those days, I was good enough as I fumbled answers on that panel, and I'm good enough today.

Right here, right now as I am.  I don't need improving.  I need to be open to the lessons that come my way, I need to stop glorifying a busy lifestyle, I need to be present in every moment, every joke told by my 3rd grader, every bit of time given to me by my new teenager, every hug my 11 year old curls into.  I don't need to improve, I need to be.  I'm good enough, and you are too.