I was a middle child,
a girl between two boys, and I wanted everyone to get along. My older brother was a bully that picked on the younger
brother mercilessly, so they fought a lot. Being the only girl helped me
escape from the worst of his bullying. I was the only fat child out of 8
grandchildren in my extended family.
I had good grades in school, played piano and sang from age 6, and read
books beyond my grade level. Although the "cool" kids were
very mean to me because I was fat and different, some of the bright kids
(cool or not) respected me for being smart. I remember kids taunting me
in K-3rd grade with those rhymes, like, "fatty, fatty, two by four,
can't fit through the classroom door.”
I wasn't athletic, yet I loved to swim (isn't it great that fat makes us
so buoyant?) and walk my dog. Also, when I was in early grade school,
ages 7, 8, and 9, I swam competitively on a town team. I wasn't fast,
didn’t ever win, and the coach could never remember my name, so he
always called me "peanut" because that is how I was shaped
(like in the shell - ha ha!).
I
always felt that I had to earn whatever love I could get by being good
at music or getting good grades or by being mature for my age -- by
being "special" in some way. I was always judged harshly for
being overweight (my mom, her mother, and many well-meaning people told
me, "You have such a pretty face, if only you could lose
weight").
My mom was terribly overweight and her parents judged her very harshly
for it all her life. My mom’s parents were in “high society,”
which had no tolerance for fat and lack of style. My mom would have been
a bit dowdy even if she hadn't lost and gained so many pounds over the
years from dieting, getting bigger each time.
I
remember how my mom was so ashamed of her looks that she didn't go out
if she didn't absolutely have to do so. She didn't want the same fate
for me, so she would make me weigh myself weekly and report back to her,
but the scale was in her room upstairs, and she didn't go up with me
when I weighed. Sometimes I lied slightly about the scale's message, to
avoid her intense disappointment. If it went on like that for quite a
while, she would eventually catch me at it. She finally realized that
her parents had tried everything to get her to lose weight, and they
didn't succeed, so it was unlikely that she would succeed with me. When
I was in college, she had weight-loss surgery and died from
complications to the surgery.
One very strong memory from childhood, was trying to diet by restricting
calories, so I would fix things that were easy to measure the calories.
Jelly sandwiches were something that seemed comparatively low in
calories and easy to count the total. Now I realize how unhealthy and
empty those calories were. My mom didn't know how to cook, so every
dinner was a big hunk of meat (meat loaf or roast) with some variety of
potatoes and an overcooked, mushy green vegetable. Our lunches were cold
cuts on Wonder bread, and our breakfasts were cereal and milk.
During childhood I was often lonely and had recurring dreams of being
able to move through the air, the same way I moved through deep water in
real life. These dreams seemed very real to me, and I knew even then
that they
were a way to rise above being teased or left out or picked last for a
team. Many of my academic subject teachers treated me with respect,
which I really valued, and I wanted to please them. My P.E. teachers
were disappointed by my awkward, fat attempts at things; these classes
were usually kind of a nightmare, and it wasn’t until high school that
I found some fitness activities that I enjoyed. I still remember the
presidential fitness testing, couldn’t even do one pull up. I also
remember weigh-ins at one point in P.E. and how mortified I was by this
public humiliation.
This
has been a good exercise, writing about having been fat as a child. I
think I am realizing that a good portion of the loneliness, of feeling
that I was an outcast, and my orientation toward adults, was not because
of being fat, but because of being perceived as different from regular
kids.
I'd like to make some
recommendations about parenting fat children. Affirm the
beauty/handsomeness of the child in a real way. I have never forgotten
my mom's genuine expression of appreciation for how beautiful I am -
she said this after I had gotten out of the pool, with my hair slicked
back, and I knew she meant it.
Find healthy foods and
recipes that you enjoy. Offer these and keep them handy and
the children will catch your enjoyment of the foods for themselves. If
"good foods" crowd out the space for most junk food, that is
the best way to do it. There are healthy vegetarian dishes I enjoy,
and these make me feel good, even though I don't eat them all the
time. Junk foods can be only a small part of the total eating a person
does.
Find a physical activity
that you enjoy, try many different kinds of activities, and if your
child enjoys it too, you can do it together. The only requirement is
that it has to be fun! Two of my boys love Tae Kwon Do, my
daughter loves tribal belly dance, I love walking, yoga-like
stretching, and weightlifting, my oldest son loves soccer.
My husband loves bike riding and cross-country skiing. I used to
love aerobic dance, but my knees and feet can no longer tolerate this
very well. Even ping-pong is fun and physical. We don't watch
much TV at all. The less TV, the healthier, for so many reasons.
We watch rented movies when we want screen entertainment.
