the skinny on this

Last week's The New York Times Magazine (Sunday, October 11, 2009) had a fascinating article on the subject of calorie restriction and health:



And while I've been a "Calorie Restriction Society" (CSR) member since 2003, I am not an active participant now---even though I promote it. Because I do believe in it. I suppose, in my case, I believe in wings and pizza a bit more. (That's a joke, alright, with some sweet, smiley truth in it). The thing about me is that I like balance and variety. That being said, I possess a naturally ascetic nature and a willpower (some call it stubbornness) that has allowed me, at various times in my life, to restrict myself in this, some say "extreme," fashion. As for me, I wouldn't call it extreme. I would call it focused. And I would call it, when done properly, very healthy. After all, that's the goal right? Abating disease and lengthening life? Well, it works on the monkeys and it also is working on us.

I will say that when I have been my thinnest, I have, in many ways, felt my best. As the calorie restriction experiments have shown, when the overall body weight is lower, the body is made of less mass and therefore uses less energy. This conservation of energy allows the body to function more quickly and accurately, allowing normal physical processes, as well as brain processes, to, quite simply, work better. While I feel amazing when I am this thin because my body works better (as for digestion, I burn what I eat more quickly and efficiently and have, overall, greater energy and a greater ability to calm, as well. And one cool thing: I hardly ever, ever fart when I'm really thin---think about THAT people!) Unfortunately, my personal thinness usually evokes responses from friends and loved ones that is not so positive and is more care and concern-based. I think this is because I have a narrow face and (as my boyfriend so affectionately calls it) a "bean sprout head." These physical characteristics make my actual body weight appear more gaunt than it might on someone with a rounder face, perhaps. But I am, once again, digressing.

I am writing this post because I am passionate about this topic. I have watched one too many "Two Ton Teen" and "650 Pound Man" shows on Discovery Health for my personal liking. Is it wrong that I am offended, saddened, disgusted, bewildered and angry? All it makes me wonder is: what, as a culture, are we doing to ourselves? Why are we fascinated with this suicidal approach to nutrition exemplified in these sad, all-too-often molested and abused, people who reach for food in an attempt to "drown" themselves in their own bodies and, ironically, to disappear?

A sad thought that most of won't even acknowledge: aren't morbidly obese people, in a sense, "invisible" to most of us? Their overly-fat bodies hide their features and mar their shape to the point where they become distantly recognizable as the normal-weight people they may once have been. Even if we don't want to admit it, don't we dread the fat person coming down the narrow airplane aisle on a Southwest flight: man, I hope I don't get stuck next to that fatty. Why are we, as a culture, sitting back and letting these people kill themselves with heaps of non-nutritious, fatty, calories-laden foods? Why are we just sitting there watching television shows about them?

If, as the spiritualists say, we are "all related" well then aren't we "all sick"?

Why is it so second-nature to me to eat healthily? Why do I crave broccoli over ice cream nine times out of ten? Why do I feel compelled to have grapes and almonds and beets and carrots and raspberries and fresh green beans when so many others are inexplicably drawn to McDonald's latest gluttonous offering? I'm no saint. I'll be the first to admit that every so often I crave Chick Fil-A chicken strips with the Polynesian sauce, a little bucket of salted waffle fries and a large Dr. Pepper. But I also do this only a few times in a YEAR. I do not eat Chick Fil-A every day, or every weekend. To me, that would just be....wrong. It wouldn't feel...right. To me.

But I'm lucky. I have a reasonably high IQ, I was raised by a diligent, health-conscious mother whose buying and consumption habits I've clearly inherited, and I was not molested as a child. I am lucky.

But what of this world we live in? Seems like some of us are not so lucky. Studies are predicting that obese children today will not outlive their parents. Children not outliving their parents? What, indeed, is the world coming to?

I say we all take a deeper look at the simplicity of calorie restriction----not as a diet but as a new consciousness. Just take a look at it. At the premise at least. It makes a lot of sense. And for those of us not in the death-grip of food addiction, let's eat a little less. And while we're at it, let's talk a little more. About what the hell we're gonna do to get healthier.

Because, whether you're spiritual or not, if we allow this obesity epidemic to continue to flourish as it already is everywhere we turn, clearly we are all sick. Very, very sick.