Member-only story
Why Do You Do What You Do?
What reason do you have to do what you do — whatever it is?
All my life I have battled with my weight.
But it hasn’t just been about me and my struggle. It’s also been about how I believe I’m perceived by other people.
This isn’t just about random people I encounter. It’s also about friends and loved ones and their perceptions and actions therein.
In addition to overweight being unhealthy — to many, it’s also unsightly. Fat-shaming is all too prominent in literature, TV, movies, and other media. Thin to win and similar notions dominate a great deal of our collective consciousness.
I have had different reactions from different people to my heaviness. Some of the well-meaning attempts to get me to lose weight still caused unfortunate side effects.
For example — when I was 13, I wanted contact lenses. I hated my glasses — and could not see jack shit without them.
My grandfather offered to buy me my first pair of contacts — if I lost 20 pounds, first. Duly bribed, I lost the weight — and got my contacts.
The weight didn’t stay off, of course. But that was indicative of the larger mental and emotional problems underlying why I was heavy.
