The Wide Angle Volume 2, Issue 2 February/March 1997

New Year Resolutions

By Marty Lipton

It’s that time of year again; the time for weight management companies and diet doctors to present their newest plans, schemes and scams. Every magazine, newspaper and TV show is full of ads that promise a "new" you, a "new" body, an exciting, sexy, happy life that, if you believe them, is reserved for those with minimal body fat and single digit dress sizes.

Meanwhile, we who are working at size acceptance recede into the background. This is not by choice but because the weight loss industry makes an annual profit of right around $39 billion dollars, much of which is pumped into advertising campaigns. Just for comparison, SCSAC brings about $400 a year in memberships and donations; we spend about $350 a year on printing and mailing the newsletter, a little under $200 a year on the voice mail and another $40 annually on the post office box.

Why is this? Well, first of all, the weight loss industry is selling a product that everyone wants. There is unwavering social support for thinness and unending social disparagement for those who are not thin. They also present the solution as easy, permanent and miraculously brought about by an investment of money and a little time. Everyone in their ads goes from despondency to endless glee in 37 weeks and they swear they’ll never go back.

On this side of the issue, we offer something that has no price tag and for which there are no easy answers. Self-acceptance is a result no one can sell you in a freeze-dried meal. It doesn’t rub off of the strength training equipment at the gym. It isn’t printed next to the laundry instructions on a garment tag.

Acceptance requires making the commitment to explore who you really are and who you really want to be. I’m reminded of the joke about the woman who lost 250 pounds in one afternoon by divorcing her husband. The twist in thinking that makes the joke funny is she finally realized that the problem was not with the 250 pounds on her body but with the man who loved and respected her so little that he felt justified in using her body to make her a victim. Once she freed herself of his negative influence, her "weight problem" was solved. She took a step toward self-acceptance.

I realize there are people who make money analyzing the psychology of fat people (which really is no different than the psychology of thin people) who would guess that she lost weight once her husband was out of the picture. They make some amazing leaps of logic to explain that she overate because he was mean to her and she ran to food for comfort. Well, I’m here to tell you she didn’t lose a pound. She did come to realize that his harassing her for eating a sandwich did not constitute "overeating" on her part. She did come to understand that his calling her a lazy pig if she sat down to rest after cleaning up after him did not mean she was actually lazy.

In other words, she developed the ability to look inside and separate other people’s opinions and needs from the truth of who she really was and what she really did. This is called a sense of self-worth.

Then, powered by self-worth, she bought clothes that fit, had her hair done, wrote up a new resume, started moving her body in ways that made her feel strong and flexible and began eating healthy foods that her ex didn’t like and so-called unhealthy foods that he tried to make her feel guilty for enjoying in the way thin people do. She refused to date jerks, accept insults or be demeaned. That’s self-esteem.

No one sold her any of this. There is no pill that can give you these things. There is no program that can guarantee these things. You have to be willing to do the work. Most people don’t bother to do the work until they lose weight. Then they realize that the "new" body is still the old body in different clothes and the "new you" still has a bad marriage, unruly kids and a lousy job.

The single most important message of the size acceptance movement is: don’t put off making your life better until you reach some ideal body size. Enjoy life now, no matter what size you are. Learn to nurture yourself, learn to care about yourself, learn to forgive yourself.

The best way for the news to get out is for each one of us to be an example in the new year. When Weight Watchers tries to shame us with the line drawings that emphasize behinds, we can point out that these drawings aren’t fat and that most women, even thin ones, have proportionally larger hips. We can respond to people who say they’re concerned about our health by pointing out that they’re probably a lot more concerned about being seen with a fat person.

We can take the money we would have spent on phen/fen and Redux and any one of a hundred diet/weight management/weight control programs and use it to go to the Big As Texas and INDD events.

We can get the SCSAC affirmations and post them on the bathroom mirror or put them under the blotter at work and repeat them every day. We can give copies to friends and co-workers and even strangers.

Finally, we can take our message as seriously as the weight loss industry takes theirs. If we believe in ourselves as a safe, effective, workable alternative to the cycle of emotional and monetary poverty that they are selling, we can make this a new year for Size Acceptance.

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