FAT SHAMING

Recap and vital statistics:

I am 5 feet and 10 inches tall and 61 years old. I was an effortlessly super-slim 70kg till my late 40s, then the weight started to pile on. By my early 50s, I was 85kg. But I didn’t become obese till my mid-50s.

I started this battle of the bulge on March 16th last year, when I weighed a whopping 120kg and measured 49-47-51 (chest-waist-hips) inches. And I’ve been struggling to shed excess lard since then.

I was at my happiest and most elegant when I was 70kg and a size 10 (UK sizing). But a woman of my current advanced age might look haggard – ill and starved even - in a totally fat-free body and face zone, so I’m taking the view that a bit of genteel padding does a sexuagenarian no harm. And since I didn’t feel/look too bad when I was 85kg and a size 14, that’s the compromise I am aiming for. It’s been a yo-yo ride. My weight has, alas, fluctuated wildly since I started this journey. I’ve had weeks when I’ve lost a couple of kilos, weeks when I’ve regained every lost kilo and weeks when I haven’t gained or lost an ounce.

Last summer, my weight dropped to 106kg – my lowest point on this journey that started in Abuja last spring. And I won’t bore you with all of the ups and downs my weight has been through since then.

Suffice it to say that after a particularly unrestrained Christmas food-and-drink binge while taking a break in London, I had reached a heinous 123kg by early January – my highest point on this journey.

I felt like such a stupid failure for starting 2021 3 kilos heavier than I was at the beginning of 2020, especially since the whole point of this column was that discussing my weight problem in a public space every week was (in addition to encouraging other fatties to shed lard that can trigger off heart disease, diabetes etc) supposed to shame me into solving my weight problem in a steady and disciplined way.

But we are all human; and some of us are so addicted to food and drink that dieting is a herculean effort. Fortunately, I’ve been able to force myself to cut down on high-calorie solids and liquids; and my weight has been falling. Last Sunday, I was 121kg. Today, I’m 19.5kg.

Incentives to lose weight are numerous:

Slim folks look better in clothes and have more sartorial choices and more self-confidence. Slim folks rarely suffer from knee pain and are less likely to require hip replacement surgery.

Slim folks are more energetic and tend to be in better shape medically. Slim folks usually attract more positive impressions within professional and social contexts (in the Western world in particular, there is a widespread belief that fat people are less reliable and less worthy of respect because they clearly lack self-control.

Even in Nigeria, where fatness has been traditionally acceptable and even desirable, more and more people would rather be slim than fat.

I myself am prejudiced against fat people. The American actress, Kirsty Alley has put on so much weight since her heyday; and I feel queasy whenever I look at her bloated body and puffy face.

Slim folks also do not struggle to squeeze themselves into narrow seats on planes (one of the most humiliating experiences I have endured in recent years was when a seat belt refused to fully stretch across my huge stomach, so the air hostess had to provide me with an extension that was designed for pregnant women). OK, so I’m keeping all of the above advantages of slimness in mind and keeping cheerleading readers like Uloma Jide-Afonja in mind.

Uloma wrote to me last week to say:

“I must tell you that I was disappointed to read that you succumbed to guilty pleasures, lol. I also know from my personal experience that losing weight is a struggle. I am glad you are determined to adopt healthier options this 2021. Please, many of us are motivated by you. Please don’t let us down. Good luck.”

By the way, I’ll be in London for another couple of weeks and one advantage of being here is that the only people who can afford full-time domestic help in the UK are rich; and I’m certainly not rich.

I hire a Jamaican lady once a week to help with chores like ironing. But I’m on my own the rest of the time; and you’ll be amazed how many calories you burn when you have to run up and down shopping for groceries, carrying heavy bags, cooking, tidying up, making beds, stacking and unstacking dishwashers, getting up to trudge to the kitchen every time you need a glass of water or whatever; and so on.

In Nigeria, househelps are affordable by every Tom Dick and Tunde; and their support can be very useful. But, Boy! Do they keep us lazy.