Hungry for a diet that will help me beat cancer

You may be shocked to hear this, but I'm trying to lose weight. Many of you are thinking to yourselves, “Gee, Marla Jo, we think you look absolutely perfect the way you are,” and I thank you for that.

But you're all liars. I'm tired of buying “plussize” clothes, which are always pictured in catalogs on models who weigh 30 pounds soaking wet, so you imagine in your fantasies that you'll look like that when you buy that dress. Even though you know this is ridiculous, you can't help yourself.

Then when the box arrives and you put on the dress — the exact same dress that looked so fabulous on the model — you look like it was made by a Moroccan tent-maker on drugs. You wouldn't wear it outside to water the lawn.

So, yeah, I'm tired of this. And I'm also tired of ordering clothes that are ostensibly my size (and, no, I'm not going to tell you) and discovering that they will only fit over my calf. And, instead of returning them (as any sensible person would), I hang them in my closet with the tags intact, secure in the knowledge that someday I'll lose enough weight to wear them. Yeah, right.

Some of you might wonder why I don't just go shopping in person, and that's because there are very few stores these days that sell plus-size garments, and they're either expensive or ugly. Or both.

It's just depressing. That's why I've decided to whittle myself down to the size of Twiggy (remember her?) and prance in a lighthearted manner right past those “full-figured ladies” stores, instead entering shops that wouldn't sell my current size if the world collapsed and only chubby people remained.

I miss hiking, and hauling a larger-than-normal carcass up a hiking trail to an ocean overlook is not fun. It requires more sweat than I even have available in my body.

There's also that pesky problem I've had for the last four years: incurable cancer. Yep. There's no question that exercising and losing weight will help me fight this disease. At the moment it's stopped growing (hooray!) but removing pounds of ugly fat from my body will definitely help keep it at bay.

My 26-year-old son, Cheetah Boy, is a weightlifter who currently looks like a Greek god. He's always complaining that he wants to gain more weight. And I keep offering him some of mine, but we've never quite worked out how to make that happen.

Meanwhile, people often ask me how I have changed my diet to combat my cancer. Because diet is really important, even if many doctors ignore this.

But here's the problem: No one really agrees on which diet is best for fighting the Big C. Except that getting rid of processed food and junk food is the first step.

I now make most of my meals at home from scratch, using my slow cooker and Instant Pot to make this easier. I usually make enough salad to last for several days and eat a huge bowl for breakfast. Otherwise, life might get hectic and I might forget.

But the question of meat versus vegan, and carbs versus fat, is still confusing. I ate only plants for years, with little to no oils or fats, and I never felt better in my life.

There's plenty of scientific evidence that dairy products make cancer grow. So I do my best to skip those, except for cheese. Sigh.

I even went to a fasting clinic up in Santa

Rosa where I paid a lot of money to not eat anything for a week. It didn't work.

Meanwhile, more and more doctors now are recommending that cancer patients eat keto — meaning as few carbohydrates as possible and lots of meat and fat — on the theory that cancer loves carbs and sugar that help it grow.

I have tried both of these plans, and they both worked for a while. The problem is that my particular rare cancer is a really tricky little bugger that manages to neutralize any swashbuckling attempts to defeat it. So it wasn't long before it started growing again.

Nowadays, I'm just trying to lose weight in a state of utter confusion. Of course, some of you would say that's my normal condition anyway, and this is true.

So far, I've lost 3 pounds this month, and as long as I can keep saying that, I'll be happy. Somehow, I keep driving past the Krispy Kreme store without stopping. Cross your fingers I can keep that up.