DIETS
Okay, I’ll admit it. I put on about ten pounds over the Holidays. Too much eggnog, pies, cookies, and spiral-sliced ham. This always happens and some of it is necessary. It’s my winter fat. Without the additional blubber, I’d have to hibernate until Spring.
So I can stand to lose a few pounds. But I dislike those messages from the media urging people to buy their product to quickly lose tonnage. The best weight loss comes from eating the right foods, in the right quantities, over a long period of time. It’s that simple. That’s why fad diets or doing 100 miles on the treadmill you usually use as a clothes rack, will fail.
Have you ever noticed that it’s the people who don’t need to lose weight that worry about it the most? I have a friend who wears a size 0. And she complains about gaining weight. What size would she zoom up to anyway — a size 2?
It’s been ingrained in our modern society to associate attractiveness, success, and wealth with ratios of body fat. On a sliding scale, we gain more of the former when we have less of the latter. That’s just a bunch of hooey.
Being fat, overweight or rotund has been in and out of fashion. It was in fashion when people didn’t get enough to eat. The most desirable individuals were usually the ones with the most body fat. It connoted health and fertility. Why do you think Neolithic females were depicted as hefty in clay figurines? Because hefty women bred more and made better babies, that’s why.
At the other end of the scale, being skinny is desirable because it’s easier to bulk up when it comes to clothes. Skinny folk fit through doors better and only need one airline seat. Having a thin body has great descriptive adjectives associated with it, like “willowy” or “reedy”. On the other hand, really skinny people look boney and act irritable. Well, like duh — they’re hungry.
Of course, standards of body fat have always been more rigorously applied to women rather than men. The implication is that heavy women are not attractive or desirable. It’s not true, and a woman’s weight is not what predicts success in relationships. A large bank account may.
Somehow, the myth persists that women need to attract a man. I hate to break it to you sister, but being attracted to women is a built-in male need (unless the guy is not heterosexual). It’s right up there with food and football. You just have to go out there and grab the guy you want — make your interest known. Nine times out of ten I guarantee those male hormones will kick in and he’ll lumber after you like a tame grizzly.
It’s attracting the attention you want that’s more difficult. And even there, you know it isn’t all about looks. You can have the figure of an underfed model, apply the right eyeliner, dress smartly, have a great career and finances, and still find yourself facing divorce number five.
Rigorous science has proved, time and time again, that female choice is the driving force in relationships — not male. A female bird chooses the male who brings her the best twigs or ruffles her feathers in just the right way. A male deer may follow a receptive female around during mating season. But she won’t let him do his thing unless she’s ready and he’s demonstrated his superior strength and endurance. Not that he needs that during the act itself, which is extremely brief.
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