Once again, the news has coughed up an interesting hairball that caught my eye.

I find myself simultaneously bored and sympathetic.

Bored, because, well, duh. Intellectually, it’s not possible that losing a lot of weight is going to make your life problem-free (unless you’ve just lost 180 pounds of ugly weight through a divorce, for example).

Sympathetic, though, because I know that so many of us gain weight to use as a human shield against complicating situations and people. Unfortunately, if the weight really IS a shield, then it again only makes sense that, if you lose the shield, then all those complicating situations and people are going to come rushing in.

So I’m kind of back to duh!

Interesting personal note: some time after I pried off sixty pounds, I remember standing in the shower reflecting on my life situation at the moment and thinking, “I wish I’d never lost the weight.” Mercifully, I can’t remember what set of circumstances might make me give voice to such heresy, but there you go.
But one thing about the article that aggravated me is the assertion by one of the women in the article: “I think fat people are sold a fantasy, and then get no support in the reality, because we’re simply supposed to be grateful that we’re no longer fat.”

Um, I can say with some confidence that if we feel that life is going to be nothing but sunshine and roses and unicorn giggles after we lose the weight, I don’t know who in the heck is supposed to ‘support us in the reality,’ because at this point we’ve bought a fantasy.

And there is a difference between the two.