You Need a Great Big Woman

That is the name of the first song I ever heard by the blues singer, Candye Kane. (Here's a link to that song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hx3X-vGOkQ0 ...okay, you just heard it for the first time, how great was that?) It was her mantra, I believe, because she was, at that time, a great big woman. She helped me a lot in my quest for body acceptance. I also liked the fact that she said to "work what you've got, whether it's a little, or a lot", because that, of course, is the message of body acceptance--to work what you've got and love what you've got. I loved all of her music, including the very raunchy songs. This is partly because I am, in fact, very raunchy myself, and also because she was very clear on the facts that 1. big woman can be sexy 2. big women can like sex and 3. big women deserve as much sex as anyone else. Which was always my attitude, along with, all you need to be sexy is to believe you're sexy. So I believed. And loved her music. Then something happened....around five years ago, Candye Kane was diagnosed with a form of pancreatic cancer. It's clearly not the death sentence kind, because I just saw her live last night, but one of the affects of that cancer was that she lost about half of her body weight, in what I think was a very short time. Last night when I saw her, and let me just say right now that her voice is magnificent (and even that sells it short) and her spirit is indomitable, but physically, she's just a little bit of a thing. She fits more closely into the stereotype of the attractive woman, being thin, slight, a bit fragile. But I have read things she's written and she's quite vocal about a few things that are decidedly not conventional wisdom. First thing she says is (and I paraphrase greatly here) damned good thing I was so fat. Because if I hadn't been so fat, I probably wouldn't have survived at all--I needed all the resources (fat) my body had to offer. The second thing is, I don't like being thin! I liked being fat. I liked how my body felt and I liked how my skin felt...and I was healthy then and I'm not now. So that's interesting, right? That someone who lost one half of her body weight (wow, they could put her on the cover of "People", in one of those articles, because hey, she lost half of her body weight, without surgery) can be NOT HAPPY about it. That someone who used to be FAT (like fat, fat, the water rat fat) can miss that. And that she can attribute her very survival to that fat. Interesting because NO ONE (maybe outside of Africa) is supposed to think that way. Thin is better, and hey, if it took cancer, then it took cancer. Interesting because you're not supposed to miss the fat when it's gone. As I said to my trainer, after another one of our "why aren't you losing weight" conversations (yes, we have them) I know we're all supposed to be throwing confetti and blowing up balloons when we lose weight, but...maybe not. Maybe not. I actually like the changes in my body that are coming about because of my working out. I like that I can tense up my leg and it's muscle, from the top to the bottom, almost without exception. I never minded being bigger, but I minded being jiggly and the jiggly is going away. I like the way I can feel my muscles when I move, I mean feel them under my skin, sliding away, contracting and relaxing...I like that. I like feeling stronger and I like feeling leanER...as though more of what constitutes me is muscle--but my goal is not necessarily to be either light, or thin. The first notes of "Great Big Woman" settled into my soul that night, and stayed there. Her words settled into my soul and stayed there. I suppose the take-away from her music, but also her life, is that you do indeed need to love what you've got, no matter what it is, because it is there to serve you. Love yourself. Everything else flows from that.

Still wondering

So where is the line? I still don't know where the line is. I mean the line between trying to improve yourself and just accepting yourself. I'm standing squarely on that line myself, by the way. I'm doing all this stuff at the gym, I'm journaling and "making good food choices" (because I stoutly--stoutly, get it? Oh, I'm a riot--maintain that every single grown woman in the western hemisphere knows how to lose weight) and yes, I'm losing weight. Because how can I not? Even after all these years of yo-yo dieting, even being 57 years old, when my metabolism is meant to have slowed to a crawl, even with a bad knee and a hip that still pulls, I can do it. A few weeks ago, I went to a family party. This party had some very large women at it. None of them, by the way, were related to me by blood. Some were from my husband's side of the family, and some were from the other side of my husband's side of the family (ie, unrelated to my husband) and some were just friends. Of all the women there, all the grown women that is, I can only think of three who were not at least overweight. Some were on the chubby side, some were, frankly, floridly obese. They were also all shapes...that is, they carried their weight differently. I'm fairly sure that if you had talked to each one of them, they would have had their own reasons as to why they were overweight. Genetics. Job. Health issues. A combo! One of them told me what was clearly (at least to me) a carefully constructed rationale and excuse at once, for being overweight: her premise was that in order to take care of yourself, to lose weight or maintain a healthy weight, you have to be selfish, and those who aren't selfish, who care for others, can't be expected to care for themselves, too, to the level they need to in order to maintain a lower weight. It's slick, I'll say that, and it's got virtue and a degree of morality wound up in it, too. And I'll even say it's a little bit true, because if you're the primary caregiver for someone aging or with a disability, then, yes, it is damned hard, both practically and from an emotional standpoint, to take time for yourself. And from purely personal experience, I can say that a pint of Ben & Jerry's a night is a lot easier (and gives more immediate satisfaction) than the gym. And I know that it's considered being a concern troll (nice phrase there, by the way) to say that someone would be more comfortable at a lower weight....but there were some cases where I absolutely thought that. Does that make me a troll for just thinking it? Or do I have to say it out loud? And does it count that I said it here? But who wouldn't think that, other than a feeder, seeing a 30-year-old woman with fat to the ankles, fat on fat on her thighs.... And I'll agree...you can carry more weight when you're young. But I'm not sure anyone ever bargained on the amount of weight that Americans are now carrying. I suppose we all have to decide where the line is, for ourselves, and ideally, stop judging other people for where they are. (And the day we stop judging is the day we can burn every single religious book that there is, not out of disrespect but because we won't need them anymore because everyone will have reached a collective state of enlightenment and we'll probably all levitate, they way we used to try to at slumber parties). For myself, I seem to have committed to going to the gym and doing increasingly more difficult workouts, while keeping a food journal and trying to make food choices that are generally considered to be "good". I know, that for myself, this will result in a lower body weight and a trimmer body all over. I honestly can't say what it will do for my medical numbers because I steadfastly avoided doctors for many, many years. What I find most difficult, I have to say, is accepting myself as I change, since accepting the changed self as good seems to imply that the old one was bad. And the old one, while not perfect, was reasonably serviceable, and I hate betraying her that way. Stay tuned....