Good News, Sober, Bad News, Fat
Hint: It’s not 118
I’ll talk about almost anything except exactly how much I weigh. All I’ll say is that I’ve gained 23 pounds since the last time I worked up the courage to step on a scale, and that was a mere four months ago.
It’s happened before. In fact, it’s happened almost every time I’ve come out the other side of a detox. It was most spectacular in 2002, after Rehab #3, when I gained 40 pounds in 14 weeks. I get clean and I eat. And eat. And eat.
I’ve gained weight at least partially because I don’t live in LA anymore. I’m no longer going to dinners with my fabulous friends at expense-account establishments; me and my no-less-fabulous friends frequent burrito joints and noodle houses. At Spago Beverly Hills, the 300-calorie Austrian Chicken Bouillon is fantastic. At Cancun in the Mission, fantastic comes in the form of 2500-calorie tacos with jack cheese and sour cream. In Los Angeles, I stayed thin enough to fit into the size 4 get-ups I wore to work; these days I have no real reason to get out of my sweats, which I’m certainly not wearing to the gym.
The most vigorous exercise I can manage involves walking from my downstairs bedroom up to the first-floor kitchen. Whereas I used to do yoga four or five times a week, it’s been months since I’ve made it to class. Forward folds have taken on a humiliating new meaning, and any possibility of finding the serenity I once experienced through yoga disappeared when I realized that I was in danger of suffocating myself when I moved into shoulder stand.
I’m 23 pounds heavier than I was pre-rehab for a lot of reasons. The most obvious is that I’m no longer getting high, and without dope to blunt my feelings, I eat over them. But I also eat because I’m bored, and because the only reason to get out of bed in the morning is frequently breakfast. I eat because I love food, and love is hard to come by. But still: it’s time to knock it off.
Losing weight this time through means sitting with my feelings, and that’s a lot more challenging than making sensible nutritional choices and getting my heart rate up. It’s uncomfortable, but it’s not insurmountable. I’ll lose the 23 pounds, but, until I do, seriously: I’d appreciate it if you’d resist the kind urge to tell me how healthy I look.
