Health: Today is the beginning of the rest of your life

2006-06-12T17:06:00.000+10:00

I’ve always been a firm believer in the notion that to start well is to achieve brilliant things, and end on a level that would be impossible to ascend to through initial pessimism. And that … that, I think, is where I’ve gone right when it comes to my diet, exercise program and every other measure and factor that has led me to my current state of fitness. Sitting on my ass and writing this, I’m currently 5’2 and 44 kg. Before you make presumptions, let me assure you that the level of thinking you have just switched to is one of the reasons this country – Australia – as well as the other obvious lard-assed nations have such an overwhelming number of fatties.

If you’re offended, leave. The only types of people I’ve never made time for in my life are those who are ignorant and those who are unable to listen to the truth. With due respect you may be aware that a low weight and BMI isn’t always indicative of good health. There are too many conflicting messages – take Hollywood. Take, say, Lindsay Lohan. Belittled for having curves, forced to an extreme, then berated for it. How can celebrities win? How can young girls feel good about their bodies when they constantly entrust their self-esteem to comparisons of their own sizes to those of the famous, who in turn must always be thinner than the norm in order to maintain their uniqueness? I’ve always seen this as some kind of vicious circle, and it’s getting ridiculous.

I have to admit excessive fat sickens me. The epidemic is rife – the other day (a case in point, bear with me) a grossly overweight man sat next to me on the bus. I was so disgusted at his complete inconsideration of my need for personal space (and oxygen) that I got off two blocks away from the flat and walked the rest of the way. One step into the UQ canteen is enough to send bile into my throat. Hot dogs, chips, meat pies, overdressed salads, sugary junk in every shade under the sun – every day I have to watch my friends eat this garbage, content in the belief their youth will protect their waistlines. Where do they think that slice of chocolate cake will go? Their feet?

Fat, contrary to the opinion you might already have formed about me, is not a superficial issue for me. For me, it’s about being able to climb the stairs with a heavy backpack and not break a sweat. It’s about remembering, or hell even discovering, that it IS possible to use your feet to get around. It’s about healthy eating that can be just as delicious as a bag of Smiths or a bottle of Coke. It’s about not finding enough time to exercise, yet through an as yet undiscovered law of physics being able to watch hours of television, eat out every night, party every weekend and sit until dawn at the computer in one’s musky bedroom. It’s about the irony of a sport-mad country where thousands sit consuming junk and beer while watching the most physically fit people in the country toss around a pointy football.

(In an aside, let me state how sick I am of the Socceroos and their ‘supporters’. What the hell do Australians know about real football? One trip to England and you can count how many cheers even the lowliest team has on one hand. And us? Um … “Aussie Aussie Aussie … oi oi oi”, or “Here we go, here we go, here we go …”, or, god forbid, “Waltzing Matilda”. The first World Cup match for us is today, and I for one would not mind Japan kicking our asses. Yeah, I really hate bandwagons.)

I have a friend named Victoria. She’s 5’8 and extremely lean, but very fit. The madness that is the First World’s opinion on weight resulted in a group of girls walking up to us in the canteen and telling her to stop purging after her meals, as she didn’t look good at her current weight. Everywhere I turn, skinny is being ostracised. Curves are ‘in’.

Give me a break.

Personally, I think curves are great. HEALTHY curves. Muscled arms, toned legs, small tummies. Fat is essential, yes, but curves are not good when they blow your stomach upwards so much you can’t see your own feet. Or when you can’t sit on the bus without filling up more than one seat. Or when you grow an extra chin. I believe society has become so fixed on pointing the blame elsewhere – at those idiot politicians, at those nasty junk food advertisers, at that bingo-winged tuckshop lady – that people have lulled themselves into a state where they believe their weight is a result of others’ actions, rather than their own.

Bullshit. Two options. Petitioning for the removal of junk food from television screens, or going out and buying fruit and vegetables for your children and teaching them the value of exercise. Which is harder? I don’t have children, but I am a daughter. My parents instilled in me from a young age the importance of healthy eating and living, and even though I was a brat like every other kid and demanded ice-cream and lollies, they never backed down. It was the best thing they ever did for me, and not just for my weight, but for my ego. Parents of today’s kids who are unable to ‘JUST SAY NO’ are creating a generation of demanding, spoilt and chubby monsters. Nothing gets me down more than a harassed mother of two walking out of a 7-Eleven with one son clutching a two litre Pepsi bottle and the other an extra-large bag of chips. Is it worse being ‘cruel to be kind’, or seeing the adverse health effects of your nutritional decisions for your children in the future?

I think the weight crisis is primarily a result of the strive for perfection. There’s a kind of ‘be all or end all’ mood out there, one which results in those who can’t reach a certain low weight giving up all together. I’ve seen men and women on the streets during my daily morning walks who were doing fantastic work, only to see them disappear a few weeks down the track, probably because they weren’t losing weight and shaping up as they thought they should be. Women starve themselves to be perfect, only to lose lean muscle and eventually succumb to temptation, gaining back more weight and ending up with an even higher ratio of fat to muscle. Men lift weights to an extreme to be perfect, only to injure themselves. They think they’ve failed. And each time, with every failure, they lose hope. They think they’d just be better off enjoying life on the couch with their ‘bad’ food.

If only they knew that starvation leads to fat storage. If only they knew that lifting weights more than three days a week hurts the body more than helping it. If only they knew they could lose weight by eating smaller meals more often throughout the day.

And then there are those who know what they have to do to get what they want, but instead turn to what they want more – a quick fix. It truly astonishes me how many people fall for the page 55 ad for the amazing non-invasive technique that slims legs, or the ab-machine that can somehow melt away the layers of fat around one’s waist without a second of cardio involved, or the incredible pill that can turn spare tyres into washboards in a week.

In fact, it frightens me.

elektros randomized

Moved.

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