My Big, Fat Obsession

Weight loss shows seem to be all the rage lately. Shows that feature extremely overweight and/or morbidly obese people trying to take off the pounds and adapt to a lifelong healthy lifestyle. Whenever these types of shows come on TV you can almost always count me in as a viewer. And a crier.  Biggest Loser. Duh. Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition. Yep. MTV's I Use To Be Fat. Uh huh. VH1's Celebrity Fit Club. Obvi. And the list goes on.  I usually have to keep a large box of tissues near me when I watch because these shows often always have me in tears. Tears of sadness for the pain in these people's lives, both physical and emotional.  Tears of happiness when they achieve their goal. Tears of disappointment if they don't. Tears of fear of becoming that large myself.  I can't help it. I get sucked in to the realism of it all. In fact, when they tell their stories, I often find myself relating to them. And this is what is so heart-wrenching. I am no where close to their size, yet I possess a lot of the same feelings about my body that they do about theirs. (On a totally semi-related note, if I see an extremely obese person in public, I sometimes burst into tears. It is not something I am proud to admit, or even embarrassed to admit, but it just always hits a nerve for me. Yes, I am aware I should probably be in therapy about this.)

One of my biggest fears in life is becoming obese. I hate to say it, but I honestly do not know what I would do with myself if I became "that" big. I have a hard enough time dealing with and accepting the size I am now, and the thought of being any heavier scares me to death. This is probably the reason I watch these shows. They almost ingrain this fear in me that scares me so much, I know I will never let that happen to myself. (Hopefully.)

My mother, is also a fan of many of these so called "fat-people shows" and we discuss them often. Unfortunately, and it should come as no surprise to her as she is reading this, that she is probably the main reason with my obsession with weight. For as long as I can remember, my mom has criticized my weight, what I eat, and my exercise habits. (I love you mom, but you can't deny this.) Mind you, I eat pretty healthy a majority of the time and I work out on a regular basis. But for some reason, I am still overweight.  Yes, it bothers me a lot, but it seems to bother her more. In fact, the only time we fight or she makes me cry is over my weight (and the fact that I am still single.  And don't think I don't see a correlation between those two things.)  It's probably unhealthy that we discuss these shows because of this trigger between us, but we can't stop.  I know deep down that I will never be the size of one of the participants on these shows, but I do sympathize with them.  They bare all on national TV all for the sake of becoming healthy. They are very brave and I wish them nothing but the best. But shame on them for making me cry so much. Oh wait, that's my issue, not theirs.