Citizen of the Month

the writing and photography of Neil Kramer

Category: Health (Page 6 of 7)

The Buddy System

May 21, 2006 / / 48 Comments

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Back in my single days, I liked to entertain a woman on a first date with this little trick. After dinner, as we walked hand-in-hand in the crisp night air, I would take off my shirt and ask her to bounce a quarter off of my chest. Women would be amazed as the quarter would spring off the tautness of my muscles and fly 150 feet away.

This afternoon, I was in Staples buying an ink-jet refill, when I found a quarter on the floor. For old-times sake, I asked this cheerful mother of two (buying colored construction paper for her adorable little girl — hello, Rachel!) if she would bounce the quarter off of my bare chest. She happily agreed, and as her two daughters looked on, she threw the quarter against my body. While the mother was very impressed with the result — the quarter flew smack into the middle of faraway aisle 12 (“Digital Media”), I was very disappointed that the quarter only went 75 feet. This meant only one thing — it was time for me to go back to the gym.

The only problem is that I don’t like going to the gym. It is BORING! I’m also a major procrastinator. When I try to do something I really don’t want to do it, I find a million reasons to put it off. For instance:

Neil 1: “I thought about going to the gym tonight.”

Neil 2: “But whoops, I just ate”

Neil 1: “Maybe later. ”

Neil 2: “Oh, I’m sorry. I have to wash some towels later.”

Neil 1: “How about after that? ”

Neil 2: “Hey, isn’t playing with yourself considered exercise? I’ll do that instead!”

Remember, I live in Los Angeles. Being in the best shape is very important here, especially in the summer. Showing off your body is actually SO important to Angelenos that law firms in Century City now allow their partners to come in wearing bathing suits and bikinis during the summer months.

I need help with this gym thing. And here’s where YOU come in.

A week ago, I was reading a post by the charming Caitlin at Caitlinator. She was writing about how she was avoiding writing some resumes. I instantly related, because I just happen to procrastinate on writing resumes as much as I do about going to the gym. I wrote a comment to her, joking that we should make sure the other wrote ten resumes this week. If one of us didn’t, we’d have to pay the other ten bucks. I completely forgot about this “deal” until today. And you know what? — it’s not a bad idea!

Think about how much easier it is to write your blog posts than any of your “regular” writing. That’s because you know that someone — even if it is a crazy stranger living thousands of miles away — is reading your blog. We’re always motivated by others!.

So, I’m looking for a virtual exercise buddy for the next week. Just one week to see if it works — and get us both started. This person should be someone as lazy as me. He/she should hate going to the gym.

This is the deal: We each go to our gym, or exercise in some other way — let’s say twice this week — nothing too over-the-top. By the end of the week, if one of us fails to accomplish the mission, the loser has to:

1) Write a post humiliating yourself in front of the world.
2) Buy your buddy a CD of his/her choice.
3) Donate twenty bucks to some cancer research charity.

I think the fear of humiliation alone will make us exercise.

Anyone want to be my buddy?

A Year Ago in Citizen of the Month:  My Date with Rob and Kai.

One Month of Waiting

May 9, 2006 / / 75 Comments

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During the last month, I haven’t been very good at commenting on blogs, answering emails, or returning calls.  After I wrote a post about accompanying Sophia to her mammogram, nothing was found on the mammogram or the ultra-sound.  We were ecstatic.  However, she also had an MRI done.  Sophia’s surgeon called with some bad news: they saw “something” in her right breast on the MRI.   This was especially scary because a year and a half ago, the same doctor removed a cancer tumor from her left breast.   This could signify something more serious.   Sophia and I both freaked out.

The surgeon, a well-known doctor at Cedars-Sinai, said that because this “something” could only be seen on the MRI, a regular biopsy could not be performed, and that the only way to go was to do a full invasive surgical biopsy, general anaesthesia and all.

Now, this doctor already knew that Sophia wasn’t just going to follow orders.  If there ever existed an organization called Proactive Patients of America, Sophia would be the poster child.   A year and a half ago, Sophia convinced her doctor to do a new radiation procedure, Mammosite, an intense twice-daily five day therapy available for those with early-stage breast cancer.  The treatment is used instead of the typical seven weeks of whole breast external beam radiation therapy   This required Sophia to have an additional small surgery, and to walk around with a “balloon” inserted in her breast for ten days.  The procedure works by delivering radiation from inside the breast directly to the tissue where cancer is most likely to recur.  It was painful and uncomfortable, but it seemed to have worked, and this technique is supposed to be much more concentrated than regular radiation, and therefore protect the heart and lungs from extensive radiation damage.

Sophia bravely made it through the treatment.

This time, after this latest discovery, Sophia went back into action, doing her own research.  She was wary of getting invasive surgery on her other breast.  Her healing after the original surgery has been difficult.  She went home and Googled every cancer site in the world.  She learned about another relatively new treatment,  a non-invasive biopsy called the MRI-Guided Vacuum Assisted Breast Biopsy that could be used in certain circumstances.  Rather than surgery, the patient is put into a MRI machine, and then, with an assistance of a new apparatus, a special needle is used which “vacuums” the samples out.

Sophia asked her surgeon about the procedure.  He said it was a theoretical possibility, but there was one big problem.  Cedars-Sinai did not have the equipment. 

Here is where most of us would give up.  I told Sophia to forget it.  Did she listen to me?  Of course not.  She went ahead and convinced the hospital to RENT the equipment for her.   This way they could learn the new technique better and eventually buy the system for the hospital to use.

While this was a giant step forward, there was still a lot of fear in the air:

1)  Sophia was giving herself up as a guinea pig.
2)  What happens if they do find cancer?

For two weeks, we waited for the big day.   Tensions grew between us.   It was hard to concentrate on anything other than the wait.   At night, rather than talk about any issues, we spent our time watching TV shows about Texas Hold-em. 

A few days before the hospital appointment, Sophia got a small cut on her finger and it got infected.  It seemed like a big nothing, but when the doctor heard about it, he said they must postpone the appointment because the procedure could cause a severe infection.  We wouldn’t be able to do the biopsy for another ten days.  Sophia was put on two super-strong antibiotics they give people with a most serious Staph infection.

Ten more days!!  Let’s just say that during those ten days, Sophia and I became professional Texas Hold-em players by watching TV every night.  We would talk about players like Daniel Negreanu and Doyle Brunson over dinner, like they were family.

Eventually, the day came.  I was not in the hospital room during the procedure.  I was in the waiting room leafing through a Golf Magazine.  Why does the hospital put these magazines out?  Are they for the patients or the doctors?  

As I sat there, Sophia was slipped in and out of the MRI machine at least 10 times, while they were mapping, positioning, re-positioning, checking, putting the needle in, etc. .  I’ve never been in an MRI machine, but I hear it is pretty unpleasant; you wear earplugs because it’s as loud as sitting in the engine of a fighter jet, your hands are tied, you have to keep perfectly still, and you feel like you’re trapped inside a barrel.

Despite it all, it was still better than invasive surgery.  The procedure took about an hour and a half, plus time in recovery.  We went home and waited again, this time for the results.

More watching poker shows for a few days.

Today, there was good news:  it was benign.   No cancer.

Sophia and I can stop watching poker and go back to fighting with each other again.  Back to normal.

I know a lot of you go on those Revlon breast cancer walks or contribute to the cause.  Thank you.

Throughout this whole ordeal, I’ve been amazed at how Sophia has handled it all — from the way she took medical matters into her own hands, to her willingness to be a guinea pig, to the way she kept her sense of humor.  

Of course, things aren’t really “over” yet.  That is one terrible thing about cancer.  You can never fully say it is over.  There is a five year “period” where you have to keep a watchful eye for any recurrance. 

Yes, Sophia and I are still separated and all that.  Nothing has changed.  But during the past month, I certainly was reminded about why I married Sophia in the first place — her beauty, brains, and grit.

If you haven’t heard my song to Sophia yet — which I put out there on the eve of her procedure — you can find it here.   Feel free to send her a message — or write a better song!

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Fat People

May 7, 2006 / / 108 Comments

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I’ve written a number of posts about women’s weight issues, from an early post about looking for a size 14 at the Beverly Center to an inane post about Lindsay Lohan and Nicole Richie which still gets comments from crazed, anorexic teenagers.

It probably doesn’t make much sense why this issue interests me so much.  I’m not a woman and I’m not overweight.  I think what bothers me the most is the way being overweight is being demonized in our society — for both men and women, and “fat” has become a code word for something more than just weight, with meanings now associated with class and social standing.

This might sound weird to you, but I’m sure part of my sensitivity to a singled-out group comes from being Jewish.  I feel lucky to have grown up in New York City, where being Jewish is so common that even the Puerto Rican bus driver who took us to school knew when Yom Kippur was coming up.  While there were some tensions between blacks and Jews in my public schools, I never experienced traditional “anti-semitism.”  It wasn’t until I went to college and met Jews from other parts of the country, that I learned that the word “Jew” could be used as a dirty word.  Some synagogues in the South even used the word “Hebrews” so as not to appear too “Jewish.” 

I learned about “jewing down” the price, with its negative connotations of cheapness and unscrupulous behavior.   Was my mother “jewing down” all these years?  After all, my mother’s whole shopping strategy was to “shop for the bargains.”  I always thought that was what you were supposed to do!  But then I learned that wealthier “Manhattan” Jews went  to the more expensive stores to buy the products at higher prices — so they can look less Jewish!  After all, if the non-Jews are too dumb to look for the bargains, then we should become dumb, too.  But this never really worked, because then buying at the better store became the Jewish thing to do, so it undermined the whole reason for shopping there in the first place.  Luckily, things have changed, and now everyone is like my Jewish mother from Queens, shopping amazon.com to save ten bucks on a digital camera (with free shipping!).  (note to Arab media:  does this mean Amazon.com is a Zionist tool?)

I remember having a Jewish friend from Louisville in college and he was so obsessed about not being seen as a “cheap Jew,” that he would scold me if I picked up a “lucky penny” off the street. 

I don’t need to go into a history lesson about how Jews have been demonized throughout history.  You still see those images of beady-eyed Jews with hooked noses in Arab newspapers.   It’s the dehumanization of a people that makes it easier to exterminate a group or blow up a bus.

Not that Jews don’t have their own bigotries.  I’ve always been a bit of a snot-nosed kid on this subject of bigotry — always on a crusade.   I remember when my uncle would come visit, he would always used the word “schvatza” when talking about blacks.  (schvatza simply means black in Yiddish, as does the name Schwartz (like Schwartzenneger.  It doesn’t really have any negative connotations to it — it means black — but when Jews say it, they usually say it with a negative spin, meaning “ghetto blacks.”   When my uncle would say this, I would leave the table, angrily saying, “I will not listen to any of this racism!”   In retrospect, if I met a kid like me today, I would find him a humorless prig.

Now what does all this about Jews and blacks have to do with “overweight” people? 

I think the association started when I was listening to this song from one of my favorite artists, Ben Folds.   While reading the lyrics, think about how the imagery of “fat” people is used symbolically to represent everything that is wrong with our American consumer culture.

All U Can Eat (They Give No Fuck)
by Ben Folds

Son, look at all the people/In this restaurant
What do you think they weigh?
And out the window/To the parking lot
At their SUVs taking all of this space

They give no fuck/They talk as loud as they want
They give no fuck/Just as long as there’s enough

For them

Gonna get on the microphone/Down at Wal-Mart
Talk about some shit/That’s been on my mind
Talk about the state/Of this great nation of ours
People look to your left/Yeah and look to your right

They give no fuck/They buy as much as they would want
They give no fuck/Just as long as there’s enough

For them

Son, look at the people/Lining up for plastic
Wouldn’t you like to see ’em/In the National Geographic
Squating bare-assed in the dirt/Eating rice from a bowl
With a towel on their head and/Maybe a bone in their nose

See that asshole/With a peace sign on his license plate
Giving me the finger and/Running me out of his lane
God made us number one/’Cause he loves us the best
But he should go bless/Someone else for a while
And give us a rest

(They give no)Yeah and everyone can see
(They give no)We’ve eaten all that we can eat

Fat people = all you can eat = SUVs = Walmart

Now, I actually agree with Ben Folds about our culture of overconsumption.   But I don’t feel comfortable singling out larger-sized people to make the point.  Poetry can be used for harm as much as for beauty. 

I can hear the twelve year old kid in me asking the questions…

“Do you mean that skinny people never go to all-you-can-eat buffets?  Or that skinny people don’t own SUVs?  Isn’t it a fact that most rich people are actually thin — and they are the ones who are most benefiting from our society.  Isn’t it an easy target to use the fat Midwesterner as the symbol of the ugly American?”

Am I being a snot-nosed prig again? 

Recently I saw some reformed racist on Oprah explaining to her that “nigger” isn’t that bad of a word; he would never think of Oprah as a “nigger.”  And I’m sure there are people who still use the expression “jew down.” 

Maybe you’re thinking, “What’s so wrong with demonizing fat people, just like we’ve successfully demonized smokers?  Maybe it will force them to change.  We do have an overweight country.  And being fat is not healthy.”

But do we really want to shun those who are full-figured in the same way we force smokers out of the restaurant?   Why do so many women, for example, avoid “hanging out” with an overweight girlfriend?   Are they afraid that getting fat is catching?   And isn’t the very fact that I’m using the word “overweight” a sign of my own brainwashing by society?  By whose standard is someone overweight?  Am I talking about someone 400 pounds or a woman who is size 12?

Have you read about this poll done by Fitness Magazine?

“More than half of Americans say they’d rather lose their jobs than get fat.

Fifty-eight percent of women and 54% of men say they’d rather be unemployed than gain 75 pounds. And 63% of women and 55% of men say they’d rather be poor with no extra pounds to lose than rich and substantially overweight.

75% of men and 80% of women say they wouldn’t give up 20 intelligence-quotient points to gain the perfect body.”

Clearly, there is a large percentage of the population that fears being fat more than being poor  (I doubt these respondents were ever poor).  Being poor has some coolness to it  — songwriters write about it all the time.  But being fat is “shameful.”  And I’m sure there are many intelligent, liberal-minded, perfectly politically-correct people out there who would never think of saying anything bigoted against Jews, blacks, gays, Muslims, etc. — but who see no problem at all singing along with Ben Folds:

“Son, look at all the people/In this restaurant
What do you think they weigh?” 

Oral Fixation

May 1, 2006 / / 34 Comments

 

PRIVATE CHAT ROOM, 2AM

HOTDAVE23:  Mmmm… U R HOT… cough…  What are U… cough cough… wearing now?

2SEXYJUDY:  Just my… cough cough… sexiest… cough cough… THONG…

HOTDAVE23:  Wow…cough… R U as… cough .. TURNED ON as… cough…  I am?

2SEXYJUDY:  U make me so… cough cough… WET.   I want your BIG… cough… HARD… cough… whoops, I dropped the.. cough… damn… cough… ashtray into my… cough cough… daughter's crib… BRB

Conversation overheard at DatingforSmokers.com. 

Waiting for the Mammogram

April 5, 2006 / / 35 Comments

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This afternoon, I  accompanied Sophia  to Cedars Sinai for her mammogram.   There were six other women of varying ages in the waiting room.  As I played "Virtual Darts" on my cellphone, Sophia talked with the other women. 

One woman complained about how long it took for her to get an appointment.  Another woman said she’d been waiting for two hours in the waiting room.  Another joked that they make you wait for two hours in one waiting room, then they bring you inside to another waiting area, where you’re tricked into waiting another hour! —  the same gimmick they use at Disneyland to make you feel like you’re moving in line at Space Mountain.  

"And at least at Space Mountain, you don’t have to wear a smock that barely covers you," said the woman.

I probably shouldn’t have gotten involved in the conversation, but blogging has made me an ultra-curious person.  I now talk to everyone, hoping to get a blog post out of it.  I politely asked about the mammogram procedure — and everyone took turns telling me how painful it could be. 

"They squeeze your breasts like they’re in a vise.  Ouch, ouch!" said a third woman.

"I’m sure of one thing, said Sophia,  "If there was such a thing as a penile-gram, and men had to have their penis squished flat every year, I’m sure medical science would have come up with a better machine ten years ago."

All the women nodded in agreement — and looked at me as if I were the enemy.

Jane Loves Target

October 29, 2005 / / 75 Comments

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Meet Jane.  She loves Target so much she bought a car of the same color.

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Jane finds Target very sexy, unlike the boring Walmart.  Target has fancy designer brands.

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Jane likes to try on sexy clothes at Target.

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Jane loves these Mossimo Gold Pricilla Crocodile ‘fuck me’ pumps she found at Target.

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Jane remembers a funny Nerve.com article which said you can "buy all sorts of unintentional sex toys at Target like novelty handcuffs, furry slap bracelets, and phallic garden hoses equipped with "turret pistols." "

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Jane doesn’t have a boyfriend and decides to buy the Ultra Percussion Massager with Heat at Target.

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Richard works at Target.  He is divorced.  He once dated Jane in high school.

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Richard sees that Jane doesn’t have a boyfriend.

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Richard gives Jane exactly what she needs in the employee dressing room.  Three times. 

Richard is concerned that they didn’t use a condom.

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Jane says don’t worry.  She has a prescription for emergency contraception from her physician.

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This is Mr. Willis, the Target pharmacist.   Mr. Willis says that Target does not fill those types of prescriptions, even if they are perfectly legal.  Target is a family store and not about sex.

(props to Miss Tanya)

More info at Blogging Baby, Crazy Virgo, Bite My Cookie, and City Mama

Citizen of the Month Wants a Cure

October 25, 2005 / / 71 Comments

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Sophia:  "Neilochka, you certainly love writing about my breasts on your blog, don’t you?"

Neil:  "Of course.  They’re the most exciting things I’ve had to play with since my Etch-A-Sketch."

Note to God:  Are you crazy?  Why did you create the most beautiful things in the world, a brilliant piece of female anatomy that comes in so many tasty shapes and sizes — and then come up with this breast cancer shit?

Sophia:  "You know, it’s National Breast Cancer Awareness Month.  Why don’t you say something about breast cancer?"

Neil:  "Like what?"

Sophia:  "You can talk about me." 

Neil:  "I can?" 

Sophia:  "It’s been a year."

It’s been a year.

It’s been a year since they found cancer in Sophia’s left breast.

Last year was pretty shitty.  This is why I was so glad that the Jewish New Year finally came a couple of weeks ago.  Maybe this year will be better.  The year had ended with my father passing away.  It began with Sophia learning she had breast cancer.

There was no history of cancer in Sophia’s family, so it came as a total shock.  It was a time of stress, fear and uncertainty.  National Breast Cancer Awareness Month is a great idea —  except when your life was just turned upside down and you suddenly became a "patient" dealing with breast cancer.  Everywhere you go, you are reminded of the disease.  At the supermarket, there are banners hanging.  You try to escape to the mall, and everyone is selling pink bunnies, slippers, bracelets.  Neither of us knew much about cancer, but we sat down for a quick education.  We read every medical site and every book possible.  We got the best doctors at Cedars-Sinai.  Sophia had a lumpectomy and through her own research, found out about a radical experimental radiation treatment.

Sophia was so brave throughout.

It was a new experience for me, as well.  I was supposed to be the caregiver, the "rock,"  but I was probably more of a "big stone."  Although I was always at Sophia’s side, I had this slight little problem of always being more nervous than Sophia herself.  I wish I could have been more like Sophia was when my father was in the hospital.  She can be a "rock."  I never had the strength to demand the best of everyone in the hospital, the way Sophia did for my father.

In fact, I found the experience so stressful, that two days before Sophia was to have her surgery, I got so tense that I ended up at Cedars-Sinai’s Emergency Room myself!  I don’t think the ER nurses ever really understood why my wife was calling me on the phone cursing at me for being in the hospital.

Many of you have emailed me through the last couple of months, asking why Sophia and I are separated.  The most common comment is "You write about her with so much love and admiration." 

There’s no one I love or admire more than Sophia.  Today, despite everything she went through, she is more beautiful than ever.  But, she is still on medication and dealing with continuous treatment and the side effects.  Sometimes, she gets down on herself or fears for her future health.  But she’s a brave and strong woman.  And boy, is she funny too.  I think a good sense of humor is really important in keeping yourself healthy.  On Saturday night, we actually worked together on that recent post on my blog — the one about the flowers and the "sticker."  When we finished it, we must have laughed for a half hour. There’s nothing more exciting to me than seeing Sophia laugh and smile.

Sophia’s sense of humor helped her maintain a great relationship with her doctors.  She was especially friendly with her great surgeon, Scott Karlan and his caring staff.  After her surgery, Sophia thanked him by ordering him a marzipan cake shaped as two huge breasts, with one a little bit lopsided, like hers was after the surgery.

I hope Sophia knows how much she means to me — whatever she is right now — my wife, my separated wife, my friend, my blog editor-in-chief, my dance partner, or the straight man in most of my blog posts.

I think I learned to be a better "rock" during times of hardship, even if I didn’t always say the right thing.  I still try to "fix things" when I should just listen.  Once a week Sophia goes to a group at the Wellness Community, a great place, where people with cancer, their friends and loved ones can talk about different issues.  One of the biggest complaints heard very often is that people just don’t know how to talk to someone with cancer, either out of insecurity, fear or stupidity.

In honor of National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, Sophia’s group did something special for "Citizen of the Month" :they made a list of stupid things people have said to them.  Let’s hope that reading some of these will help us avoid making the same mistakes.

15 things you should never say to someone with breast cancer:

But you’re so young!

How long do you have?

And you have such beautiful breasts!

Oh no, what are your kids going to do?

You shouldn’t be depressed because if you get down, you’ll waste what little time you have left.

God only gives you what you can handle. 

But you look so good!

Two people just died in our office from cancer — these things always come in threes.

Oh, no.  That’s so weird.  I just saw Melissa Etheridge in concert last week.

I’m wracking my brain.  What could have you done to cause it?

Do you use paper or plastic? — because I read plastic can cause it.

At least with a double mastectomy, you’ll be even.

Don’t say the word.  Just say "C."

Now you’ll see if he really loves you for you.

I know how you feel.

Here’s something you can say:

Sophia, you’re amazing.  Congratulations on being a one-year breast cancer survivor — and getting healthier every day!

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Neilochka vs. Nicole

September 8, 2005 / / 45 Comments

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I have nothing against Nicole Richie.  Really.  I actually thought she was pretty cute in those reality shows with Paris Hilton.  And Nicole was pretty funny.  And a hundred times more interesting than that dopey Paris Hilton.  I’ll even admit that I had a couple of Lionel Richie albums.  I liked him.  And I loved him when he was with the Commodores.

So, please stop emailing me, saying how I hate Nicole Richie.

The problem started with this post:

And then this post:

I didn’t mean to pick on Nicole Richie.  She was just the skinny actress du jour.  She is more a metaphor for skinny actresses everywhere.

If you look to the right on the page, you’ll see that I use a WordPress plugin called "Most Popular Posts."  The plugin uses some complicated formula based on hits and comments to come up with this list of most popular posts.  I don’t make any of the choices.  As you can see, "Too Skinny" is my most popular post.  It is also my worst post.  It isn’t particularly funny or interesting or touching.  But tons of people come to read it.   At first, readers came to make jokes about these skinny women.  Then, some people sounded sad about what women do to their bodies.   But then the tone changed, after I was linked by some pro-ana sites.

I had no idea what pro-ana was until I looked it up:

Pro-ana websites were first developed to counter the many support websites which encourage recovery from anorexia. Many anorexics believed that the desire to achieve an unnaturally slim figure was not a mental illness, but an alternative lifestyle. Doctors who treat anorexia see pro-ana as a life-threatening danger to current and potential anorexics.

These were young women who were advocating excessive skinnyness — calling anorexia a lifestyle — sort of like being gay or a Teamster is a lifestyle.  The whole concept of ana seemed pretty silly to me, until I started getting angry emails.  Most played the victim card:  

"You would never call someone fat in public.  Why do you feel it is OK to call someone "skinny?"

Yes, that guy on "Lost" is fat.  So, there.

Here’s an "ana" forum that discusses one of my dumb silly posts about Nicole Richie, Teri Hatcher, and Mischa Barton.  Here’s one of the comments:

Has anyone noticed that most of the people complaining that the three were too skinny were chicks?  I thought that was kinda amusing. i think its stupid how chubby people complain about how girls should be more womanly and all that jazz but secretly they themselves want to be just as pin thin as the supermodels, but won’t admit it.

I hate having that "Too Skinny" post as my most popular one.  I’ve tried to cheat the system by hitting some of my other posts dozens of times, hoping to push them up the list.  But every time I do that,  ten more people come to read about "skinny woman."

And each day, I get an email telling me how good Nicole Richie looks since she lost the weight.

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On a related note, he is an amazingly touching post about a lifetime of weight isssues written by Kristy.

And to start the weekend right, here’s another gag at Nicole Richie’s expense, via Justin.

The Body Woman

June 30, 2005 / / 11 Comments

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My most popular post is titled “Too Skinny” – about the too skinny Lindsay Lohan and Nicole Richie.  Weight and body issues are an important subject for many women, particularly young women who look up to these actresses and feel ashamed of their own bodies.     The average dress size of the American woman is size 14.  Women are beautiful in all sizes.  Luckily, there are advocates who can speak to women about the importance of being comfortable with their own body – someone like Oprah.   Did you know that only three women were on the Discovery Channel’s list of the Top 25 Greatest Americans:  Eleanor Roosevelt, Rosa Parks, and… Oprah Winfrey?!  (TV Guide, June 26, 2005)

I spoke to my friend, Brenda, also known as New York City’s #1 Oprah Fan.  I was surprised to learn that Brenda’s not Oprah’s #1 Fan anymore.

"When Oprah was fat, all she talked about was being happy with who you are.  Once she got thinner, she changed her tune.  Now, she’s like a recovering alcoholic, berating people for being fat.   If only you exercised more, ate less, did everything right.   That, and have a personal trainer and chef at your disposal!"

OK, so maybe Oprah is no longer an advocate for women on this subject.   Surely there are others who take the fashion industry to task for only designing clothes for very skinny women.  Take Cathy Horne, the New York Times fashion critic.  She used to weigh 190 pounds.   Oh, but then she started to feel like a phony.  How could she write about fashion if she was couldn’t — oh my god — fit into the designer clothes she reviewed?

Unlike art or music or other fields that receive critical appraisal, fashion is visually as well physically expressive. It necessarily involves the body. And I had been using only my brain to evaluate clothes. Because I had little personal experience with the physical side of fashion: the fit, the movement, indeed the pleasure that it can give.

What led me to think about this and to question, at least retrospectively, my fitness for the job was that in the last eight months, after a decade of slowly inching downward, I have lost about 30 pounds and now weigh 137. For the first time since my early 20’s, I can wear a size 8. People in the industry have noticed and complimented me on the change. But the picture wouldn’t be clarified until I went to see Andy Port, a friend and editor at The Times Magazine, to ask if she thought there was an article in any of this.

"Oh, definitely," Andy said. "Especially given your job and the way the fashion industry views weight." She added, on the verge of a shriek, "I mean, just think how many times a designer, after getting a bad review from you, said, ‘That big fat bitch!’ "

Now, Cathy Horne is a happy and fulfilled woman.  It was the fat that was holding her back from being the ultimate fashion journalist.   As a writer, I can absolutely relate.    To better write this post about weight and women, I have gained 30 pounds and undergone a sex change operation.  

If there is going to be a strong advocate for women being happy with their own bodies, it must come from the feminist movement.  I remember how my Aunt Tilly used to go on marches with Bella Abzug and complain about the male dominated society.  What I didn’t know was that the Bella Abzug is as old school as Run-DMC. 

The representatives of the “third wave” of American feminism are Jennifer Baumgardner and Amy Richards, writers of the well-received Manifesta:  Young Women, Feminism and the Future.  Baumgardner and Richards are popular speakers on college campuses.  They separate themselves from older feminists by saying its OK to dress pretty and flirt with boys.  On their own website, they give another reason for their popularity.

Jennifer and Amy agreed to visit the class. What a night. One student said afterwards, "It was wonderful how they didn’t look like feminists."

feminism.jpg
(photo by Ali Price)

I’m sure my Aunt Tilly would be the first to admit that Bella Abzug and Betty Friedan weren’t lookers.  And look how thin Jennifer and Amy are!  They look great!

Amy Richards also has an advice column titled “Ask Amy” on a feminist website.  Finally, we found a person who can help young women overcome their body issues.

Many years ago I used to get so many emails from girls saying: "I’m ugly, I’m fat, I hate my body." and I kind of towed the feminist line for a long time, which was: (saccharine voice) "Oh, that’s not true! It doesn’t matter what you look like! It’s what’s inside! You are a beautiful person!" And then I realized- first of all, when I would write that back to people they would, like, never write me back, ’cause I think they could just see through the phoniness.

In other words, the new answer is  “We’re feminists, but you’re fat.”

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