Fit2Fat2Fit

Fit2Fat2Fit. Have you all seen this? Personal Trainer, Drew, is going on a six month adventure to become obese and then will trim down again. He is almost at the end of his journey of obesity having packed on 70#s. This has become a national sensation. He is on the Today Show, Jay Leno, various websites to include Yahoo and of course his blog and Facebook.

This is almost like a train wreck. Most people are following along to see if Drew fails to lose the weight. Some people are truly inspired by this and are hoping they can mirror his efforts to lose their weight and have success themselves. And some obese people are taking a strong abhorrence to Drew’s efforts.

I have been following Drew’s adventure the last two weeks. He makes a comment on Facebook about trying to find clothes for his television appearance on Jay Leno and gets 267 comments ranging from hostility, kinship and awareness to the plight of obese people trying to find clothes that are descent. You get off colored comments that the fashion industry doesn’t encourage obesity that is why there aren’t any fashionable clothes for heavier folks, to shop at Big Dog or Wal-Mart they expect everyone to be fat. I have been fascinated by Drew’s dedication to be able to identify with his obese clients. I thought wow, here is a man dedicated to his job. I could never do that. I wouldn’t want to risk my health, put undue stress on my skin, ligaments and bones, and I just don’t want to be fat. Period. That simple.

The more I read his posts and the comments the more it got me thinking. I think Drew’s intentions are good and I do think he will help some people out with his journey back to fit. And I have no doubt that he won’t get back to his previous fit form. He has a lot of media attention now, what great motivation! But the comments people are making about Drew’s attempt to appreciate the struggles of someone who is obese are misguided.
America has become the celebration of mediocrity. We celebrate everything: Kindergarten graduations; Tumble with mom medals; graduating elementary school to middle school; t-ball ceremonies. And then we go overboard with celebrations like drug rehab and, weight loss (think Kristie Alley and Oprah). Last time I checked you are expected to make it through kindergarten and elementary school (I actually think there is a law requiring it) t-ball isn’t anything but kids digging in the dirt, chasing bugs, wondering what is for snack and the chance hap that one of them catches the ball and throws it in the right direction. We aren’t supposed to get fat or do drugs. Why are we celebrating so hard? We don’t celebrate when kids don’t get addicted to heroin. We don’t celebrate that stay-at- home- mom who has four kids and a rocking body – most of the time she is ridiculed! We have our priorities wrong people.

Hands down to Drew, but I have to wonder if he just succumbed to the pressure. What pressure am I referring to? Well this is the pressure that people who are obese have already given into. Look around you – there are ads for McDonald’s during the Olympics, Krispy Kreme and Girl Scout Cookie fund raisers, the office donut mess, commercials telling you that high fructose corn syrup is ok for you, Tony the Tiger tells you Frosted Flakes are GRRRRReat and will help you win that soccer game, Gatorade replenishes electrolytes for sports games (and it also sports more calories and sugar than soda), grocery stores with buy one get one free hamburger helpers, or buy one get one free bags of chips, the FDA telling us if your bread is whole wheat and brown it is good for you. I am not saying that Drew just wanted to eat to his heart’s desire for six months, I think he gave into the peer pressure of his overweight clients telling him he doesn’t know what it’s like. And to that he should have told them HORSE SHIT.
If you are in shape you know exactly what it is like to have cravings for Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Cap ‘n Crunch, Lucky Charms, calzones, French fries, a Dr. Pepper. Unless this said fit person has lived in a cave their whole life they have partaken in these foods. And yes, sometimes these foods at the right time of the day or the right moment of stress can be a better release than sex.

But fit people make a conscious choice not to eat these foods but in an extreme once in a while (we are talking a few times a YEAR…none of this moderation shit) because we recognize the rat hole these foods will take us down. Diabetes, hypertension, clogged arteries, high cholesterol, heart attack, cancer, arthritis, sleep apnea, lupus, acne, irritable bowel syndrome, and all kinds of weird and strange aliments.

If you are obese and you think a fit person, and I am not saying a skinny person, the kind of skinny that thinks they can put on weight by being a garbage disposal, an actual fit person like Drew was, is an easy life to travel you are hugely mistaken. There are internal battles that rage constantly. Being the odd man out at the morning coffee table when everyone else is indulging in a liquid candy bar from Starbucks and a big old boston cream donut; opting out of football pizza, nachos and, beer party fun with friends every Sunday, being the only person on a business road trip who is concerned about what time they go to bed, where the nearest gym is and not hitting the bars every night with your colleagues. There is the I can’t relate to any of my kids friends parents and they all think I’m freaky. The everyday explanation to your kids why their friends make poor food choices and why they shouldn’t.

Yeah, I am sure if you are obese and you are reading that last paragraph you are rolling your eyes and saying oh poor woe is me, Angela. And that is fine. But here is the thing, these are the hard choices I decide to make the right choice about and if you are obese or overweight you didn’t make that hard choice. You chose the easy way. Well everyone else is having a 2000 calorie coffee and another 2000 calorie donut that has about 109 grams of sugar in it I will too. Or well my husband wants pizza to watch football so I’ll just eat that too. Or my friends are all going out partying and staying up late, I’ll just skip the gym and sleep and go along. An obese/overweight person made the easy choice. I’m not saying the easy choice has easy rewards. Quite the contrary. Having discipline to do the right thing at all the right times is hard. And the fact that I do that every time I need to and an obese/overweight person chooses not to doesn’t make my life easier than yours. It DOES make my life happier than an obese/overweight person. It DOES make my health better than the obese/overweight persons. It DOES let me enjoy my life better than the obese/overweight persons.

I don’t think that someone that is obese/overweight should be pointing fingers at people that are fit, such as Drew and saying, “but you don’t understand, you don’t know what it is like.” That’s HORSE SHIT. I don’t need to walk a mile in someone that is obese/overweight’s shoes to recognize they have health problems ranging from nagging to severe, that they can’t find clothes that are fashionable, that children point at them and laugh, that they are discriminated against at the work place. I KNOW this. I don’t need to be obese/overweight to know this.

What the obese/overweight person needs to know is that it is time to start being disciplined and stop whining how no one understands. Time to stop having that liquid candy bar for a coffee, time to stop having regular meals at Subway, Pizza Hut, Burger King and the like. It’s time to make the right decision and get up and get moving even when you just don’t feel like it. When there is something on television that you want to watch or you just want to relax after a long day at work. Relaxing is an easy choice. Television is an easy choice. Subway, Pizza Hut, Burger King, liquid candy bar coffees (CARBS) ARE THE EASY CHOICES. It’s time to stop crying that “you don’t know what it’s like” because you make the easy choice all the time. There are more times that I do not want to work out than I do and there are more times than not that while I am working out I just want to scale it back and take it easy. But I don’t. I know that I have to work out, that I have to train hard. I know that I have to make a good healthy dinner for my family, and pack lunches for all of us that are the right foods. No one wants spinach and chicken with a side of mashed cauliflower! But these are the right and hard choices.

And don’t expect results in a few weeks. It took you awhile to become obese/overweight it will probably take you twice as long to get fit. It’s not going to be easy. It’s going to be hard and even when you get fit it will still remain hard. Because making the right choice is always the harder road to travel. We live in a world with many luxuries, many affordable luxuries, it’s hard to say no to them, especially if you take on the attitude that you are somehow entitled to a luxury because you work, or raise a family. Carry the attitude that you are entitled to work hard and then work really hard and you will never be disappointed in your health, life or body shape.

So hats off to you Drew, I wish you luck and I wish your followers luck.