I hate scales. Just the sight of them makes me break out in a sweat. It could be because I spent the better part of my teens beholden to the numbers on the scale; those little black lines would dictate my mood for the rest of the day. If the number was lower than expected, life was wonderful, beautiful, terrific. But if the scale read even a pound higher than my ideal, I would feel instantly miserable, depressed and convinced obesity was lurking around the corner. I grappled with 25 extra pounds as a kid; I went to Weight Watchers and Diet Workshop, and spent six years, from age 16 on, going to fat camp, where we unhappy campers stepped on the scale every week.
By my early 20s, thanks to almost-daily workouts and the stress of graduate school, I was no longer carrying extra pounds. And for the most part, I felt genuinely free of the weight-number craziness that afflicts so many women. Avoiding any machine or contraption that had the ability to weigh and measure me meant I never again had to play the seesaw scale game.
And then earlier this year, at age 37, I published a book, Teenage Waistland: A Former Fat Kid Weighs In on Living Large, Losing Weight, and How Parents Can (and Can't) Help. As the title suggests, it's a memoir about my experiences as a fat kid, as well as an investigation into what does and doesn't work for other overweight kids. I did a lot of interviews to promote the book, and invariably, each interviewer would ask about my weight.
"It's fine," I'd say with absolute certainty. "I never step on the scale, but I'm totally healthy." This response worked well until one especially dogged reporter pushed me on it. "If you don't weigh yourself, how do you know you're healthy?"
"Because my clothes fit, I exercise at least three times a week, and numbers really don't matter," I replied. Besides, I rationalized, even weight-loss experts can't agree on what a "healthy" weight is. In April of this year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced that carrying around a little extra weight -- 10 to 15 pounds -- could help you live longer. A month later, they retracted their findings. Hmm. No wonder we all feel crazy. But the reporter's question got me thinking. Maybe I'm not technically, according to the professionals, as healthy as I thought. Maybe I am too heavy for my five-foot-two-and-a-half-inch frame -- even if I can fit into a size 6. Was the answer in the numbers on the scale after all? I didn't think so -- but I had to find out.
Friends, family and strangers weigh in: "You look great!"
"Of course you are!" says my friend when I ask her if she thinks I am a healthy weight. I've known her since college, and she tends to be honest with me.
"You look fine to me," says my ex-boyfriend Peter.
My doorman: "You look great!"
The guy at the Laundromat concurs ("Perfecto!" he proclaims, eyeing me up and down), and so does the woman at the deli. "You are a good weight, healthy," she says. She laughs and rubs her hands over her rotund body. "Me, not so good."
Even my mother dubs me "fit" -- one of the highest compliments she has ever paid me -- and my brother says, "You look good." Gee, thanks, guys!
