Without Measure (WOM) Beta

The Continuing Adventures of the Super-Duper-Sized Woman 

By Daphne Yvonne Bradshaw

 

Daphne, the Super-Duper-Sized Woman, has sat through many CME (Continuing Medical Education) courses in the patient rooms of her various doctors through the years and has heard that many other fat people of all varieties of size have also sat through similar lectures. So, since the many doctors think it very important to spend countless minutes each appointment to teach the following lessons for a fat person’s own good and because most of the doctors seem to think that fat people have not paid attention, not realized the seriousness of their issues with us, or maybe are unable to listen (probably due to too much fat clogging our ears,) Daphne, the SDSW, thought it would be helpful to write out a list of lecture notes so that all will know whether or not we have listened, understood, and considered these words of supposed wisdom and truth on the issue of our weight, specifically the issue of our large supply of adipose tissue.

 

The following list will be in no particular order of importance. It will simply list lecture points. No comment on these points will be made at this time. This listing does not mean any agreement with the points or any disagreement with the points. Furthermore, these lecture notes do not mean the method of speaking to the fat patient is respectful or warranted. It is simply making sure the doctors know we have heard them properly… and perhaps have now passed this part of the course finally and can move on to more helpful aspects of our doctor visits. Well, Daphne, the SDSW, can dream, can’t she?!

 

So, without further ado, here are Daphne’s notes from her doctors’ lecture series entitled “Morbid Obesity for Morons, Specifically You (the Super-Duper-Sized Woman:”

 

1)      My weight is killing me, and my death is to be soon… even within the next five years (endlessly renewable as five year allotments pass.)

2)      I am in denial by refusing to go into hospice by thinking I am not near death when it is obvious I am dying soon due to being so very fat.

3)      I lie continuously and consistently about what I do and don’t eat.

4)      I obviously do overeat but refuse to admit it.

5)      Either I am a pathological liar about food and weight issues, or I am delusional or both.

6)      Maybe I am unaware of portion sizes, caloric values, the glycemic index, or other fine points of nutrition.

7)      I am apparently ignorant of the research and proof (and I am instructed to go read up on it if I am unconvinced) of how my weight is killing me and need to read more research on it since I am very determined to stay so huge.

8 )      I have never considered or even thought about the possibility of losing weight.

9)      I am incredibly lazy and either sit around or lie around all day, refusing to move. But, some doctors do add that if they had even an extra 100 pounds on them, they wouldn’t want to do anything either.

10)  I need less self-acceptance and more losing weight.

11)  A 1000 or even less calorie diet is healthy for me because the alternative is death.

12)   I need the gastric bypass surgery to make all my troubles go away. In fact, each doctor knows several people who have lost down to their normal weight and have no need for their former medicines. Some patients have even been cured of diabetes this way.

13)  Obviously I have no self-control or will power, so the only hope is the gastric bypass.

14)  It is my fault that none of the medical equipment, none of the doors, and none of the facilities are accessible or accurate for me because of my size, but I am to struggle through the agonizing pain physically and emotionally as well as paying the many fees for the services that don’t fit me and/or do not help me. After all I need the exercise anyway.

15)  Doctors hate seeing their patients, specifically me, killing themselves, but this is a part of the job, alas.

16)  Only I can choose what I do or don’t put into my mouth. If I would choose to eat less, I would lose weight.

17)  I need to exercise and move about or die.

1   Anything I say or do that does not support the theory that my weight is killing me and is caused by my deliberate and willful choices is either fabricated or an obvious misinterpretation of whatever happened.

19)  I am too stubborn about medicines and the side effects. All medicines have side effects. But if I choose not to take a medicine, a cholesterol lowering medicine for example because it caused jaundice in me, then that is my choice. However, I should be aware that my choice is killing me. And, what is the point of taking a fasting lipids blood test if I am not going to be taking any medicines anyway?

20)  Since I am in a lot of pain, I need pain medicine not a firm diagnosis of what exactly is going wrong to cause the pain since I have already been told that my pains are caused by my huge amount of adipose tissue crushing and killing me.

21)  My too tight control of my diabetes is hindering my losing weight.

22)  Every condition is caused by and exacerbated by my fatness.

23)  I need psychiatric help because I am so huge and determined to stay that way.

24)  No professional medical person – nurse, OT, PT, practical nurse, nutritionist, dietician, or social worker who comes to my home and sees my conditions here has a true picture of how I eat or not eat and, hence, have all been brainwashed by me to lie for me concerning these matters.

 

Other entries in the continuing adventures of the Super-Duper-Sized Woman can be found here:

Adventures of the Super-Duper-Sized Woman
Pushing Jack Back Down the Beanstalk: So, I’m Fat; Must I Be Made Constantly Afraid?

The newest tidbits of expertise on obesity from one segment of the medical world published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) (vol 357, 370-379, 2007) are, not surprisingly, painfully flawed and guilty of the same underlying prejudice against fat people that plagues the medical community in general. If you break down their findings, two dangerous messages come across loud and clear:

1. Being around fat people will increase your chances of getting fat, so you better not hang out with fat people; and
2. If you’re fat, you’re going to lose all your friends if you don’t lose weight, so you better get thin as soon as possible!

Even the Chicago Sun-Times had a problem with the new research in this article. They concluded that the NEJM research “may also contribute to prejudice against overweight people.” I agree.

The new research hangs on that blemish of science, the Body Mass Index (BMI), which has never been an indicator of health and the research also makes sweeping generalizations about social networking influencing eating habits.

Common sense always provides answers where research fails, because research can be influenced by the researchers’ assumptions and prejudices.

Common sense says your friends don’t make choices for you. You decide what what you want to do with your life, even if you decide to agree to what your friends suggest you do. The assumption the medical community wants you to make is that all fat people make poor food choices and overeat with abandon, so you’d better get away from their social influence or by gum, they’ll make you lazy, ugly and stupid, too!

It’s a silly assumption but too many doctors and medical professionals make leaps of logic like that every day.

Common sense says everyone is an individual and individuals make individual choices. It may be hard for some people to understand but people of all shapes and sizes can be fit, eat healthy and be productive and active members of society. By the same reasoning, people of ALL shapes and sizes (including thin ones) can also lack fitness, have un-healthy habits and not be productive and active members of society. For some reason, some people don’t like to hear that — but it’s the truth.

Common sense says that you choose your friends based on whether they’re good friends or not.

There’s another term for choosing your friends based on appearance…it’s called “discrimination.”

Pushing Jack Back Down the Beanstalk: So, I’m Fat; Must I Be Made Constantly Afraid?

by Daphne Yvonne Bradshaw  After my adventures with my now ex-doctor, I started thinking of all the fear mongering put on me and on others like me. I am constantly warned of a shortened lifespan with a terribly painful death awaiting me from cardiovascular (or insert another major disease or, if the fear monger is particularly rude, “your lifestyle choices!”) disease. This is even more a certainty because of diabetes, of course. The diabetes alone adds more terror — the potential loss of limbs, sight, and other ghoulish complications. This death is expected at any time because of my morbid obesity and other risk factors. Just an aside here–I am WELL beyond being morbidly obese, thank you! So, I will die eventually in a larger than life manner? So? I live larger than most life around me already. Now what?

 

Well, I am told that this demise will be extremely painful over a long period of time, but my death will come unexpectedly at anytime. Yes, the fear mongers do use a lot of redundancy and contradiction, I repeat … and I am still trying to figure out how to reconcile that. Excruciating but unexpected demise? Long period of time but suddenly? Hmmm….oh well…onward with my rant… When I am doing all I know to do and all that I am convinced can be safely done, is it still reasonable to beat me up over these risk factors? Have I really deserved what I get because of these factors? Do only people of large size with my risk factors get this treatment? Is this fear mongering normal for the wider population? or even the narrower population? Do skinnier people with the same disease(s), minus the morbid obesity (but note that fat is not a disease!), get the same whipped frenzy of terrorization? Has any of the “mob squad” ever studied genetics, body chemistry, endocrinology, or even basic high school science? Yes, I do include our medical professionals here, alas. Maybe the skinny, maybe the whole population, maybe we all get these scare tactics, but do people like me get it more than the “norm?”  What is the acceptable harassment and terrorism of fat people index for today anyway? Do any of these terrorists realize that fear is itself a major risk factor? Hmmm…maybe that is their angle? They DO want rid of my hulking hugeness by any means necessary. I hear it replayed now–”Kill the giants!”

Oh, and it starts young, too. We have to save those fat kids before they grow any bigger and have more risk factors! Why, don’t you know that even KIDS die of cardiovascular disease now-a-days? Uh, perhaps, but so do some major league pitchers, Olympic ice skaters, wild/health food nuts, avid joggers, … Oh, oops, I wasn’t supposed to look there. Foolish footnote freak that I am! Geesh. Sorry about that. Personally, I see scare tactics used to sell almost everything this society wants us all to buy. It is right up there next to the woman’s boobs which are used to sell everything else. But, I can’t help but feel that the supersized and the still-fat-but-less-than-supersized do get more of the terrorization. Terror keeps all too many of us in line…docile…not rebelling and disabling the farts who are pulling all the strings and stealing all the fear hostages’ money.

I do resent being targeted so often for things I either cannot control or for things I am doing the best I know how to do. I know these diseases are nothing to take lightly, but do I have to be beaten into terror in addition? Can’t I enjoy whatever life I have nevertheless? Can I opt out of being afraid or being made afraid?

My next trick is learning how to stop being afraid and just smile. I will button up my overcoat, put on my hat, silently smile for now, and wheel myself right past all my detractors. Want to come along with me? Yes, there will be obstacles in my path and yours, too, no doubt. Does anyone have suggestions for the huge hurdles?  Oh, I forgot that I am too large for jumping hurdles. Drats! Ok, so I will have to settle for mowing them down with my wheelchair! Onward ho!

AUSTIN, TX - The International Size Acceptance Association (ISAA) would like to thank Yahoo for responding to public feedback and creating plus-size apparel and appearance for their male and female “avatars” (cute, customizable graphical representations of people) for their Yahoo Messenger instant messaging software. In 2005, ISAA made a short campaign to encourage the public to contact Yahoo to encourage the company to make avatars which represent all segments of the population, including the plus-sized.

As of today, Yahoo has made “plus-size” a category to choose from their “apparel” customization screen on the Avatar section of their website. To use Yahoo Messenger and create an avatar, one must have a free Yahoo account. Yahoo offers a variety of free and for-pay services, including e-mail, blogging, music, news, classified ads, maps and much more!

ISAA encourages the public to contact Yahoo at the link provided below and thank them for responding to what you asked for and make suggestions for even better fashion choices for males and females. We have made an impression, so let’s build on it. Thanks for continuing to be involved in size acceptance. As you can see, we are accomplishing more than we know sometimes.

Contact Yahoo at the link below to offer them positive, productive and encouraging feedback. Please do not attack or flame them if you think they’re not doing enough, just let them know how you think they could improve. Thanks!

Yahoo Avatar Feedback Form

We know Yahoo reads your feedback, so offer it today.

Best Wishes,
Allen Steadham, Director
International Size Acceptance Association

by Daphne Yvonne Bradshaw

 

Finding and receiving even adequate respect when you are a fat person is both tricky and vital. All too often, a fat person does not get something even closely similar to minimal afforded dignity much less a good standard of treatment. This is true in a wide variety of fields, too, from inadequate space to move to clothing that truly fits to medical care. Even in the most personal of relationships, respect is all too often lacking because the use of a person’s fat is too easily used as a weapon to punish the “transgressor.” And, boy, can I tell you some tales!

 

As almost every fat person can tell you, everything bad or even the merely not good tends to get blamed on the fat. Good things that happen to and for a fat person are usually looked at as suspect or as consolation prizes of some kind. The message is loud and clear: You’re fat, so how could you have received that good thing (compliment, award, promotion, lover, etc.)—wasn’t there a more normal-sized person around at the time? Oh no! A fat person cannot have keen intelligence nor wit, beauty in and of themselves, good skills and talents, or any of the other things normal to humankind, right? It is as if respectable traits are in a negative ratio to body poundage: the more pounds the less good traits. Of course, when a fat person is berated for something that is automatically blamed on the fat, the fact that humans of all sizes and shapes tend to have these very same traits is not mentioned and is certainly not mentioned to the fat person in question. Why, that might just empower the fat person and destroy the power of the berating! We cannot have that, now can we?!

 

And so, let me introduce you to Daphne, the Super-Duper-Sized Woman who also sometimes likes to call herself the Quarter Ton Woman. She is loosely based on me, of course, but she does tend to have a lot more adventures than the real Daphne does, which is ok by me since she also gets into a lot more trouble than I tend to do on my own. Some of what Daphne, the SDSW (Super-Duper-Sized Woman,) gets into is based on situations either the real Daphne or my friends have experienced, but the stories are changed enough to protect the privacy of the participants, including or maybe especially including me. Daphne’s story will usually be told in third person so as to differentiate her tales from my own true tales which will be in first person. The Daphne used in first person is the one who tends to write documented articles and more serious stories; whereas, Daphne, the SDSW, likes to have fun and tends to be quite mischievous.

Give Me My Death Certificate, dag nabbit!

Daphne, the SDSW, was long overdue for a doctor’s appointment. Months had passed, and she had been unable to get out to see one of those she thought of as extremely overpaid and overly respected professionals. It wasn’t like she was deliberately trying to skip appointments…. Well, it was exactly like she was deliberately skipping appointments, truth be told—doctors tended to have hard to get into and around offices, tended to have very bad attitudes toward fat people in general and toward super-duper-sized people especially, and never seemed to give any remotely decent standard of care to a super-duper-sized person beyond “lose weight and all your troubles will be miles away.” In other words, if passing out awards for being truly unhelpful and even tending toward abusiveness, doctors ranked high up there in Daphne’s mind.

 

But, that wasn’t the primary reason she hadn’t been to see a doctor in months. The real reason was she had been in much more pain and extremely decreased mobility because of that pain for months. Flared up joints all over a body tends to do that even to the best of people and intentions. However, being practical about needing medications like a depended upon one known as insulin gave an added incentive not to put off seeing those doctors too long.

 

So, the day came when Daphne, the SDSW, made a valiant effort to get out to see her doctors all in one day so as to get it over and done with at one time. Even the weather decided to help her efforts… It was one of the strongest torrential downpours of the decade type of day. Ah, such joy.

 

Anyway, dripping onto the tiled floor, Daphne awaited her verdict. Surprisingly, she was not kept waiting too long this time to be disappointed much. The Doctor came in, shook her hand lightly, and proceeded to tell her she was dead already; therefore, she must go get the miracle performing and resurrecting “chop you up and serve you for sausage” surgery because, well, super-duper-size was a grave condition after all, and this procedure will get rid of all the many things going wrong in that super-duper-sized body. Never mind if the patient may die from the procedure because all know that such an enormous person did not have a life anyway. Besides, no one really knows when another will indeed die, and it would be much better to die after paying an enormous price to a very lucrative medical experimental business before expiration dates on a particular body than to die without adequate assisting of a payroll, now would it?

 

What was worse, Daphne wondered: being bullied into a quasi-submission or being declared dead but not given your death certificate that you’d already paid for? (Doctors’ office staffs have become very clever at requiring payment before allowing a person to see the MDieties anymore.)

 

Yes, both she and the doctor are still at this time breathing. And, she is still waiting to receive the paid for Death Certificate so she can approach her insurance for possible death benefits. Meanwhile, the saga will definitely continue, have no fear!

We all know the scenario: the end-of-year holidays have come and gone and now the diet marketing goes into effect. People are guilt-tripped because they supposedly ate too much during the holidays, make New Years’ resolutions to lose weight this year and will try just about anything to accomplish this goal. Ah, but this year, we also have weight loss surgery being pushed by bariatric corporations, whether gastric banding or the full shebang, gastric bypass.

I’m pretty passionate in my disapproval of weight loss surgery (See ISAA’s Position on Weight Loss Surgery). I’ve had friends die from it, I’ve seen numerous lives ruined by it and I learn more not to like about it almost daily.

My outlook is not all gloom and doom, however. Actually, I have seen a lot of positive changes in recent years. Modern teens and young adults do not make weight loss as high a priority as their parents. Some do not make it a priority at all. In the United States, at least, this is the first generation of people to be raised with some awareness of size acceptance and the scientific proof that diets do not work. I believe this will eventually happen in other countries where word about size acceptance and healthy body esteem is beginning to spread, slowly but surely.

As we continue to work to get information about size acceptance, Respect Fitness Health and the pitfalls of the junk science being used to promote weight loss is dispensed in person and over the internet, the more information people will have to make informed choices concerning their health.

Even new studies are clearly showing that weight loss is not necessary to be healthy while making improved food choices and being active is. I believe we will see more research in this area and more conclusive proof but of course, time will tell.

Best Wishes,

Allen

I have just come out of the battlefield. I had no warning. I have a terrible flu and my voice is gone, but I fought back and won the last word for size acceptance.

On BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) radio, they had 3 Doctors, one after the other, spreading the same propaganda on Obesity, same old adage. I had been invited on to represent the size acceptance point of view.

(Here is a link to the “Africa Have Your Say” radio programme’s website and audio)

They were saying one thing, then when I retaliated, they changed their tune. But when they went back to saying obesity kills, they sounded like a sales pitch to the connoisseur but doom and gloom to the listener.

Obesity is a major killer in Africa, they said. It is a time bomb waiting to explode and kill every one in its path.

The majority of the callers were against them. They said that the WHO (World Health Organization) should re-check their data. How can obesity be a major killer of Africans when over 77% of the deaths are from starvation and AIDS?

One of the doctors told me that I was feeling victimized, I should not. They only want my health and well being.

The other said since I am an activist, then I have negative feelings and need help. I must be positive, he said, and do something about my weight. I should not be too confident because if I have any one in my family who has diabetes, I will surely get it. I said I would get it even if I was thin. I thanked him for his advice and said that scaring people into starvation is not the right way to go about it. The worst thing, I said, was the humiliation, the abuse, the insults and the marginalization of fat people and not acceptance of diversity. You want one size to fit all and you make beauty trends that are not attainable by the majority in the world.

The dietitian said first that obesity kills and that they must get rid of it. Then when I said how does she get rid of it, when diets do not work, she then said only 10% is enough, but got back to the obesity kills message quickly.

I spoke about many things. I had more time since I was the “punching bag.” The presenter asked the doctors to convince me that obesity kills and that I should not be proud of being fat, but I answered back (I had to shout sometimes) my voice is very weak, I am not well, but I found strength in our cause and I fought on with dignity and respect for them and myself. They kept repeating the same thing about how not every fat person gets diseases like the smokers but obesity in general kills and Africa is in mortal danger from It.

I managed to talk about many things like eating disorders, stress, the ridiculing of fat people in society and in the media, my own experience as a fat beautiful normal person, the war on obesity that has no opponents, fighting the docile fat people who believe it all, they get on the merry-go-round of bingeing and dieting and getting bigger. They have no voice and they are always blamed for their size.

The doctor then said, We are not fighting you, Fatima. We are fighting obesity not the obese. You have a problem with people, but we are fighting the fat not fat people.

I said you have been fighting fat for over 50 years and obesity is on the rise, why? …they did not answer. I said what we need is education and acceptance that people can learn to live happy healthy lives at any size. And if you do not push for one size fits all and make one look or one color a trend and model of beauty to sell hope of happiness and success in a jar , if every one was respected and had dignity and their self esteem was not damaged from feeling low and inadequate, then there would not be extreme obesity nor would there be need for a war.

Fatima Parker, President

ISAA UK (United Kingdom) and MENA (Middle East aNd Africa)

Many years ago, a friend recommended that I try the Hip and Thigh Diet.

I asked her how the diet plan knew to take weight only off my hips and thighs. What if it got it wrong and just took fat off one bosom and I ended up with one voluptuous breast and one saggy, skinny one. Or suppose it targeted my legs, I didn’t wants to walk around with one thin leg and one strong, shapely one.

She told me seriously that this was a, “scientifically designed diet to improve health and wellbeing”. Up to then, I hadn’t really thought of her as terminally stupid.

No diet, whether it is aimed at reducing body fat or designed for improving nutrition, can possibly target specific areas of the body. The Heart Diet doesn’t zoom in on that muscle and immediately repair any damage and cause it to beat happily for the next fifty years. The Liver Diet does not sweep through only that organ, cleansing like some nutritional hoover.

Of course you can eat foods which are kinder to the liver but they also reach every tiny particle of the whole body.

A certain food may upset your stomach and give you headache but it is also reaching every blood cell, every vein and muscle – because that’s what food is designed to do.

That’s why we have well nourished feet!

There are sensors throughout every particle of our wonderful bodies and when the glucose level falls they leap into action. First our senses become more acute so we can see and smell food and respond positively to it.

If you doubt this, try looking at your favourite food when you have a full tummy – doesn’t have the same appeal at all!

Then the awareness of food, or the need for it increases and our brain is unable to concentrate fully on whatever we are doing.

It begins small, the odd thought, ‘Gee, I’m about ready for a cup of coffee’, and continues, if we don’t respond, to a more intrusive imagining, the smell and feel of Java.

Eventually we just can’t get on with the job in hand because the body is crying out for sustenance.

Our need for food is no different to our need for water – the longer you deny that need, the more the body shuts down other faculties so it can concentrate on making you reach for something liquid, or edible.

I call that pretty wonderful.

Every tiny atom of you has been built and is sustained by one thing – food and this is why everything in the body is geared towards finding and consuming it.

From the pupils of the eyes, which dilate when we see food, to the saliva glands, taste buds and stomach juices which ra-ra in anticipation.

If we consume a diet full of low-nutrition foods, we will be malnourished, every part of us, and that means the organs will deteriorate.

This is why the diets aimed at certain organs are just plans to get better nutrition into the body so it can heal itself.

Eat fruits, vegetables, quality meats and fish, nuts, seeds and grains and (unless we are allergic to something) we will be filling every particle of our body with the elements it needs to repair and remain healthy.

That we should now be firmly trapped in a culture which seeks to feed the body on something which offers no nutritional value, or deprive it of the essentials it needs, is sad beyond belief.

It’s like buying a top-of-the-range sports car, expecting it to run on mower fuel and never maintaining it.

YOU are that sports car and you deserve the very best to power and keep you going, every part of you, hips, thighs and all.