My Manifesto on Health Care for Fatties
I know I have one last installment in my Health at Every Size® eating series, but there’s something else I want to write about. That’s coming soon, I promise.
Today, I want to write about being afraid to go to the doctor. Only, it’s so much more than that. It isn’t just fear of the doctor dismissing my concern and chalking it up to my weight. It’s fighting against my own deeply-ingrained indoctrination that any kind of pain I might experience is my own fault. My own fault because I’m fat.
Lapping History —
It’s become a sort of mantra for me: saddened, but not surprised.
This time, it’s in response to Chris Christie getting the Lap-Band.
So long, rotund Republican rabble-rouser.
Predictably, the press went wild with speculation over Christie’s obvious presidential ambitions. Just as predictably, Jon Stewart pushed back against the hyperventilating punditry by simplifying Christie’s justification:
Why else would a 50-year-old man with young children and a loving family take steps to address obesity and extend his life? Why else? It is a classic presidential run tell… Can’t a guy get healthy without the prognosticators? “Oh, what does it mean?” It means he doesn’t feel well and wants to feel better.
Of course, Stewart’s assessment is also speculation. That’s the thing about personal health: you can’t determine the motives behind such a drastic, personal health choice unless you can peek inside the head of the chooser.
The fact is, you can’t divide motivations into mutually exclusive camps of professional ambition versus personal health concerns. It’s far more complicated than that.
Feta-Stuffed Chicken
Hi everyone! Today in Cooking With Kerasi, I’ll be featuring a recipe for another Greek-inspired dish, feta-stuffed chicken. In the name of full disclosure, it’s Martha Stewart’s recipe (you can view the original, along with a demonstration, on her website here), but perhaps obtaining it via your local third-party fativism website will somehow feel less felonious. 
Let’s get started!
Body Image and Depression
Poor body image and depression feed each other mercilessly. (Depression also makes it incredibly difficult to write, so I hope I can manage to be coherent.) It’s hard to know which came first. For years I spent weeks or months in seemingly endless cycles of self hate and depression — the severe suicidal kind. For me, it’s hard to know which triggered which. It’s easier to figure out now that I’m a Body Acceptance activist as an adult. My bipolar depression leads to self hate, not the other way around. But was it so simple before I found Fat Acceptance? Not so much.
Summer Footwear for Fat Feet
For a lot of fat people, the fat doesn’t reach down to their feet and they don’t need extended sizing in shoes. Unfortunately, I’m not one of those fatties.
Fat Baby in Public
Public transit has been a part of my life since forever. I can remember being so little when I took the bus my mom had to use her arms to keep me from sliding off the slick, vinyl seats when we went around corners. At ten came my first solo bus ride down to the mall to watch a movie with some friends. The bus has gotten me to and from high school, first job, second and third job, dates, university, movies, poetry readings, dances and more. I literally take the bus everywhere. Part of taking the bus everywhere is dealing with all the different kinds of people you’re insulated from when you drive: the overly-chatty person who sits at the front near the driver, the drunks, the smelly people, the loud high school and college kids, the obnoxiously loud high school and college kids who can’t refrain from swearing for five seconds, etc.
A double decker bus in BC Transit’s fleet.
Unskinny Bob —
The following is an open letter to Director, and original fierce fatty, Kevin Smith about dieting and weight loss.
Hey Kevin,
I’ve been a huge fan of yours for nearly two decades, first through your iconic movies and then through your Q&A sessions at colleges across the country. I love your story-telling skills, both through film and in person. My wife and I still still randomly quote shit like “Chaka mad. Chaka real mad.” just to make each other laugh.
Not only can you weave an engrossing and hilarious story, but you’re one of those rare celebrities who manages to keep his feet on the ground even while cruising among the stars. Somehow, along with all the acclaim you’ve earned and criticism you’ve endured, you have managed to keep it real in a way few other icons have.
Except in one area: your weight.
