Step Away From the Diet

I have recently found a new author crush. Her name is Jen Lancaster and she is freaking high-larious. I love everything about this girl… partly because there are so many commonalities (save her being a Republican… and white). One of the weight-related blogs I regularly read described her book, Such a Pretty Fat, as fat positive and funny to boot. And that’s all I needed to find out more.

After googling Jen (and can I ask, what did we do before google and wikepedia?), I discovered that she’s a blogger turned author who has written a few books. I quickly borrowed her first book, Bitter is the New Black and her “fat positive” book, Such a Pretty Fat from my local library. Yes, I’m that girl who borrows books versus buying them… partly because I am SO UTTERLY broke right now.

I read Bitter is the New Black first… made sense, it was her first book after all. It was all about her over extravagant life and what happens when she and her boyfriend (turned husband) both lose their jobs and realize they have been living waaay outside of their means. I could totally understand this as I’m finding myself in a financial quagmire riddled with personal irresponsibility at the moment. But I digress.

Everything Jen wrote totally resonated with me. This was a girl who was larger than life figuratively and physically and wasn’t ashamed of it. The focus of Bitter is the New Black wasn’t about weight but her weight came up from time to time, but each time… there was no shame or regret or sadness attached to it. Just the opposite actually. Jen seemed pretty happy outside of the unemployment and financial destitute place she found herself in.

Once I finished that book, I was so excited to turn to the book that was described as fat positive. I wasn’t surprised by this description after reading Bitter is the New Black- Jen seemed super confident about her weight and size. So I was all ready to read about her hilarious life in a book that focused on her weight and was fat positive to boot. Well…

This isn’t a book review on Such a Pretty Fat as much as it’s my thoughts mid stream while reading this book. I am halfway through the book and so far, all I can say is that the first 1/2 of this book is exactly the reason why I’m trying to stop focusing on my weight and how to lose it. Jen was fat but damn, she seemed genuinely happy, confident and had an amazing man by her side (all things I wish for). And then she decided that she needed/wanted to lose weight and all of a sudden she found flaws and faults with her body.

At one point her husband tells her that “up until recently, she was the most confident person he knew. She’s the one who says everyone else is too thin and she’s just right. [And] now that she’s actually losing weight, she’s completely fixated on body image, she never was before.” And although this isn’t an anti-weight loss book, truer words have never been spoken on why forced weight loss screws with our heads and psyche. Jen was awesome the way she was but by fixating on losing weight, she was unraveling (albeit in the most funny, entertaining way possible).

I’m not sure what I expected from this book but I’m not sure I’d coin it as “fat positive”… at least not yet. Bitter is the New Black was more fat positive than Such a Pretty Fat is so far. One thing I’ve gotten from the first half of this book- diets and forced exercise is not the way to go to lose weight. In fact, you may end up more screwed up and self-deprecating than you were when you were just fat and fabulous.

I am gonna finish the book because even though it’s not fat positive (in my opinion) and flies in the face of where I am right now when it comes to diets and forced exercise, its fun to read someone else’s memoirs of attempted weight loss that are so eerily familiar to all of my failed attempts of the past. And an added bonus? Jen’s writing has me laughing out loud more times than not and I can always do for a good laugh.