16. Chapter Sixteen
Chapter 16
Leslie
O ver the next four days, my shifts at the restaurant went slightly better. I barely saw Risto except through the porthole in the kitchen door. I wondered if spying was his typical MO, or if he was keeping tabs on me. I pretended it was the latter, though settling Dot at home after her hospital stay left scant time for my imaginary love connection.
Auntie gingerly moved about the house, delighting in the silence and absence of electronic blood pressure cuffs and IV tubes. She waved off my offers to cook (likely a good idea) in favor of the massive containers of leftovers she’d prepared beforehand. To her, they looked untouched. But I had eaten while she was away. Mostly grazing out of the fridge when hunger pangs stirred. But she was lucky I got that far. Every bite launched an exhausting psychological battle with Little Diana screaming bloody murder in my head. It sucked the joy dry and made me question the wisdom of the whole chewing and swallowing thing.
“I think I’ll go lie down,” Dot said as she put her lunch plate in the kitchen sink.
“You should let me help more. I feel so useless.”
“I’ll recover faster if I stay active. I’m not used to sitting around, so the quicker I get back to my walks, the better.”
“Once you’re steadier on your feet, we can give it a go. I’m here to help—”
“You are. You’re doing laundry and running to the pharmacy. You’re helping at the restaurant. Having you here is a blessing.” She cruised around the counter, using it for support, and kissed my forehead.
“I don’t want you to overdo it,” I said.
She cupped my chin. “Believe me, if I’ve learned anything, it’s how to listen to my body. And right now, it wants to go upstairs and sleep. You’ve got work to do, anyway.”
Dot wasn’t wrong. While not helping my powerhouse aunt, I had time to research her contentions about the food industry. Big Diet evidence was mounting to support her case, but I didn’t build a solid reputation as a journalist by blindly accepting information as true without fact-checking it backward and forward. Anything I put my name on had to be bulletproof.
The more I read, the more I drowned in implications for my life. Instead of inspiring further investigation pathways, I got mired in distraction. How would these factoids change how I lived? What new habits must I adopt? Then there were the mounting grievances against my mother. Shocking truisms sent me running to my phone to shame her for all the lies. Only sober reality stilled my hand. I shared the blame. Despite being a fucking reporter, I never once questioned the cage I’d woven for myself. Realization left me pissed off and confused. I rarely leaned on anyone, but it’d become painfully obvious that I needed a sherpa to guide me toward whomever I was supposed to be. And if I couldn’t find her, I’d need instructions for building a new one. My next session with Tasha was still three days away, giving me no choice but to wade deeper into my work.
After Dot went upstairs for a nap, I hopped in the car to drive over to my appointment with a professor I’d discovered at a local university. Her research debunked the notion that weight management led to healthier outcomes. The CDC study findings were convincing, but I yearned to learn more.
During my ride, questions pinged around my brain. Between my mother’s dictates, health establishment decrees, news coverage, and entertainment industry stereotypes, it was impossible not to question how a scientific truth this easy to find received no media attention. There were scores of studies for decades all over the world, all pointing to the same conclusion: you didn’t need to be thin to be healthy.
Why had I never learned any of this before?
Every popular information source parroted the same message, like magnets drawn true north. The uniformity should have attracted my suspicion. But it never did. Instead, I marched blindly along, ignoring my inner compass, trying to divert me from heading over a cliff. If someone presented me with a story this one-sided, I’d cross my arms and demand to hear the other side.
But not about fatness.
And not about food.
Since my cafeteria breakfast with Gabby, I’d eaten more than usual. Not full meals by my family’s standards, but better than nothing. The few times I tried to walk away, Aunt Dot made me share my hesitations aloud.
“I’ll eat later,” I’d said.
“Why not now? Talk me through it,” Dot said.
“Well, I just ate an hour ago and shouldn’t be hungry.”
“But are you? Hungry?”
“Yes.”
“So what happens if you eat?”
Thoughts had collided around my mind, but only one emerged from my mouth. “I get fat.”
My reply stunned me. In my head, eating had no other purpose than to make me fat. It had nothing to do with nourishing my body with the nutrients it needed to function. Thinking. Breathing. Sleeping. Moving. Meals became warped into gateways to fatness. Giving into hunger showed I was weak and undisciplined. Deprivation was the only legitimate path to be healthy, pure, and worthy. Or so my mother taught me.
But there was no sense denying that since I’d begun eating more, I felt better. I had more energy and mental focus. I could walk the dog twice daily without my legs going to jelly. Analyzing my thoughts about food led to one inescapable conclusion: they were all rooted in fear.
Fear of ridicule.
Fear of poor treatment by colleagues.
Fear of not fitting in.
Fear of not being loved.
Fear of people pointing at me, repulsed, on the street.
Fear of receiving second-rate service in stores and restaurants.
Little Diana lived rent-free in my head, promising to descend with every worst-case scenario I could imagine simply because I ate a meal.
That was a hard pill to swallow, and it only unleashed a barrage of additional questions. If, as my aunt contended, there were no good foods and no bad foods, then food was just… what? Food?
I drove past a dairy pasture dotted with cows while imagining my mom’s head blowing clear off. Besides being an artist, my Mom’s entire persona revolved around the near-religious dogma of her dining regimen.
Mom’s way of eating was the one true way.
Eating freely was weak, immoral, and should be rejected.
Following my mother’s clean-living path would make me healthy and protect me from harm.
Only the righteous eater will be rewarded with a long, healthy life.
If you slip, you must repent, make restitution in the form of skipped meals or additional movement, and promise to do better.
Holy shit.
I swerved to the side of the road and cut the engine, my pulse throbbing my ears.
How had I never noticed?
My mom was a fucking cult leader.
My shaky hands gripped the steering wheel for dear life, aching for something solid. Something reliable and true. Never had a story contorted my worldview as much as this one. Revelations jolted my body with electric current as if a sadistic executioner helmed the switch. It hurt. So much so that I battled an overwhelming instinct to turn away from the story. Past critics of my investigations complained I was a pest, needlessly unearthing secrets best left hidden. Being on the receiving end made me realize they might have a point. But I refused to succumb to personal fears.
Yet I couldn’t deny the risk. My approach to reporting required me to be fully invested. Not just observe events dispassionately from afar, but dive in up to my neck. From living the sex trade to drinking with gangsters, I was part of the story. How would that work this time, and where the fuck would it leave me?
Victoria flashed to mind.
One of the most accomplished journalists today was reduced to tears by disgusting anti-fat bigotry.
Did I want that?
Not in the slightest.
Did I want to change the culture that tolerated that behavior?
Abso-fucking-lutely.
I turned over the car’s engine and pulled back onto the road.
Time to meet the good professor.
After parking, I crunched down a gravel path and across a lovely campus quad. Red brick buildings bordered an impeccably mowed lawn, like chess pieces on a green checkerboard. A pang of longing surged through me. College held amazing memories. It was where I’d met my best friends Barbara and Rebecca, two women who’d been by my side ever since. Funny how my family noticed my eating challenges, but neither of my girlfriends had. Or at least, they never mentioned it. In their defense, though, our time together was one of the few instances when I allowed myself to eat more normally. Our Central Park picnics, Sunday brunches, and girls’-night-ins were full of laughter and fun—and food.
Why did I eat with my girls but rarely anywhere else?
I’d have to ponder that question another time, since I’d arrived at my destination.
I climbed the stone steps of Jonston Hall, yanking open a two-ton wooden door on whiny hinges. Lights flickered on as I passed into the cool interior, goosebumps erupting on my skin. I rubbed my arms as I searched for stairs to Professor Hawley’s second-floor office, huffing more than I wanted to admit as I ascended the grand staircase.
A pool of light splashed into the hallway ahead from her open door.
She muttered under her breath while wrestling a filing cabinet drawer closed. It slammed, then she startled when seeing me.
“Oh! Are you Miss Allen?”
“Yes, Leslie Allen. Thanks for meeting with me, Professor.”
She gestured for me to sit. Her pale cheeks had a natural rosiness to them that complemented her dark bangs and blunt shoulder cut. I wasn’t sure what to expect from a woman advocating for fat acceptance. Professor Hawley was a larger-bodied person, which sent Little Diana into a tizzy.
Of course she’s heavy. Fat acceptance is an excuse not to control oneself.
I shook off the toxic thoughts, but shuddered, knowing I’d have to interview a skeptic who would gleefully articulate the same position. Sometimes journalistic balance sucked.
Scores of articles recounted the prevalence of anti-fat bias in the workplace and the world at large. This led to a host of unfair practices, such as fewer job opportunities and promotions and unequal treatment from doctors, leading to missed diagnoses and poorer health outcomes. Then there was ridicule from the media. Navigating life in a larger body was hard all around, and I was glad to have access to Professor Hawley so I could learn more.
Professor Hawley explained that countless studies about weight and diet were funded by those advocating for strict calorie control. Companies depended on people buying products, supplements, and meal plans to manage their weight, with profits tallying into the billions. “Big Diet is just as toxic and dangerous as any interest group. Big Pharma, Big Oil, Big Tobacco. Anything too big gets corrupt.”
She took me through the data. Like the CDC study, Professor Hawley’s work showed overweight people lived longer. But not all overweight and obese people were necessarily healthier than those of normal weight. It was about lifestyle, which was why the professor advocated for people to avoid getting weighed at the doctor.
“It forces medical professionals to treat their health indicators instead of making assumptions based on a patient’s body size,” she said.
I sat back, thinking.
Just the other day at the hospital, the doctor on rounds nearly fell over when hearing that my full-and-fabulous aunt taught yoga. By the end of their conversation, the trim doctor was doing a standing eagle pose, modified for larger-bodied people, that still stretched the shoulders and upper back and relieved his back pain. Dot was the living personification of what Professor Hawley was describing.
“Are you aware of the origins of the BMI?” the professor asked. “I sometimes hesitate to quote studies founded on that data because it’s such a bogus measure. It was developed using data sets containing only white men, yet it’s used as a standard across races and cultures who were never included in the data collection.”
“Yes, I hear it’s badly flawed,” I said as an idea formed. “But surely you agree that there is a limit to weight beyond which it’s unhealthy?”
“The data sets in this area are so flawed I can’t scientifically give you an answer. There is so much variability from person to person, and ultimately, I question what the purpose is of declaring right and wrong weights. Why not engage with medical conditions and health factors and take weight out of the equation altogether?”
I opened my mouth to protest, but stopped. She had a point. What benefit was there in categorizing people into arbitrary weight groupings? If there was no right or wrong height and no right or wrong shoe size, why had weight assumed such importance in determining health? I needed to investigate further to find out.
But first, food. Suddenly I felt very hungry.