I won’t be at the test this month. I won’t be in class this month. I won’t be in class ever again. I no longer see the point, since you informed me last week that I will never be promoted to shodan.
I know that’s not what you said. What you said is that you won’t promote me until I lose a significant amount of weight. It amounts to the same thing, however. I’ve been struggling with my tendency to put on weight since I was 20 years old, since I stepped on a scale in my first sergeant’s office and heard him say that I exceeded the Air Force’s weight standards. Like you, he told me that I wouldn’t be promoted until I lost weight. On that day I tipped the scale at a whopping 146 pounds. I weigh considerably more than that today, of course.
I don’t know how I got so fat (let’s just call it what it is), whether it’s my genes or the way I was raised. Every week I read something new about another possible cause of obesity, causes ranging from chemical imbalances to childhood ear infections. It seems, though, that for me it was simply inattention. I think I grew up being told that people with better things to do didn’t worry about how they looked, that only those with small intellects focused on such things. Neither do I know why I can’t get rid of the fat, whether it’s my body or my mind that works against me, that sabotages all my best intentions, all my efforts. But I do know this: you can’t know what it’s like to be fat. Let me give you a glimpse, then, into my life.
***
While inattention may have allowed me to get fat, it’s not the reason I remain so. There isn’t a single moment that being fat doesn’t occupy a portion of my thoughts. I wake up in the morning knowing that I didn’t sleep well because I’m never completely comfortable in my bed. The first thing I do after turning off the alarm is weigh myself. I can’t know what kind of day I’ll have until I know whether I’m up 3 pounds or down 2. I’ve never put on a pair of pants without first holding them in front of me and cringing at how large they are. Of the 8 pills I take each morning with my breakfast, I know how many have been prescribed to me because I’m fat: 7. After breakfast I carefully plan my day around how much walking I’m able to do on my arthritic knees.
Everything I do during the day is affected by my being fat. I creep around in the early morning so my footsteps don’t annoy my downstairs neighbors. I try not to notice the accusing glances if the elevator adjusts its level while I’m on board. I stare down the cashier at the grocery store who rolls her eyes at the package of cookie dough on the belt; apparently someone like me shouldn’t be allowed any gustatory pleasures. There is only one store in town that sells clothes in my size. I have never passed a mirror without being surprised and dismayed at my appearance. I have never put a bite of food into my mouth without berating myself.
Each day is a struggle to maintain my self-esteem against the constant onslaught of other people’s disapproval and ridicule. Acquaintances make cruel remarks about fat people even when I’m standing nearby. Men will sometimes suddenly stop talking to me if another person enters the room. I’ve had many enjoyable evenings ruined by a fat joke told by a character on a TV sitcom, by a stand-up comic or a late-night talk show host. While it’s considered bad manners to tell ethnic jokes, and even blonde jokes are lately falling out of fashion, fat people will apparently always be funny.
I am not lazy or lacking in self-discipline. When I was on active duty I studied every day for over a year to earn a promotion ahead of my peers. I was the winner of the John Levitow award in leadership school (for highest overall scores). I put myself through college 1 and 2 classes at a time for 19 years to earn a degree, all while working full-time. Yet whenever I step on the scale, I blame myself for my failure to become thinner.
I’ve tried everything to get rid of this fat: commercial diets costing thousands of dollars, diet shakes that did things to my digestion I don’t care to detail, diet pills that were later shown to cause fatal heart problems, hypnosis and surgery. I’ve even starved myself, knowing that doing so might kill me but thinking that at least I would be thin when I died. I’ve exercised until I’ve collapsed. Despite all these things–or maybe because of them–I’ve only become fatter.
I know that every extra pound shortens my life. I know that I’m at greater risk for cancer, for Alzheimer’s and any number of diseases. I know that no one wants to know me, that no one loves me. I worry that I’ll be alone the rest of my life because I could never settle for a man who would settle for me. I’d rather be alone, though, than become a victim of “hogging.” Look up the term in the Urban Dictionary.
Being fat has ruined my life. It has stood in the way of all but the occasional moment of happiness. And I find that I am often angry, especially at those who inform me that my life would be more satisfying if I’d just lose some weight, as if I were somehow not aware that I’m fat. I get angry at those who tell me losing weight is a matter of some simple math: that I only need to expend more calories than I consume. Most of all, I’m angry at myself almost all the time. I hate myself.
***
You’re no doubt thinking that I’m being unfair, that you weren’t the cause of any of my problems and that you’ve done your best by me. All that is true. It’s not as if you hadn’t been telling me all along that my weight will stand in the way of earning a black belt. And I suspect that you take a lot of heat from your superiors about me. It hasn’t escaped my notice that I stopped receiving promotion certificates from Okinawa. I sense everyone’s disdain when I show up for camp.
It’s the timing of this that stinks, and I’m most to blame for that, because I’ve not been in a hurry to get my black belt. If I had known where I would be in my life when I was finally within reach of it, I would’ve done a lot of things differently. I was never thin enough to earn a black belt, but I would’ve handled it better a few years ago.
***
I don’t like for people to see my pain; I hate to appear weak. When asked, I always say I’m doing okay, even when I’m not, so maybe you thought I was coping well. Or maybe I was when I was in class; I was able to focus on karate to the exclusion of anything else for a couple of hours a week.
You know that Hal, my husband of 24 years died in September of 2007, but I don’t know if I told you that my mother died unexpectedly 4 days before, that I missed her funeral in order to be with Hal when he died. Hal was first diagnosed with stomach cancer in April 2006–it’s been over 3 years since I’ve been okay.
My family lives out west. They were gone within a day or two of Hal’s service. I had no real friends of my own–our friends were Hal’s friends; they drifted away within a couple of weeks. I was left alone in our house, forgotten. But then a woman I knew from my Toastmasters club decided to befriend me. For 18 months Cyd was always at the other end of the phone line, always available for dinner when I had to get out of the house. She advised me, consoled me and encouraged me. The pain of losing Hal was very nearly more than I could bear, but Cyd helped me through it.
At last I found the strength to sell the house and move, but I didn’t want to move too far. I decided to stay in the area for 2 reasons:
1. Cyd was here, and I wasn’t ready to try to cope with my life without her help.
2. I wanted to earn my black belt before I left. I wanted you, who has been my teacher all these years, to give it to me.
Cyd died of a heart attack on May 2.
Since then I’ve been more alone than I thought any person could be. With Cyd gone, my closest friend is a married man–which means that we’re not very close. I no longer had my house, which was filled with things that Hal had loved; it seemed that I’d left him behind when I moved. I realized that I’d made a serious error in staying in Virginia. I should’ve gone to Colorado to be near my sister.
It was in the first few weeks after moving that I progressed from thinking that if I were to die I would at least be out of pain to thinking about how I might bring about my death. I was saved by what at the time appeared to be an impulsive decision–I put my blog on my Facebook page, my contacts saw it, and 3 people I really only barely knew came to my rescue.
I got back to my routine as soon as I could: going to the dojo, Toastmasters and my writing groups, working on my fiction and looking for freelance work. However, this proved not to be as wise a decision as I thought it would be. What I’ve found is that depression requires a lot of energy. I’m like a small child who begins to cry when kept up past her bedtime–if I let myself get too tired, I get dangerously depressed and start thinking about suicide. I had to make room in my schedule for a lot of rest.
It’s because of this that my karate classes became an almost overwhelming commitment. First, I had to take care not to do too much the day before, so I could show up for class with “fresh knees.” Afterward, I had to lie in my recliner for several hours to rest. If I didn’t rest, or if I couldn’t because of other things I had to do, I would fall into bed that night weary in body and in mind. I would cry myself to sleep and would wake up the next morning still tired and too depressed to do any work. My desire to finally put on a black belt had not only become a 20-hour a week endeavor, but was actually dangerous for me.
***
I’ve been living on Hal’s life insurance for two years, trying to get myself together and restart my life. Dealing with the death of my husband has been more difficult than I ever thought anything could be. I have a little over two years’ worth of money left. I’ve thought more than once that I may as well have an expiration date stamped on my forehead–February 1, 2012. There’s a lot I want to accomplish before I run out of time. Getting my black belt was high on my list, yet it was making it almost impossible to accomplish any of my other goals.
I tell you this because although I’m heartbroken that shodan is out of my reach, giving up karate is going to make my life a lot easier. It frees up my week. I’ll be able to exercise more moderately, which will allow me to do it more regularly. I hope to be less depressed. I’ll be able to write more. I may even decide to pack up and move to Colorado after all.
Maybe one day I’ll pick up where I left off and try again. But I won’t be here when I do.
I’ll miss you and everyone at the dojo. Please tell them that.
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