I was fat for most of my life.
- Until the age of 5, I was an average skinny kid.
- I was fat from 2nd grade until 9th grade. I was never the fattest kid in school but I had a fat belly, a double chin, and big flabby love handles.
- From 14 to 20, I got tall, thin, and fit. A restrictive diet, a growth spurt, and exercise managed to keep me thin until I was 21. I had 5 years of being skinny.
- After I met my wife, started working full-time, and became a family man, I got fat again. I put on 35 lbs within a few years and struggled to control my weight for the next 30 years.
- When I hit my 40 I became vegetarian. I dropped 25 lbs and stayed there for 5 years. I wasn’t skinny but at least I was less fat than I’d been in 20 years.
- After 5 years of vegetarianism, I went Paleo. My weight stabilized. My energy and strength improved. My mood improved.
- After a few years of this, I drifted toward keto as I eliminated most grains, starches, processed foods, sugars, cheat meals, and nuts.
- This past year, I went full carnivore, eliminating everything except beef, eggs, and occasionally fish.
I dropped to 135 lbs and got ripped for the first time in my life. This made me rethink everything about eating.
For me, why I ate was far more powerful than what I ate.
One of my early fond memories is eating Butter Pecan Ice Cream with my Grandma at night. We would fill our bowls, then stir until the hard ice cream melted to a smooth, creamy consistency. I loved the entire experience. The stirring process, the hanging out with Gram, sitting at the kitchen table in the dark with just the little stove light on, the satisfaction of a perfectly smooth bowl of ice cream, the crunch of the pecan bits, and the sweetness of the sugar.
Other nights, when I slept over at my Aunt Esther’s house, I would make a chef salad for my nighttime snack. My aunt would praise my cooking skills and say I’d make a good bachelor someday, as I chopped up lettuce, cheese, ham, bacon, carrots, celery, and eggs. I’d whip up my own custom dressing of mayonnaise and ketchup and then dig in. Other nights, I’d feast on Essie’s homemade fudge, cookies, bologna and cheese sandwiches, or dinner leftovers. We’d play cards or Yahtzee for hours. Or I’d sit on her lap in the rocking chair while she scratched my back and hugged me close as we watched the little black and white TV perched up in the corner on a shelf..
In the summertime, after dinner, Mr. Softie would drive his truck down the street and all of us kids would race to buy a soft-serve cone dipped in cherry, chocolate, or sprinkles. We’d bite off big chunks from the top then lick spirals around the ice cream until there was just a small bit of ice cream left in the bottom of the cone. Then we’d suck it out before devouring the cone. Afterward, we’d play freeze tag with sticky faces and dirty hands until the curfew siren sounded for us to go home.
On special nights, we’d pile into the car for a trip to Heisler’s Dairy Farm for hand-scooped ice cream, sundaes, and floats made from favorite flavors like teaberry and black raspberry. On the way there, we’d wind down the windows to point at the cows and horses and smell the fresh breezes, the corn stalks, and the manure. Sometimes, we’d play miniature golf across the road. Then we’d play punch buggy on the way home or make steam drawings on the inside of our fogged up car windows.
Wednesday was movie night in the park. We’d play basketball, ride the swings, squish-the-lemon on the slide, and visit “The Stand” where our volunteer parents sold us shoestring licorice, red silver dollars, gumdrops, Baby-Ruths, caramels, soft pretzels, and pizza plus every imaginable soda flavor from sassafrass to birch beer to orange to blueberry.
At home, during the school year, my sister and I ate ice cream in front of the TV nearly every night. I liked strawberry and she liked chocolate. But we’d also venture into Mint Chocolate Chip, Vanilla Fudge Swirl, Rocky Road, and Peanut Butter. We watched Happy Days, Laverne and Shirley When the Days Were Really Rotten, the Flintstones, and Scooby-Doo.
Friday night sleepovers with friends were made special with pizza, popcorn, and chips. On holidays, we’d have Russel Stovers chocolates and mixed nuts, finished off with candy canes.
Eventually, I grew into a teenager with a part-time job. Dinner was often a hoagie, pizza, or fast food shared with my friends at a local joint. We would eat, laugh, and mess around all for hours.
Date nights were dinner, followed by a movie, making-out, frisbee, tennis, long walk, and feeding the ducks at North Park.
With my wife, date night morphed into more expensive, elaborate dinners. Appetizers of fried zucchini, lobster bisque, and baskets of warm bread were followed by exquisite main courses of chicken campagnola, veal parmesan, and parmesan-crusted sea bass with a side of angel hair pasta. No matter how stuffed I was, I’d cap off the meal with a decadent dessert.
Other times, date night was movie rentals and a night spent at home by the fire. We’d order big takeout meals and I’d get pleasantly drunk. Then I’d cap off the night munching on Doritos, Cheetos, chips, nachos, popcorn, Hershey Kisses, pretzels, ice cream, and dry roasted Planter’s Peanuts.
I would snack whether I was hungry or already full to the bursting point because I loved the feeling it gave me. It made me feel warm, safe, drowsy, semi-comatose, relaxed, and loved.
No wonder I struggled with weight most of my life! My best memories of love, family, and friendship all circled around overeating nutritionally deficient food that was full of carbs, sugar, and processed chemicals.
When I was 50, my wife died. I no longer enjoyed eating. I ate alone now – often in front of the TV. I stopped getting take-out. I stopped buying ice cream. I stopped going to restaurants.
I dropped 10 lbs.
A few months later, I went on the road for a while before settling down in a new town. With no friends or family to join me, my meals became utilitarian. I ate good high-quality Paleo food but dropped another 10 lbs.
I liked this. I had dropped to 145 -150 lbs and my lifelong love handles shrunk. But I still craved that feeling of comfort and satisfaction so once or twice a week I would have a nightly binge of ice cream, peanuts, and chocolate before falling into bed in a sugar-induced stupor. The next day I would feel like I had eaten a bowling ball, but it was worth it.
Then last year I had hernia surgery. After my surgery, I could no longer stuff myself. Anytime I overate, it would feel like a knife was being stabbed through my abdomen from the inside. I’d get terrible acid reflux that woke me throughout the night. My workouts the next day would suck and it would take me days until my binge had cleared out of my system.
Today I don’t eat to feel better. I eat to fuel my body. On the rare occasions when I binge on cheese and chocolate I always regret it.
I like being clear-headed. I like being skinny. I love being ripped. I like having high levels of sustainable energy.
But I’d be lying if I said I never miss the dragon. It’s just that chasing it with food is no longer part of my life.