It is an unfortunate fact of life that when you are trying to diet, obstacles sprout up like mushrooms – and we don’t just mean your children’s half-empty packet of Cheetos lying temptingly on the kitchen table (though there’s always that, too). We think it’s a good idea to identify possible pitfalls in advance of them occurring, and to develop some strategies to deal with them.
If you are worried about a specific upcoming event, turn to page 61 for a detailed index of how to cope in many given situations, such as parties, the pub, or Christmas dinner. What we have found far more troubling – and troublesome – than the odd stray sweet, or the sudden overwhelming urge to think, “Ah, bugger it, I’ll just eat this sticky toffee dessert, and start again tomorrow,” are other people. As the writer and critic Mary McCarthy once said of someone who made a habit of always helpfully pointing out her bad reviews to her, “There’s always friends.”
Girlfriends, in particular, can be very peculiar about your dieting. They’re pleased for you – up to a point. We’ve lost track of the number of times we’ve both been told, by well-meaning “friends,” that we didn’t need to lose another pound and were utterly gorgeous just as we were (at 200 pounds). Now, either these friends are so blinded with love that they can’t see you as you really are, or, we’re sorry to say, the idea of you controlling your biggest vice – your overeating – makes them distinctly uncomfortable.
Women are strange creatures. When I (India) got divorced, many of my girlfriends suddenly got very possessive of their husbands. I can honestly say that, to me, the majority of these husbands were monstrous gargoyles (I’m sure they spoke very highly of me, too). I wouldn’t have touched them with a very long stick. They were my nice girlfriends’ inexplicably dull, unattractive, or both, spouses, and over the years I’d learned to put up with them, and they with me. And yet, suddenly, their wives were behaving as though their fat, bald, braying, coma-inducingly boring husbands were Brad Pitt, and I was some sex-crazed, frenziedly lustful femme fatale, instead of an exhausted single mother who’d really rather be asleep, but who’d come round for a drink because it seemed rude to say “no” three times in a row. Weird, or what? But it happened with alarming frequency.
It’s the same thing with weight. People don’t like too much movement around the status quo. You’re supposed to be fat, they think – it’s just how you are. If you wanted to do something about it, surely you would have done it by now. No, you must be really comfortable in your skin, and happy with your lot. So you get pigeonholed: you sit in your little box, which says “My fat friend,” and you’re not really allowed to jump out. People are threatened by change, and they are especially threatened by change in their close friends. This is particularly true of people who aren’t especially happy, and for whom the smallest change can tip the balance in a negative way. For these people, the fact that you have done something and confronted an issue – your weight – head-on can seem threatening. But, do you know, that’s their business. It’s not yours.
So it shouldn’t surprise you that the friend who’s offered to cook you dinner “forgets” about your eating plan, and puts a chocolate cake in front of you for dessert. You shouldn’t be too shocked when, out for the evening, your friend urges you to eat something you’re not supposed to, “just this once.” And neither should you be surprised if the same friend – or another: this has happened to both of us with a variety of people – suddenly tells you that you’re getting too thin, when you both know perfectly well that you’ve got another 30 pounds to go before you’re anywhere near a healthy weight for your height. It’s not just your skinny friends: your overweight friends are more than likely to be incredibly dismissive of your dieting plans, because, of course, the act of you dieting reminds them that they could do with losing weight too; that you’re doing something about your problem and they’re not. We know this to be true because we’ve done it ourselves. As for colleagues: no one should have to put up with the nosy woman who sits opposite you and makes a point of investigating, and commenting on, your packed lunch every day.
This sabotaging will happen in one way or another, no matter how charming, lovely and supportive your friends are. And we suggest quite a radical solution to it. This is not to tell anyone that you’re on a diet – excepting, of course, your designated diet buddy, if you have one.
Dieting is like giving up smoking: if you involve other people and make a great big song and dance about it, anything they say – from “How boring of you” to “Congratulations” – is potentially irritating and anxiety-causing. This is because you now feel that you’re not just dieting for yourself, but for other people, and naturally their input matters to you. And by telling them about it, you’re giving them license to comment.
Do you really want their comments? Think about it. Probably not. If the person who originally said, “Congratulations,” now says, “Oh, go on, this little piece of bread won’t hurt you,” a weird thing happens psychologically. You think, “This person is on my side. And yet they’re telling me to have the bread. That means it must be okay.” Conversely, the person who says, “How boring,” is not on your side from the off, and is unlikely to be helpful. Why not simply avoid both scenarios by keeping quiet about the whole project? Life’s too short.
You need to remember that you are doing this diet for you. You’re in charge of yourself – nobody else is. Only you can influence what you eat – nobody else can. Losing weight is your responsibility, and no one else’s. So we suggest you quietly get on with it. That way, nobody will be expecting you to succeed, and nobody will be expecting you to fail, which removes an enormous amount of stress and pressure. Nobody will stare at your plate and say, “Doesn’t look much like diet food to me.” Nobody will say, “Should you really be eating that?” or “But it’s low fat, you can have it,” or “I don’t believe in diets. You should just exercise more,” or any of the other little things that can drive you up the wall. And nobody will cause you to feel humiliated in public by loudly announcing, “She’s on a diet” (cue everyone turning round to stare at Miss Tubs).
So our advice, which you are free to ignore, is to keep quiet. Aside from anything else, it will stop you from turning into the incredibly tiresome kind of woman who’s always thinking and talking about food. You might even want to keep it from your partner. Does he really need to know? Wouldn’t it drive you crazy if he started commenting all the time about what you’re eating, and looked all disappointed if you slipped up? (This last scenario is so demoralizing and stressful that it might very well make you give up altogether.) The same thing applies with your children: do their mates really need to know that you’re on a diet? You might as well wear a sticker on your head saying, “Hi! I’m a Fat Mum.” We say no. And given that you can eat or prepare the food your family normally eats, doing the diet quietly and noiselessly is entirely feasible. You all have the roast pork, but only they have the mash. You have some cheese instead of dessert. Unless your family are directly related to Hercule Poirot, they probably won’t even notice.
If it becomes impossible to keep quiet about the diet, i.e., if someone asks you about it directly, say something vague like, “I thought I’d try and eat more healthily for a couple of days.” Remember: you’re doing this for yourself. And, you know, you don’t need help from anybody, apart from your trusted diet buddy, or this book.