It feels real to me

Yesterday I had a regularly scheduled appointment with Dr. S. She has no answers. She really focuses on my weight, because that's what she primarily does in her practice.

She looked at my food diary and concluded that I am currently eating less than 1200 calories a day, most days, and that's probably right for me. She said my protein-to-carbohydrate ratio is excellent. She would like for me to eat more protein, but I told her I won't do it if it means more calories.

Here's the hell of it: I gained four pounds in the last two weeks. Oh, I took the stairs, and walked briskly, and parked far away from my destination, and carried a lot of boxes up and down stairs, cleaned the basement, mopped floors, and tried to move more than usual. My reward: weight gain around my middle.

And people wonder why I fucking hate my body so much.

The thing is, I am in a lot of pain. My right knee is on fire. My pelvis feels like it's going to crack apart. The pain from the spasms in my psoas muscle are indescribable, but I can't go to see a doctor for any of it because at this point, he or she will just blame everything on my weight as they seem inclined to do. My neuralgia isn't weight-related, but that's always an easy answer for an often difficult-to-diagnose problem. I want to take that diagnostic option off the table entirely, and that means no medical help for the pain until I lose another sixty pounds. If I can get to 110, there is nothing that a doctor can blame on my size or diet. Nothing.

Dr. S looked over my food log and said that eating every four hours is bad. She has banned me from eating anything between meals, so I must combine the calories from the snacks into my meals, and I must wait full six-hour intervals before eating again.

I told her six hours is a long time and I'm going to get hungry. She said it's not real hunger--it's only psychological hunger and it will pass. I just have to learn to ignore it. No snacks. The hard-boiled egg white must be eaten with the oatmeal at 7:00 in the morning, not as a snack at 11:00. The apple or slice of low-fat Alpine Lace Swiss cheese must not be eaten at three. Those calories have to roll into lunch, and then I have to tough it out until dinner at 7:00 or 7:30 p.m.

Dr. S said that by eating small amounts of food every four hours, I may be helping my headaches, but I never give my body a chance to to need to draw on my fat stores.

I hate my fucking, stupid-ass body. Hate it. Now I'll get to endure constant hunger and stomach pangs--along with headaches--and I will bet I still don't lose any weight.

Let's face it, in America, if you're not thin, you're nothing. You are sneered at and waved off by the medical establishment. You can't even buy clothes for a body that isn't toothpick thin and curveless. I know this because I went shopping for pants on Sunday. I still wear a size 16. That hasn't changed. What I found were racks and racks of "Skinny Jeans," "jeggings," (see photo at left) "narrow-leg trousers," "trim-fit pants," and more of the same. I personally know of two people who can dress in those styles. The rest of us will look ridiculous. The message here is, though, that you should never be fat or even curvy. We must all adhere to the fashion choices available and become shaped like little boys. Apparently, that's the American ideal. If it weren't, there would actually be clothes out there that fit.

And if I could fit the ideal, no doctor would tell me that everything from fatigue to shingles to chronic pain to parasthesia to vertigo was a result of being too damn fat.

Keira, Keira, Keira, how do you stay so utterly perfect?