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April 10, 2005
RANT: Spend More Money on Vegetables and Swimsuits
[WARNING: FIERCE POLEMIC FOLLOWS. Thin skinned folks should just skip this one. This will generate a lot of angry comments.]
My two favorite NPR shows are "Sound Money" and "Voices in the Family." My local NPR station, WHYY in Philadelphia, plays them on Sunday morning at 5 am and 6 am. This is not a problem for me because I'm up at 5 am anyway... never have been able to shake those union organizer hours. "Voices in the Family" is a local show by a family therapist named Dan Gottalieb, and I disagree with him a lot, but I really enjoy the show. I think I like it as much for his calm, soothing voice as for the content of the program.
This morning the show was about psychiatric medications for children. I'm not going to talk about that. (Huge sigh of relief from the crowd.)
What caught my attention was a statistic quoted that 40% of girls ages 8-14 report that they are unhappy with their bodies. Immediately, the host said, "Those are eating disorders in the making."
Shortly thereafter, the guest quoted what sounded like one of Jay Olshansky's statistics. I don't remember the exact quote, but it was about the giant rise in childhood obesity.
I am going to connect the dots in a way that will enrage and offend a lot of people.
Could there possibly be any connection between these two data points?
Are more children unhappy with their bodies in some small part because more children are obese?
Now before you throw a steamed vegetable (I hope) at the computer screen, hear me out. You've already decided to ignore the warning at the top of the page, so you're in.
I know that young girls who are not obese, not overweight, not even slightly anything other than thin are obsessed with their bodies and have terrible body images. I WAS ONE OF THESE GIRLS! Go read the Women's Magazines issue of the blog for the longer story. I have great credentials in the body image struggle field. I thought I was fat when I wasn't, blah blah blah. I also really was overweight for awhile, so there. I get lots of points.
When I was a young girl who was not happy with my body, I was usually not overweight but just on the side of too plump for fashion. And I was unhappy in my own skin. I tried all sorts of bizarre diet schemes, mostly concentrated around eating no fat whatsoever (bagels with mustard era.) I watched my friends go down the anorexic road, and witnessed the dawn of the Snackwells era, when everyone ate no-fat crap filled with sugar that not only contained lots of calories, but was completely without nutrition. It seemed like there were two camps: kids who got fat by eating a lot of no-nutrition crap, and kids who starved themselves so got really thin but ate only no-nutrition crap with less fat.
Now it seems like the camps are even further apart: the fat kids are fatter, and there are a lot more of them. The starving kids are still starving, though now maybe they're eating no-carb crap instead of no-fat crap. Kids are not getting good nutrition, especially not in schools. Parents have to work too many hours just to keep up and don't have the skills to cook super-fast, easy, low calorie high nutrition meals to feed to themselves or their children. Meanwhile, the disconnect remains between real nutritional issues and how children feel about themselves and their bodies.
So join me in this thought experiment. Teleport back to 1988, when I was fourteen, in my first year at a performing arts high school where dancers were actually graded down on their report cards for gaining weight. Toxic environment! Camera focuses in on the upstairs study lounge, where a group of girls are comparing the fat grams on different packages of fake-fat cookies. None of these girls are dramatically overweight, but some of them are a bit plump, some are a bit thin, and none are happy with their bodies.
Then, suddenly, as though out of a puff of smoke, an unusual being appears in their midst. Perhaps it's an angel, or maybe just a collective hallucination caused by eating Olestra. He's slightly orange in color. Anyway, the unusual being immediately catches the attention of the girls, mostly because he's a guy and kinda cute. Not to mention that he appeared out of a puff of smoke.
"Put down the Snackwells," commands the being. "Abandon your Entemann's fat free chocolate chip cookies."
The girls drop the fat-free gak and stare in amazement at the Orange One.
"You have to eat protein! Otherwise, you will live the rest of your life in the grip of horrible carb cravings and you will gradually decompose into a giant bagel!"
As though by magic, a lovely dish of scrambled eggwhites appears in front of each of the girls.
"You have growing bones! You need calcium!"
A kale salad with a scoop of cottage cheese on top appears, right next to the eggwhites.
"Your no-fat lifestyle is killing you! You have to eat healthy, unsaturated fats."
And a half-tablespoon of olive oil mixed with a half-tablespoon of flax oil appears, lightly dressing the kale salad.
"And eat some *87&^%ing vegetables!"
Tomatoes, green peppers, all sorts of salad greens, and interesting veggies appear on the salad, happily basking in the oil that will make their nutritients absorbable.
By this time, the girls are staring at more food than they usually allow themselves to eat. And more nutrition than their fat-free crap filled bodies have seen since Dean Ornish was in medical school.
As quickly as he had appeared, the Orange One is gone, leaving a feast of nutritious food in front of the malnourished teenage girls.
They are all a bit afraid. Not because a random dude just appeared out of a puff of smoke and dropped off some food. No, they're scared of the oil! IT HAS FAT!!!!!!!!!! Everything they have been taught about how to be thin is that they should eat no fat.
Gradually, the girls dig into the food. It's great! They feel... different. Not hungry anymore, completely satisfied.
Later in the day, anonymous notes appear in all of their mailboxes explaining what they should eat. They compare the notes and they're all the same... clearly a communication from on high. Or Canada.
Nothing in the notes says anything about calories. It just explains why and how to eat more protein, good fats, and a variety of nutrient-dense vegetables with a few fruits.
The girls change their diets. The thin ones look healthy! They have color in their faces again! The slightly too plump ones lose weight, liberated from carb cravings and unhealthy eating habits. They have more energy, they focus better on their studies.
One of the girls, the one who was a tiny bit heavy and is now happily thin, resolves to spend the rest of her life looking for a man with a slight orange tint to his skin and an encyclopedic knowledge of nutrition. This process takes sixteen years and involves some disasters that are funny if they didn't happen to you. But I digress.
In one appearance out of a puff of smoke, the Orange One did what legions of counselors, psychologists, feminists who say that we shouldn't imitate fashion models, had never been able to do. He gave the girls the tools they needed to create the bodies they wanted, and BE HEALTHY!
I am not saying that good nutrition can cure anorexia. Nor am I saying that teenagers should be CR'd. I am saying that while we're harping on and on about how girls should not have bad body images, wouldn't it make sense to feed them healthy food?
You see, I have this bizarre belief that it is possible to be healthy and thin. That it is possible for everyone. Unless, like Terry Anderson, you are spending years as a hostage being shackled and fed rice.
And I believe that most people, even young women, *especially young women,* when fed a proper diet of high quality protein, unsaturated fats, and tons of good veggies and fruits, will reach a healthy weight. And will like themselves at that weight! Because I don't think that body hatred is a natural part of being a woman, or even a function of looking at Kate Moss a lot. I think it's a function of being at war with your body because you don't know how to eat.
Yes, there are exceptions. But real anorexics are very rare. While women at all weights who struggle with their weight and health are the rule, not the exception. Wouldn't it be easier to just get yourself the body you want, through a way of eating that is extremely healthy?
How about if we put all that energy that we used to spend hating ourselves into finding our very favorite protein source? We'll have so much time and energy left over that we will be able to run all over town looking for just the right vegetables, and then weighing them and chopping them! Or if that doesn't sound like fun, we could just take over the world. Or whatever.
I think it's pointless to tell women to ignore society's ideas of beauty. It hasn't worked yet. Let's tell women this: if you eat the right foods, you can have the body you want.
Yes, it takes self-discipline, especially if you're the kind of girl who, like me, used to greatly enjoy a bagel and a margarita (not together, I assure you.) But it takes a lot less self-discipline than spending your life hating your body and fighting mad carb cravings.
And most people, when fed the kind of diet I now eat, even without restricting calories, will be thin. Not super-skinny, perhaps, but thin.
Now CR is a different thing. CR, when done right, that is with ON, means taking the building blocks of excellent nutrition and then gradually lowering the total Calories. That's great if you want to slow your own aging process. Or if you have a job where you need to be *really* thin, like a dancer or a model. Or if you're trying to pick up girls.
[Small correction: no man has ever told me that he adopted CR to pick up girls. That was a total fabrication. I made it up.]
So what's the point? What's the clever line that's going to tie this whole thing together?
There's a lot of public handwringing about childhood obesity. There's also a lot of public handwringing about girls who hate their bodies. Yet, our experts remain unwilling to confront the real issues of inadequate nutrition that keep people locked in an infinite loop of ill health and bad body image. It's absurd to deny the connection between how we feel about our bodies and how our bodies actually are! What if, just as an experiment, we give our bodies what they need, and stop ingesting stuff we don't need?
Then maybe we could stop blaming our problems on Kate Moss, and start chopping vegetables.
We'll live longer, be healthier, and spend more money on swimsuits.
Posted by april at April 10, 2005 6:19 AM
Comments
Yes - better food for all teenage girls! A movement must be started. You are right that this is the age to get them on board. Maybe we should create a healthy eating mini-textbook for high school health classes with all the evidence that MR can give us.
But then we would have to fire all the home ec teachers. They taught my older son to cook things with biscuit dough.
Teenage girls need lots of iron too. You don't get enough iron! Not enough iron in your egg whites and vegetables for teenage girls. Lack of iron makes women tired and mentally sluggish. Girls have to take supplements or eat red meat or clams/oysters to get enough iron in 1800 calories or less.
Posted by: Mary at April 10, 2005 1:04 PM
Halleluia, April! What an awesome entry this is! You should send it out to the media!
The obesity stats are almost the same here in Canada and they appalling. Fat, malnourished children -- how very sad. I also suspect that basic nutritional deficiency has a great deal to do with the high rates of conception difficulties now being experienced by so many young, would-be parents. They've been raised on gak, are now subsisting on gak and lo & behold, their bodies refuse to allow a new being to commence life in an environment that will not support it. Orange One - to the rescue!! JD
Posted by: Judith at April 10, 2005 4:02 PM
Great post, April. Kind of reminds me of last week, in fact. I was paging through the latest issue of Consumer Reports and came upon this frightening little nugget:
"Jill Staats, an apparel-industry professional, says vanity sizing has arisen in part because 'it's tough to admit you've grown around the middle.' The average woman weighs 164 pounds today, up from 140 pounds in 1960."
I shutter to think what the average man now weighs. Meanwhile, if this whole vanity sizing thing carries over to men's clothing, I'll have to start shopping in the Boy's department!
-Dan
Posted by: Dan at April 10, 2005 6:44 PM
I firmly believe a CR educated parent is a better parent. Please allow me to elaborate...
My children, ages 9 & 10, benefit from CR-indirectly. The snacks at home range from raw nuts to fresh fruits and veggies. When they come home from school, absolutely ravenous, these are the things they eat. Although I take pride in my cooking abilities, a favorite at my house is always my home-made soups. Obviously, it is much easier to control the nutrition in this situation. My kids are definitely not totally CR, but I'd put a paycheck on the fact their nutrition is head and shoulders above the average child. They are both gorgeously healthy and I'll never regret taking the extra time to shop for fresh, organic produce.
So, to anyone who cares to argue April's blog, step up!
Thanks April!
Posted by: Danielle at April 12, 2005 6:24 AM