How To Lose Weight; But You Won’t Listen

Many years ago, there was a very fat girl called Delores.  She was virtually round.  I was and always have been slim… maybe skinny.

She wanted to lose weight and I gave her an easy diet plan.

It is basic.   Firstly, cut out all soft drinks and drink water or pure fruit juices.   Cut out all cake, cookies, and candy.  That was the first month, for what I know and every one knows, is that a diet has to become part of you.  It has to be normal for you.

If it is too harsh, too fast, one can’t keep to it.  But if it is slow and more replacement than rejection, it will work.

It worked for Delores.  Within two weeks she actually had a waist.  She was fat, but not as fat as she had been.

Then she stopped and went back.   And when questioned she said;

“If I lose weight people will like me for how I look.   People who like me now like me for myself.”

I thought that was pretty stupid.

Firstly she was fat and having lost the weight during her brief diet she still was fat.  Yeah, if you knew her you would know that she had lost weight, if you didn’t know her, you’d say, “That fat girl….”

Secondly, she had very few friends, and the reason she was my friend is because she lived across the street and I was friends with her brother.  If she hadn’t had her brother, then I wouldn’t know she was alive.

So, it became one of those dialectics where you sit around with other people and discuss things that you find puzzling.   Such as a young person who was so fat that all you could see was fat, who had lost weight just by replacing fizzy drinks with water and juice and leaving out snacks.

She would have to lose like 100 pounds to look human for she was that fat, and could have.  It would take about a year, moving slow, but it would work.

But she quit.

The fact is, people like excuses.   They like to have an acceptable reason for their failures.   Delores could use her obesity as the reason why;

a) no body liked her

b) why she didn’t have a boyfriend

c) why she could ride a bike, didn’t want to go to the beach, didn’t like to go out in public

on and on.

Where another person might accept their personality was cold or they were stand offish or were clumsy, Delores had her instant excuse.

“The reason why….. is because I’m fat.”

When she realised that if she followed the diet she would no longer be fat and then would no longer be able to claim it was her weight which was the reason why…. she preferred to use her fatness as the excuse.

So we went to the beach; she stayed home.   We went to the concert, she stayed home.  She stayed home because she was fat.

Eventually, we went away.  We married, we went to University in another place, and no one remembered Delores who was always glum and negative and we weren’t and didn’t want to be.