When I was 39, my doctor informed me that I had virtually no thyroid function left.  I went screaming home and called my mother in a panic, and she calmly commented, “Of course your thyroid stopped working– you’re about the age when mine stopped working.”  Okay, I thought to myself, thanks a heap for the heads-up.  I realized that though I was generally aware of the medications my mother took, I had never noticed her taking thyroid supplements.  She explained that in her era of stay-at-home Moms and bridge parties, her doctor had discouraged taking synthetic thyroid hormone and recommended that she “get more rest when she feels tired.”  Uh-huh.   We’ve come a long way, baby.

This episode taught me a couple of important things.  First, it was time for a loooong conversation with Mom about health issues, which wasn’t easy; our parents come from a generation that was not raised to discuss intimate subjects, especially with their children.  (Hopefully we’ll do better when it’s our turn.)  I also learned to keep notes as my mother encountered  health issues, as I was pretty sure I was getting previews of coming attractions.  I was able to recognize the next inherited gift, lactose intolerance, without too much drama.

Nature Taketh Away, Abbott Labs Giveth Back

Once I realized that my thyroid had retired to a cottage in the Cotswolds where it was unavailable for my future metabolic needs, I wasted no time in starting on thyroid replacement hormone.  To my delight, not only did I feel better, but five pounds dropped off like I’d taken off a backpack.  Our systems run with such precision that it doesn’t take much slowing of your metabolism to put weight on.  Your metabolism will slow as you age, but if you’ve gained a bunch of weight in a short time, and you can’t easily assign a cause (well, there was the leftover Halloween candy, then Thanksgiving, then Christmas…), see your doctor for a chat and a blood test.

Of course, the opposite is also true.  I have a good friend who was skinny all her life no matter what she ate and how little exercise she got, until the day her doctor realized her thyroid was stuck in overdrive.  What with the long list of ill effects of chronic hyperthyroidism (including heart failure), she started treatment and now has a weight problem because of the years of bad habits she got into when those habits had no visible consequences.  The angel on my right shoulder compels me to tell her how glad I am that she is no longer in danger of dropping dead of a heart attack.  I try to ignore the devil on my left shoulder shouting, “Hah!  Welcome to MY world!”  Dying is a steep price to pay for being thin.

If you are lucky enough to still have your Mom (and your Dad, especially if you know you take after his side of the family more), make a plan today to talk about family health history, even if you’ve done it before.  As successive generations live longer, they may encounter health problems that their parents died too early to experience.  And give your Mom a hug from me.  I lost my Mom a few years ago, and I miss her.  When I consider all the amazing things she gave me, I guess getting an underactive thyroid is part of a package deal I can live with.

Any number of people have remarked that one of the smartest things you can do to be healthy is to, “choose your parents wisely.”  That’s doubly important when it comes to your weight.  I feel very fortunate that I had normal-to-thin parents with no life-threatening inherited diseases (a few quirks here and there, but no cancer or diabetes, so I really mustn’t grumble).  I know plenty of people who aren’t so lucky.

Taking After Dad

I have a friend who is one of four children born to a willowy, sylph-like mother and a stocky, heavily-built father.  You’ve seen this couple a zillion times– it’s the classic “head cheerleader marries football team captain” story.  Three of the kids, both boys and one of the girls, seem to have received their genetic material exclusively from Mom’s side of the family; the other girl, sadly, got Dad’s.  She spent her formative years eating pretty much what her siblings ate, and maintaining roughly the same activity level as they did, yet her siblings were all model-thin and she was shopping at Lane Bryant.  At best, that’s got to be terribly depressing; at worst, it can drive you to dangerous starvation diets just to try to achieve your family’s “normal.”

In absolute scientific terms, you get exactly 50% of your genes from each parent.  That’s rarely how they are expressed, though.  Why?  No idea, and I started my college life as a Genetics major.  If you can figure it out, they’ll probably give you a Nobel Prize.  (I didn’t grow up planning to be an accountant.  The day I started at my firm, nine of us started together; seven of us were former science majors and the other two switched from engineering.  Nobody with a soul dreams of a future as an accountant, and I get to say that, because I AM one.)  The older I get, the more I look like my mother.  My brother is the spitting image of my mother’s father.  My sister looks like my father’s sister.  You pull the lever on the genetic slot machine and hope that it comes up sevens and not lemons.

The Size You Were Meant to Be

There are plenty of other factors that govern weight besides heredity, chief among them environment and lifestyle.  I often see two very overweight parents walking with their normal-weight young children, and I want to take the kids and give them to somebody who does not eat double pepperoni with a 72 oz. Coke on a daily basis, because even though the parents are clearly not allowing their children the same overindulgences the parents enjoy, that behavior is what the kids are learning.  Those kids are going to chow down as soon as they get the chance, because that’s what they’ve seen their role models do.  And they just might one day say to themselves, “Well, I guess my fat is in my genes– I mean, both my parents are fat.”  And it won’t be true.  They inherited a normal-weight destiny that was corrupted by Donut Depot and House of Hamburgers.

Ask your parents for pictures from when they were children and teens.  If one or both of them has always been stocky, you may have inherited a predisposition for bulk.  This doesn’t mean that you can’t still be svelte, but it does mean that you’re going to have to work harder at it than the rest of us with thin parents.  You’ll probably need to see a nutritionist, but if it’s what you want, you can do it.  And to all you cheerleaders out there, please marry the quarterback or the running back; they tend to be long and lean.  Leave the middle linebackers and offensive tackles for the larger girls.  Otherwise, sure as the sunrise, you’ll end up with a daughter who will starve herself into neurosis and malnutrition trying to fit into your old cheerleader outfit.

Today I’d like to address a scourge on Society, a class of nefarious evildoers determined to corrupt the innocent and lead them down them the long, dark road of addiction.  Of course I’m talking about the store employees at your local Krispy Kreme donut shop.

We’re Givin’ ’em Away!

Sometimes the siren song of that “Hot Donuts Now” sign is just too much to resist, and I find myself inexorably drawn into the parking lot.  I never use the drive-through; I figure if I’m going to have a donut, the least I can do is get off my butt and walk into the store.  The trouble is, nine times out of ten I am met at the door by a store employee holding out a hot, fresh, glazed donut and asking, “Would you like a free sample?”  What am I going to say, no thanks, I’m just here for the coffee?

Now I am in a real bind.  Even if I was totally committed to having ONE donut, I can’t possibly do that.  You can’t just take your free donut and walk out.  So now I figure I have to buy at least two donuts, and now I am looking at eating three donuts.  And then you look at the pricing and it’s cheaper to buy a dozen than just a few.  It’s either cottage cheese for dinner, or it’s time to get creative.

Paying Your Donuts Forward

Here’s a chance to save yourself calories and do something positive.  Buy that dozen donuts and have ONE.  What do you do with the rest?  Take them to work with you; you’ll be incredibly popular.  Take them to your kid’s school and give them to the secretaries at the main office.  Take them to your local police station; you know how cops love donuts.  Take them to a local nursing home or hospice facility.  You will be amazed at how touched people can be by a gesture of kindness.  They’ll smile, you’ll smile, and you won’t have to skip lunch.

You can do the same thing with any evil goodies.  I bake at holiday time like Martha Stewart on crack, and I always load up a big box for my local police and local firefighters and deliver them on Christmas Eve as a thank you to the people missing Christmas with their familes just to keep me safe.  But it doesn’t even have to be Christmas; most people are happy to get treats anytime.  It’s a good thing to get to know your local police and firefighters; you might need them someday, and you won’t be a stranger.  One year the firefighters actually invited me to dinner (hey, I brought dessert).  And since those guys spend most of their on-call time working out, the eye candy will totally take your mind off the rest of the yummies in the box.

So have that donut, and dare the Donut Pusher to do his worst.  (I actually call the manager of my local KK “Donut Pusher” and he smiles and says, “The first one’s free!”)  Then relieve your guilt with a purchase, and find people to share it with.  You just might make eleven friends.

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If you were ever near a TV in the 70s, you probably remember the series of ads where an off-camera narrator tried to foist Chiffon Margarine off on Mother Nature instead of butter.  She responded with the phrase, “It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature,” accompanied by thunder and lightning to express her displeasure.  It’s a shame we can’t seem to take the lesson to heart.

In the era of the commercial campaign in question, American consumers were switching to margarine as a “healthy alternative” to the saturated fat of butter.  It was decades before research revealed that the trans fats used in most margarines were at least as bad as the saturated fat, if not worse.  For some reason, our bodies don’t seem to know what to do with trans fats except use them to coat our arteries.  You’re better off (yippee!) with butter.

You Mean Fat Doesn’t Make You Fat?

The scientific community is still fighting over the possible explanations of the “French Paradox,” namely, how a country that drowns everything in butter manages a relatively low rate of heart disease.  Some argue that the diets of pregnant women have an impact on the developing fetus such that the baby “learns” before birth how to handle saturated fat.  Some believe it’s simply that we are better able to fully metabolize natural fats, as the French diet is low in hydrogenated or otherwise chemically manipulated fats.  The low-carb pundits would have you believe that’s the answer; obviously, they haven’t been to a French bakery lately.  Sadly, the impact of red wine has been thoroughly debunked (but I’m having a glass just to be on the safe side). 

Whatever the explanation turns out to be, there is a general consensus in the medical community that a diet high in natural saturated fat is not the ticking time bomb it was once thought to be.  So be aware that butter is hugely high in fat and calories, but if you want it, have it.  It’s probably better for you in the long run than anything that pretends to be butter but isn’t.

No Sugar Added?

I’m also thrilled that there is new evidence of the evils of artificial sweeteners.  Recent studies at the University of Texas, San Antonio, have revealed a high correlation between people who drink diet soda and the development of obesity.  Yep, not regular soda, diet soda.  They aren’t suggesting that artificial sweetener directly causes weight gain, but that something in the behavior of people who use a lot of artificial sweetener puts them at risk for obesity.  As one of the lead researchers says, you can fool your tongue, but not your brain.  Your body is expecting a certain metabolic effect from sugar that it doesn’t receive; your angry brain may actually cause you to crave the calories it has been unjustly denied.  How many times have you heard the joke about, “I’ll have a candy bar and a diet soda”?

We live in an era where “light” versions of things abound, yet we are fatter than ever.  That’s because we still have to please our fat-loving taste buds, so when you take something out, you have to put something else in.  Take out fat, and typically they put in starch, which turns to sugar the second it hits your saliva (remember that from 7th grade science class?).  Take out sugar, in go chemicals that fool your tongue but not your brain.  The more we try to fool Mother Nature, the less satisfied we feel, and the fatter we get.

As the saying goes, don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.  If you want a sweet drink, have it with sugar.  At least your body will know what it’s getting.  Have butter, mayo and cream cheese.  Do you want a no-fail product with half the fat and calories of a stick of butter that still tastes exactly like butter?  I have it.  HALF a stick of butter.  Want half the sugar of a 16-oz Coke?  Drink 8 ounces.  It’s that easy.  Decide how many calories you want to take in, and portion out that much of the real thing (no pun on old Coke slogans intended), not some feeble imitation.  Your taste buds will thank you, and so will your waist line.  And Mother Nature can turn off the lightning.

A few years back, when a certain psychologist (I’ll call him “Dr. Bill”) was hawking diet advice via the TV show of his good friend (let’s call her “O”), I watched just long enough for the top of my head to blow off.  I mean, in the first place, where does a 6-foot-4-inch, um, portly man, who is not even a medical doctor, get off telling an audience of mostly women how to control their weight?  You might as well go to a Catholic priest for advice on feminine hygiene products.  But here was Dr. Bill, taking audience questions and phone-ins about diet plans.

A Fallen Woman Seeks Guidance

So a woman calls in asking for advice because, after a long, hard week of working, caring for her family, and sticking to her diet, she had broken down and had a hot fudge sundae.  Does Dr. Bill tell her it’s okay, it sounds like she deserved it?  Does he ask if she enjoyed it?  (Does he ask if it was regular or bittersweet?)  No, he tells her to “forgive herself” for her terrible sin of sabotaging her diet, and to resolve to do better next week.  Excuse me?

As I talked about in “Survival of the Fattest,” we are hard-wired to want sweet, high-fat, high-calorie foods.  It requires tremendous strength of will to choose a salad over a chili burger, or to actually bake that cookie dough into cookies for the bake sale rather than tucking into the bowl with a large spoon.  Even Weight Watchers, that stalwart organization which has been fighting the fat for decades, has gone to a system where you have “free points” that you can save up and, if you want, HAVE that hot fudge sundae.  There is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to forgive.

Indulgences For Indulgence

Calories are like money– you can either save up and spend, or spend and owe.  But the save up and spend option is the better one in every respect.  If you limit your calories during the week, you CAN splurge on the weekend.  You will have earned it, and knowing you earned it will allow you to enjoy it guilt-free, which can never be said for the “spend and owe” plan.  Besides, just like there’s interest on owing money, you’re going to pay interest on calorie debt, because the longer your body has those extra calories, the more able it is to squirrel them away into places where removing them is much more difficult.  And the collection agencies?  That would be the store clerks selling you the larger-sized jeans.  It’s not a morality issue, it’s a perfectly objective business issue, and the more you can think of it that way, the better off you’ll be.

Happily, Dr. Bill got out of the diet business, though not before an FTC investigation and a class-action suit.  But I think his big mistake was trying to treat dieting like an emotional problem.  Oh sure, lots of people overeat for emotional reasons, but even solving the emotional problems and perhaps fixing the behavior isn’t going to repair the damage that has already been done.  Dieting isn’t psychology or theology.  It’s science.  It’s math.  Burn more calories than you take in, you’re going to lose weight.  And vice versa.  It’s not confessional thinking, but checkbook thinking that’s going to make a real change in your behavior.  Good thing, too, because this mortgage is a killer.

I don’t know, do you?

I am a healthy size 14, which apparently makes me the average American woman.  I would like to be a healthy size 12.  I was a size 10 before I had my son, but between the spreading of my ribs that he managed with his little baby knees plus developing actual breasts (Woo-hoo, real boobs!  Where were you when I needed a date for prom?), I doubt that’s in the cards.  But you never know.

I have reached a point in my life where I’ve learned a lot of personal truths, and one of them is this– skinny just does NOT feel as good as chocolate tastes.  I’m a fan of The Biggest Loser on TV and I love seeing people change their lives, but what I’d really love is to see the contestants sit down with doctors and trainers after the contest portion is over and develop a goal weight that will fit into their real lives while requiring no more than 2 workouts per week and permitting the occasional pizza.  By the end of the season, the contestants are so focused on losing weight that they are living at the gym and eating half the calories their healthy bodily functions require.  To no one’s surprise, they put on a fair bit of weight immediately after the show, and some of them get so depressed about it that they gain it ALL back and then some.  The contestants who manage to maintain their ultra-skinny weight are the ones who go professionally  into training, motivational speaking, or spokesmanship, where they are in effect being paid to stay skinny.

When Skinny Wins

If your major life goals include wanting to work in media or entertainment, you want to lose weight.  Media is brutal.  Unless you’re Kathy Bates, you can’t work in television and eat pie.  On the other hand, you’ll likely be well compensated in money and prestige.  Is that what you want?

Do you want your significant other to be a smokin’  hot hardbody?  Then you’d better be the same, if for no other reason than that people who look like that spend a lot of time in the gym.  If you’re not there as well, you’ll never see your honey, and other hardbodies will.  Is that what you want?

Ask yourself if there is something you want to have or do that you can’t, solely because of your weight.  It’s not about whether you love yourself.  Self-esteem is incredibly complex, and whatever the weight-loss industry would like you to think, it’s almost totally unrelated to your weight.  I know skinny people who feel worthless, and fat people who think they are the greatest thing since sliced bread, both equally without objective basis.  Changing the number on the scale will not change the voices in your head.

…On the Other Hand…

Everything in life is a trade-off.  I love good food, good wine, and relaxation, and that means either I’m going to have to be brutal with the rest of my time and calories, or it means I’m going to carry a few extra pounds.  So I do.  My husband doesn’t mind (and as long as his BMI exceeds mine, he’d better not).  My blood chemistry is normal.  I’m fit enough to walk where I want, run up and down stairs, and go swing dancing.  I’m in no shape to run a marathon, but then, I don’t want to run a marathon.

Unless your butt is too big for the airline seat, your weight is probably not what’s keeping you from traveling.  Unless you are so large that you are styling fashions by Omar the Tentmaker in an office where tailored suits are the standard dress, your weight is probably not keeping you from professional development.  And it’s definitely not keeping you from finding love.  If you want to walk the runway, lose weight.  If your knees hurt when you walk, lose weight.  If your glucose numbers are off, lose weight.  But know why you want to lose weight, and be realistic about how much you want to lose versus how you want to live.