The healthy Unhealthy

The social media algorithm believes I need to see body transformations. I am bombarded with images of men losing weight and getting shredded. These miraculous diets and training programs not only build muscle and drop weight but also provide a tan, strip body hair, and allow for a manly beard.

 

Impressive program.

 

When I gained weight, I hated my body. It disgusted me. My solution? Pretend not to care and just keep eating.

 

It might have been the Cherokee or the Lenape people, but the war of two wolves in everybody rings true. The one you feed is the one that grows. I wonder if I have three wolves. My third wolf is hunger. It ate the other two wolves, which is all I have left to feed.

 

It is always hungry.

 

I worked hard to lose weight. The damage was done. Something in my brain changed. I can't turn it around.

 

I am still dissatisfied with my body. All I see is inadequacy. Shortcomings. I feel small, no matter how big I am.

 

"When we don't know who to hate, we hate ourselves." ― Chuck Palahniuk

 

Shell is the balance. She constantly gives me positive reinforcement. It is genuine; she lets me know when things are untidy.

 

It must be exhausting for her. Feeding another wolf, I cannot feed. Self-esteem.

 

The fourth hungry wolf.

 

Now more than ever, society is quick to judge what is 'healthy'.

 

I watch Charles Bukowski read his work to a packed audience. Drunk from the onset, he drinks through the entire recital. He can barely read by the conclusion. The crowd loves it—the flawed genius.

"Find what you love and let it kill you." ― Charles Bukowski

 

Imagine the outrage today.

 

Everything is judged differently. Everything called out. Hysteria. Call out culture.

 

Lean on alcohol; this is bad. Lean on drugs. Bad.

 

Lean on food is different. Too little, anorexia? Bulimia? Bad.

 

Overeat. We know it's terrible. All the body positivity in the world cannot cancel science. You might get away with being obese young, but the fat wolf you keep feeding is catching up with you.

 

Somehow being overweight is ok. Not bad. Wolves are becoming domesticated.

 

"Despite decades of obesity research, and billions of dollars spent in the laboratory and on clinical trials, the bedrock fundamental concept underlying all nutrition and dietary advice is that fat, and lean people are effectively identical physiologically, and that our bodies respond to what we eat the same way, except that the fat people at some point in their lives ate too much and expended too little energy and so became fat, while the lean people didn't."

― Gary Taubes

 

What about obsessive? I am praised for my dedication. Nothing is ordinary about weighing food and packing four meals in Tupperware daily.

 

Fifteen grams of pumpkin seeds, not 14. Not 16.

 

The healthy unhealthy.

 

Then there is the gym. How could it be bad?

 

The stress of missing a single day. The anxiety. Taking Sunday off and feeling the guilt, dragging yourself there when you need a break because you cannot miss a day.

 

The healthy unhealthy.

 

We all lean on things. Some of them just look better.

 

When we did the ride, I had to come to terms with the fact that there would be no gym for months. This had not happened for 20 years.

 

I have no words for the anxiety.

 

I let it go—all of it. I drank every day. The cycling kept the weight off. At first.

 

You can't out-train a bad diet. Or outride.

 

By the end, I was drinking at lunch and dinner. No mirrors. No problems.

 

The ride ended, and it was time to take stock. The damage was done. That old familiar sting, as Cash and Reznor put so well.

 

Hate. Self-loathing. I was a sloppy mess.

 

So, I fed my other wolf. The healthy unhealthy wolf.

 

I didn't grow a beard. My body hair remained. There is no tan.

 

I took the post-ride photo and shamed myself with it. Motivated the wolf.

 

This is what ten weeks look like—ten weeks of weighing food. Ten weeks of training, six days a week. Ten weeks of feeding the wolf.

Not Social Media worthy. The differences are minor. Shell can see them.

 

My start weight was 103kg and about 20-25% body fat.

 

I am 98kg, and I guess I have 13-15% body fat.

 

I have lost count of how many wolves are in me. But I know which wolf to feed.

 

I will feed it and feed it because it will never be satiated.

 

The other wolves will be back if I don't feed this wolf. I cannot handle those wolves.

I will never love my body.