A Most Unreliable Narrator Issue #96 Fat Girl Running
My body is amazing af.
Welcome to A Most Unreliable Narrator, the slice-of-life newsletter of GenXer around town, Lisa Rabey. I talk about anything and everything with a bit of swears. I’m glad you’re here.
Dear Internet,
Yes, I know, an unexpected mid-week newsletter. I wrote #95 on time and I have some thoughts on my “get healthy and well plan” that I wanted to write about on this dreary Saturday night to send out in a few days rather than wait a whole week.
In my last missive I talked about the rejection from Baptist and that I had options. My GP is very supportive on whatever I want to do because I’m a great candidate, health wise, for bariatric surgery. My BMI is 42. I have no health issues other than being crazy which apparently is now a limiter on losing weight. Can we just pause for a moment that I’m being active on getting healthy and I’m being shot down on the most accepted way to lose weight? Thank you.
In the past it was about calorie counting and get thin schemes, but I realized that did nothing for my overall health. Yeah, sure calorie in, calorie out (CICO) is the most accepted form of losing weight, but it says nothing about macronutrients, what you’re putting into your body, and eating style. In theory, I can eat at McDonald’s every day and take out one item and lose weight because I’m ingesting less calories. In theory. But we know that’s not how it really works. (Also, before I continue on, Honey Nut Cheerios does not have 1300mg of sodium per serving. LoseIt was wrong.) I willingly admit in all my dieting forays, I never really thought about what I was putting in my body, only that I was following CICO. Food intake and metabolism are huge factor as well as age and sex on how your body responds.
The Best Kate gets some weird ass reactions to some of the foods she eats while TEH is doing intermittent fasting and eating like shit and his diabetes is really controlled. (He also lost 40lbs when we were on Noom last year to my 10 and I was livid. Fucking XY chromosomes.) My body, however, fights me tooth and nail on everything weight wise. I’m near menopause (which has YET to happen wtf), old, tall, XX chromosomes, and carry around 315lbs. Plus I keep hearing about the “weight set point” where your body, no matter what you do, wants you to stay at X lbs and it fights anything that doesn’t match that. (I’ve also been told bariatric surgery “resets” the “weight set point” which is why people who have the surgery have greater success in losing and keeping the weight off.)
So, options. Changing my diet is one start. Less sodium for sure since I carry water weight like a camel. More greens and fruits. More protein. I am not going to watch carbs or sugars because I’m nowhere near being pre-diabetic and it’s not a concern. I already take a multi-vitamin to shore up what I’m missing, so that’s already in the books. Eat small meals six times a day. Breakfast, lunch, and snacks are taken care of. As I mentioned in the last missive, dinner was my sore spot and we’ve come across the perfect solution of ordering Factor meals. I’m about to sound like a hunbot but we’re really liking them. They are a meal box subscription where instead of you making the meals, the meals are already made so you just heat and eat. We were skeptical on taste because we’ve had bad luck with previous meal box subscriptions and all their packaging, ohmigod, the packaging is insane. Not with Factor. Even TEH, who is massively picky about food, likes them. The portions are good and the nutrition is decent. Anyways, it’s costing us about $100/week but we can easily blow that on a Grubhub meal and a small Shipt order so for us it’s worth it.
Movement is huge. Depression warder, flexibility giver, activity icon.
I keep talking about “Oh, I want to teach yoga to fat people” and yet I do nothing about it. Or “Oh, I want to hike the steep trails at our cabin without falling apart” and sit on my ass eating M&Ms. Or. Or. Or.
In my mind I see this all happening without actually doing the work. I never want to do the work. Lady Catherine de Bourgh from Pride & Prejudice says about having natural taste in music, “If I would have learned, I would have been a great proficient.” I do not practice anything. I pick up things and put them down because I get easily discouraged. Then I beat myself up for being a loser because I am not a great proficient.
When I’ve said this in the past, people have said, “Oh, you’re not meant to do anything you don’t enjoy.” Okay, well, how can I know if I enjoy it or not unless I actually try to do it?! I don’t. I just wish and hope it will magically happen and then I’m flustered when I can’t walk up that steep hill or my back throws out at .5 mile into a walk because in my mind I can.
I made the decision a month or so ago that against my better judgement, I want to run a 5K for my 50th in June. It doesn’t have to be in June but sometime this year, I want to slap on a bib and run. Just to prove I can. I don’t care about getting a t-shirt or a medal. I keep hearing my body is amazing af so I want to see if that is actually true.
Training is going to be long, hard, and challenging. I have to do something about my back (Check! At PT currently to work on it.) and about my arthritic ankle (Check! I have exercises to help gain my balance.) But I also need to actually do those things when I’m not at PT where Mindi is having my jog up and down the length of the room to watch my gait. (Also, shout out to Mindi who is putting a regime together to help me get from point A to point B on my running journey.) I’ve got the tools, it’s just a matter of working them.
So, PT is twice a week and I train with TEH three times a week. We just started so I shouldn’t get ahead of myself here. Man, Internet, was that a kick in the ass. We walked to the park where we walked up and down some stairs and then walked a lap to get a cool down. I lasted for two sets before my back was too painful. I was feeling like such a loser. Can’t I do anything?
Thus, that is the challenge. I got up and did it one day, so I can get up and do it another day. And then another day, and another day, and so forth and so on. I also need to figure out when to do yoga. Maybe in the morning if we train that night? Move, baby, move.
And can we talk about fat girls running? Like, they exist but only in the 2010s. I did some research tonight and found a few women who were profiled but the articles were all old or the blogs were abandoned. I found a website based in the UK and I signed up for newsletter and asked to join their FB group. Dave pointed me to the Slow AF Club, which is another website with their own private social app. I had to write a damned near essay for my request to join which is fair, need to keep the trolls and shamers out. Dave also pointed me to @300poundsandrunning on IG who is also the creator of Slow AF. Best Kate had no problem finding fat women who do arial work, roller skating, or hiking and Kristin found a lot of fat women who lift and compete in lifting competitions so why the difficulty finding fat girls who run? They gotta exist somewhere. (After I wrote this I found out they all exist on IG so now between them and #tags, I’m finding my peoples.)
I commented on my own post about this dilemma on FB that a newsletter or a blog is brewing here. People dig plans, triumphs, workouts, tips, tricks, and failures. But I can barely keep this one running, plus I have my book blog, my Jane Austen blog, and I write reviews for No Flying No Tights. How do I spread myself so thin?
1500 words to tell you I’ll be adding a section to my weekly missives on my movement plan. What I did movement wise. How I felt. The usual bullshit. Maybe a newsletter down the road just not now.
Get vaccinated and mask up! There is a pandemic going on.
lisa x
(Fuck fascists and Nazis!)
You've just finished reading A Most Unreliable Narrator: the slice of life newsletter from the GenXer about town, Lisa Rabey. You can find me on Instagram, Facebook and Bluesky if you're so inclined. I am everywhere. Copyright © 1996 - 2025 by Lisa Rabey