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Catherine Gacad

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Move Over, Fatso

While watching the ballet tonight, I kept thinking, ‘Wow, that person really needs to eat.  And that person and that person.  Their rib cages are showing through their leotards!  I hope after the show, they all go out for pizza and ice-cream.’  They were all so skinny, it disturbed me.

But after thinking that, I thought, ‘How often is it that people are too skinny?’  Not often.
At Safeway last weekend, an old woman came by one of the narrow aisles in her motorized wheelchair.  “Thank you for being skinny!”
“Thank you for saying so!!!”  I gushed.
People get fat with age.  Fine.  But does it really have to be that way?  I see old friends from yesteryear with some serious poundage in their early to mid-thirties.  Does that really have to be the case when you’re not even that old?  
Let’s think about it another way.  Do people hit their thirties, then resign themselves to the fact that they’re just dumber?  We should all just quit our jobs and stop being our sharp, witty former selves?  Can you imagine sitting at work saying, “Aww, sorry, it doesn’t make sense to me.  I’m gonna give up on thinking about it.  Give the project to someone else.  I don’t have the mental capacity to do it.”  No, of course not.  So why then would people think it’s ok to get physically larger and larger?  Oh, it just happens with age.  But then wouldn’t you try to exercise more, try a little bit harder, the same way you would try to work harder at a more difficult problem at work?
I had my loony-toony days when I obsessed over my weight.  After I stopped obsessing, I returned to my set weight and can pretty much eat anything, go overboard, and still be the same on the scale.  But I do know very well the anguish of weight gain and the toll it can take on one’s emotional well-being.  
I guess my point in writing this post is asking the question: Do people really have to be fat? And again, I do want to caveat that I know what it’s like to be fat.  I empathize.  I’ve been there. But it doesn’t have to be that way.  Just like even though I am really on the dumb, ditzy side, I didn’t let that get in the way of me accomplishing everything I wanted to do in terms of academics and my career.  You just work harder, exercise your mind, exercise your body.  Do what it takes to be at your best.

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03.18.08

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Welcome to my site, derived from an advice column I wrote while getting my MBA. I live in the San Francisco Bay Area. I give helpful, opinionated advice based on my own experience and from the expertise of my extensive network. For more, click here.

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