The Story behind my MSNBC Oped Piece

Yesterday I had an op-ed piece on the MSNBC web site, about Oprah’s latest weight-loss campaign and why it frustrates me. The idea for that essay started brewing long before I learned that Oprah is among the many folks who have turned to the category of drugs known as Glucagon-like peptide 1 agonists (or semaglutides) to drop unwanted weight.

I’ve been wanting to write an essay about weight loss since last summer, after I asked my doctor if I should consider Ozempic or one of its relatives (the names of which I didn’t know but do now: Wegovy and Mounjaro). I’ve been overweight since hitting puberty, but my doctor told me I did not need to go on a weight loss drug.

Prepubescent me, in white ruffles, packing on the pounds

“You’re healthy,” she reminded me. “Your blood pressure is good, your cholesterol is healthy, and you’re nowhere near even pre-diabetic. You can take Ozempic, but it will be off-label, and you’ll have to pay. And you have to come in for weekly injections.”

It was the combination of the cost and weekly injections that really stopped me, but the reminder about my health was also a deterrent: why take medication if I don’t need it?

I won’t lie: I wish I was thinner—I feel like I’d look better without bulges of flesh smushing out hither and thither on my midsection—but I have a sweet tooth, and I’m a pretty good baker.

I made these (they are dark chocolate chip cookies with Maldon sea salt)

And this (sourdough focaccia with onion and black pepper)

And this (pizza with eggplant and mushrooms. My husband bought me an Ooni-Karu pizza oven and boy does it work well.) In case you’re wondering, I give more than half of this stuff away because there’s no way I could or would eat it all. Our eight-month-old silver Lab puppy, Belle, would also eat it all, but it’s no fun cleaning up after her when she has an upset stomach. The beneficiaries of my baking prowess include family that doesn’t live with us, neighbors, and my hockey pal’s family. I am a very popular relative and friend.

Given that I’m healthy, I’d just as soon not deny myself a cookie or a piece of chocolate. I had a really good friend who used to do that—she weighed about 60 pounds less than I and whenever she got more than two pounds over her Weight Watchers goal weight she’d go back on the plan. I was always impressed at her discipline. But that friend died at age 62 of ovarian cancer. I know she was happy being so disciplined about what she ate, but I also wish she had let herself go more often and enjoyed the desserts I know she liked. She did everything right, but all the healthy eating in the world is no match for a mutated BRCA gene.

When it comes to health, I made out better in the genetic lottery than my friend. But our society places a higher premium on how we look than on how healthy we are, which is something I addressed in my MSNBC essay.

The inciting incident for that essay was an encounter I had last summer on a trip to a back-country lodge in the Canadian Rockies with my husband, our neighbor, and seven of her super-fit friends who, it turned out, were fat-phobic. I lost track of how many times they made comments like "I shouldn't be eating this" or "I shouldn't be eating that," despite having trekked eight hours to get to the lodge where we were going to spend the next four days hiking.

I can’t believe I got to spend four whole days at this place. (My husband, neighbor, and I helicoptered in.)

For the first few days I tried to shrug it off. But a few days later, during a discussion about snoring, it got personal. That’s when the tallest, skinniest person in our group, a dentist, said that his son-in-law had lost 40 pounds rather than undergo throat surgery for sleep apnea. “He doesn’t snore anymore,” the dentist said proudly, before announcing that he, too, had lost nearly 40 pounds rather than let his doctor put him on statins to lower his cholesterol.

“I got a mouth guard for my snoring,” I said. “My doctor told me I don’t need to lose weight.”

"Get a new doctor,” the dentist said. 

I have replayed that moment more times than I can count. "Why would you say that?" I should have asked, but my head emptied of a good comeback and filled instead with shame. Oh, what I would have given to have roasted that dentist the way I did an obnoxious member of the Beasties Boys’ entourage who interrupted my interview with the band 37 years ago to ask, “Do you fuck the people you interview?”

“Only in print,” I shot back, and the room erupted into laughter. I continued the interview, but to be honest, it took a minute or two to recalibrate: I couldn’t believe I’d been so quick to turn the tables and humiliate the guy who had set out to throw me off my game. I think I was as gobsmacked as he was. (But at least nobody was laughing at me…)

In retrospect, comparing that moment to the one last summer, I suspect I wasn’t intimidated by the Beastie Boys’ hanger-on because at the age of 26, I couldn’t believe anyone would sexually harass me. I remember thinking, “What a stupid idiot you are. Shut up and let me do my job.”

The dentist’s comment was equally stupid, but far more wounding. I’m 63 now, and I’ve spent a lifetime hating myself due to my weight, ever since my dad caught me sneaking egg rolls out of the freezer not long after he and Mom signed me up for Weight Watchers when I was 11. “After all we’ve done for you to help you lose weight, look at what you’re doing!” he said, and somewhere in the back of my mind I’m sure I thought, “I never asked you to for help! I didn’t think there was anything wrong with me!”

I sure thought so afterward. Dad never yelled at me — or maybe it’s more accurate to say he yelled at me so rarely that that’s the only instance I remember. He died not long after, so it wasn’t as if we ever resolved that encounter in a healthy way. Basically, I’ve spent a lifetime assuming that the first thing people think when they look at me is, “Wow, she’s heavy. And after all her parents did to help her lose weight when she was 11 years old.”

It’s only been in the past couple of years that I’ve made a concerted effort to accept myself for who I am and how I look, to realize that when most people see me, the fat isn’t what they’re focused on, and that those who do focus on my weight aren’t worth agonizing over. But my healthy new mindset is still fragile (recall that earlier I wrote, “I wish I was thinner”). Working with a nutritionist and talking with my physician have helped bolster it. So have workouts with friends who are far thinner and more fit-looking than I, but remind me constantly how strong and capable I am.

Me working out, pre-covid. Now my friends and i work out from our houses with our trainer beaming in via Google Meet.

I’m trying hard to be grateful to my body for getting me this far in life, and to remind myself that my value comes not from my shape but from the good I do in the world. And also that if everyone were blind, it wouldn’t matter what I look like. (Not helpful, probably, but sometimes it makes me feel better.)

Me doing good in the world, dancing stomach-to-stomach with my friend who has early-onset Alzheimer’s (It did me good, too)

Before the skinny dentist made his boneheaded comment last summer, I was channelling my newfound confidence, proud of myself for being healthy in spite of my weight. Part of the reason his comment knocked the good sense out of me is that I forgot that to someone who doesn’t know me and doesn’t value me for the kind of person I am, none of that matters. What I need to remind myself is that people like the dentist need to be educated, too. If I’m ever in that situation again, I will not hesitate. I’ll just ask, “Why would you say that?”