Fat Chance by Deborah Blumenthal Read Free Book Online

shake my booty and get it together. I’m doing it because if there was ever a motivation for me to recreate myself, this is it. If the thought of coaching Mike Taylor can’t fire me into a body makeover and be successful where legions of others have failed, then there’s no hope for anyone—EVER! This is the acid test, Tamara. BIOLOGICAL WARFARE! I can’t ever really and truly accept the concept of self-acceptance unless I know what my capabilities are. I need to do this. You with me?”
    â€œSpreadsheets are starting to call my name again,” she says, going out the door.
    â€œNow, that’s aberrant. C’mon, Tamara,” I yell as she leaves. “This is going to be fun!”

four
    Don’t Worry. Be Happy. Weigh Less.
    S tress. I’m an expert, aren’t you? Isn’t everyone? Does it make you eat more? Duh.
    Who doesn’t walk, zombielike, into the kitchen for comfort as soon as the world gets too much to handle? Well, now the scientific community weighs in (ha) with this news and I hope it helps rid you of some of your guilt because, dear hearts, it’s not just a matter of willpower: Your body chemistry is partly to blame.
    Stress does make you eat more—especially sweets—because it causes the body to produce more of a hormone called cortisol. And not only do you eat more, but the fat that you put on as a result, is the “deep-belly” stuff that’s associated with a higher risk of health problems such as heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, stroke and cancer.
    And while some women experience elevated levels of stress and cortisol periodically, depending on what is happening in their lives, others suffer from “toxic stress,” in the words of Elissa Epel, Ph.D., a health psychology researcher at the University of California at San Francisco. “Toxic” or long-term stress is associated with feeling helpless and defeated. It leads to perpetually high cortisol levels that invite deep abdominal fat to be deposited—and that can happen whether you’re fat or thin. So bottom line: It’s a lot more complicated than just blaming your paunchy gut on the fact that you can’t resist that second or third Krispy Kreme.
    What to do?
    * If stress is long-term, ditch the lousy job, or the lousy husband, or at least think about therapy to change the dynamic.
    * When you’re tempted to pig out, try to steer clear of the refined, sugary stuff that causes insulin levels to soar and then drop, making your urge to eat even greater.
    * Try to counteract the urge to eat by doing something physical—sweeping the floor works and so does scrubbing the bathroom—at the very least, get yourself out of the house, and particularly away from the refrigerator.
    * Next time you do head to the refrigerator, stop and ask yourself: Why am I eating? Better yet, needlepoint those words onto a pillow that you can stare at every time you get up off the couch heading for the kitchen. If the answer, honestly, isn’t hunger—assuming you remember what that feels like—get yourself into another room.
    Â 
    â€œSo you’re heading home?” I look up from my column to see Tex carrying his briefcase. He looks like he could be a poster boy for my article on stress.
    â€œMitchum’s on the late movie,” he says, as if that explains it all.
    Tex, the movie buff, worships Mitchum. I’d heard it all before. Mitchum, the sadistic ex-con in Cape Fear; the American destroyer skipper in The Enemy Below; the cool American up against Japanese gangsters in The Yakuza. The heavy-lidded, laconic Mitchum.
    â€œNo one came close,” he said. He had seen every one of his movies three, maybe four times. “That swaggering stride,” he says, “the great laid-back antihero. So completely his own man, no matter what the role. And so cool.”
    I bought Tex Mitchum’s biography and we laughed over the part