I will not diet.

We've moved!

2011-07-07T21:54:00.000-07:00

I Will Not Diet has moved!

Please visit the new site at http://www.iwillnotdiet.com.

Announcing a new website and a new look!

2011-07-05T20:45:00.000-07:00

Great news, sports fans! The new website for I Will Not Diet is up and running.

Like this original site, the new I Will Not Diet has blog posts on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the gallery of gorgeous women, and tips for healthy living/losing weight without dieting. It also includes more info about my history as well as a new section called “Unburden Yourself” where you can tell your stories and, if you’re brave enough, post your weight.

You can check out the new site here:

http://www.iwillnotdiet.com

Also, be sure to subscribe at the new site because this site will cease existence one week from today.

I have to admit that launching the new website is a little bittersweet. I’ve been using this site on blogspot for over two years, so it’s hard to say goodbye.

It’s interesting to think about the fact that when I started I Will Not Diet, I told myself I wouldn’t spend any time or money on the design of the site until I proved that it was something that would stand the test of time—both for my readers and for me.

I honestly never imagined I Will Not Diet would become what it is now—something bigger than me, something about more than just my struggles to lose weight without dieting, which is how it all started. Now I’m not even sure I want to lose weight anymore. This blog has had that much of an effect on me. Yes, I want to be healthy, but I also want to believe what I preach—that beauty comes in more than one size. And if that’s the case, then losing weight is besides the point.

I have to also say that I struggled to create a logo and a website that I thought fit the message fo the blog but also didn’t look too cute if you know what I mean. My web designer, Kara Thurmond, has spent months working through this with me, and I want to thank her for her patience, her tenacity, and her talent.

Hope to see you all on the other side!

P.S. I may have to add the Statue of Liberty to the Gallery of Gorgeous Women since she is the first lady of natural beauty.

Eat . . . Pray . . . Eat . . . Love . . . Eat

2011-06-30T18:20:00.000-07:00

I've had a problem this week . . . I've been insatiable.

It's a feeling that hits me about once a month, and when it does, I am overwhelmed by my desire for food. Over the past few years, I've become one of those people who gets full pretty quickly (even though I was never like that when I was younger), but when a bout of what I call "The Insatiables" hits, I can never seem to feel satisfied, not to mention full.

The result is that it feels like I eat all day long and simply cannot stop eating.

Don't get me wrong—I'm not a binge eater. I don't sit down and eat a whole pint of ice cream or a bag of chips. Or both. But during these monthly bouts of insatiability, I can slowly make my way through all of the food groups in one day. More than once.

This last round of insatiability started early on Monday and lasted through Tuesday night (thank God it's finally over), and I spent the first half of the week trying to figure out why I could no longer control my eating.

Was I upset about something? Was I falling back on the old feeding-my-emotions trick?

Those questions didn't lead me to an answer, but something else did . . . over the weekend (a time when I usually indulge), I had tried to make healthier choices. We ate light on Friday because we were going to the movies that night and didn't want to miss any of the film for bathroom breaks, and when we went out to dinner on Saturday, I intentionally ordered the lowest calorie item on the menu.

I think that's where things went off the rails because even after we finished dinner I still felt unsatisfied. Yes, I was full, but I wasn't sated.

The next day we went out for drinks with friends, and the beer made me too bloated to eat a real meal that night. Translation: I still didn't feel like I'd had much to eat that weekend.

Monday was when the sh*t hit the fan.

We were both struggling with our writing projects and, in order to cope, decided to indulge in some much needed comfort food: Skyline chili.

If you don't know, Skyline chili is served over pasta. Yes, pasta. With cheese. A single entree doesn't get much more decadent than that. Well, unless you add sour cream, which I have seen people do when they make it at home.

For some reason, every time I eat Skyline chili, I lose control of myself. It is so good that I feel I must go back for seconds and can't wait until I go to sleep that night so I can eat the leftovers the next day.

So this is how Monday and Tuesday went—eat some Skyline, have some more Skyline, and have even more Skyline on top of that.

It was like I was in a chili-eating contest.

And I was winning.

As cliched as it sounds, it was an unmitigated disaster, facilitated by the fact that Dave and I usually make enough food for four people, so we can eat it for two days (and thus avoid cooking two days in a row).

Thank God we ran out of Skyline on Tuesday night because, I swear on my mother-in-law's life, if there was Skyline in the house right now, I might not be able to stop myself from eating it.

So part of the problem was the Skyline.

But I believe the bigger problem was my meal on Saturday.

Dave and I try to eat out only once a week, and when we did that last weekend, I picked something that was healthy rather than indulgent, which is where I think I went wrong.

I always talk about how one of the reasons dieting doesn't work is because whenever we are denied something we want, we end up wanting it even more. (Remember how appealing beer was before you were twenty-one?) But sometimes I forget that even small changes in your diet can leave you craving the things you're trying to avoid.

That's what I believe happened to me this week—instead of having a greasy pizza or a nice fat juicy cheeseburger during my one meal out on Saturday night, I had vegetables and shrimp in a curry sauce.

Sure, it was delicious, but it was also light.

I've known for years that we NEED to indulge ourselves sometimes, so it's kind of embarrassing to admit that even I still make the mistake of denying myself that indulgence. I guess it makes me human if I have to remind myself not to take the healthy living thing too far sometimes.

The funny thing is that I know for sure that if I'd ordered the same meal last Saturday because I wanted it (rather than because it was healthy), I would have never had the problem I did after it was all over. I would have never had a raging case of The Insatiables.

As it turns out, my need to feel satisfied was simply psychological.

And now that I've figured that out, I just need to figure out what I can do the next time the psychological desire to eat chili for two days straight takes over every cell of my being.

How to Talk to Little Girls: a cross post by Lisa Bloom

2011-06-28T17:43:00.000-07:00

Originally published on ThinkTV and The Huffington Post.

I went to a dinner party at a friend's home last weekend, and met her five-year-old daughter for the first time.

Little Maya was all curly brown hair, doe-like dark eyes, and adorable in her shiny pink nightgown. I wanted to squeal, "Maya, you're so cute! Look at you! Turn around and model that pretty ruffled gown, you gorgeous thing!"

But I didn't. I squelched myself. As I always bite my tongue when I meet little girls, restraining myself from my first impulse, which is to tell them how darn cute/ pretty/ beautiful/ well-dressed/ well-manicured/ well-coiffed they are.

What's wrong with that? It's our culture's standard talking-to-little-girls icebreaker, isn't it? And why not give them a sincere compliment to boost their self-esteem? Because they are so darling I just want to burst when I meet them, honestly.

Hold that thought for just a moment.

This week ABC news reported that nearly half of all three- to six-year-old girls worry about being fat. In my book, Think: Straight Talk for Women to Stay Smart in a Dumbed-Down World, I reveal that fifteen to eighteen percent of girls under twelve now wear mascara, eyeliner and lipstick regularly; eating disorders are up and self-esteem is down; and twenty-five percent of young American women would rather winAmerica's Next Top Model than the Nobel Peace Prize. Even bright, successful college women say they'd rather be hot than smart. A Miami mom just died from cosmetic surgery, leaving behind two teenagers. This keeps happening, and it breaks my heart.

Teaching girls that their appearance is the first thing you notice tells them that looks are more important than anything. It sets them up for dieting at age 5 and foundation at age 11 and boob jobs at 17 and Botox at 23. As our cultural imperative for girls to be hot 24/7 has become the new normal, American women have become increasingly unhappy. What's missing? A life of meaning, a life of ideas and reading books and being valued for our thoughts and accomplishments.

That's why I force myself to talk to little girls as follows.

"Maya," I said, crouching down at her level, looking into her eyes, "very nice to meet you."

"Nice to meet you too," she said, in that trained, polite, talking-to-adults good girl voice.

"Hey, what are you reading?" I asked, a twinkle in my eyes. I love books. I'm nuts for them. I let that show.

Her eyes got bigger, and the practiced, polite facial expression gave way to genuine excitement over this topic. She paused, though, a little shy of me, a stranger.

"I LOVE books," I said. "Do you?"

Most kids do.

"YES," she said. "And I can read them all by myself now!"

"Wow, amazing!" I said. And it is, for a five-year-old. You go on with your bad self, Maya.

"What's your favorite book?" I asked.

"I'll go get it! Can I read it to you?"

Purplicious was Maya's pick and a new one to me, as Maya snuggled next to me on the sofa and proudly read aloud every word, about our heroine who loves pink but is tormented by a group of girls at school who only wear black. Alas, it was about girls and what they wore, and how their wardrobe choices defined their identities. But after Maya closed the final page, I steered the conversation to the deeper issues in the book: mean girls and peer pressure and not going along with the group. I told her my favorite color in the world is green, because I love nature, and she was down with that.

Not once did we discuss clothes or hair or bodies or who was pretty. It's surprising how hard it is to stay away from those topics with little girls, but I'm stubborn.

I told her that I'd just written a book, and that I hoped she'd write one too one day. She was fairly psyched about that idea. We were both sad when Maya had to go to bed, but I told her next time to choose another book and we'd read it and talk about it. Oops. That got her too amped up to sleep, and she came down from her bedroom a few times, all jazzed up.

So, one tiny bit of opposition to a culture that sends all the wrong messages to our girls. One tiny nudge towards valuing female brains. One brief moment of intentional role modeling. Will my few minutes with Maya change our multibillion dollar beauty industry, reality shows that demean women, our celebrity-manic culture? No. But I did change Maya's perspective for at least that evening.

Try this the next time you meet a little girl. She may be surprised and unsure at first, because few ask her about her mind, but be patient and stick with it. Ask her what she's reading. What does she like and dislike, and why? There are no wrong answers. You're just generating an intelligent conversation that respects her brain. For older girls, ask her about current events issues: pollution, wars, school budgets slashed. What bothers her out there in the world? How would she fix it if she had a magic wand? You may get some intriguing answers. Tell her about your ideas and accomplishments and your favorite books. Model for her what a thinking woman says and does.

And let me know the response you get at www.Twitter.com/lisabloom.

Here's to changing the world, one little girl at a time.

For many more tips on how keep yourself and your daughter smart, check out my new book, Think: Straight Talk for Women to Stay Smart in a Dumbed-Down World, www.Think.tv.

LISA BLOOM, author of Think: Straight Talk for Women to Stay Smart in a Dumbed Down World, is an award-winning journalist, legal analyst, trial attorney, and the daughter of renowned women's rights attorney, Gloria Allred. A daily fixture on American television for the last decade, Bloom is currently the CBS News legal analyst, appearing frequently on The Early Show and CBS Evening News with Katie Couric, as well as the legal analyst for The Dr. Phil Show. Bloom has written for the Los Angeles Times, Family Circle, the National Law Journal, CNN.com, the Daily Beast, and many more. She currently lives in Los Angeles where she runs her law firm, The Bloom Firm.

What are they teaching these kids in Sunday school?

2011-06-23T07:43:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I got an email message from a former student telling me that I am “fugly” and I need to get on a treadmill and have plastic surgery.

Sure, I’m hurt by this message, but not on a personal level as much as on an intellectual one.

For instance, it doesn’t really hurt my feelings that the student called me fugly or implied I’m overweight. Since I don’t think he really believes I need plastic surgery, his attack is rather toothless. In that sense, it's kind of obvious to me that he was just trying to wound me.

But what really hurts me is that he doesn’t respect me. Because if he did, he wouldn’t be trying to wound me at all.

Like most of the teachers and college professors I know, I work my butt off trying to help students learn the material and become better writers. I give it everything I have, and when school is in session I basically live and breathe my job. Though I don’t have “summers off” in the sense that I still have to work on my writing, I honestly don’t know how I would survive if I didn’t have these three months away from the classroom to recharge.

So when a former student sends me a hateful message—and it happens almost every semester, though it’s usually not this personal—it bothers me because it tells me that the student doesn’t think I work hard or care about my job. Because if the student believed that, he wouldn’t intentionally try to hurt my feelings.

To be honest, it’s hard to imagine any student—this one included—not knowing how hard I work after spending a semester in my classroom, and that’s what really burns me about this message. This kid knows I bust my butt for my students, and despite this, he’s basically saying, “I don’t care how hard you work or how much you care about your students because I still hate you. “ He’s pissing all over my attempts to be a good teacher.

It also bothers me because it’s the kind of comment that’s designed to attack me where I’m most vulnerable, which seems especially cruel. Most of my students learn over the course of the semester that I have a blog about body acceptance, so it’s clear this student thought he could undermine my self-confidence by attacking my physical appearance. It’s a cheap shot, but one he apparently thought would work.

Finally his comments bother me because they imply—especially the “get on the treadmill” comment—that I don’t exercise just because I’m not thin.

Twice every week on this blog I try to send the message that curvy does not mean unhealthy and a curvy person is not necessarily a person who doesn’t work out, but I’m clearly not getting the message across.

Not only do I work out, I work out religiously. I walk every morning—lately for eighty minutes, during which time I alternate between walking and running—and I usually exercise almost every afternoon and evening as well, which is my attempt to follow my own advice that we should all “play and play often.” So when this student told me to get on the treadmill, it actually hurt me more to think he assumes I don’t work out than it does for me to realize that he thinks I’m overweight.

So let me be clear—just because I’m lumpy or imperfect does not mean I am sedentary or lazy. It just means I’m no longer young, and I have a little wear and tear on my body. Of course, when you’re twenty-two, you have no idea that you can do everything in your power to be thin and still fail.

Though all of these issues are a problem, the biggest problem is why anyone—student or otherwise—feels comfortable saying these kinds of hurtful things to anyone else. Whatever happened to the golden rule?

I am not a religious person in the sense that I don’t read a Bible or go to church unless you count communing with nature every morning, but at times like these I find myself thinking of Leviticus 19:18—“You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against your kinsfolk. Love your neighbor as yourself”—or Matthew 5:39—“But I say to you, do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also.”

Which makes me wonder, what makes a human being want to harm another person this way? What kind of issues must one have to be so hateful?

I don’t have the answer to that question, but I do hope that each of us—myself included—will think twice the next time we are tempted to lash out at another.

If need be, think of the Torah, the Bhagavad-Gita, the Quran, the Bible, the Tao Teh Ching. Think of Socrates, Buddha, Jesus, Matthew, Luke, and Confucius. And treat others as you wish to be treated.

Don't even think about trying this (This = jogging in place while eating celery and cheesecake)

2011-06-21T21:06:00.000-07:00

I've talked many times about the fact that the media plays a H U G E role in how we see ourselves—both our bodies and our behavior. Of course, we all know the American obsession with thinness and dieting is largely influenced by the media, and that until the way women are depicted in the media changes, our collective perception of our bodies won't change either.

That's why I'm thrilled to report that General Mills pulled a Yoplait commercial last week (see video above) that makes it appear as if having an eating disorder is normal, even desirable.

In the ad, a thin woman is standing in front of a refrigerator eyeing a cheesecake with raspberries on top. She wants to have a piece but clearly feels guilty doing it, so she tries to talk herself into it by first telling herself that she's "deserves it" and that she'll have a "small slice."

But then her internal monologue goes haywire as she tells herself she can have "a medium slice and some celery sticks and they would cancel each other out" or that she could have a "large slice and jog in place while I eat it." And then finally she wonders, "how about one large slice while jogging in place while I ate celery?"

Watching this woman try to convince herself that it's all right to have a piece of cheesecake is honestly frightening.

Maybe the woman is just a good actress or maybe we're all just a little too familiar with this kind of internal justification process.

Either way, it's scary to see her longing for the cheesecake and trying to convince herself of some way it will be acceptable to eat a piece. It's kind of like watching a healthy person descend into the land of lunacy. No, she's not completely nuts, but she's going to a place that is not healthy or happy, which is what makes it so hard to witness.

And this is the reason why the National Eating Disorders Association complained about the ad, saying that it "felt like a 20-second look at the mind of somebody with an eating disorder."*

Jenni Schaefer, author of Goodbye Ed, Hello Me: Recover from Your Eating Disorder and Fall in Love with Life, added that "a commercial showing a thin person anxiously doing mental gymnastics in order to justify eating dessert—and then denying herself the treat because she wants to be even thinner—could reinforce the idea that such deliberations are healthy and normal,"* and I completely agree that's what makes the commercial so problematic.

Not only does the ad seem to make light of this woman's eating disorder in order to sell yogurt, it also models that behavior for viewers, which is exactly what we don't want our commercials to do.

Schaefer adds that an eating disorder "often starts with that voice in your head saying 'Eat this but not that... The commercial just reinforced that voice. It made that inner dialogue look normal. It let you think, 'I'm okay. I do the same thing.' But that's not normal. You don't have to open that refrigerator and hear that voice."*

Not only does the ad normalize this unhealthy justification process, it also reinforces the message that thin is better by showing this woman complimenting an even thinner woman on her body. The message is clearly that thinner = better, which is one we get far too often on our television and movie screens.

General Mills ultimately apologized and removed the ad from the airwaves.

I have to say I'm thrilled General Mills didn't try to rationalize their depiction of a woman clearly struggling to maintain a healthy attitude about eating, and I'm equally pleased that they pulled the ad without hesitation. I like it when someone, or in this case something, accepts responsibility for its actions. I'm not even unhappy that the ad is probably getting more air time now than it would have without this controversy because it gives people an opportunity to talk about why this message is so unfortunate.

In fact, if every corporation was as conscientious as General Mills, then maybe none of us would ever engage in this kind of unhealthy behavior again.

I'm allowed to fantasize, right?

* http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/health/does-this-commercial-encourage-eating-disorders-video-2497971/

Dress for the body you have: revisiting the moob-and-miniskirt debate

2011-06-16T19:27:00.000-07:00

Recently I wrote a post about the fact that I think most men should keep their shirts on even when the weather becomes unbearably hot.

I have to say that when I admitted this on Facebook, a few people gave me grief about it and hinted that I was being hypocritical.

It's possible that making a joke about shirtless men on Facebook (by asking them to put away their "man boobs," which one friend called "moobs") was hypocritical in the sense that it sends the message it's okay to make fun of people's bodies. Yes, that's true, and I'm sorry if I sent that message.

Though I also think it's possible to take ourselves TOO seriously.

But I don't think that my attitude about men needing to keep their shirts on is hypocritical at all, and I'd like to explain why.

This blog is designed to help people understand two things: 1) why dieting is unhealthy and has caused many people to gain weight over the long haul, and 2) how important it is for people to accept themselves the way they are. As I've said before, I don't think sustained weight loss or healthy living is possible without understanding these ideas.

Part of accepting ourselves requires us to see what it is that makes each of us beautiful and then showing off that beauty by highlighting our best features.

This first part is pretty straightforward (after you do the hard work of seeing what makes you beautiful): if you have great legs, you can show them off by wearing more skirts. If you have a defined waist, buy more clothes that feature your middle. If you have gorgeous green eyes, wear more red to make them stand out. (I often wear orange or blue because my eyes are blue.) That kind of thing.

These ideas are not revolutionary, but they really can improve your self-esteem and, therefore, positively affect your life. Half the time I wear blue someone comes up to me and says, "Wow, your eyes look amazing!" That's the kind of thing that makes me feel like I'm on top of the world. There is no substitute for a good compliment, and I'll take them any way I can get them.

(Incidentally that is also why I ALWAYS tell other women when I like something about their appearance—whether it be their shoes, their hair, or whatever. I think it's important that we hand out compliments as much as we can—about our appearance or anything else.)

The second part of accepting ourselves the way we are requires us to dress for the bodies we have, and that can be a lot trickier.

The hardest part is figuring out what body you have. I'm still never sure if I have a pear-shaped body or an apple-shaped body or simply fall under the "plus-size" umbrella. (Glamour magazine has a great monthly column about picking a certain piece of clothing for your body shape and size—last month it was bathing suits—and I never know which shape I am, so I usually look at more than one.)

Equally difficult is following the rules for your body. Sometimes this is hard because our bodies change, and we don't know it right away. In fact, it can take Y E A R S to figure this out.

For instance, I've always had a defined waist, so I've never worried about wearing unstructured clothing on top. I love a lightweight slouchy t-shirt in the summer almost as much as I love hot dogs and watermelon at a picnic, but lately I've noticed that when I wear flimsy t-shirts to a party where someone is taking pictures, the photos come back with me looking like I have a little roll around my belly even though that part of my body is pretty fit. Part of the problem is my posture. I have never learned to stand up straight, so when I'm sitting, my shoulders roll forward and cause my stomach to look bigger than it is. The other problem is that even though my stomach is relatively small, it's not as small as it was when I was younger. No matter the cause, the pictures are always awful, and so I've vowed to stop wearing those kinds of unstructured tops when I might be photographed.

I had the same problem with short skirts when I was younger.

I was always a fan of the miniskirt and, until I was in my late-twenties, could pull it off. But after I gained weight from an accident, I didn't realize that the look was no longer flattering until I saw some pictures from a bridal shower where I wore a panty-skimming dress (what was I thinking???) and started watching What Not to Wear, a show that pushes the "no miniskirts after thirty-five" rule. Now I swear by this rule too because—I don't care how thin you are—after a certain age, a knee-length skirt is much sexier than a mid-thigh one.

The picture above of one of the thinnest woman alive, Nicole Kidman, proves my point.

(I wish Heidi Klum would follow Nic's lead and give up minis.)

Nicole looks sexy as hell in this photo, but if she had gone four inches shorter, she would have looked like she was trying too hard to hold onto her youth. In fact, the longer skirt actually makes her look younger. Some people call this aging gracefully, but that can make people feel old—better to simply think of it as looking your best.

This is the same place where my negative attitude about shirtless men comes in.

I think men over the age of twenty-five take their shirts off when they working out for two reasons: 1) because they're hot (which bothers me because women don't have the same option), but more importantly, 2) because they started doing so when they were teenagers and haven't stopped and looked in the mirror long enough to realize how much their bodies have changed. And if they did, I imagine they would think twice about baring their chests to the world.

The reason I think they shouldn't bare said chests if they're not in great shape is because doing so is NOT dressing for the body you have. It's dressing for the body you used to have. To me, an out-of-shape man taking his shirt off in public is no different than a forty-something woman walking out the door in a micro-mini: it should just be avoided. Even if technically she or he can still pull it off.

The same could be said about muffin tops.

If your jeans are so tight that a layer of fat spills out of the top, it's time to get a new pair. One really important lesson I've learned is that it is ALWAYS worth it to buy new clothes rather than stuffing yourself into the old ones. You will immediately feel better in a new pair of jeans but feel lousy for a long time if you have to lie down on your bed to zip your old ones.

I don't mean to send the message that we all need to cover ourselves up. On the contrary I'm all about showing it off. I hate sack dresses and muumuus and polygamist-type clothes more than almost anything. I believe in showing off our assets—in skirts that skim the knee and shirts that show off a great set of arms. (I also understand that sometimes we just want to blow off the rules, which is fine too.)

But I think showing off our liabilities is just plain silly.

And admitting you have liabilities is not inconsistent with the message of this blog or even hypocritical because it's in line with what the blog is about—which is focusing on what makes you beautiful. But you can't do that if you're not honest with yourself about what your less-than-perfect features are too.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that body acceptance is not only about appreciating your beauty, it's also about being okay with the fact that none of us are perfect. And I hope more than anything that you will understand that recognizing your imperfection doesn't mean that you have to be ashamed of them, but it also doesn't mean that you need to flaunt them either.

F. Scott Fitzgerald famously said that "The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function." Being able to do so—hold two opposing ideas in your head at the same time—also allows people to understand why I want everyone to accept themselves the way are AND dress for the body they have. And from my point of view, these are not mutually exclusive ideas.

What a tangled web we re-design

2011-06-14T21:33:00.000-07:00

I'm in the process of re-designing the blog and my new companion website, mollymccaffrey.com, so I'm going to take the day off from blogging.

But to tide you over until Thursday, I've posted the new logo here (see above).

What do you think??????

It's never too late to change: Belle Vere = True Beauty.

2011-06-09T10:44:00.000-07:00

Well, it's about time.

A major fashion magazine has F I N A L L Y featured curvy women on its cover. The honor goes to the latest issue of Vogue Italia, which can be seen above. (The rest of the photos I've included here are from the cover story.) As Time magazine says, "Vogue Italia has thrown the fashion world a major curveball — by placing three plus-size models on its June 2011 cover." (Please not the plus-size models are size six and up.) And even better is that these women look stunning. As one blogger writes, "You see real confidence in their eyes—they KNOW they are beautiful."

I truly believe we are in the middle of a paradigm shift about what it means to be beautiful—people are beginning to believe that beauty does not come in just one size or shape. We're seeing more diversity in women's body sizes in film (Bridesmaids) and television (Mad Men, Huge, Glee), and corporations like Dove are committed to helping us reassess what it means to be attractive.

For some time now, Glamour magazine has been devoted to featuring women of all sizes in its pages, and now Vogue Italia has jumped on the curvy bandwagon. And for the first time ever a first lady with a real body is seen as a fashion icon.

But in order to keep this change happening, we have to keep supporting the movement. I'll probably not get a subscription to Vogue Italia since half the women in it are naked, but I will order the new Vogue Curvy and continue to get Glamour and support real-sized women every chance I get.

Here's one easy thing you can do: vote in this poll about Vogue Italia's choice to feature real-sized women on their cover and tell them you say YES to curvy women!

Reader mail

2011-06-07T14:33:00.000-07:00

I had a reader of the blog email me last week saying she needed advice about trying to lose weight. She has struggled with numerous diets in the past—not being able to stick with them and also feeling like she'll never be as skinny or attractive as her two married sisters. Since I get questions about this on a regular basis, I thought I'd share my response . . .

Dear XXX,

I'm honored that you wrote to me, and I'm sorry to hear that you're struggling.

I do believe that the first step to losing weight is body acceptance, which is a big part of what my blog is about. If you do not accept yourself the way you are—and like yourself the way you are—you will probably never lose weight and keep it off. So my first piece of advice is to look in the mirror and figure out what about you is most attractive. Most people have one amazing feature—be it beautiful eyes, a perfect nose, full lips, gorgeous brows, adorable ears, a sculpted jawline, or clear skin. (For me, it's my eyes, and luckily, I've always known that.) And I think when people see us, they focus on that good quality—and never see the parts of us that are average or imperfect.

I have a friend who is extremely obese, and after knowing her for a year or so, she told me she thinks that when people see her, all they see is her fat. I was horrified and also knew immediately she was wrong. This is someone who is blessed with a sunny disposition and a gorgeous face. When I see her, the first thing I see is her infectious smile—she is the kind of person who lights up a room. After that, I see her adorable nose, her pretty eyes, and her flattering freckles. I never even think about the fact that she weighs more than 300 lbs. It's not even on my radar. But when I told her this, it shocked her. She thought it was the FIRST thing people saw. In truth, people see your assets first, not your flaws.

So you need to look in the mirror and figure out what it is about you that makes you beautiful. You may not be as thin as your sisters—and trust me I know all about that—but you do have something that sets you apart. I know it.

Once you find that thing about you that you know is attractive and start focusing on that by buying clothes or accessories that emphasize it, you'll notice people will start complimenting you about it too. You say that you're not attractive, but as soon as you decide you ARE attractive, other people will find you attractive too. Confidence is contagious, and once you have it, you will pretty easily find that people—men included—are drawn to you.

After you re-gain your confidence and focus on YOUR attractive features, you can start working on losing weight. I follow a seven-step approach to losing weight that is not a diet, but a lifestyle change. Because my approach allows you to eat junk food from time to time, it's not hard to change your life this way.

Incidentally, the reason you want to eat junk food every time you go on a diet is because the diet tells you not to eat junk food. Any time someone tells you not to do something, the natural response is to want to do it. That's one of the main reasons diets don't work. The other reason diets don't work—and 90% of dieters gain back the weight—is because our bodies get used to eating less, and when the diet is over and we go back to eating more, our bodies store those extra calories rather than burning them. These are the two reasons I am totally opposed to dieting. Instead of dieting, here's what I recommend on the blog:

1) Like yourself

2) Indulge from time to time
3) Play more and play often
4a) Avoid processed foods

and

4b) Understand why it's hard to avoid them, so you can avoid them even more
5) Cook at home
6) Eat all day long

7) Get more sleep

Also, you may want to read my manifesto and my post about how I define the word diet. You should know that though my approach will work in the long run, it is not about quick results as much as lasting ones. Honestly, it may take you five years to lose all the weight you want to lose. But it will work.

Finally, remember that not everyone has the same body. You may even have a different body than your sisters who share your genes. I grew up with a rail-thin sister, and it took me years to realize my body could not possibly look like hers. But neither of our bodies are perfect. She hates that she has to wear a padded bra, and I hate that I need spanx on special occasions. Either way, no one is perfect. And no one body is perfect either.

I really hope that this helps. Please check in with me and let me know how this plan works for you. I would love to hear back from you again.

Good luck!

Molly

Summer love handles . . . a plea to all the men out there who like to go shirtless

2011-06-02T21:05:00.000-07:00

Ah, summer . . . t-shirts, cut-offs, flip-flops . . . the smell of a neighbor's fire pit, the sound of a distant lawn mower. . . I'm really enjoying all of the signs of summer even though the season doesn't officially begin for about three more weeks.

But one thing I'm not enjoying now that the days are "hot as balls" as my friend Kristin said yesterday is that the heat brings with it another summer tradition, an unwelcome one:

men without their shirts on.

Now, don't get me wrong, I love it when we come across a buff runner sans shirt on the walking trail, but I would happily give up that rare occurrence if I never again had to see his polar opposite: the all-too-common out-of-shape guy strutting around the frisbee golf course without a shirt—or the tennis court or the golf course or the basketball court or fill in the blank.

I'm all about body acceptance, but taking your shirt off in public isn't about body acceptance if you ask me. It's about exhibitionism. And maybe self-centeredness too. Because the message is, Look at me! I don't have my shirt on!

And then I look and think, Why the hell did I do that?

In some ways, it feels like a violation of my privacy. My eyes shouldn't have to be exposed to man breasts and love handles and pale stomachs with dark hairs crawling across them like spiders.

It also feels a bit selfish since women can't do the same.

The message is: I'm hot, so I'm going to strip down, but you women just have to deal. Kind of like when your older brother got to stay out later than you and spent his whole day flaunting the fact that his curfew was one instead of midnight. I don't like the selfishness implicit in that message.

Who knows? Maybe I'm just jealous, but it bugs me when a guy goes shirt-less in a public venue. I can't take my shirt off, so why should he?

It's different on the beach, a place where there is an unspoken agreement that everyone can let their shit hang out—men, women, and children. You can't complain about it because you're doing it too. And if for some reason you're not, you know that stepping onto the sand means you've got to expect to see something unpleasant.

But in the park, it just seems wrong since it's only the male sex that can reveal—at least legally—a part of the body that doesn't normally see the sun.

So until women are allowed to take their shirts off in public, can you men out there please—pretty please—just keep your sweaty shirts on?

Killing Us Softly: Advertising's Image of Women

2011-05-31T09:44:00.000-07:00

This video is going around right now, and it's an incredibly important one for us to watch because it emphasizes the point that our obsession with thinness is a public health problem.

I could not agree more.

But though I think this speaker means that our obsession with thinness is a public health problem because it leads to eating disorders and body dysmorphia (something I believe all American women have), I also think it's a public health problem because it leads to obesity.

Sometimes it feels like we have two choices in our country—be thin or be fat. Since being thin in this country means having almost no body fat, which is impossible for those of us who are genetically inclined to be curvy, it's easy to give up and say, if I can't be thin, I might as well eat whatever I want.

Our obsession with thinness also leads to obesity because it causes us to embrace unhealthy crash diets that nearly always—90% of the time—cause us to gain back more weight than we lost.

Two celebrities are quoted as having spoken out about the problem of making women look flawless to the point of being unreal in the media: Cindy Crawford and Kate Winslet.

Crawford (pictured above in before and after shots) says she wishes she looked like Cindy Crawford, indicating that she doesn't look like the Crawford we see featured in magazines and on television.

And about the magazine cover above, Kate Winslet said not only that GQ trimmed her thighs by a third without her permission (the photo on the right is the original), she also says, "I don't look like that, and I don't desire to look like that."

Bravo, Kate.

(And what I don't get is what was wrong with her legs in the original photo???)

The real question is why don't more celebrities have a problem with this? Why aren't they all putting their foot down on this issue? Why aren't they demanding to be depicted in more accurate ways since we all know that it hurts all women in the long run?

I suppose they're afraid that if they speak out, their careers will be over. And it's certainly true that Crawford and Winslet are two of only a handful of untouchable women in the media, so I admire their desire to use that power to speak out. But what about Julia Roberts and Reese Witherspoon? Sandra Bullock and Cameron Diaz? Angelina Jolie? Why aren't these women speaking out and trying to combat this problem?

If they are and I've missed it, I'd love to hear about it. If not, it's time to step up, girls.

Why, in my fantasy life, Annie Leibovitz is my best friend and travels with me everywhere I go

2011-05-26T20:23:00.000-07:00

I was spending the day with a friend of mine recently when she showed me some pictures from a recent family trip. I noticed almost immediately that there weren't any pictures of her, and when I asked about it, she said, "I don't like having my picture taken."

I get it. I really do.

Because that was my attitude most of my adult life—until a few years ago, I HATED having my picture taken and looked pretty awkward almost every time I was forced to do it, which I talked about in my "Who is the girl in the picture" post. I'm still not great about posing for photos now, but I'm working on it and try my best to have a good attitude, which I think is crucial to taking a good photo.

Lately, though, I'm beginning to wonder if it's about more than just having a good attitude. Over the past few months, I've had the opportunity to have my picture taken by more than one professional photographer, and I am always shocked by how good the results turn out. (The photo of me above was taken by one of those pros.)

As a result, it started to occur to me that maybe the reason I hate having my picture taken is because I don't have a professional doing it all the time. In fact, it's usually my husband or one of my friends taking my picture, and they usually do it quickly—in between talking and hanging out—without really thinking about it.

All of this had been in the back of my head when I saw a new photo of a friend on Facebook and actually thought, "Wow, that doesn't even look like her. She is so much more attractive than that." And that's when it hit me—the reason our photos don't look as good as the ones we see in magazines is simply because we don't have a professional photographer following us around all the time.

Maybe this sounds obvious, but I have witnessed too many people—men an women—bemoaning the way they look in pictures for me to believe that people understand this is the case. I think we all want to look like a celebrity every time we have our picture taken even though we don't have half the resources that most of them do.

And then I saw something that made me sure that taking a good photo doesn't usually happen by accident but rather requires some serious effort as well as a professional photographer.

I was watching Letterman a few weeks ago when Courtney Cox was on the show talking about a recent trip to St. Bart's. While she was there, Letterman held up this photo of Cox from that trip:

Letterman oooohed and aahhed over Cox's amazing physique, but she resisted the compliment, explaining that she doesn't normally look like that and that she was doing everything she could to look her best when the photo was taken.

"Well, Dave," she said. "You know when the paparrazzi are there, so that's not real . . . I mean that's real, but I was working it pretty hard . . . We made a joke about it. Let's see how Sports Illustrated we can get. And I really was like . . . I sucked in, I moved my body, and my arms are streched out. I don't walk like that!"

Cox even claimed that Letterman would be horrified if he saw the way she sits on the beach when nobody is looking and imitated herself seaside, hunched over and limp.

Whether you believe it or not, her message was clear: people don't normally look the way she did in that photo. And for some reason, I believed her. I believed that she could suck in her gut and pump her arms and legs in such a way that put her best features on display.

Do I believe I could strike the same pose and appear as hot as Cox does in her string bikini? No way, but I do believe that trying to look good and believing you can look good goes a long way towards accomplishing that goal.

And while writing this post, I decided to Google "Courtney Cox at the beach" to see if there were any pics of her looking the way she described, and believe it or not, one of the first pictures I came across was one of Cox looking the same way she imitated herself looking on Letterman . . .

Is she still beautiful? Absolutely. But she also looks real because she's not posing for the paparazzi.

It's easy for us to imagine that the beautiful people look beautiful all the time, but the truth is, when they're just being normal and goofing around with their friends and an iPhone, they take crazy photos too.

The only difference is that their bad photos never show up on Facebook.

Ten steps forward, one step back

2011-05-24T17:47:00.001-07:00

Last Thursday, I wrote about why Bridesmaids is a movie that redefines the role of women in film today and why we, therefore, must all get behind it and see it.

As I said then, the movie does this by:

1) avoiding the cliches of the rom-com/chick flick,

2) focusing on the friendships of women instead of a love story between a man and a woman,

3) thereby creating a new genre (the female version of the bromance),

4) passing the Bechdel test,

5) featuring actresses who are not A-listers

6) and women who of all sizes

7) who talk about sex

8) and other real things and

9) are also fully developed characters.

Finally and just as importantly,

10) the film was written by two women—Kristin Wiig and her former Groundlings castmate Annie Mumolo (pictured below).

But what I didn't talk about is the one thing the movie gets desperately wrong.

As I indicated last week when I said that there was more to say about her, this misstep has to do with Melissa McCarthy's character, Megan, who is also the sister of the groom.

Before I saw the film (or any portion of it), I was thrilled that Melissa McCarthy was part of the cast. I loved her on Gilmore Girls, and even though I'm not a fan of her new sitcom, Mike & Molly, I think she's an outstanding actress. And I am happy that her performance in Bridesmaids is getting the positive attention it deserves. But . . .

. . . when I first saw McCarthy in the previews (and on the big screen), I was horrified. The people who made Bridesmaids took an adorable woman . . .

and made her look plain, manly, and mostly unattractive . . .

Not only that, they made her character into a clown who routinely acts the part of the fool and who inappropriately hits on the in-flight air marshall, saying things to him like, "You feel that heat? It's coming from my undercarriage."

The message is clear—a big woman can't hit on a man in a movie (or be in a movie at all) unless we are allowed to laugh at her doing so.

Admittedly, this problem is counteracted to some degree by the fact that McCarthy's character is one of the more well adjusted and confident people in the film, and she's also the voice of reason—she's the one who goes to Kristin Wiig's Annie when she hits bottom and convinces her that she needs to change her life. But that moment still happens inside the bubble of Megan's crazy antics—she brings her nine puppies—yes, nine!—when she rescues Annie from her wallowing and then insists on giving Annie a ridiculous body-slam-type hug before she leaves, reinforcing the message that this character cannot really be taken seriously.

There is a long history of making the "fat" person the funny guy in movies, a history that goes back to classic comedians like John Candy, John Belushi, Chris Farley, Jason Alexander, John Goodman, and Roseanne, and continues today with current comedians such as Kevin James, Larry the Cable Guy, Jonah Hill, and the pre-diet Seth Rogan among others. In fact, in our society, one of the only ways it is acceptable to see big people on the big or small screen is if they're cracking jokes. Or if people are laughing at them.

And, to be honest, I had hoped that a movie that spends so much time redefining how we see women in film would not have given into this cliche. Not only is it cheap and easy humor, it's also rather offensive.

At the same time, I think it would be foolish to focus on this one problem—even though it's a real problem—and ignore all the good that Bridesmaids does for women.

The bottom line is that this movie is good for women—women of all sizes. Yes, the writers made a mistake by depicting McCarthy's character as the butt of most of its jokes, but it did so many other things right that I have to believe it will help all of us—big and small—in the long run.

Why we all need to see Bridesmaids

2011-05-19T19:34:00.000-07:00

I keep hearing people say they aren't going to see Bridesmaids because it's a rom com or a chick flick, and since this is really an important movie for women, I want to tell you why it is not either of those things and why you need to see it.

(There are no spoilers here, so feel free to read even if you haven't seen the movie. And then after you read, go see it!)

1) First and foremost, this is not a rom-com. Yes, this movie is a comedy, but it's not a rom-com because those movies put the romance first (and it's usually cheesy, unbelievable romance) and the comedy second. Notice that the word "rom" comes before the word "com"? That's because the rom is center stage, and in Bridesmaids, comedy definitely trumps romance. (By the way, women don't exercise in a rom-com; they just look perfect without trying.) Also, this movie is not a rom-com or a chick flick because the main plot of the story is not about a woman who would only be happy if she could just find the right guy, which brings me to my next point . . .

2) No, this is a movie about . . . wait for it . . . female friendship. I know what you're thinking—A movie about female friendship? I've never heard of such a thing. Well, there was Thelma and Louise, but that was like a million years ago. Yes, that's my point. It's been WAY TOO LONG since we've had a movie about female friendship, which is why people are saying. . .

3) This film is the first of a new genre. Perhaps you've heard of the bromance? Well, Bridesmaids is supposed to do for women what Wedding Crashers did for men. This new genre still doesn't have a name—"sismance" and "wom-ance" just don't sound quite right, and if you come up with a clever moniker, I'm sure you could make millions doing so.

4) And because this is a movie about female friendship, it passes the Bechdel test, which asks: 1) Are there two named female characters in the film? There are SIX in this movie. 2) Do they talk to each other? Yes, they do. 3) About something besides men? Absolutely. I don't have the exact numbers but I would venture to guess that about 90% of the movies made in Hollywood do not pass this test, reinforcing the wrong-headed notion that women are only in the world to be accessories to funny male comedians or hot male action stars. In other words, that women are defined by men. And guess what? We're not.

5) It's also the first Hollywood movie in a long time about a woman who is not played by an A-list actress. This may seem like no big deal at first, but when you think about it, it really is. The reason that most movies about women have to feature A-list actresses is because the people in Hollywood think good stories about women aren't interesting enough to make us want to see them on their own and that they need something else—like Julia Roberts or Reese Witherspoon or Angelina Jolie—to get us in the seats of the theatre. But we know that's not true, and by giving Kristin Wiig and Maya Rudolph the leading roles in this movie, the powers-that-be are also giving us a chance to prove that. And because they are played by "regular" actresses . . .

6) Bridesmaids features women who look like real people, which is almost unheard of in Hollywood movies these days. Kristin Wiig, as beautiful as she is, also looks her age in this film. She has wrinkles and bags under her eyes and doesn't dress like she just stepped out of a Prada boutique. Maya Rudolph looks adorable, but she also doesn't look stick thin. Nor does Wendi McLendon-Covey or Melissa McCarthy. Yes, three of the women in this bridal party are Hollywood thin, but three are not. And three out of six really ain't bad. And the fact that we get this range of curvy bodies—from Rudolph to McLendon-Covey to McCarthy* is really unbelievably impressive since normally Hollywood only features the two extremes of big and small with no in-between. Not only do the women in Bridesmaids look real . . .

7) Like real women, they talk about sex . . . If Sex and the City was important because it showed women talking about sex in raunchy ways that we had previously only associated with men, Bridesmaids is important because it shows them talking about it—and acting on it—in believable ways. Now that we've had the insanity that was Samantha (and thank God we did), we can have authenticity, which is what you'll find when Wiig and Rudolph discuss sex over breakfast, a scene that reads like an homage to the post-coitus brunch that was a staple of Sex and the City.

8) They also talk like real women. Like the rest of us, they talk about everything in life . . . they talk about their jobs, their life choices, their regrets, their bodies, their friendships, other women, their hopes and dreams, and, yes, their clothes and even sometimes men. But they don't ONLY talk about men, which is crucial.

9) And, for me, the most important thing is that these woman are well-rounded characters who have real personalities and genuine flaws. And no I'm not talking about their bodies. I'm talking about the fact that these characters sometimes make the wrong decisions about their friendships, their jobs, their roommates, their lives, and as a result, the audience can't help but feel for them while also wanting to kick their butts. Kristin Wiig's character goes through the same kinds of ordeals we all go through—the kinds that make us question who we are and what life is about. And her struggles are so frustrating and so moving that I found myself actually sobbing through the middle of the movie. The crazy thing about it is that while I was sobbing, I also started laughing. I've laughed and cried in a movie, but I've never before done both at the same time, and I did both while watching this movie more than once. I always tell my students that over-the-top comedy only works if it is paired with real, honest emotion, and my response proves that is something Bridesmaids does really well.

10) Finally, this movie was written by two women, Kristin Wiig and her former Groundlings castmate Annie Mumolo (pictured above). As we all know, there are not nearly enough women in Hollywood, so we need to support them as much as we can.

So what are you waiting for???

I've talked many times about the importance of voting with our dollars and how the depiction of women in the media won't be more accurate until we do. Well, this is our chance. If we get behind this movie and spend our hard-earned cash to see it, Hollywood will get the message—we want movies about real women with real bodies and real problems who are not simply accessories to the men in their lives. (That is, unless you want Hollywood to make more movies like Thor.)

I'm going again this week—when are you going?

*There's more to say about Melissa McCarthy's character in this film, and I'll write about that next week.

Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun . . . now say that 24,999 more times.

2011-05-17T21:41:00.000-07:00

Today a man from Wisconsin ate his 25,000th Big Mac.*

Yes, you heard me right.

A man ate his 25,000th Big Mac.

And that man is still alive.

And healthy.

If you've never seen the movie Super Size Me, you should.

The film follows documentarian Morgan Spurlock as he attempts to find out exactly how bad fast food really is for Americans. In order to do this, Spurlock agrees to eat nothing but food from McDonald's for one entire month. At the beginning of the month, Spurlock is in perfect condition, but after it's all over he's a physcial wreck—he's gained a ton of weight, has heart and blood problems, and is on the verge of liver failure, proving his theory that fast food is killing us.

But there is one person in Spurlock's film who remains a mystery, and his name is Don Gorske.

While Spurlock is traveling the country eating supesized meals, he meets Gorske at his hometown McDonald's in Fon Du Lac, Wisconsin. Everyone there knows Gorske because he goes there every single day. Not only does he go to this McDonald's every day, he also eats a Big Mac and a Coke every day as well. Sometimes Gorske even dines at his favorite restaurant twice in one day.

Gorske ate his first Big Mac thirty-nine years ago when he was eighteen years old. He liked it so much that he ate eight more the same day. After thirty-nine, he's now eaten 25,000 Big Macs. That's an average of 641 hamburgers a year.

Okay, fine, so the guy is completely nuts. We know that. But what doesn't make sense is how he's still going. Spurlock eats McDonald's every day for a month and he almost goes into liver failure. Gorske does it every day of his life, and he's just fine. So fine that his cholesterol is only 156. (Anything under 200 is good.)

This raises the question, why don't the Big Macs have the same effect on Gorske as they do on Spurlock and other people?

Who knows?

Maybe it's because he doesn't get fries with his double decker Big Mac, which many people claim is the worst part of fast food.

Or maybe he's taking in fewer calories than the rest of us. If he limits his diet to about two Big Macs and Cokes a day, that means he's only consuming around 1400 calories, much less than most Americans since it's recommended that people who are only moderately active get at least 2000 calories every day.

Or maybe we are all just different. Some of us can eat a Big Mac—or two!—every day for forty years and still be tall, lean, and healthy. While others just look at a Big Mac and pop an artery. We've known for a long time that genetics play a huge role in our body shape and size. Isn't it possible that Gorske just has good genes and a high metabolism? His father is 81 and still kicking after all. It's really easy to think that people gain weight because they stuff their faces with crap all day long, but Gorske is living proof that a bad eater does not necessarily lead to a bad body.

I know people like Gorske—and lots of them. They shovel food in their mouths from sun up to sun down and never gain a pound. I kind of hate these people, but they do prove something we all like to forget: sometimes the biggest pigs are the hardest to spot.

Watch Gorske eat his 25,000th Big Mac here.

Waxed, plucked, and greased: Okay, she's ready. a.k.a. Theatre of the Grotesque

2011-05-13T10:45:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago, I was channel surfing one night when I came across Courtney Cox on Letterman. Though I'm not a fan of Cougar Town, I've always thought Cox seems like a smart, sophisticated actress who hasn't yet reached her full potential. So I stopped on that channel to hear what she had to say.

Unfortunately, I was so distracted by how she was dressed I had trouble listening.

She was wearing a super short low-cut dress, and her legs were bare. Not only were they bare, they were also slick looking—as if they had been greased up for appearance.

Immediately I thought of For Your Consideration, Christopher Guest's satirical mockumentary about Hollywood. I didn't like the film as well as his others, and I don't think that's because it wasn't accurate. I think it's because it was too accurate. When you see Best in Show—his best in my opinion—you laugh the whole time. Not just because Guest did such a good job spoofing the Westminster Dog Show, but also because his characters are so ridiculous that you don't take them too seriously. Yes, they are exaggerations of real people you know, but they are not real people. So you can laugh at their unusual behavior without feeling too bad about it.

But in For Your Consideration, the characters seem just like real actors. Though their behavior is unusual to the point of being incredibly odd, they don't seem unbelievable, which is what makes the movie so hard to watch. It's almost too real. You can't laugh at the weirdness of it because it's not much an exaggeration, and laughing at real people seems cruel. And instead of enjoying the film, you leave the theatre feeling bad for these people, which is probably why the movie—billed as a comedy—didn't do as well as Guest's other films.

In one scene, Catherine O'Hara's character is being interviewed on a late-night talk show because she is getting some serious Oscar buzz (which is where the movie gets its name). Before the late-night appearance she looks like a normal middle-aged woman—she has wrinkles around her eyes and mouth and on her forehead, she dresses appropriate for a woman in her mid-fifties, and she has limp dirty-blond hair. . .

But when she shows up for her late-night appearance, she's wearing a too-short, low-cut dress and has had a massive makeover—botoxed skin, plumped lips, waxed legs, blown-out bleached blonde hair, the works. . . .

She looks absolutely insane.

But the message is clear: if a woman wants to be a star, she's got to follow these rules no matter how old she is: show off her bod and make herself over in the image of a twenty-year-old. No, she can't look like an ingenue and may not even look good anymore, but she can stretch and tweeze herself to death trying.

This is why I thought of For Your Consideration when I saw Cox on Letterman: because she was made up almost exactly like O'Hara's character—same low-cut mini-dress, same shiny legs, same pushed-up cleavage. Sure, Cox pulled it off and looked good, not insane. But that's not the point. The point is that we make these women fit a mold that not everyone can or needs to fit, as Tina Fey rightly pointed out on Saturday Night Live this season when she explained that she had to have every hair removed from her body before she was allowed to appear on air. And I've noticed in the years since I've seen For Your Consideration that nearly every actress who appears on late-night television looks this way.

(The Daily Show is the one exception, and I couldn't help but notice that Kristen Wiig looked like a normal person when she appeared there last night in a sweater and jeans . . .

but looked like a frightening Elvira version of herself when she appeared on Letterman earlier this week in a short, tight black dress and goth-like makeup. . .

)

Cox is 47 next month, and she looks phenomenal for her age (or for any age), but I'm still horrified that she feels like—even at this point in her career, even with all the millions she earned on Friends—she still has to look like a sexpot every time she steps in front of a camera. It also reminds me how accurate Guest's film was—if she wants to continue to succeed in Hollywood, she's got to play by these rules.

I have no solution to this problem. I can tell you to turn off any late-night program that makes woman parade across the stage like some Stepford version of a bombshell, but you probably won't do it. Still, I can suggest this: at least be aware that women are required to look this way if they want to succeed in one of the most profitable industries in our country, and ask yourself, what does it do to the rest of us?

Step right up!

2011-05-10T18:49:00.000-07:00

I work really hard at having a good attitude about my body and the way I eat, but every once in a while, I find a situation that causes me to struggle.

One of those situations is when my husband doesn't want to eat anything and I do.

For some reason, it makes me feel like a horrible person if I want to eat and he doesn't. I'm not sure why I feel this way. I wish I could blame him—because that would be so much easier, right?—but in truth, he's the most supportive person in my life. He backs me up even when I tell him I want to eat ice cream from the carton or an entire box of processed mac 'n cheese by myself. Okay, so I only do these kinds of things about once a year, but still, the point is that he's there for me when I do.

Which raises the question why do I feel guilty when I eat without him? I'm not really sure, but this weekend I finally decided I was sick of it.

We went to Cincinnati to celebrate a friend's wedding—Congratulations, Katie and Murray!—and see our moms on Mother's Day, and per usual, being on the road meant that we ate WAY too much unhealthy food.

(We did manage to exercise two of the four days we were gone, so not all was lost.)

After two and a half days of subsisting on fast food and an all-you-can-eat-Mother's-Day buffet, Dave hit the wall and declared he didn't want to eat another bite until we got home. (Yes, he's prone to these kinds of extreme statements.) That was fine for him, but this was Sunday afternoon, and we hadn't had dinner yet. No way I was going almost twenty hours without food.

But that meant doing something I loathe—eating when he doesn't.

To make matters worse, we were staying with friends, and by the time we got back to their house after a long day with Dave's family, they'd already eaten their dinner. This meant that not only would Dave not be eating with me, but they wouldn't either. AND on top of that, I'd have to eat my meal while all three of them watched me do it.

In other words, I'd be the floor show . . .

Step right up, ladies and gentleman, and see something that will make you cringe in horror. Appearing in this tent right behind me is the curvy lady who eats by herself. Yes, that's right—a curvy lady who eats by herself! Come inside and see her do it . . . if you dare!

Needless to say, the idea wasn't very appealing.

On the other hand, neither was skipping dinner.

As far as I could see, I had two choices: miss a meal or pressure Dave into eating with me. And I knew the latter would not be pretty.

And then it occurred to me I had a third choice: I could eat by myself and not let it get to me. After all, it was up to me whether or not I wanted to feel uncomfortable about eating alone in front of three other people. I could just do it and not make a big deal out of it, right?

As soon as I realized this, I felt like a new person. A person who didn't worry about eating when no one else was eating. A person who doesn't mind eating in front of others. All I had to do was be that person.

So I put on my big girl panties, walked right up to Habañero, and got myself a veggie taco and some chips and salsa, which I brought home and ate in front of three people who couldn't have cared less.

I am not kidding when I say it was one of the best meals I've ever had.

The Good, The Bad, and the Evil

2011-05-05T20:20:00.000-07:00

Well, it's been a hell of a week . . . from the Royal Wedding to the death of Osama Bin Laden to Cinco de Mayo, there has been no lack of drama in our world. As a result, I want to quickly mention a number of thoughts I've had over the past week or two related to the subject of body issues.

First up, the Royal Wedding . . . I'm probably the only person on the planet (besides my Facebook peeps Sophia, Kristie, and Ajsela) who didn't love Kate Middleton's dress—what was up with that stiff armor-like bodice?—but I did appreciate some aspects of the royal gown.

I was thrilled, for instance, that the new Duchess of Cambridge wore sleeves. Not because I'm a prude who wants everyone to dress like a sister wife but because I'm sick to death of the long-running American obsession with all things sleeveless. Most of us don't look good in sleeveless, people! Let's try something else for a while.

For that reason, I'll file Waity Katie's dress under bad with a huge side of good.

I'm also happy that Kate—unlike Diana—did not have to be a virgin to marry her prince. Nor did she have to be of royal blood. These outdated requirements are no better for us than the idea that only thin women are beautiful.

This is very, very good.

Second, the death of Osama . . . I'm not a big fan of celebrating the death of anyone—even someone we can actually call a mastermind of evil without exaggerating, but it was hard not to be a bit pleased that a person who killed so many people has been banished from the earth. I'm also glad that a man who still wants women to be covered from head-to-toe is gone too. I may not want to wear sleeveless, but I want the RIGHT to wear sleeveless.

An evil killer who hated women is no longer among us?

Good.

Third, my haircut this afternoon . . . today I got my hair cut for what feels like the first time since Princess Diana's wedding. And while the stylist was lopping off my split ends, she looked at me and said, "You know, your hair could look just like mine if you wanted."

This woman had bleached blonde hair that she had blown out in a straight but fluffy cupcake-like style. I couldn't imagine why she would think someone with dark, curly hair would want to look like she did. But rather than say this directly, I said, "I like my hair curly."

Unfortunately, the stylist didn't take the hint.

"But it could look like mine," she pleaded. "Just use a big curling iron every morning. And you could have highlights like mine too. That would look great!"

A person who wants me to change who I am to fit her image of beauty?

Bad. Very bad.

Fourth, tonight's episode of The Office . . . in which the old boy network, embodied with scary authenticity by Will Ferrell, finally gets what it deserves . . .

So good I want it to get an Emmy.

Fifth, the guy who waited on me a couple of weeks ago and said "Big appetite, huh?" after I cleaned my plate of lean pork, rice, and vegetables?

Bad and maybe even a bit evil given that kind of comment is designed to undermine our self-esteem.

Finally, last week's Glee . . . I haven't had a chance to write about last week's amazing episode in which all of the glee clubbers don t-shirts advertising what the world sees as their worst quality, thereby reclaiming that part of themselves.

If you missed it, Rachel Berry's shirt said "nose", Artie's said "four eyes," Emma's said "OCD," Finn's said "Can't Dance," Mr. Shoe's said "butt chin," and Kurt's said, "likes boys." (Perhaps the funniest, though, was Puck's which said "I'm with stupid" and had an arrow pointing to his crotch.)

If you know me at all, you know that I simply loved this idea. So much so that I'm thinking about getting a t-shirt that says "curvy." Or maybe "gossip." Or both.

A television show that encourages us to turn our "flaws" into something we wear with pride?

All good!!!

"Birdcage Thighs" by guest poet Jane Wyatt

2011-05-03T17:48:00.001-07:00

I was pushed out of the womb of a woman

with legs small and thin.

I was rocked in my cradle at night by

two hands with slender lady fingers

and long red nails.

I suckled the breast of She whose breasts

were large and soft.

I was raised by a lady fair—midnight

in her hair

and ornaments

in her eyes.

I was pushed toward the bowl

to feed myself when hunger came.

I was thrust toward a table's fare, with the

cheese and the loaves, the knife so hot

the butter melted down

the yeasty bread—doughy to match my growing

thighs and widening hips. My breasts

made mountains of themselves and my eyes

grew wide at the thought of the bowl—

the bowl from which I fed.

I grew from child to Me overnight,

my tongue forever dipped

in tastes I wanted to forget.

I was called thunder thighs by boys in school—

the same boys who wanted my thighs wrapped

'round their bird-frame waists—like cages.

I was laughed at for my breasts by girls

who wanted them on their own chests.

I was dressed in women's clothing

by age fourteen, and my woman shape filled out every

line—my body bled out of its lines

like a child's coloring, and filled the folds

to make a young woman.

My hips grew round and legs grew strong,

and I was called fat by those who

grazed on callous words—I devoured my pain

with a side of fries.

I had a large nose and large eyes—

large breasts and the loins to match. Large

woman to tempt the little bird boys into her

cage and to make them feel her heavy thighs tighten

'round their waists, choking their breath out till

they fell on her in defeat.

No more, they cried.

No more of that. Let me go find a bird-boned

girl to twist and creak her bird-bone legs 'round

my waist, so I can heave in and out while she rasps my name.

No more—they couldn't hear my thick woman whispers and feel

the sway of my hips and the beat of my step.

They wanted their cages breakable,

so they could escape easier from the bird-boned women too weak

to hold them tight and ruffle their feathers.

JANE WYATT is a thirty-year-old creative writing major at Western Kentucky University. She writes a column called "Bluegrass Beat" for Down Home in the Barrens, a magazine based in her hometown, and has just discovered that poetry and memoir are her two favorite genres. She claims to have struggled with her body image all of her life. Wyatt lives in Glasgow, Kentucky with her children, Max (6) and Sophie (5).

Choose the path less traveled, Gwyneth. Get your cheeseburger on. And I promise we'll still love you.

2011-04-28T21:54:00.000-07:00

A recent New Yorker article talked about Gwyneth Paltrow and the new cookbook she is releasing.

I've enjoyed Gwyneth's recent run on Glee as Holly Holiday, the substitute teacher turned temptress who wins the heart of McKinley High's glee club director, Mr. Shoe. But during Gwyneth's last appearance on the show, I noticed that she looked frightfully pale and thin during one of her musical numbers.

Gwyneth has always been willowy and thin, but she looked really drawn and thin on Glee. Almost sickly. And then I read the article in the New Yorker.

The first half of the article includes a direct quote from Gwynnie in which she runs down what she has eaten that day: "A cappucino, some poached eggs with spinach, an apple, almonds, some cheese and bread, and a turkey sandwich with avocado and tomato."

Pretty light fare—and it might explain why she looks so skinny these days on Glee. But later in the article, they quote friends of Gwyneth's who say she eats like a truck driver.

A truck driver? Really?

Have you ever seen a truck driver eat a turkey sandwich with avocado and tomato?

I don't want to offend truck drivers. And I really don't want to offend Gwyneth since she will likely be my best friend some day. But tell me the truth—which version of Gwyneth do you think is accurate? Skinny girl who eats like a truck driver or skinny girl who lives on rabbit food?

To her credit, I suspect she was being honest about what she'd eaten that day (and I love a girl who can be honest about her food intake), but it doesn't sound like enough for a busy thirty-something working mother of two.

Gwyneth is at that age when women in Hollywood have a choice: stay rail thin and start to look unhealthy, or eat like a normal person and say good-bye to the good movie roles.

Gwyneth has clearly chosen the latter, and like I said above, I'm glad to see her still working. But tell us the real truth, Gwyneth, aren't you just dying for a greasy hamburger, cheese fries, and a shake?

It beats the hell out of turkey.

Baby steps

2011-04-26T20:52:00.001-07:00

ME AND MOM, CHRISTMAS 2010

I haven't had time to talk to my parents for two weeks, but I made sure to call them on Easter. When I asked my mom how my father was doing, she gave me a dissertation on his medication list and his latest symptoms.

But when I asked how she was doing, she only said two words: "I'm fat."

I sighed into the phone and wondered for not the first time if my mother would ever accept herself the way she is.

"I'm going to that reunion this weekend," Mom explained, "and I wish I looked better."

"Everyone will be too happy to see you," I said, "to notice if you've gained a few pounds."

"I wish I believed that," Mom said.

Then I decided to try a different approach.

"Do you think Sandy is fat?" I asked, referring to a good friend of hers who has a very average body for a woman in her late sixties—Sandy's body blossoms at her breasts and hips and thighs but nips in just enough to make her look womanly at her waist and calves. Sure, Sandy could lose twenty or thirty pounds, but she still looks attractive and relatively fit for a sextagenarian.

"No, I don't think Sandy's fat," my mother answered, clearly not seeing where I was going with this line of questioning.

"Mom," I said, "Do you know that Sandy has the same body you do?"

"She does?" Mom said, clearly skeptical.

"Yes, she does. Almost exactly the same. And when you see Sandy, you don't see the little bit of padding around her hips. You just see her smile. Because every time Sandy walks in the room, the first thing she does is smile and say how happy she is to see you. And that's what you're like. You're too positive and happy for anyone to have time to examine your body. The people you see this weekend won't notice any tiny little flaw. They'll notice your enthusiasm for life."

I've had this conversation with my mother before without any luck, so I fully expected her to balk, to say that she didn't agree, to talk about needing a dress that would hide her arms. This is a woman we lovingly call "Contrary Penny" because she so likes to disagree with almost everything I say.

So I can't tell you how surprised I was when she said this: "I'm so glad you said that, Molly. Now I feel so much better."

And out of nowhere, there is progress. At long last.

The grass is not always greener by guest blogger Amber Leab

2011-04-21T20:17:00.000-07:00

People have often told me—throughout a lifetime of being underweight—how great I look.

I confidently wear a bikini.

I’m one of those people you might love to hate: I can eat anything, and as much of it as I want, without gaining weight.

People, especially girls and women, praise my thinness, exclaiming “How do you stay so skinny?!” or “You’re so lucky.”

Other people envy me—a person whose thinness is due to cystic fibrosis, who has had regular, extended hospital stays since childhood, and whose daily medical regimen no one would ever envy. But I have this bizarre cultural privilege: I am skinny. It hasn’t generally mattered to people why; thinness is seen as an always-positive attribute in our society.

In the summer of 2004, I weighed 92 pounds. I was very sick and doing everything in my power to put on weight. My doctor went so far as to prescribe an appetite stimulant, derived from cannabis, which was supposed to give me the legal munchies.

It may have helped me put on a pound or two, but that wasn’t enough.

It wasn’t just that I was too thin; I needed a lung transplant and had to weigh a minimum of 100 pounds before I would even be considered for the surgery. I was left with one option: a feeding tube for high-calorie protein shakes every night while I slept, in addition to a high-calorie diet every day. This was scary for me, not just in the way that a feeding tube (and serious illness) would be frightening for anyone, but because, in spite of the serious illness, I liked being so thin and was afraid of gaining too much weight.

I know now that these feelings had much more to do with control (and, specifically, the lack of it in my life at that time) than the actual numbers, and that they weren’t rational or healthy attitudes to hold.

As much as I knew intellectually that I was too thin, I never felt too thin.

When I finally got beyond my fear of “fattening up” (which is how countless doctors and nurses, clearly not sensitive to issues involving body image, jokingly referred to my need to gain weight) and faced the reality of my situation, I scheduled the procedure to place the feeding tube.

I did so with reticence and anxiety.

There would be anesthesia, there would be an incision through the wall of my abdomen, there would be a tube permanently sticking out, there would be pain while my stomach healed from the surgery. I would be hooked up to a nutrition pump, much like an IV pole, every night.

On the operating table, I was prepped for the procedure by a female nurse and a male doctor. When the nurse lifted the hospital gown above my abdomen, she exclaimed, “Look at that pretty flat stomach!”

I processed this statement for a moment. A medical professional had complimented me on my thinness, which was so extreme as to prevent me from having life-saving surgery, while prepping me for a procedure intended to help me gain weight.

To his credit, the doctor quickly snapped, “That’s the problem!” but her message couldn’t have been clearer.

We live in a culture that so values thinness, that values such extreme thinness, that I received a compliment about my body when I was on an operating table, when I was so ill and weighed so little that doctors feared I might not survive major surgery.

While this might’ve been a single extreme incident, I can’t say the same about a lifetime of these compliments, the envy of women, and the gaze of men directed at my ultra-thin (so thin because it was diseased) body.

I can forgive myself for enjoying these moments; I had a difficult life that inspired little envy, and I took the compliments and positive feelings about myself where I could find them.

When I received that comment on the operating table, though, I felt a tangled mess of emotions: I was happy to hear something—anything—uplifting during such a trying time, I was scared to lose that unscarred, flat stomach, and I was angry at the nurse for her inability to read the situation.

Later that same year I had a double-lung transplant and have since gained 25 pounds. I’m still thin, but curvier than before. I threw out the old bikinis. The regular “You’re so skinny!” compliments are gone, but I’ve come to see those comments, even when they were meant in kindness, as all part of our toxic culture.

Depictions of unhealthily thin women in film, television, and advertising constantly bombard us, distorting the way we see one another and how we define a “healthy” body. Extremely thin bodies are often seen as the epitome of health and beauty, when the fact is that healthy, beautiful women come in all shapes and sizes.

If we all didn’t have such a distorted view of the female form, women might have better relationships with their bodies, instead of hating them, resorting to cosmetic surgery for self-esteem issues, and having unrealistic expectations about how they should look.

AMBER LEAB holds a Master’s degree in English & Comparative Literature from the University of Cincinnati and a Bachelor’s degree in English Literature & Creative Writing from Miami University. In 2008, she and Stephanie Rogers co-founded Bitch Flicks, the feminist film review site that advances “the radical notion that women like good movies.” In addition to her film analyses, her fiction has appeared in The Georgetown Review, and in other places soon, she hopes.

Pregnant women lead us into the light

2011-04-19T21:29:00.000-07:00

In honor of National Poetry Month, I thought I'd share another poem with all of you. This one is by Christine Stewart-Nunez, and I think you'll agree it's a great fit for the blog. And if you're not hungry after reading this ode to indulgence, you're probably dead.

Enjoy!

IN PRAISE OF A PREGNANT BODY

Some women count calories, step on the altar

of weight each week, mourn the loss of waist—
jeans too tight to button, I prefer to blossom.
I surrender to coconut salmon in banana leaves,
miso soup with prawns, paella, lasagna, seafood
risotto, mangu and tostones, salads of blueberries,
blood oranges, and papaya, the bloom of belly,
breasts spilling over seams, petals of areolas darkening.

I’ve abandoned the lunch-break park with its tire swing
and picnic of stale chips for the circus, lion tamers,
dogs with purple tutus, magicians pulling doves
from top hats, trapeze artists somersaulting
through the air. I want the Big Top’s pillows
of cotton candy dissolving in my mouth, mounds
of popcorn shiny with butter, globs of caramel
apples, hot dogs drenched in mustard.

Blood thickening and milk springing from nipples
remind me: be open. Enough of this suburb
with its square meals served in look-alike
houses. Give me Paris with its artists scattered
on sidewalks, painted confetti, dancers
in discotheques stretching onto streets at dawn.
With more body to envelop, I’ll browse boutiques
at the Rue du St.-Honoré, lounge sipping café-au-lait,
nibbling a croissant’s flakey layers. Order coq-au-vin
or pot-au-feu, decorate the board with baguette,
brie. Will mousse aux fraises complete me?

If I’d been born with different genes—
petite, straight-hipped, willowy-tall—would I enjoy
fat bowls of kalamata olives, sliced avocado,
desserts of mangoes in cream, pumpkin pie?
I surrender to possibility, to joy, to feasts
of seven-grain breads, lamb stews, chocolate
soufflés. I thank this baby whose growing bones
demand wheels of provolone, sticks of mozzarella,
cubes of sharp cheddar, cups of vanilla yogurt
at two a.m., whose kicks remind me to taste
roast beef, venison steak, the cream of deviled eggs.

Christine Stewart-Nuñez is the author of five volumes of poetry. Her poems and book reviews have appeared in a variety of magazines, including Prairie Schooner, Calyx, Arts & Letters, and North American Review.

The themes of her work range from explorations of popular culture, inquiry into the lives of historical women, and the gendered body to pregnancy/childbirth, loss, and travel.

Pooping perfect

2011-04-14T17:34:00.000-07:00

A week ago I wrote a post called "Everybody poops . . . but not on the same schedule" about how much trouble I have pooping—and how it sometimes seems like the people I know who don't have trouble pooping also don't have trouble with their weight. As I said then, it makes me wonder if I would be supermodel thin if I could kick the constipation habit.

After I wrote this, my friend Kara Thurmond, creator of the Neo-19th century cooking blog, An Hour in the Kitchen, sent me the list below about ways to make it easier to poop. I would be derelict in my duties if I didn't share those tips with all of you.

1. Chew and chew some more. I would say the first thing to do to improve your pooping is to chew your food well. I mean really well, more than you think is necessary. Chew it until there isn't anything left to chew.

2. Eat yogurt (full-fat, plain, sweetened by you lightly with honey, fruit or maple syrup) and lacto fermented food like pickles (Bubbies is one brand, check the label). I would find a local, organic yogurt instead of going with Activia.

3. Tame your stress. This is a big one. You can't control the amount of stressful events in your life, but you can control how you react to them. To start, when you feel overwhelmed, just take a deep breath and say something like "everything will get done." It sounds silly, but it redirects your brain. I believe that dealing with stress in a positive way is the key to many health problems.

4. Go gluten-free. Plus I really, really think you need to give up gluten for a week or two just to see if you feel differently. It's not something you'll have to give up forever, but your "gut" may been a little "repairing".

Here's more about my try at gluten free:
http://www.registerstar.com/articles/2011/04/14/columnists/an_hour_in_the_kitchen/doc4d9dbab6035b8396032443.txt

How to repair your gut:
http://blog.gaiam.com/blog/how-to-fix-your-gut-7-steps-to-intestinal-health/

Let me know if you try any of these!

Kate Winslet: walking the walk AND talking the talk

2011-04-12T21:34:00.000-07:00

I've been a fan of Kate Winslet since she was a curvy nineteen-year-old in Sense and Sensibility sixteen years ago (pictured to the left). She was beautiful in that film but she also looked like someone we could all aspire to be, which is the kind of actress we need to see more of in Hollywood.

Around that time, Winslet's co-star (and Sense and Sensibility's Oscar-winning screenwriter) Emma Thompson told Winslet that if she ever became one of those anorexic-looking actresses found all over Hollywood, Thompson would stop speaking to her.

What Thompson said must have had an impact because Winslet has never become that kind of actress, the kind who looks malnourished.

Yes, she's more thin now—presumably she's lost her baby fat since S&S—than she was then, but she's also not too thin, and I have to give her credit for not caving to industry standards that require most actresses to look underweight.

Because of this, I shouldn't have been surprised when Winslet recently opened up in a completely honest and healthy way about her past weight issues in the April issue of Glamour magazine.

After the Glamour reporter asked Winslet about being called "blubber" as a young girl of eleven when she was 5'6" and 200 pounds, Winslet said, "Looking back on it, I really wasn't that heavy. I was just stockier than the other sporty, whippy-looking kids."

What that means is that Winslet is admitting that 200 pounds isn't really heavy for a five-foot-six woman, but rather, as she says, stocky. This is obviously something I've believed for years, so when I read about Winslet saying the same thing, I wanted to put my copy of Glamour up to my mouth and give it a big old kiss.

But it gets even better.

Because Winslet also admits a slight irritation with the backhanded compliments she used to get at that weight. "People would say to me," she explains, "''You've got such a beautiful face,' in the way of, like, "Oh, isn't it a shame that from the neck down you're questionable.'"

I know exactly what she is talking about. As I discussed in my "I don't care what anyone says—I think you're hot" post, people feel completely comfortable making these kinds of comments that on the surface sound like praise but in truth are laced with implicit criticism.

So when Winslet admitted this had also happened to her, I felt like I'd found my soulmate.

Finally, when asked about whether or not she considers plastic surgery, Winslet said, "I don't have parts of my body that I hate or would like to trade for somebody's else's or wish I could surgically adjust into some fantasy version of what they are."

All I have to say is, Kate Winslet, will you be my new BFF?

Everyone poops . . . but not on the same schedule

2011-04-07T21:48:00.000-07:00

I am really beginning to believe that the key to not being overweight is pooping.

I'll admit that most of my evidence for this theory is anecdotal, but I can't help but notice that a good deal of the people I know who poop regularly are thin.

My husband Dave's pooping schedule, for instance, is as predictable as the sunrise and sunset—once in the morning and once at night. Without fail. And he has never had a problem with his weight. In fact, I think he has been the same weight all of his adult life.

My dad's the same way—his pooping is in fact so efficient that he can stand up from the dining table, announce that he has to "use the facilities," go take care of business, and be back at the table in five minutes.

On the other hand, my pooping schedule is about as easy to predict as a girl's first period. In other words, you have no idea when it's coming, and inevitably it always arrives at a bad time.

The problem with that is that when it comes at a bad time I have no choice but to hold it, which is not only unhealthy, it also means that my body goes into revolt, either pushing the poop out more vigorously or pulling it back inside like a turtle head (possibly Dave's favorite phrase).

No matter when it comes, it's almost never a good thing, and as a result, I spend most of my life bloated and in pain.

One of my friends once told me that she never understood how anyone could poop in a public place. (Spoken like someone who never has trouble pooping.) But if you're like me, you go where you have to . . . at rest stops, at work (thank God for faculty bathrooms!), at various McDonald's locations, at the Pak-a-sak on Highway 27 in Richmond, Indiana, at almost every Barnes & Noble I've ever been to, and many, many times at the Pizza Hut on Harrison Avenue on the west side of Cincinnati.

(I guess that last example should be explained . . . between our junior and senior years in college, I used to visit Dave at his parents' house in Cincinnati. The only problem was that his parents' house only had one bathroom. And it was centrally located—right between the living room, the kitchen, the master bedroom, and the den. Smack dab in the middle of the house. So no matter where you were sitting on the first floor, you could hear the person in the bathroom. This meant that, for probably fifteen years, I was unable to poop in their house. And the closest bathroom I could find was at the Pizza Hut on Harrison Avenue on the west side of Cincinnati, which is now—through no fault of my own—closed.)

People who don't "get" pooping in public places are people who don't HAVE to poop in public places. They have no understanding of what it means to be overcome by the sudden urge to take a dump. Their digestive system is regular, they are healthy, and usually they are also slim.

I guess I don't have to tell you that the friend who scoffed at pooping in pubic was, of course, thin.

I read an interview with Whoopi Goldberg about a year ago in which she claimed that losing weight was all about pooping. She had just dropped some serious pounds (which I believe she has now gained back), and she explained that she just had to learn to poop. Once she started pooping regularly, the extra weight disappeared.

I keep waiting for that to happen to me.

It seems like more and more people (including me) have some form of IBS these days, and it makes me wonder if there's a connection between that surge and the increase in obesity. Is it possible that Americans are getting more fat because we simply can't get enough poop out? And is it also possible that the toxins in our environment—our air, our homes, even our food—are messing with our digestive systems?

I have to believe there's some connection.

No matter what the reason, I feel confident that if you can poop regularly, you can also look good in a bathing suit.

And hopefully you can avoid an embarrassing trip to Pizza Hut.

Happy birthday! Happy blogoversary!

2011-04-05T10:12:00.000-07:00

Today is my 41st birthday and the second anniversary of the blog. To celebrate, I am announcing a special offer.

My first book, How to Survive Graduate School & Other Disasters, is coming out in May and up for pre-sale now at http://www.mainstreetrag.com/MMcCaffery.html for just $8 + shipping. As an added bonus, anyone who pre-orders the book before the end of my birthday (midnight April 5th) will be entered into a drawing to win a $25 gift certificate to Barnes & Noble.

How to Survive Graduate School & Other Disasters is a collection of short stories about everyone from graduate students to Girl Scouts, from teenagers to retirees. These stories are set in Cincinnati, New Jersey, Indiana, Baltimore, East Berlin, and Washington, D.C., but all of them have one thing in common: they are stories about surviving the disasters and dysfunctional relationships we all have with friends, family, and lovers.

Though no single story in HOW TO SURVIVE is explicitly about women’s body issues, all of them feature women who struggle with how they see themselves.

In the title story, “How to Survive Your Last Year of Graduate School,” the main character is reluctant to use her body to get ahead in academia, but ultimately realizes she must at least appear to play the game, causing her to do something she almost never does:

“You wear a skirt.

And knee-high boots.

With black stockings.

And you saunter into [your department chair’s] office like the slut you used to be in college, all hip and ass because you don’t really have the breasts. You tell him how excited you are about your defense, you tell him that your dissertation director has given you the go-ahead and how much you’ve appreciated his guidance over the past five years.

He is moved.

He blushes.

He looks at your knees.

In “The Lake in Winter,” a young woman’s self esteem is so low that she is willing to put herself in dangerous positions with men she doesn’t know just to improve her standing among her peers:

“Violet is just average, and for her, a special boy comes around only as often as the seasons. So she feels like Ty is a prize, something to be cherished. She’s desperate to hold on to him. Even if she can’t do it in public. Even if almost no one else knows what they do. This means she goes along with him no matter how far across the line he travels. In the few weeks that Ty has been taking her to the airport, he has taught her to go further than she’s ever gone before, but the night in the ice-fishing shack is something entirely different.

And in many of the other stories, including "Himmel und Erde," the female characters see themselves as bland and unappealing:

“For every part of Sarah that shines, I have a part that is equally dull. My flat, dirt-colored hair hangs around my shoulders in uneven, nearly transparent strands. My empty gray eyes look at me every morning in the mirror and beg for more.

More beauty, more vitality.

More.”

If you don’t get around to ordering the book today but order before the end of the month, have no fear—there will be another drawing—this one for a free copy of Stephanie Klein’s Moose, an outstanding memoir about a slightly plump young girl who was sent, against her will, to fat camp.

Be sure to let me know you ordered (here on the blog, on Facebook, or via email at mollymccaffrey@yahoo.com), so I can include you in the birthday or April drawing!

Thanks!

Molly

Turns out Sir Mix-A-Lot wasn't kidding . . .

2011-03-31T21:03:00.000-07:00

A friend turned me on to an article about curvy woman on The Art of Manliness blog, and it's too good not to share so I'm posting it here. Enjoy!

Men Like Women with Curves;
Women Still Think Their Butts Look Too Big
A cross-post from The Art of Manliness by Brett and Kate McKay

I recently came across this interesting study (warning: nude ladies covering their lady parts with their hands) which showed that while women believe a thin figure is the female ideal, men actually prefer a more curvy lady. What was even more interesting is that this story made the front page of Digg, and while Digg users are known for their terribly disparaging and caustic comments, the vast majority agreed with the results. So what does such a story show us? First, men like women with curves. Second, women don’t believe this. Third, contrary to popular belief, men are not to blame for this disconnect. The blame lies instead with the media and the catty expectations of a woman’s female peers.

While men may not be at fault for women’s skewed body image problem, we can be part of the solution; we can support the women in our lives and help them feel better about themselves. I have been rather dismayed at the number of my female friends and family who on the surface appear confident and attractive, but inwardly are pained with acute insecurities. Even beautiful women often feel ugly, fat, and unattractive. True, some men also battle insecurities, but by and large we often feel fairly comfortable about ourselves. Just take a look at the beach at the shirtless men, their huge guts hanging over their Speedo, strolling along without a care in the world.

Let me be clear about something-at the end of the day, a man cannot make a woman feel good about herself; a woman’s self-esteem is under her control and something only she can fix and heal. But it would be most naive to not admit that we are all-men and women alike-influenced by those around us. To your lady, you are the most important and influential person in her life. And you must be valiant in protecting her heart and spirit.

BE A MODERN KNIGHT FOR YOUR LADY

Be generous with your compliments. Whenever your lady is looking luminous, let her know. I often fall into the trap of looking at my wife, thinking about how beautiful she is, but then not vocalizing that thought. I figure she already knows how pretty I think she is, so there is no need to repeat it. But I have come to realize that she can never hear it enough. Insecurities never completely go away, and my frequent and sincere compliments can buoy her up each day. Whenever your lady is experiencing self-doubt, be there with an earnest and encouraging word for her.

Don’t blatantly ogle other women. It’s natural for a man to look at other attractive women and women should understand this. But men should try to keep this impulse under control. If you’re at dinner with your lady and she sees you ogling some model-esque woman, even though she knows it’s a natural impulse, the message is still going to register as, “He wishes I looked more like that.” Feeling that you only have eyes for her will make your lady feel confident and secure.

Guard against harmful media sources. Women will admit that advertisements make them feel insecure, yet they keep on reading Cosmo and other trash that make them feel like crap. Try to steer your lady away from tabloidy rubbish. Buy her a subscription to a magazine that doesn’t set the standard of female beauty artificially high.

When magazines and television do present some fake, plastic surgery constructed stick of a woman as the female ideal, you may be thinking, “Yuck, she’s so gross,” but your lady may be thinking, “I wish I looked like that.” Interrupt these thoughts by vocalizing your distaste for women who look like they are strung out on heroin or are the result of a science experiment gone awry.

Quit watching porn. When you turn to porn to get aroused, you send this message to your lady: “You are cute, but when I really want to get excited I need to look at women with cantaloupe sized breasts” Your lady, and her alone, should do if for you. And she should know that in her heart.

Steer her away from negative friends. When a woman gets all gussied up, she’s not doing it just for you. She also wants to impress other women. And who can blame her when so many women are super judgmental and critical of their female peers. Steer your lady away from negative friends who obsess about their appearance, make comments about your lady’s appearance, and generally make your lady feel insecure.

The Art of Manliness is authored by husband and wife team, Brett and Kate McKay. It features articles on helping men be better husbands, better fathers, and better men. In our search to uncover the lost art of manliness, we’ll look to the past to find examples of manliness in action. We’ll analyze the lives of great men who knew what it meant to “man up” and hopefully learn from them. And we’ll talk about the skills, manners, and principles that every man should know.

Real bods in the boudoir: "What matters is how you FEEL"

2011-03-29T19:18:00.000-07:00

My friend Alison turned me onto a story about a plus-sized woman—"Ms. N"—who wrote about her incredibly positive experience at a Seattle-based photo studio that specializes in "boudoir" photos, and I just had to write about it.

The goal of Seattle Boudoir Photography is to take alluring and provocative photos of women of all sizes.

(One of their photos is featured above, but be warned that if you decide to go to their website, not all of their photos are kid- or work-appropriate and some—especially the couples photos—are pretty R-rated.)

If you do look at their gallery, you'll see skinny women, plus-size women, curvy women, flat-chested women, tattoed women, pierced women, older women, pregnant women, women with crow's feet, women with tummies, women with generous derrieres, women with fleshy arms and legs, women with men, women with women, and more—one of my favorite photos is of a woman who is small on top wearing a wife beater that says "Sexy Little Bride."

The women in the gallery have different body shapes and different types of faces, but what these photos have in common is that all of them are absolutely stunning—and somking hot. I highly recommend that you take a look at SBP's galleries (especially "Bombshells & Babes") in order to see a great visual representation of the idea that beauty does not come in one size or shape.

Ms. N detailed her own experience at SBP for Offbeat Bride and explains, "I got to spend 2 hours with amazing people who, very honestly and sincerely, thought that I looked beautiful, and did everything they could to make sure that I knew it. And not only KNEW it, but FELT it, too. Nobody ever once looked at me and said, 'Oh, I sure wish you were thinner,' or 'Wow, those stretch marks really take away from this photo.' What I heard instead was, 'Oh, you have killer boobs!' and 'You look so hot in that pose, for real!' I could NOT believe my ears. And really, that was all it took for me to suddenly realize this: I'm freakin' HOT! It doesn't matter about size or scars or weight or anything. What matters is how you FEEL. And I have never been more amazed at how comfortable I could be with myself."

I could not have said it better myself.

In fact, "What matters is how you FEEL" would be an appropriate tagline for I Will Not Diet.

As long as I've been writing this blog, I've fantasized about posing in my underwear in order to prove that I'm happy with my bod—all 197 pounds of it—but also to show that women's bodies can look attractive at an average size, one that's more attainable than those of the models and celebrities we see in the media.

Looking at this studio's work makes me realize I'm not the first person to have this idea and that I really do have to follow through on that goal some day.

Nevertheless, I'm not going to lie—I may pose in my underwear, but I'm never going to show any boob. I'll leave that to the women who are braver—or crazier—than me.

Back in my day . . .

2011-03-24T20:49:00.000-07:00

Thankfully, after a long, hard, and sick winter, Dave and I are finally walking every day again. Getting back to our routine is wonderful, but it also reminded us recently of how different our childhoods were from the lives of kids today.

And that's because almost every time we walk through Kereiakes Park, we pass the playground on the far side of the park where kids play on the jungle gym, ride the swings, and—wait for it—eat fast food.

I am not kidding when I say that almost every single time we see a family at the playground, we also see a mom or dad cleaning up the fast food meal they just served their children.

We had seen it so many times that, after a while, we stopped noticing. But being away from the walking trail for weeks this year made us look at this now familiar scene with fresh eyes.

Four kids, two adults, six sets of hamburger wrappers, french fry cartons, and to-go cups.

What's wrong with this picture?

I think we all know.

"Did you ever take fast food to the park when you were little?" Dave asked me the other day. "When I was young, there was only one McDonald's on the entire west side of Cincinnati. And going there was a big deal, like going out to a fancy meal or something."

And he's right. When we were kids, going out to eat—fast food or otherwise—was a big deal. Sure, on a special occasion or holiday, our families took homemade picnics to the park, but now, for too many American kids fast food is a daily occurrence.

Though this is partly the fault of parents, it's hard to blame parents alone for this problem when there's a McDonald's on over corner. When you have to drive right past one on the way to the park, it's easy to wonder why you shouldn't stop and feed the kids while you're out?

(There is, in fact, a McDonald's, a Wendy's, a Rally's, and now even a Dairy Queen all within four blocks of Kereiakes Park.)

It's also hard to blame parents when it costs about two dollars to feed each kid at a McDonald's.

What's weird is that I really think a happy meal used to cost more when we were kids than it does now. Am I wrong or didn't a happy meal in the seventies used to cost three dollars and now they're just two bucks? Or maybe they're three now, I'm not sure.

Either way, that doesn't make any sense! We have had forty years of inflation, but prices at McDonald's have gone down, not up. How is that possible???

It's possible because technology is always making it easier to make our food even more processed, meaning that fast food is cheaper today because it's less real. It's also possible because the main ingredient in almost all American fast food is corn and/or corn syrup, and corn is heavily subsidized by the federal government in our country, which means that fast food restaurants can sell products made with corn byproducts cheaper than ever before.

Translation: our kids get fatter every time they eat fake, er, I mean fast food.

Keep your eyes on your own plate

2011-03-22T21:00:00.000-07:00

Tonight I went out for an otherwise lovely pre-reading dinner with a guest writer and some people from school.

Everything was going well until the waiter came to take our orders. He said he'd start with me, and I just assumed that at that point, the rest of the table—eight other people for God's sake!—would pick up their conversations where they left off, as most people do when you are eating in a nice restaurant with a large group.

But, no, instead of doing that, the entire table sat there silently, staring at me and listening intently to my every word.

I felt like I was placing my order on a live YouTube feed.

In case you don't know, this is not the way to behave. When a lady places her order—or a man for that matter—its best to busy yourself with other things. Look at your menu, re-fold your napkin, make small talk for God's sake. Whatever. Otherwise, said lady may feel like you are judging her choice of food.

Okay, so I will admit said lady—that would be me!—has some food and body issues that may contribute to her desire to be able to order without so much scrutiny, and we all know that. But I still think that whenever a person orders a meal, it's best if others don't act like the most interesting thing they've done all day is eavesdrop on the very private conversation that occurs between a server and his/her patron.

Really? You're going to have the calzone? But isn't that the highest calorie item on the menu?

Okay, again, so I have to admit that no one actually said that or anything like it. But they might as well have for all the looks I got.

(And for the record, I ordered the calzone because, at $11.50, it was easily the cheapest thing on the menu.)

It also didn't help that the waiter was a bit clueless. The menu said "make your own calzone," so when I asked him what normally comes in a calzone, I thought he might say, mozzerella, cheese, and tomatoes. But instead, he said, "Well, a calzone is like a pizza rolled over on itself."

Like I didn't know what a calzone was. I grew up in New Jersey for God's sake, home of the mafia and Frank Sinatra. I think I know what a goddamned calzone is.

In fact, that's the reason I was asking. I didn't want some Americanized version of a calzone. I wanted the real deal. According to the World English Dictionary, a calzone is "a dish of Italian origin consisting of pizza dough folder over a filling of cheese and tomatoes, herbs, ham, etc."

That's right—cheese, tomatoes, and ham. That's how they make it in Jersey. But as those of you who've been to any branch of LaRosa's in Cincinnati know, one person's calzone is another person's fill-in-the-blank. And I didn't want any cheddar cheese in my calzone, thank you very much.

Of course, our poor waiter did not know I hail from Jersey, but still. It seemed like a simple question. You'd think I could have gotten a simple answer. And all of this happened while I was still on stage, performing for the rest of the table like a tight-rope walker.

So I felt a bit uncomfortable when I had to explain to the waiter that I wanted a calzone with mozzarella, ricotta, tomatoes, and ham.

Ricotta and ham, you say? I might as well have ordered a chocolate cake for dinner. With brownies on top.

And that's now where it ends either.

Because when the waiter finally brought my calzone, he presented it by apologizing for burning the end of it, saying they were currently making another in case I wasn't happy with this one. Of course, his comment caused all eight pairs of eyes to look down the table at my plate and see the newborn-sized slab of dough he had placed in front of me.

Wow, that's huge!

I can't believe the size of that thing!

Boy, do you think it's big enough?

Unlike the previous words, the ones that had only been said in my head, these words were said out loud. By actual people.

I wanted to die.

Or crawl under my monster-sized calzone and hide.

I also wanted to shout, Haven't you people ever seen a calzone before??? They're always freaking huge. What, have you never been to Jersey before???

But most of these people probably haven't been to Jersey, and if they have, I'm sure they'd have no idea where to find a good calzone.

(Here's a hint: if you can add cheddar cheese to it, it's not a real calzone.)

Here's another hint: when a lady's food arrives, and it looks a bit oversized, it's best not to comment on the girth of the meal in front of her. We worry enough about our girths. We don't need to worry about our food being too fat too.

As it turned out, the calzone was amazing and completely authentic. Sinatra would have been proud of the people at The Brickyard. But the truth is I'll think twice before I order another Italian turnover as big as a small child when out with other people. Which, in the end, kind of makes me sad.

Doctor's orders—no more black clouds

2011-03-17T20:20:00.000-07:00

When I'm in a pessimistic mood, I think there must be a black cloud hanging over me this semester. . . after all, the semester started with death, was followed by illness, and now—after a brief respite over spring break—has been followed by yet again another illness.

Yes, I am sick for the second time in six weeks.

But I'm in an optimistic mood today (brought on by lots of new miracle drugs), so I'm not even thinking about the black cloud and instead am going to choose to focus on a spring-like forecast—I'm getting better by the second and, by Monday, I will feel like myself again for the first time in over a month.

(If I keep saying it, maybe it will come true.)

Still, in order to get to this place of optimism—and secure previously mentioned miracle drugs—I had to go to a place of fear and loathing: the doctor's office

Nobody likes to go to the doctor, but truthfully, I have amazing two doctors—my girl doctor and my GP. The latter, who I saw today, is smart and funny. He also reads YA books with his teenager daughters and likes to make nerdy Star Trek jokes with my husband. That makes me like and, more importantly, trust him.

Also, he is current on everything, which makes me happy. Except, that is, when he tells Dave that new research shows it's good for him to drink two—not just one—beers a day.

(Our fridge already has too much beer in it anyway.)

But no matter how much I like my doc, I was just not up for another visit to sick-ville today. I've been coughing since the beginning of February and this would be my third visit to the Medical Center in just as long. I simply did not want to go.

And it showed.

Because while I was there, my old insecurities reared their ugly head, which of course was ugly and uncomfortable.

This happened after my examination, but before we had left the examining room.

Since he had the opportunity while we were there, Dave asked the doctor if he was due to have his cholesterol checked, and for some reason, this made me furious.

"You don't need to have your cholesterol checked!" I insisted even though I had been too sick to speak a moment before. "You're a freaking model of health."

"But I want to stay on top of it," Dave explained. "I have bad genes."

"My God, look at you!"

Later, after we got home, I apologized to Dave, explaining that I'm just not comfortable with him being so obsessed with his health. I even admitted that sometimes it makes me feel bad about myself.

"You're in great health," he said. "I mean, except for being sick. And you can't assume I'm healthier than you are just by looking at me."

But the truth is no matter how much I'm told that I'm healthy, I still look at other people—Dave included—who are thin and think they've got one up on me. I still feel as if at any moment I'm going to find out I'm dying of some weight-related disease and my doctor is going to tell me—wait for it—that I have to go on a diet or some ridiculous thing like that.

The truth is that I'm insecure. Not about how I look. But about my health.

At the doctor's office today, we found out that the number that determines if you're pre-diabetic has been lowered. And even though I'm not in that category or anywhere near it, sometimes it just feels like we're all fighting a losing battle. That every time you accomplish something with your health, you are met with a new challenge.

Oh, you lost ten pounds? Great, now you need to lose ten more.

Oh, you cut out trans fats? That's good because now you need to cut sugar.

I know I started this post by saying I'm feeling optimistic, and I am. (As it turns out, my tests showed there's nothing wrong with me except a bad sinus infection.) But I wasn't in a good space earlier today, and I guess my point is that it's normal to have moments when you feel like everyone is out to get you—or at least tell you to drop a few pounds.

I guess that's part of body acceptance too—knowing that you'll never entirely let go of those issues. Especially when a black cloud has spent more than its fair share of time in your atmosphere.

On Rape, the Media, and the New York Times Clusterfuck

2011-03-15T15:41:00.000-07:00

Though the main topic of this blog is body issues, sometimes another issue that may seem only tangentially related is worth discussing. I believe that's the case with the New York Times' recent decision to include inflammatory information about an eleven-year-old rape victim in their story about the case.

I've talked at length how crucial it is for us to see women of all bodies sizes in the media and asserted time and again that until the media shows us that people of all sizes and shapes (and types) are attractive, we won't really believe it.

The same is true of how we depict women. Until we see people in the media treating women with humanity respect, people in our society won't treat women with humanity or respect. And last week, the New York Times treated a young girl—an eleven-year-old rape victim—without either. This issue is so troublesome that I've asked the women at Bitch Flicks if I could re-post their take on the situation here. I hope you get as much out of their article as I did.

On Rape, the Media, and the New York Times Clusterfuck

On Tuesday, March 8, the New York Times published an article by James C. McKinley Jr. titled, “Vicious Assault Shakes Texas Town.” Eighteen men held down an 11-year-old girl and repeatedly raped her in an abandoned trailer while recording the rape with cell phones. Much has been written about McKinley’s—and the New York Times’—irresponsible, victim-blaming, rape culture-enforcing report of the rape. Or should I say lack of report of the rape. While the entire article is a catastrophic joke, this paragraph warrants specific mention:

Residents in the neighborhood where the abandoned trailer stands—known as the Quarters—said the victim had been visiting various friends there for months. They said she dressed older than her age, wearing makeup and fashions more appropriate to a woman in her 20s. She would hang out with teenage boys at a playground, some said.

Shakesville breaks down the story, and it’s a must-read piece. The writer points out, “Nowhere in this story is the following made clear: … that our compassion and care should be directed first and foremost toward the victim rather than the boys, the school, the community, or anyone else.” The NYT piece is such an obvious case of victim-blaming, and terrifyingly unapologetic, that it wasn’t surprising to see an immediate petition go up at change.org, “Tell the New York Times to Apologize for Blaming a Child for Her Gang Rape.”

The creator of the petition, Shelby Knox, writes, “1 in 4 American women will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime. A culture that blames victims for being raped—for what they were wearing, where they were, and who they were with—rather than blaming the rapist, is a culture that tacitly condones rape.” As of now 43,820 people have signed the petition, and Arthur S. Brisbane of the New York Times has issued an apology—not without its flaws—regarding the lack of balance in the piece.

*****

That apology should’ve felt good to read. But about an hour before it was issued, I’d posted the petition on my Facebook wall, urging friends to sign it. And this was one of the first responses:

Actually...no. I just read the "offending" comments of Mr. McKinley. The complaint is that he "gave ink" to the opinions of some idiots from Texas? He's a reporter for Christ's sake. He's SUPPOSED to present all angles of the story. Looks like responsible journalism to me. Attack the idiots in Texas for this. Attack the wretched perpetrators. Why in the world is anyone mad at The New York Times for telling the whole story? If anything its GOOD that they reported on those folks as well. Its important for people to know that there are idiots like that everywhere. This is wildly misplaced rage here. Wasting time on things like this is why no real problems ever get solved in this damn country. Let the public burning commence. I'll be tied to the stake willingly. =)

Another person immediately agreed. Thankfully, others jumped in to defend the petition, but I didn’t walk away from the thread feeling good about it. I felt defeated. Exhausted. Like I might burst into tears. So when the NYT finally got around to “apologizing” for publishing an article that never should’ve seen the light of day to begin with, I wanted to revel in the success of a group of people coming together to affect change. I couldn’t, though. And I started to think about why I couldn’t.

*****

The same day the New York Times published its story, the newspaper in my hometown published a report of another young girl’s rape, “Man accused of raping 12-year-old girl.” I read the opening paragraph: “A Middletown man has been charged with rape and intimidation of a witness after allegedly conducting a sexual relationship with a 12-year-old girl.” I read it again … “a sexual relationship” … “with a 12-year-old girl.” I kept reading … “accused of having sex with a child younger than the age of 12” … “alleged abuse of the female juvenile.”

What the hell? A child cannot consent to sex. Ever. Under any circumstance. So how does a man conduct a sexual relationship with her? How does a man have sex with her? And why does “the girl” suddenly become “the female juvenile”? If I’d ever gone a moment without thinking about Rape Culture (and it's hard to do), two newspaper articles published back to back—discussing the rapes of two girls as if one girl couldconsent to having sex with a man, while another could facilitate her own fucking gang rape—would make sure I spent a good few days and nights obsessing about the most recent media onslaught of violence against women.

*****

Three years ago, on March 28, 2008, Amber and I started Bitch Flicks. We respected blogs like Women and Hollywood that focus on women in film and explore how difficult it is for women to navigate the sexist terrain of Hollywood. And we wanted to be a part of that conversation, by looking closely at how popular films, television, music videos, movie posters, and other forms of media contribute to misogyny, violence against women, and unattainable beauty ideals. Because more than anything, we believe the blind and uncritical consumption of media portrayals of women contributes to furthering women’s inequality in all areas of life.

And we’ve noticed a few things here and there: rape being played for laughs in Observe and Report; the sexual trafficking of women used as a plot device in Taken; the constant dismemberment of women in movie posters; the damaging caricatures of women as sex objects in Black Snake Moan and The Social Network; and we’ve often pointed to discussions of sexism and misogyny around the net, like the sexual violence in Antichrist and, most recently, the sexualized corpses of women in Kanye West’s Monster video. It barely grazes the surface. I mean, it barely grazes the fucking surface of what a viewer sees during the commercial breaks of a 30-minute sitcom.

Yet, this constant, unchecked barrage of endless and obvious woman-hating undoubtedly contributes to the rape of women and girls.

The sudden idealization of Charlie Sheen as some bad boy to be envied, even though he has a violent history of beating up women, contributes to the rape of women and girls. Bills like H. R. 3 that seek to redefine rape and further the attack on women's reproductive rights contributes to the rape of women and girls. Supposed liberal media personalities like Michael Moore and Keith Olbermann showing their support for Julian Assange by denigrating Assange’s alleged rape victims contributes to the rape of women and girls. The sexist commercials that advertisers pay millions of dollars to air on Super Bowl Sunday contribute to the rape of women and girls. And blaming Lara Logan for her gang rape by suggesting her attractiveness caused it, or the job was too dangerous for her, or she shouldn't have been there in the first place, contributes to the rape of women and girls.

It contributes to rape because it normalizes violence against women. Men rape to control, to overpower, to humiliate, to reinforce the patriarchal structure. And the media, which is vastly controlled by men, participates in reproducing already existing prejudices and inequalities, rather than seeking to transform them.

And it pisses me off.

*****

"This is wildly misplaced rage here. Wasting time on things like this is why no real problems ever get solved in this damn country." I decided to respond to that portion of my friend's Facebook comment by quoting a passage from a piece on Shakesvillecalled, "Feminism 101: 'Feminists Look for Stuff to Get Mad About,'" in which Melissa McEwan makes the following argument:

... in a very real way, ignoring "the little things" in favor of "the big stuff" makes the big stuff that much harder to eradicate, because it is the pervasive, ubiquitous, inescapable little things that create the foundation of a sexist culture on which the big stuff is dependent for its survival. It's the little things, the constant drumbeat of inequality and objectification, that inure us to increasingly horrible acts and attitudes toward women.

People can argue that “the little things” are less important to point out than “the big things” all they want to. They can accuse feminists of misplaced anger, irrationality, man-hating, overreaction. But the reality is that violence against women has become so commonplace in film and television, in advertising, in stand-up fucking "comedy," in video games, that it's the absolute default treatment of women in media, and we can't pretend that doesn't extend to how women are treated in the rest of society. It contributes to rape. And it certainly contributes to a "liberal" newspaper's inability to effectively report an 11-year-old girl's gang rape without victim-blaming and slut-shaming, which, incidentally, also contributes to rape.

So. I gave myself a break. I let myself feel shitty and helpless for a minute. I'm over it now and ready to fight back. Stay tuned for our regularly scheduled programming...

STEPHANIE ROGERS co-founded and writes for Bitch Flicks, a web site that focuses on analyzing films and pop culture from a feminist perspective. In her spare time, she tries to remember she has an MFA in poetry and occasionally publishes some. She lives in Brooklyn.

Food is not magic by guest blogger Emily Threlkeld

2011-03-10T20:34:00.000-08:00

Sometime during all this cooking*, I had a revelation: Food is not magic.

Yes, food can sometimes feel like magic. In most cities, at any given moment you are less than fifteen minutes away from an instant burger, fries, sandwich, or pizza. The only effort you have to put in is forking over your debit card.

But effort was put into that food, even if you didn't see it. Someone prepared it for you. Someone delivered the ingredients, someone put them together and made them presentable for your consumption. In the case of fast food, there are food developers, food tasters, and food scientists involved. Food scientists.

Before I went to Costa Rica, I was in Houston for a physical. It turns out that my cholesterol is high. Like really high. Not high enough to cause my doctor concern, but high enough that she suggested I work on lowering it. Then I went in for an eye check up and while my doctor was looking into my eyes through the phoropter, she asked, "So do you like eating sugars or starch?" Turns out she could determine my diet excesses by looking at my eyes.

In combination, those appointments made me realize that cooking at home is an important goal for me. My cholesterol tends to be on the high end of normal, and the amount of stress in my life recently hasn't helped. Throw drive-thru meals on top of that, and it becomes a problem. Even eating too many sweets has an effect on my body.

But here's the good news: If you eat out of your own kitchen, you kind of can't help but be healthier. Baking cookies and brownies is an involved process that takes far more time and energy than grabbing a box of them from the store, so there are likely to be fewer temptations sitting around. Fruit, meanwhile, is naturally sweet and requires no more preparation than a quick rinse under the tap. Chicken and beef often take more time and effort to cook than fish and vegetables, so you're more likely to throw some tilapia in the oven and make a salad for yourself while it bakes.

That said, I wouldn't recommend such a major shift in eating habits to anyone. I had to work the Saturday before I left for Costa Rica and it resulted in me cheating. I was on my feet for eight hours, which I expected, but then my relief called in sick and I was asked to stay for four more. After running around like crazy getting eleven brides started with their registries, I almost had to crawl out of the car and onto our couch. My husband was already there, at the end of his own long day. He offered to order a pizza for us, which filled me with a rush of relief. Once I was finished eating, however, I had another rush—one of guilt. "I really could have made that pizza," I found myself thinking. As Molly has pointed out in her "Cheeseburgers and the importance of indulgence" post before:

"The other thing that's important is not feeling bad about allowing yourself to eat that cheeseburger or brownie sundae. Because the worse you feel about it, the more you're going to want to do it again and again."

So true! Once I got back from Costa Rica, the pendulum swung back in the opposite direction. I went on a pizza, Panera, Taco Bell, McDonald's binge. I didn't go to the grocery store for a week. Without realizing it, I'd put myself on a kind of diet. I dedicated myself to an unreasonable goal. I'm back on track now, with the realization that sometimes it's okay to eat out, whether it's ordering a pizza after a long day or going to a nice dinner with a friend to catch up.

Restaurants aren't the enemy, as long as the kitchen is your close friend.

*In case you don't remember, I committed to cooking all of my meals at home for the entire month of February.

EMILY THRELKELD is a newlywed living in Raleigh, North Carolina. She's also a writer and a photographer who supports herself being a bridal consultant at Bed, Bath, & Beyond.

Who is the girl in the picture?

2011-03-08T22:06:00.000-08:00

About a week ago I had to have an official author photo taken for my upcoming book by the lovely and talented Victoria Taylor, a photojournalism student here at WKU.

Like most women, I'm not a big fan of having my picture taken, but over the years, I've tried to have a better attitude about it. After spending my entire life watching the women in my life groan every time they see a photo of themselves—and immediately pointing out their worst flaw—I grew tired of the pessimism and negativity.

For that reason, I have tried as much as I can to have a good attitude when my picture is taken. It's never easy, but I do my best, and for a few years now, I've been pretty good about noticing what looks good rather than what looks bad when I see a snapshot of myself.

I do the same thing in my daily life—when I look go shopping or even just when I look in the mirror each morning—so I had naively started to believe I had kicked the low self-esteem habit.

But while sitting in front of a high definition camera with a professional photographer, all of my insecurities came flooding back to me. When I looked at the images on her three-inch screen, all I could see were the flaws—why was my nose so big? my hair so flat and dark? my lips so thin? After years of teaching myself to focus on the positive, I was suddenly and completely only able to see the negative.

Not only was my inability to see my assets gone, but so was my ability to see myself at all. When Victoria showed me the images she'd captured, I could not even recognize myself. I looked that strange and unfamiliar. It was as if I was suffering from a severe case of amnesia except that the only thing I couldn't remember was what I looked like.

I would glance at the images on her screen and frown. Who was the person staring back at me? Where was the person I saw in the mirror every morning? The person with a few stray blonde highlights from her youth? The person with a normal-sized nose?

Poor Victoria had to put up with my inability to see the pictures clearly for two hours before she was finished. Every time she showed me a new shot, my face would drop, and she and Dave would have to reassure me that the pictures were good.

Now, over a week later and after posting the new photo on Facebook (and getting a dozen positive responses to it), not only do I know that the photos are good, I also know they really really do look like me.

So why couldn't I see this while they were being taken? What happened to make me so unable to see my own image?

I'm really not sure, but I think it has to do with how slowly we change.

Whenever I look at anyone in my family—my husband, my parents, or my sister—I don't see them as they are now, in 2011. Instead, I see a compilation of who they've been over the years. I see my husband's longer hair and too-big concert t-shirts, my parents' young faces and rich brown hair, my sister's glasses and pigtails. I don't see them as flat images. I see them as fully developed people with complex pasts and interesting histories.

And I think that's also what I see when I look in the mirror—the little girl with the boyish haircut, the teenager with the perfect bod, the young woman with blonde highlights. So when I looked at the photos Victoria was taking I was confused—where was the girl I used to be, the young woman I was only a few years ago?

In the end, I'm thrilled with the photos Victoria took, but I have to admit, it's also a little bit scary to realize that I've let those parts of me go. But it's letting them go that allows me to see that beauty can change and evolve just as we do as people.

James Franco: bad Oscar host or wise sage?

2011-03-03T22:12:00.000-08:00

So much Oscar gossip, so little time.

If you didn’t watch, probably the most dramatic thing about the Oscars last Sunday (because nearly all of the winners were known in advance) was James Franco’s unbelievably lackluster performance, which even he predicted in this video he posted on Twitter. Not a half an hour into the ceremony, Franco was so out of it that Twitter and Facebook were inundated with questions about his sobriety. The main question being, is Franco high????

I have no idea if Franco was high, but I know he was not exactly into hosting the Oscars, which was the polar opposite of his co-host Anne Hathaway, who worked hard enough for the both of them. He was so not into that he didn’t even go to his own after-party, instead flying back east the same night.

I know Franco is going to school right now—studying to get his Ph.D. in literature (at Yale no less). And I remember a few weeks ago, he was on The Daily Show talking about his Oscar nomination, which had been announced that morning right before he’d gone to class. Stewart then asked if anyone in his class had congratulated him on the nom, and without even thinking about it, Franco said no. “No one said anything?” Stewart asked, skeptical, and Franco had to admit that his classmates at Yale couldn’t give a shit about the Oscars. (At least that’s how Franco read it, but it’s also possible they’re pretending not to care, which is what I really believe.)

I guess this brings me to my point—maybe Franco didn’t care about hosting the Oscars because he has bigger fish to fry—or if not bigger, then at least better. This is a guy with serious aspirations—he’s an actor (in three different venues—film, television, and daytime television), a short story writer, a filmmaker, and a scholar. That might explain why getting dressed up in a thousand-dollar tux to go to the biggest party of the year to honor a bunch of people who are honored every day may not seem like a huge priority. Sure, Franco should have said no if he wasn’t going to do his best, but I can see why it wasn’t that important to him. Because in the big scheme of things, it just wasn’t that important.

Fun, yes. Important, no.

Which might be why Franco was at his best in the ridiculous skits in which he dressed up like Marilyn Monroe or donned the tights of a ballet dancer a la Black Swan. (By the way, if you ever feel bad about the way you look in a dress, just picture Franco as Monroe, who looked wonderfully absurd.)

As one Tweeter said Sunday night, “The Oscars are a pointless, trivial, gross popularity contest that rarely honors the true best of the year. I will be glued to the screen.” Maybe Franco is simply more in the former camp than the latter one.

Franco’s uninspired performance doesn’t directly relate to the topic of this blog, but in a tangential way it speaks to the same issue. That is, the issue that there are more important things in the world than how you look in a tight dress or how white your teeth are. On the red carpet the other night, Natalie Portman claimed that, though she likes attending these ceremonies, it’s the rest of us who are lucky because we get to sit at home and watch in our sweats. I have to say, Franco’s resurrection of his Pineapple Express character was pretty entertaining from my spot on the sofa, but I imagine it might have felt mighty awkward—even scary—from the seats of the Kodak theatre.

For years, I fantasized about going to the Oscars and still a part of me wants to go some day, but lately I’ve come to realize Portman’s point—it’s probably more fun to watch on the sofa than attend.

For that reason, I won’t join the hordes of Americans who are bemoaning Franco’s performance this week. Instead, I’ll thank him for reminding me that though watching the Oscars is a lot of fun, it’s also pretty darn silly and something none of us should take too awfully seriously.