Is My Ass Really Fat?

Part I: The Workout That Doesn't Make Me Shed The Pounds

I remember the first time I bought a pair of size 3 pants. They were a pair of really cool black Calvin Klein flared corduroy pants. The smallest size the store carried was size 3 and that was slightly too big for me. But that was OK. I didn't mind. I liked being a size 3. I owned all these really cute crop-tops and tiny, designer, lace bras. I remember that I was so small that after a bad breakup I walked into a fancy boutique and bought a one-size-fits-all top and it fit.

I also remember all my friends telling me that I was too thin and that I needed to eat something other than Oh!Henry bars, spicy fries, coffee, pizza and Coke. That was ten years ago and it was the last time I was actually at my ideal body weight. I was 115lbs. I could see my ribs! It wasn't healthy.

Now I'm 134lbs. I'm officially overweight. I go to the gym for an hour and a half three or four times per week, split between aerobics and weight lifting, and I'm overweight. I can bench 30lbs (40lbs on a good day), I can lift my body with my abs and I can run up five flights of stairs without being out of breath, but I'm overweight. Not only that, but my waist-to-hip ratio is 0.8, putting me in the "you'll be dying of a heart attack tomorrow" club. It doesn't matter that I eat mostly vegetables and that when I eat meat I eat only lean, free-range, organic meat, I'm a Big Giant Risk Factor. I look better than I did at 21, I feel better than I did at 21 and I eat better than I did at 21, but back then I was "ideal" and "healthy" and now I'm "overweight" and "at risk." I don't think it's really fair.

It isn't as if I just started hitting the gym yesterday either. I've been working out regularly for two years now. At first I lost tonnes of weight all at once. Within the first month, I was down from 134lbs to 129lbs. I was so happy. I figured I was well on my way to my ideal weight of between 113lbs and 126lbs. Yay!

But no. It was not to be. I started gaining weight again. Soon I was back up to 134lbs and that's where the scale stayed glued. The scale has been stuck at 134lbs for a year and a half now.

Initially, I was concerned about my lack of weight loss, but then my boyfriend, who used to weight train, explained to me that muscle is really dense. So while I'd lost a lot of fat, I'd gained a lot of muscle. The mucle weighs a lot, but doesn't make me a big, bulbous, jelly person. I was happy to accept that explanation, especially after my doctor told me that I wasn't carrying excess fat.

Then one day last week I was reading either Shape or Fitness Magazine while on the Stairmaster at the gym (they really don't have a fantabulous selection of magazines to choose from) and there was this article about the Myths of Working Out or Myths of Weight Loss or something like that. The first myth was that you shouldn't gauge your fitness progress with the scale. The article disagreed. The article said that while many people will tell you to gauge the amount of fat you'ved lost by how your clothes fit, you should really look at the number on the scale because if that ain't going down, you ain't getting any thinner, fatty! It said that it's a total myth that fat gets replaced by slimmer, but denser, muscle. It said that women don't gain muscle nearly as fast as they lose fat, so if the scale hasn't moved, it's because you're not losing fat. Great, I thought. At least before I thought I was getting fitter, but now I know that I'm actually still a Big Giant Blob.

I looked to my fitness buddy for guidance. I should have known better. She's the type that refuses to lift anything above 8lbs for fear of "bulking up." Even though she agrees that there are benefits to weight training, like preventing osteoporosis, that doesn't make it any more palatable to her. She regularly says to me, "You're arms are too big. You need to stop lifting weights; you're looking scary." And while it's true that my biceps are a bit bulgy and that my neck is getting thick, I'm not bulky by any stretch of the imagination. Not only that, but I really enjoy being able to handle water-filled pots using only one hand, so I'm not about to stop the weight training.

Anyways, as we were leaving the gym, I said to her, "I can't believe I haven't lost any weight!"

"You're going to have to change your diet. You eat too many carbs. You eat rice and beans and pasta. You need to stop eating that."

I was dumbfounded. Like honestly, I was totally flabberghasted. I figured I'd get some kind of pep talk or something, especially from the woman who's seen me change in the locker rooms. I figured she'd at least say something like, "You're not that fat." Instead the Queen of Cool Whip, the girl who eats low-fat, additive-laden "yogurt" is telling me to ditch the whole wheat pasta and brown rice! WTF?

I looked at her and I asked, "What am I supposed to eat? Just meat?"

"Yeah," she said. "You just need to quit the carbs. You eat too much of them."

"But where will I get my fibre and vitamins?"

"Take supplements. I take supplements. You have to because you can't get all your vitamins, minerals and fibre from your diet."

"Of course you can. You just need to eat legumes, vegetables and whole grains."

"I guess," she said. "But then you'll gain weight because of the carbs."

You can't argue with that kind of logic.

Next time in Part II of "Is My Ass Really Fat?"
"The Diet That Just Won't Work For Me For So Many Reasons"