Illustration by Jan A. Igoe
In a perfect world, cheese would be a vegetable, guys would get cellulite, and I wouldn’t be pondering another diet. In fact, I’d be Jillian Michaels.
You know Jillian, the personal trainer from reality TV, with the steel-belted abs that start right under her ear lobes. There’s nothing like those polished, bionic abs to make mortal women regret every crumb we’ve inhaled since Thanksgiving. Especially since it’s bathing suit season and the beach is beckoning.
Some new studies estimate that 65 percent of us are in imminent danger of splitting our Speedos. According to the Centers for Disease Control, the average female waist now measures more than 36 inches. The last time Scarlet O’Hara laced up her corset, that was a chest measurement. And men are in the same boat. (Or bloat.)
It wasn’t always like this. Before Facebook and Desperate Housewives, our ancestors spent most of their time foraging. Females slaved from dawn to dusk just to gather a few measly berries and maybe a nut. Spear-hurling cave guys would sprint after the nearest 3-ton reptile in the remote hope of snagging a dinoburger for dinner. And it never came with fries. Everyone was exhausted, hungry and miserable, but buff.
Then, with civilization, came beer bellies, thunder thighs and low-fat diets. To shed a single pound of flab, dieters must burn off 3,500 extra calories, which is nothing when a T-Rex
is chasing you down the block. But it’s 417 cups of beef noodle soup, 328 bananas, 23 beers or six years on a treadmill to us.
And it gets worse for anybody over 35, when your thyroid brakes for cookies. At that point, you’ll probably never have Jillian’s abs, unless you own one of her posters, which also make excellent dartboards.
By the time you’re 40, fat is airborne and you can catch it just waddling past a Dairy Queen. This wouldn’t bother me so much if I could also catch a trust fund by driving past a bank. Then I could pay somebody to lose weight for me.
Counting carbs and fat grams is boring, but not these diets:
The Chew Chew Diet. To shed pounds, all you do is chomp every morsel of food 32 times. When it’s liquid sludge, you let it drizzle down your throat. The concept makes me nervous because it never worked for cows.
Beer and Ice Cream Diet. This one’s based on the theory that bodies burn off fat just warming up ice-cold food. Unfortunately, scientists with advanced degrees in joy killing say it doesn’t work.
Tapeworm Diet. Once you swallow this voracious parasite, you can have your cake and the worm will eat it, too! The diet is illegal here, due to some inconvenient side effects, such as seizures, nausea and death. Also, it’s icky. Did I mention that these critters can top 30 feet and have to be excreted?
Before rushing into any crazy diet, I’ll go watch Jillian torture some new victims. Just in case her abs are contagious.
Jan A. Igoe is a recovering journalist, illustrator and like many of us—a serial dieter. She keeps her treadmill parked in Horry County.