"I'm in shape. Round is a shape!"
For as long as I can remember, I've had weight issues.
Don't we all?
My parents deemed it right for my mother to be on a diet while she was pregnant with me.
So when I came out, I was so tiny.
During my early school days, I was thin as a rake.
I had thick curly hair.
I wore thick glasses.
My ugly duckling phase.
I only got to be this 'healthy' once I started working.
My daily routine entailed that I sit on my butt for 8 hours in front of a computer doing things a secretary had to do.
No exercise except for a few tennis games.
Nights of drinking and getting wasted.
Feeding on nuts, nachos with dip and potato chips.
It was tolerable.
I was still petite, I just had more meat to my bones.
It didn't really make me feel bad.
I was living abroad.
During those days and in those places, being fat wasn't exactly a crime.
I came back home for good, September 2001.
That's when I started ballooning to my now less flattering figure.
I blame it all on our local cuisine.
Of course on my sedentary lifestyle.
But still it doesn't really bother me at all.
I don't think I can be qualified as obese.
My problem area is just my waistline.
But now I live in a country where the first thing people say when you first see them is:
"Wow you've gained weight!"
I think we are the only country in the world where it is the norm to comment on a person's weight quite openly.
That it is ok to tactlessly criticize a person's weight.
I never made a big fuss about my looks and/or my weight.
If I did care I would have rebonded my hair a long time ago, right?
But it is starting to affect me in more ways than one.
My weight not my curly wavy hair, ok?
I've tried dieting. It doesn't work.
I've tried exercising but I'm too lazy to get all sweaty.
Now I'm trying the latest fad.
Drinking 2 tablespoons of virgin coconut oil,daily.
So far it's working.
I don't feel so bloated. I eat less.
It claims to increase one's metabolic rate.
Whatever that means.
Only hitch is you have to spend the first few days cooped up in the bathroom.
But hey I believe it's worth it.