I hate to see ads with skinny models telling about how they went to the beach, a school reunion or a friend's wedding, looked in a mirror, and "I was fat!"  Fatness, even slight overweight, has become a dirty word in our society, especially the "Anglo" American culture.  Forget the encouragements to  "Eat, eat!   Enjoy!  Mangia!" and so on.   Those who are "fat" are criticized, looked down upon, and considered as unattractive, weak-willed or somehow defective.  

"Whoa," you say.  "Obesity isn't healthy, is it?"  No, of course  I'm not suggesting fatness is "ok" or healthy.  (By the way, if you are diabetic, morbidly obese, have joint, lung or heart problems which require you to strictly control your diet and weight, this whole piece doesn't apply to you.)    What I'm just saying is simply that overeating is natural, and we who indulge in it or constantly want to eat everything in sight, should quit beating ourselves up, recognize it as a natural-- and in previous times, healthy-- instinct, and deal with it and control it on that basis.

Up until I was thirty-five, I ate constantly.  Not only at mealtime, but I ate all day long.  When I hear comments about "bad" or "sick" people who would eat a half gallon of ice cream, I cringe.  I could do that!   How about a two pound box of chocolates in 24 hours?  Or an entire fruitcake in one day?  How about a whole pound of cheese as a snack?  Or an entire "family size" package of food in one sitting.  How about cleaning up all the leftovers at the end of a meal. Or getting up in the middle of the night to nibble, unable to sleep because of hunger!  (You can tell I like food!)

In defense from those who will throw up their hands in horror:

• I was much younger,
• The effects of cholesterol and excess sugar weren't as well known back then,
• I was skinny,  really skinny,
• If I got a bad cold or some illness that put me off my feed, I would immediately drop weight like a stone, until I'd resemble an anorexic,
• I was somewhat muscular and very active physically,
• I mostly ate quantities of good food; loads of veggies, fresh fruit, whole grains, eggs, etc.  I just ate a lot of it.  For whatever metabolic reason, I had to.

My dad would bemoan his inability to eat like he did when he was young.  He was another skinny food-hound until he passed  thirty-five.  I didn't pay attention to his complaining until I, too, started putting on the pounds with age and had to cut back severely.   When one is used to eating like a maniac for years, this is hard.

I firmly believe that overeating is simply a natural instinct that has, in many societies, outlived its usefulness.  Sure, a lot of people overeat when they're stressed!  The greatest source of stress to early humans was (1) not having enough to eat,  (2) facing natural disaster, traveling or warfare what would probably result in not having enough to eat, (3) not having enough food to keep one's children nourished.  The response?  Eat anything in sight while possible.  Store up some fat.  Those that did were more likely to survive.  Those that didn't, either died or at least failed to reproduce as successfully.  Result?  This reinforced our "gobble it all up" instinct.

People who eat to excess are often labeled neurotic.  In most cases I don't think this is the case.  Did you ever see your dog turn down food?  Are all dogs neurotic?  No, they just have good instincts-- eat while you can!

Note that persons from backgrounds or cultures where food is  scarce, or was in short supply in recent memory, rarely condemn plumpness or even obesity, and in fact often prize it.   Food shortages completely change one's point of view. 

In the fifties, when my father realized that his working conditions in Lincoln, Nebraska were becoming intolerable, he decided to pull up stakes and move to Florida.   He did it on faith and not by research, being a firm believer in the adage that God would provide.  Unfortunately he didn't realize that in this era before air conditioning, everything in Florida closed down in the summer.  In addition, the whole USA was sliding into a serious recession.  His dream of establishing a new church wasn't working out.   By summer he had been laid off from the only low-paying job he had been able to find.   We weren't fishers or hunters; we had no resources.  We had a house to live in, thanks to my Uncle Theo Tupper, a home builder who personally held the low-cost mortgage on it, but nothing else. But food was about to run out for our family, including my little sister and two small brothers.  

This had to have been the lowest point of my father's life; he was shamed, desperate and discouraged.    Swallowing his pride, he applied for welfare or some other assistance.   To his horror, he found that we didn't qualify, due to having lived in Florida such a short time.  The only aid available consisted of bus tickets back to Nebraska.  Not only were our bridges burned back there, but that would mean abandoning all our possessions, including many household items and pieces of furniture that had been in the family for generations.  So we were stuck.  Our last meal consisted of a few plain cooked beans, a thin "gravy" made with flour and water, and some iced tea.    When that was gone, there was nothing. 

A neighbor came over the next day with half a tin of sticky Christmas ribbon candy that had solidified in Florida's humidity.  She was about to throw it out when she decided we might like it.  She had no idea!  For three full days we chipped off small pieces and passed them out. 

I took my seven year old brother Nathan out into the fields and showed him how to pull out grass stems and eat the tender ends, strip and eat mustard seeds, how to identify sweet-sour sorrel, and which flowers could be munched on, scarcely a source of energy, but something to do.  My father prayed a lot.  My five year old sister, who was probably the most sensitive of the six of us, went into a decline, laying in bed staring at the ceiling and refusing to get up.  I really don't know what would have happened if my Uncle Theo had not stopped by for a visit. 

Daddy knew that due to summertime and the recession, a number of people had defaulted or were behind with their second mortgage payments to Uncle Theo, leaving him extremely short of money, so much so that he hadn't gone north to visit relatives in New York as usual.  In fact, he had made payments on a number of his mortgagee's first mortgages, to help them out and to avoid having the banks foreclose on them, which would leave families with children homeless and erase his second-mortgage investment.  "Don't tell Uncle Theo we're hungry," my Dad warned us.  

When Uncle Theo noticed the children weren't themselves and that my sister Priscilla was unresponsive, he raised a fuss, refusing to let it go until he got to the bottom of it.  I don't think I have ever seen him so angry as when he found out how long we'd been without food. 

"God provides through people's help, not by manna falling from heaven.  You should have told me," he argued with my father.   "You're my niece," he admonished my mother, "and you should have had the sense to ask me for help for the children's sake."  

"We knew you were short of money too," my mother told him.

"Don't worry about it!  A lot of people owe me favors.  Let Bess go with me to help."

What followed was nothing short of amazing.  The first stop was to pick up several baskets and buckets from a construction site.  Then we visited people all over the rural part of southeastern Sarasota county.  Uncle Theo, who tended to mumble his thoughts out loud, non-stop, would recount the favors he had done for this or that person, who also happened to have fruit trees, laying hens or a garden with collards, okra, mustard greens or other summer veggies.   He'd pull a bucket or basket out of the car, find the homeowner and call in some markers.  "Fill the bucket with whatever extra you can spare from your garden," he'd order.  "My niece and her family don't have any food."   Sometimes he reminded them of times he had helped them out one way or another.  

Last stop was a supermarket where he bought some meat, milk, bread, flour and a few other staples.  

We brought my sister to the table for the light meal Mother fixed for  us.  When she tried to eat, her hand shook so badly I had to help her guide the food into her mouth.  I had been somewhat stoic about the situation until that point.   I cried.  

Uncle Theo put us all to work part time on some of his building  sites, where we barely earned enough to keep body and soul together.  That fall when I turned sixteen I took a job in town, something that required me to move out on my own as there was no transportation available.  Uncle Theo then moved in with my parents in order to pay the mortgage and to make sure the children stayed well fed.  Eventually things got better for all of us.

Is this the reason I'd like to eat like a horse?  No, I had always done that.  But it did affect the way I treat food.  I have a compulsion to stock ahead, copiously.  I try not to waste food.  I hate to see anyone else waste food.  I grow beans, bananas, papayas, herbs, and have a bunch of fruit trees.  I share food with neighbors and guests, and cannot stand to see people go hungry.   I put extra fruit into a wire basket I have attached to the fence, for passers-by to enjoy.   

When my sister lived with my husband and me during her teens, we found that, while I try to always clean my plate-- and sometimes other peoples as well--,  she would always leave some on her plate to prove that she could!

Whether you've ever known a food shortage or not, don't beat yourself up if you want to eat all the time.  You just have good instincts.   Deal with it by substituting healthier and lower-calorie foods for fattening ones.  Drink more water.  Eat more vegetables.  Exercise enough to burn the calories off.  Can't resist ice cream?  It's your choice-- try 1 scoop instead of two and load it with fruit and nuts.   Want cheeseburgers?  Buy very lean beef; slap on a couple slices of fat free cheese and a bunch of lettuce and tomato.  Fill up on low-calorie healthy snacks.  You get the idea.

If you've tried and failed several times to lose weight by denying yourself food and counting calories, stop already and concentrate on improving your diet instead.  Set goals of becoming physically fit.  Do positive things for yourself, enjoying good, healthy food and exercising or engaging in vigorous activities.  Forget the negative thought, "I'm fat!"  Think "Gotta side-rail my natural instincts!" instead.   Most important, enjoy! 

See Ten Commandments for Shaping Up (for women).

Donate for Free-  feed a hungry child.