I looked on the back of the box, saw a lone UPC code,
and realized that the calorie count of a piece of fudge
is like the price of a piece of art glass at
Tiffany's…if you have to ask, you can't afford it.
Reluctantly I put the box down and walked away, turning
every few steps to gaze in avarice on a post-Christmas
treat I hate to resist...Chocolate Cheesecake Fudge.
When I was a child, I ate what I
wanted and never worried about calories. In fact, I
don't think calories were invented when I was a child,
because a size twelve was considered "healthy" back
then. I once ate an entire bag of Halloween candy in a
single night without adding anything to my figure, but a
sore stomach. I ate piece after piece of fudge during
the holidays in those halcyon days and, when I finished,
turned to the divinity. No matter what I ate, I remained
thin as a rail, and laughed at the idea of gaining
weight. Then it hit me…the dreaded fat-promoter called
pregnancy. <continued below>
I remembered my doctor's warnings
about high-fat foods, two-percent milk, and other deadly
sins, but I paid no attention. I'd always eaten anything
I wanted without gaining weight, and I felt pregnancy
wouldn't change my metabolism. How wrong can one person
be.
Over the next nine months, I gained
fifty pounds. True, I lost thirty after the delivery,
but the other twenty were mine to keep. I was at a loss.
Having never dieted before, I had no idea how to go
about it, and I watched the months slipping away without
improvement.
Four years later, I was the proud
possessor of another delightful child, and another
twenty pounds. Good grief, I was now forty pounds
overweight. I silently apologized to Richard Simmons and
vowed to do better, but it seems that I can't focus long
enough to get rid of more than five pounds at one time.
I work hard, off come the five pounds, I relax, and back
they scurry. I've seen my weight shoot up three pounds
overnight. It's enough to make a saint swear.
The only thing that comforts me during
times like this are the bald-faced lies of my loving
husband. When we were married, he didn't just kiss the
Blarney Stone, he chiseled off a hunk and swallowed it.
He maintains that he has never seen a finer specimen of
the female body. When I mutter that I feel fat, he hugs
me and says clever things like, "Not to me." I'm going
to keep him.
Men who slather compliments on with a
trowel are the ONLY kind to marry, so if anyone out
there is considering marriage and its corollary,
pregnancy, my advice to you is…marry a flatterer.
They're worth their weight in gold. Or should that be
worth my weight in gold?
Copyright 1999 Heather Jensen
