Obligatory background – I used to be fat. I’m talking bigger around than tall kind of fat. This was due to several health issues that have since been resolved, and I am no longer fat. I know how hard it is to lose weight. I know personally how weight affects how others see you both personally and professionally. I understand the “I would do just about anything to lose weight” mentality, but I recently was subjected to something that I simply cannot grok.
One of my coworkers, Sam* is overweight. Not grossly so, in all honestly, probably only about 50 - 60 lbs away from a healthy weight. She is constantly asking me to help her with her weight loss goals. I try to help her, but she always loses heart by day 2 and goes back to her normal routine.
Sam has had all of her bloodwork done by the same doctor who diagnosed my issues, if there were any medical reason for her to not lose weight, she would be aware of it. I have seen how she eats – trust me, this is one of those instances where it is fully within her control to lose the weight. I have met her family, too – this is not genetic, she is the only fat one in the lot.
Oh, and I have watched her “cook.” I put the word in quotes, as it literally made me physically ill to watch. She made “chicken alfredo.” Now, I don’t expect anyone else (save for a few people on here that I have talked to) to make their own alfredo sauce from scratch like I do, but let me tell you waht hers was like. She opened a jar of Ragu Alfredo sauce and dumped it in a saucepan. Not so bad, right? That was just the beginning. She then decided that the 1 can of sauce would not be enough to feed 4 people (her 2 small children, herself and her boyfriend) – nevermind the fact that the nutrition label indicates a serving is 1/4 cup and the jar contains 7 servings – so she poured 3 cups of whole milk into the pan. Realising that that made the Alfredo sauce too thin, she then dumped a 16 oz container of full fat sour cream into the pan, followed by a 16 oz can of condensed cream of mushroom soup. Like I said, it made me physically ill to watch this. This is typical of how she “cooks.”
All that being said, let’s talk about her most recent weight loss attempts. She asked me to help her put together a diet/exercise plan. I agreed. She told me that she didn’t see how eating 2000 calories (keep in mind that during the day, I watch her eat upwards of that many – and I am only here PT) per day and doing no more than 15 minutes of workout would help her lose weight and decided not to even try. Ok, I said, don’t ask me for help again. The next day, she had bought some Dexatrim “natural herbal appetite suppressants” – she took those for one day – they made her feel sick to her stomach. The following week, she had bought some of that Alli stuff (you know, it makes your body not able to absorb the fat you eat, it just oozes out your ass?) she took that for two days, but stopped because it did what it was supposed to do, er I mean, it gave her the shits. Yeh.
So, fast forward to yesterday. She emails me a link to some “diet detox” shit site, asking my opinion. I look over the list of ingredients in the “detox” (which costs at least as much as the Alli did) and tell her my opinion – it’s not going to work. The site claims that you can lose 20 lbs in 20 days – I explain to her that if that were the case, it’s nothing but water weight, why not just take laxatives. The main ingredient in the stuff was senna – a laxative. Oh, but it’s better than all that – she proceeds to argue with me that I just didn’t read the whole site – which is true, I skimmed enough to hear the quacking and moved on – because if I had read the site, I would have seen that part of why the plan works so well is that you must have a coffee enema every day. 
:dubious: :eek: Ok, so here’s what I simply do not grok – who in the hell is willing to shove coffee up their ass every day for 20 days, but not do 5 situps a day for 1 flippin’ week? I am sorry, this is beyond comprehension to me. A coffee enema. Every day. For 20 days. Is preferable to 15 minutes of exercise? WTF? Anyone want to help me grok?
*name changed to protect the stupid
