I am writing this column a changed man. A fitter man, a thinner man, a better man. A man who has seen the dark, morbid depths of obesity. A man with pounds upon pounds of past. And, proudly, a man who has risen out of the wheezing blackness of fatness with a much stronger and more well-balanced diet.
I used to weigh 727 pounds. I was the size of a pair of pregnant Siamese twins. That's about 3 7/8 people, depending on what trimester each couple was in. I was so fat I could never leave the bed except for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I was so fat I couldn't walk down the street without people staring, poking, snickering and puking. In fact, I was so fat, I couldn't walk at all. I had to pay two Swedish men, Sven and Thor, to roll me around. We had to expand all the doorways in my house so that Sven and Thor could squeeze me through. I would have to come down the stairs one roll at a time, like a Slinky.
I was so fat I had to have my clothes specially shipped from the San Diego Zoo. I was a size super. I was so fat that I wasn't allowed on the top floor of my house. I had to sleep in the backyard under a canopy. I was so fat that yo mama made jokes about me. And they hurt. I was so fat that if my clothes got dirty, all I could do was wrap a king-sized sheet around me, staple it and hope it held. I was so fat I couldn't even make it to the taping of my own Maury Povich special. I had to have my interview done at home and shown via satellite. You should have seen me; I was a blubbering mess.
In a country of obese people I was a beast among all people.
But all that changed. Drastically. All that fat changed a little while ago when I made a promise to myself and a declaration to the world; that I would never consume one more single carbohydrate again. That part of the pyramid was out. That group of food gone. I was on my first diet.
And it went something like this. Hamburger, no bun, for breakfast. Turkey, no bread, for lunch. Salami, one stick, for snack. Chicken, fish or corned beef for dinner. And some slices of pastrami for dessert. Sometimes I would sneak a roll-less hot-dog in at midnight, but we don't really have to mention that. It's not a piece of cake.
Every day I had to discipline myself to maintain my diet, to stick to it even when it seemed impossible. Every day only brought one more battle with myself in which I believed there was no chance I could survive without another biscuit. Every day was a war to only eat meat. But, every day I was making progress.
True, I was deadly tired all the time. I just felt like I had no energy. Like anything that would give my body any energy was just not there. I couldn't get up, couldn't exercise, couldn't really do anything at all. But just being carb-less was taking its toll. I was losing weight.
So I stuck to my diet. Only drank carb-free water. Only drove in a car without a carburetor. Only breathed pure oxygen so I wouldn't let any carbon dioxide into my lungs. I avoided carbs like they caused cancer. There was not a single organic compound in my entire body.
And the weight was just lifting off. Like it was being loaded in a rocket and shot off to space to orbit there infinitely. Within two weeks I was able to step on the scale without breaking it. In a month I was able to stand on it if I could balance myself on one of my trunk-like legs. Two months in and I could actually see past my stomach to read the number on the dial. All I did was just keep eating meat and then sit around and let the rest take care of itself. The results were amazing.
Soon enough, I was actually skinny. I was actually so skinny that you could hang a ball from a rope wrapped across my forehead and play tetherball around me. I was so skinny that if I went out for a walk, I would have to make sure it wasn't windy, or I might get carried away. I was so skinny that I could poke a hole in a wash-cloth and use it as a poncho. I was as skinny as a coke-addicted, Range-Rover driving, magazine-clipping, trigger-pulling vegan.
And so now, as of writing this column, six months after I was so fat Sven and Thor quit out of disgust and I swore off carbohydrates once and for all, I am proud to announce that I am officially back to my birthweight - 11 pounds 8 ounces. It was not always easy, but it was never that hard. All it took was a severe and serious resistance to that terrible, evil, breaded, bastard portion of the food pyramid that includes sugars, starches, celluloses and gums which are produced by photosynthetic plants and contain only carbon, hydrogen and oxygen, usually in the ratio 1:2:1, some willpower, no exercise, a lot of beef, pork, chicken and coldcuts, and the desire for change.
Trust me. If I could do it, you can too.
Gavin Shulman '05 is a hero to us all.
