Life in the fat lane

Even though I’m 40 pounds overweight, I swore I’d never read a diet book. Reviewers of The Hungry Years: confessions of a food addict couldn’t quite classify it—memoir, personal diet book, literary journalism, creative non-fiction—and this intrigued me. What would a sometimes-overweight well-known British journalist do with the topical issue of fat? I ordered William Leith’s book from the library.

Before The Hungry Years arrived, I was set to dislike it because I assumed the journalist knew it was a ripe time to commercialize the hot topics of obesity and the controversial Atkins diet. He needed a good angle and found it in his interview with Dr. Robert Atkins just before he died. As any good fat journalist would do for research, he went on the Atkins diet. And, to spice things up, Leith also chronicled his fondness for cocaine, painkillers, caffeine, alcohol, as well as his penchant for women who smoke and shop too much.

Leith surprised me though. The book unexpectedly captivated me—giving me pleasure. After reading about 30 pages a night of The Hungry Years, I received an email from the library requesting me to return the book. I had assignments due, readings including daily newspapers—not too mention the dozen or more e-news and e-zines that zip in and out of my inbox. I rarely read for pleasure these days.

But, Leith’s writing was worth stealing away one afternoon from my work. Lying in bed, covertly reading The Hungry Years reminded me of the way I quietly get up in the middle of the night for white bread slathered with butter and jam, slouching in and out of the kitchen for my clandestine snack.

The book was like food: by the time I got near the end of each chapter—and they were short chapters of two or three pages—I wanted more. The closer I got to finishing a plate of food, I wanted more. Leith calls this, full but hungry. There’s about a minute or two of unadulterated gratification in eating. And then it’s a slow race to the end, knowing that within a short time I’ll be back where I started—hungry.

Leith explains that carbohydrates, which contain a lot of sugars, make our blood sugar rise; the rise is followed by a drop, and the drop in blood sugar causes hunger. Next to sugar, the worst culprit is French fries. Leith also sets the record straight about the Atkins diet: it is not a high-fat, no-fruit diet but merely a plan that reduces the intake of carbohydrates—bread, potatoes, pasta, rice, and high-carb snacks. By reducing carb intake and eating meals of egg, cheese and meat protein, vegetables, and fruits, and handfuls of macadamia nuts, appetite is satiated.

On the low-carb diet, Leith rapidly lost weight. He lost his heavy-smoking girlfriend too. And his father, who tried the diet, lost weight.

Not only did Leith lose weight, more importantly, he lost his craving for food. He didn’t crave, he didn’t obsess, and he didn’t long for food.

But he missed being hungry.

Losing weight and losing the craving for food wasn’t enough for Leith. He had to figure out why he loved his addictions so much. And this is where the book takes a dive. Leith took a stroll down therapy lane and, unfortunately, the last part of the book becomes an endorsement for the helping industry.

As a good therapy client, Leith learned to build shrines of his childhood hurts and to return, week after week, for worship. He reverted to eating too much, drinking too much, and consuming painkillers and cocaine too much. And Leith let his new girlfriend, who owned over a 100 pairs of shoes and loved shopping too much, feed him lots of toast with butter. He described gorging on pasta and wine, and passing out with her on a hotel bed—fully dressed.

The helping industry erodes self-reliance. Reliance on others erodes discipline. It is discipline—not insight into our bad childhoods—that we fatties lack.