I’ve dealt with being an overeater for most of my life. I began feeling fat at the age of twelve; in the sixth grade. I felt taller and bigger than most of the kids in my school. I was athletic. Still am. I played soccer, basketball, softball, and I was a fast runner …so not exercising wasn’t my problem. My problem was I ate too much food. Why? Well… that’s a whole other bag ‘o chips!

In high school, I was an average weight …and then I was plump, or chunky, but not unhealthy. Well, I was not an unhealthy weight per se, but I ate a lot of “junk food,” as “they” call it. I enjoyed my life. I was active and goal oriented. I was a leader, smart, studious, athletic, talented, and friendly. I was often self-conscious about my weight, but still felt attractive …most of the time. I believed in the saying “it’s what’s on the inside that counts.” I still believe that. But I have come to accept that I live in a world that sells and consumes the opposite.

One of my first clues came in the form of an unintentional backhanded compliment. After dating me for a few weeks, my first boyfriend said to me with a sappy smile, “Ya know, I started going out with you because you have big boobs but now I really like you!” …I did NOT know how to handle that. I was oddly flattered but also deeply disappointed that it was my “boobs” -and not my talent, or savvy mind- that attracted him. My heart and mind (aka the inside) was only seen after weeks of staring at my breasts. I mean… I know they are beautiful …but I wasn’t ready for them to have more power than my personality or intellect. At least it seemed like they had more power at the time. A knowing inner-voice boomed, “Welcome to the world of dating Heather! This is the world you live in… and your figure matters!” but my heart only wanted to hear the “I really like you!” parts. I’m Heather by the way. Hi.

I didn’t want to give up overeating to be sexy (though I couldn’t phrase it like that at the time). I wanted to be sexy because I got As in class, because I could shoot a swish-shot from the three-point line, or score a goal on a header from a corner kick; because I could belt Eponine’s ballad from Les Mis, or because of how honestly I played Anne in the The Diary of Anne Frank. For me, sexiness was linked to being smart and talented, not to my figure. In my mind, people who focused mostly on a woman’s figure were too shallow to see the person behind it. Eventually, I came to realize that isn’t always true, but it took me years to accept.

This was the first time I began to gain an understanding of that experience brilliant women write books about; how people negotiate that line between being attractive and being objectified. Exposing that nebulous entity that sells fantasized happiness in a skinny woman’s cleavage tied up with a red bow, or a man’s bulging pectoral muscles sleeked with suntan oil. Objectification certainly goes further back than corporate greed, but this commercialism is what shaped me growing up. I have finally begun to understand this relationship between social conditioning and my overeating. I have finally begun to hear myself …now. But, I wasn’t ready to hear these realities at that time. I would stifle that knowing inner-voice for years to come. I shut that voice up quick. How did I do it? With food of course.

I needed food. Still do sometimes. Not to sustain me nutritionally, though it did, I needed it to soothe me, to cope, to comfort, to delight, to celebrate, to ground me, to entertain me, to numb me; to give me a break. I needed it to survive, not just physically, but emotionally and mentally. I needed it to protect me from being objectified. I didn’t know how else to do it! I didn’t want to accept that there was not an easy solution; that I would be objectified by some people whether I liked it or not. This is the world… and I didn’t want to believe that. So… I ate too much food.

I was fourteen or fifteen when I got my first agent. I’m an actress by the way. I’ve been acting since I was five years old. (I’m a theater artist and scholar.) I went on commercial auditions for the most part and had a little success. I was over eating daily, and by the time I was sixteen or seventeen, my agent said to me, “What happened to 125lbs.?” I died a little. I was heartbroken, shocked, and deeply embarrassed. I was barely aware of the fact that I had gained so much weight. She gently “let me go” from the agency. I’m not sure I even weighed 125lbs. when I had put that on my resume two years earlier, but I had certainly gained over thirty pounds in those three years. I had gone from 130-164lbs. (I’m 5’6″ for those of you thinking… “well, my judgment of whether or not you truly dealt with fat depends on your height” Believe me when I say …it doesn’t matter. Really.) Of course, I also grew a few inches but I didn’t just grow up, I also grew fat. Despite my weight, I got into 5 out of 7 audition-only universities. Not bad considering I was a size 12-14 and Hollywood’s average female at the time was a 6-8 (now it is 0-6.) They saw potential and that was all I needed.

I decided to go to NYU Tisch School for the Arts. I felt excited and lucky. I gained the classic “freshman 15” which didn’t affect my health because I was still young and active. I was in movement classes and stage combat classes. I still played basketball and soccer. I was a size 14-16 and headed in an upward direction. It was in college when I had my first real epiphany about my weight.

I had just finished my “actor-combatant” certification test for the Society of American Fight Directors in 1995. I was proud of the work I had done. I had worked with my scene partner to create a funny and entertaining scenario where I spliced Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet together so they fought each other to the death. It got a great response and I felt successful. I went in to hear my feedback about my certification (which I passed of course!) and they told me that my work was strong, well executed, and clever. They inquired about my script, and asked for a copy to use in their own classes. However, all of this great feedback was muffled, like the adults in Charles Schulz’s Peanuts cartoons, because the first “compliment” the certifier gave me was, “You move incredibly well for a big girl.” All I heard was “…for a big girl.” What do you mean “for a big girl?!” I thought, “I move well for anyone!” Then it happened. My first time I really faced the fats.

The world around me became fuzzy. I thought “…Wait…Am I that big? Am I going to be a “fat-girl” actress? I’ve been active my whole life! I know I’m not skinny but…” Sigh. Somewhere in me I knew it was true. I knew this was a problem. I knew my career was going to be affected by my weight. I had always known that about the industry, but I finally knew it in my heart that I was considered fat, not obese, but fat.

Not to say there are not brilliant actresses who are plump, or even quite heavy, but they are marketed as such, and I could probably count the ones who were working on two hands. There were even fewer mid-size actresses. This is still true. I knew I would be put into that category and I was angry about it; rebel angry as I have come to call it. I was angry about it’s limitations because I was aware of the way our society views fatness. I knew I’d never do a love scene or be a leading lady. I would be relegated to playing the fat secretary, fat aunt, fat mother, fat person in line, fat sidekick, fat lady, fat friend, fat teacher, fat crazy-bitch, a husky man, or non-human characters. Or, I’d have to become a comedienne because “fat and funny” is more acceptable. I was limited by my fatness. I was limited by the construction of my society, of my business. Sure the brilliant “fat” actresses were inspiring to me, but I didn’t want casting director’s to say, “Oh yes she is great! but she’s not thin enough for this part.” or “Oh her! She’s a great heavy-set actress.” I wanted to be considered talented, beautiful, smart, and sexy. Of course, I knew that fat wasn’t sexy. It just wasn’t. Yet still… I ate too much food. ugh.

In college, I was cast exactly how I knew (deep-down) I would be. I played Banquo (a man) in Macbeth, Lord Cerimon (a medicine man) in Pericles, and Olga (the older sister and teacher) in Three Sisters. I loved every one of these parts but the point was that I was not even in consideration for Lady M, Marina, or Masha. I read for them. I wanted to play them. Could I have been considered? I don’t know, but what mattered was I…blamed it on my weight. My weight both saved me and hindered me. If I was heavy it was easier to be disappointed because I could blame society for my failure to get the part, not my lack of skill or any other number of reasons I feared. I was slowly learning that the marketing box that was available to me at that weight was unacceptable to me as a person… but this was a SLOW learning process …acceptance process. I had to face my fat but I wasn’t ready to.

I worked as an actress (a plump one at that) in NYC for a while after college. I didn’t want to accept that the art I loved so much was governed by such standards. I had desperate and bold thoughts, “I should change this about the industry!” and “I will show them that talent is more important than thinness!” But in my heart I knew I had to lose weight if I wanted a career where I didn’t have to play the fat girl. I wasn’t ready to accept myself as a fat person. Being fat meant I was not beautiful according to my society. Or it meant that I was fat with a pretty face, which did not translate to beautiful in my eyes. I was tired of hearing “You have such pretty eyes,” or “You have such beautiful hair,” or “you are rubenesque.” These were kind ways people wanted to tell me, “You are beautiful! Except the fat part.” Being fat meant I was sluggish, lazy, and undisciplined. I was none of those things but my fatness labeled me that way. It meant that I was unattractive. And I knew that no matter how many times I played the words of people who loved me in my head, I wasn’t as attractive as a skinny woman. Instead of hearing “You are beautiful the way you are.” I heard “You would really be beautiful if you were thin.” I just wanted to tell them all off. Whoever “they” are. I wanted to rage and spit fire at them for not seeing the beauty within me. Or, more accurately, for not calling the beauty within me beautiful.

I moved back to California because I broke up with a boyfriend (of course I had boyfriends, not everyone is delusional); and was I floundering in NYC because I was fighting Goliath (the industry), and it was eating me alive. But really, something else was destroying me. Something that made me overeat, daily. It was an intensely uncomfortable kind of denial and fear. I needed support and I needed space.

At 24, I moved back in with my parents, which I was blessed to be able to do, and I read Oprah’s book with Bob Greene Make the Connection. This was my first real self-help book. I had read Richard Bach’s Illusions and Daniel Quinn’s Way of the Peaceful Warrior (which helped but weren’t really self-help, nor did they deal with overeating). Oprah’s was my first book about dealing with weight. I was inspired and motivated! Thank you Oprah and Bob!  I got myself in gear and I lost 40lbs. I went from 180lbs-142lbs. I was fitting into a size 6-8 and I was lovin’ it! Finally, I ate a normal amount of food for a while. I was 25 years old and I had begun to face the fats. Still… I wanted to overeat, badly. I had learned a lot about my body, nutrition, motivation, and exercise but I hadn’t dealt with the compulsion to eat, and I hadn’t come to terms with the industry or society.

I took me a long time to finally realize that I would not likely change society’s point if view on fatness. I went through several boyfriends. Two years with one, seven with another, one with another, etc.. Each time gaining it when I was with them and then losing weight when I was alone. On average, I went from the 140s to the 180s each time (size 6-16). Each one loved me deeply, but the weight I bared –the actual and the metaphorical– were too much for them. Even if they desperately wished they could …they couldn’t deal with it. They couldn’t handle me, and I was testing them in a way. Did they believe what I believed? Did they believe it’s what’s on the inside that counts? Did they really love all of me? Really… I couldn’t handle me, though I blamed them at the time. They never said directly that it was my fat that made our sex-life fade but that was the truth. My fat was my excuse, my protector, and my identity. If they couldn’t accept my fat part, then they couldn’t truly love me. What I realize now (with the help of my last boyfriend, who is truly an angel in my life) is that they loved me very much, and even though they could see through the fats into my heart and my mind; they weren’t able to face the fats either. They too are subject to this oppressive social conditioning. Of course there were other reasons that contributed to these breakups, but my weight, and its effects on my life, was a big one, and the one I used to protect me from rejection.

Throughout the ten years leading up to my current place (grad school at UC San Diego); I worked as an actress, a director, and a teacher. Teaching was my “side job.” Actors often have side jobs to make ends meet, and mine was teaching. I was doing more teaching than acting because I wasn’t being cast often because I didn’t physically fit many roles. I began to fear I would settle into being mildly depressed and feeling unsuccessful. I didn’t want to “re-define” success for myself in a way that made me feel less alive. So, I moved to L.A. in an effort to try film and television. I worked a little bit. I got a commercial agent and sold myself as a young mom/secretary/lawyer (thank you Camryn Manheim and Kathy Bates!). But I couldn’t get my SAG card, which you need to have to get into higher paying auditions. I was struggling, and I didn’t understand how to do the hustle I needed to do to get what I wanted. I studied at Playhouse West, which became my artistic refuge. I developed my skill even more. I helped create and produce a short film, I performed, and I practiced all the time. But, still I wasn’t being cast enough to make ends meet. So, I decided to go back to school and become a professor. I loved teaching, and I thought it would be more stable than acting. Looking back now, I realize that it was easier for me to stay fat and teach than it was to create work. I was living in fear. Fear of being my whole self. Fear of being powerful and sexy.

I also thought it might help stabilize my long-term relationship at the time. I was desperate to make something work. The “marriage” conditioning was present then too. So, I went back to school. I got my MA in theatre. At the end of my MA program my boyfriend and I broke up. I was back at my heaviest weight and it was predictable. I took a year off of school and lost my same 30-40lbs. Going again from 180-145lbs. Then I started my PhD. I am about to graduate and during my six years here I’ve gained and lost 30lbs. and was in and out of another love relationship. Again. hum… I detect a pattern here. However, this time the way I approached my weight loss was different, but I’ll get to that.

During this time, from ages 25-40, aside from working as an artist and teacher, and getting an MA and a PhD, I also read all of Geneen Roth’s books, Munter and Hirshmann’s Overcoming Overeating three times, Mary O’Mally’s The Gift of our Compulsions (one of my favorites), and several books on fat and feminism. Many of these are quite insightful and useful. I felt inspired by NAAFA, though that required accepting myself as fat and, while I believed in their mission, (still do) I didn’t want my life to be about forwarding that agenda. I joined, left, and rejoined Weight Watchers several times. I looked into OA. I read a few diet books but tossed them out fairly quickly. I know what I need to do. I’m a smart cookie. I know I need to eat when I’m hungry, stop when I’m satisfied, eat a healthy balanced diet, and exercise. These are no-brainers to the majority of fat folks. I was trying to reconcile with myself. I know “dieting” is a multi-billion dollar industry that only perpetuates the cycle of fatness. I know that I overeat, and that doing so is painful, but I still do it! It has nothing to do with being smart, or lack of self-will or discipline. I am about to get a PhD …discipline is not my problem. I get rebel angry when people who have never really faced the fats think they have me all figured out! They don’t! If they did, the diet industry would be out of business and fatness would be limited to those folks who have medical conditions! My fat is not due to a medical condition, though it will contribute to some pretty awful ones later in life if I don’t figure it out. Let alone the fact that I do not want to be living in this mental state forever either!

There were a bunch of other life things of course, losses, successes, celebrations, heart breaks, and through them overeating was my coping mechanism, and a good one at that. After all, you gotta eat! Just… not that much.

To this day, I manage being an overeater. I’ve gained and lost the same 20-40lbs four times in two decades. I am 40 years old and I’ve finally accepted something I’ve known deep down for a long time. My having excess fat is not about a lack of self-control, self-esteem, discipline, or determination. It is not because I don’t know what is healthy. I know that eating an apple is a better choice than having a glass of apple juice. It doesn’t take long to learn what to eat, or to learn that fries or cupcakes should be on the “once in a blue moon” list. Food nutrition information is available everywhere and it’s not that hard to navigate. That didn’t stop me from overeating. I overeat because it is easier than dealing with my fears of the unknown and because it is comforting. It is a way I show myself compassion, not a particularly healthy way, but that is what it is.

This website and blog are an exploration of my process and my new found belief that managing overeating is more about awareness, acceptance, creating my own tool bag, and listening to myself than it is about anything else. This last experience of losing weight has been quite different than all the times before. I’m sharing my process because I believe it is different than others that are out there. It is not easy all the time, nor is it intended to tell you how to manage your weight loss. I have come to believe that weight loss is extremely personal and that only I can face my fats specifically. This blog will address the various topics that come up for me on a daily basis concerning overeating. I am sharing my experience because I believe that other people’s stories and ideas have helped me build my own tool bag, and I hope that my stories help others reflect on themselves. I don’t have answers. I have only my experience to share. In gratitude, Heather