The Fat Girl's Guide to Life
by Wendy Shanker
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Book Summary Information
Author: Wendy ShankerEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2005-03-02
ISBN: 1582345538
Number of pages: 288
Publisher: Bloomsbury USA
Book Reviews of The Fat Girl's Guide to Life
Book Review: A Great Read, But I Guess No One Has ALL the Answers.
Summary: 4 Stars
So, as someone who as recently lost a significant amount of weight, I have an obsession with books about fat girls, by fat girls & so on & so forth. This book, I have to say was very, very, VERY entertaining. I think my original motivation for getting this book was because I wanted to know what she knew. I was getting this book under the impression that she knew something I didn't. I wanted to hear that she was fat & happy. I wanted to hear that she felt fat & fabulous & had no doubt about it. I wanted to hear her say, hey I feel great, I enjoy my life & I don't think about my fat. So, what did I find?
I found a lot of things I could relate to. I love her sense of humor. I love her style of writing. I love how she communicates her feelings. I hear myself & my story in her story & words. I also heard where I used to be. I hear all the pain, misery & suffering that we as fat girls & fat people have to go through. I heard my childhood, I heard my adolescence, & I heard my adulthood. I also hear the denial.
Wendy, the author is my age, give or take a year. Wendy started her fat journey as a child, just like me. So much of her story spoke to me. The difference is that somehow, I was given a gift. She did every diet in the book, she tortured & tortures herself about her looks & weight & everything she is & everything she isn't. She has been hurt by many, loved by many & hurt by them too. She's also been used by many.
She went into the medical side of being fat. Is it really that unhealthy? A lot of questions I asked myself. I could outhike many friends when I was fat, I could lift a lot of weight, my LEGS were & still are amazingly muscular ;) LOL. So, here's my take on that. I believe there are exceptions to every rule. So, yes, there are some people out there who are overweight yet very healthy (she referred to that woman who taught jazzercize who got fired for being chunky I remember being pissed off about that too!). BUT, for every one overweight jazzercize instructor, how many overweight couch potatoes are there. How many people with diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke risk, etc etc etc. She specifically says, it's the sedentary lifestyle that is killing us & yes, I know some underweight people who probably have some of the same risk factors too (again, exceptions to every rule). But they have their own set of problems to deal with & us, as fat people have the fat to worry about & BOY do we WORRY about it.
So, as a health care provider and as a person who had to grow up fat, seeing how overweight society is really scares me. Here's an argument for Wendy. Lucky for her & I, we didn't develop diabetes as children. These past couple years it's all I've been hearing about. CHILDREN, developing what used to be called ADULT ONSET DIABETES. CHILDREN... >sighs< Now, if that isn't enough to say yah being overweight is unhealthy, I don't know what is. I lost my dad to diabetes, hypertension & heart disease, a killer triad that takes a whole lot of people down & it AIN'T pretty. One leads to the other, leads to the other. It's frightening & for me, here I was, miss nursing student who took nutrition classes & all these classes about medical conditions & had a father who suffered through those conditions because his lack of self care in the diet department KILLING myself with food. I never admitted this to anyone but during nursing school, my blood pressure was high. VERY high, I was scared, but ashamed. I didn't take care of it... Thankfully, since I've lost the weight, it's gone down & I'm getting taken care of, I went to my doctor yesterday. I have all my tests & exams scheduled.
That is something Wendy mentioned in her book that was HUGE for me. I appreciated her talking about the shame. A lot of fat people don't take care of themselves because of being ashamed of where they are & how they look physically & are afraid of what they're going to hear. She stresses the importance of taking care of yourself & finding a doctor who you're comfortable with. I liked that a lot. There are so many things in this book that she stressed that I liked, I liked all of her suggestions about taking care of oneself, of doing things to feel good & look good. I agree, that no matter where you are, what you're doing & what you look like, you must take care of yourself & do things that feel good & keep you positive.
So anyway, ultimately, although I love this book & will definitely read it again and recommend it, she didn't have the answers I thought she did. She's still on the path to finding herself, as am I. I didn't find this so much a guide book but as a reminder of where I used to be & how strong the power of denial can be.
Summary of The Fat Girl's Guide to Life
Vibrant, vivacious, and gorgeous, Wendy Shanker is a fat girl who has simply had enough-enough of family, friends, co-workers, women's magazines, even strangers on the street all trying (and failing) to make her thin. Written in Wendy's wonderfully funny and candid voice, The Fat Girl's Guide to Life provides thought-provoking insights, statistics, and body-image resources intended to restore a realistic standard of beauty and self-acceptance to the 68 percent of American women who wear a size 12 or larger. The Fat Girl's Guide to Life invites you to step off the scale and weigh the issues for yourself.
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