Food – Or not? 1973-80
Dieting was a way of life for my mother, and it had been passed on to me. My siblings, Franny, Tina and Brian, took after my grandmother. They were all addicted to chocolate and strawberry milkshakes, and they were all bony thin.
By the age of eleven I was a bit chubby, especially in the thighs and hips, and my face started to erupt in pimples. Mom would say to me in that helpful yet scolding tone, ‘I was about your weight at your age.’ Even though old photos of suggested otherwise, I still believed her and heeded her warning. If I weren’t always on some sort of diet now, I could grow up looking like her – the fat lady of our street.
That was when Mom suggested I join her on the Ayds diet.
Ayds were appetite suppressants, toffee and chocolate flavoured squares with the softness of caramels. About 30 minutes before meals, I would eat one with a hot drink, usually instant coffee – black, no sugar. Ayds worked in the short term, until I experienced days of constipation followed by an outbreak of more acne. That finished me. I decided to start counting calories instead.
My after-school snack became melba toast with margarine and a glass of low-sugar cranberry juice. I counted every calorie and noted the sub totals throughout the day in my pocket-sized spiral notebook.
‘Are you eating cardboard?’ Brian smiled broadly as he ambled into the kitchen.
‘I don’t have your metabolism.’
He gave me a strange look, plopped his college books on the Formica tabletop and headed for the freezer to grab a Fudgsicle. I avoided eye contact and the temptation of the Fudgsicle by concentrating on Franny’s issue of Seventeen Magazine.
My mother stopped using Ayds and moved on to the Atkins Diet. It was all about high protein and low carbohydrates. She would give herself extra portions of bacon, stacked on paper towels to absorb the grease. I found the whole thing rather strange, especially when fruit juice and some vegetables were considered bad. It contradicted everything I thought I knew about healthy eating.
Still, my mother lost weight, slowly, very slowly.
Then a family birthday rolled around, and she made a chocolate cake, something usually left to my grandmother. I watched as she broke off a piece of chocolate before melting it, licked batter from her finger, cleaned the spatula, and finally used a spoon to scrape up the last of the frosting. I didn’t say a word.
After the birthday song, little Tina blew out the candles, and my mother rewarded herself with a small sliver of cake. That was the end of the Atkins Diet.
‘Do you think maybe you’re a bit young to be on a diet?’
I looked up at Brian. Big mistake, I could smell the chocolate lingering on his breath from the Fudgsicle. His textbook about electrical wiring was laying open, and I did my best to focus on the upside-down pages of coloured diagrams to combat the chocolate fudge craving.
‘Mom doesn’t think so. It was her idea.’ I knew that would end that conversation.
After Atkins, Mom gained back all the weight she had lost and then some. That pushed her on to Weight Watchers. I thought the slow weight loss and healthy foods were good, but she found it too much of a hassle to prepare separate meals for herself and the rest of the family. Other diets followed – the One Bowl diet, calorie-counting, the grapefruit diet, fat-gram counting, and finally, by the time I was seventeen, Overeaters Anonymous. This was the only diet that was grounded in behavioural psychology. I thought that was a better approach for my mother. But she found the 12-step programme ‘too religious’ and quit that too.
As Brian and I had quietly returned to our reading, I heard the clicking of stilettos approaching the kitchen. My grandmother entered, grinning, her crimson lipstick gleaming as she carried a large platter with both hands. Instantly, I could see and smell what they were – Klejners! These Danish cookies are deep-fried like donuts and have a similar flavour, only they’re thinner and slightly crispy.
Turning on her sweet voice, she said, ‘Bunny, I made these for you. I thought you’d want them for your afternoon snack.’
Not for the first time, she ignored Brian completely. He looked up from his book at me, signalling that he was clueless as to what he had done this time to deserve the cold shoulder.
‘Thank you, Grandma,’ I nearly whispered as I took a Klejner and placed it next to a half-nibbled melba toast.
‘Oh, go on. Have another one!’ She smiled and tilted her head the way sitcom housewives did in the 50s and 60s.
I reached for another cookie and smiled. I couldn’t speak from fear and from bewilderment.
‘Okay,’ she announced. ‘I’m going to deliver these to your mother, and I’ll leave the rest in the dining room in case you and your sisters want some later.’
Once she was gone, I held out my plate to Brian.
‘No thanks. You have them.’
And I did.
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To read previous vignettes from this fictional series, visit Bunny’s Vignettes.
