My 2 Cents on Kirstie's 80 Pounds

Let’s see: what weights about 80 pounds? (1) 160 five-pound bags of flour (2) Two small children (3) A very large dog. Eighty pounds is a lot of weight.

I picked up the tabloid at the grocery store line while waiting to check out my fruit, veggies, fat-free products, whole-grain bread; well, you get the picture. I decided to read the first couple lines of Kirstie Alley’s latest saga. All I caught was the impression that she was “shocked” about gaining over 80 pounds and that she gained it by eating lots and lots of butter.

The butter comment irks me. It’s not the butter that’s a problem, it’s the amount of butter consumed and the frequency with which it’s eaten. The all-or-nothing approach to butter was the fastest ticket for Kirstie to take yet another trip on the weight loss roller coaster ride. It’s dizzying, and the only way to get grounded is to stop blaming the food itself and start looking at herself. What makes her eat? I wonder.

On the other hand, I can feel for Kirstie. It seems to me that she lost her accountability with the folks at Jenny Craig and needed the media pressure to maintain her slimmer self to satisfy everyone else. Obviously, it doesn’t work. There’s something deeper needed. Same thing happened with Oprah; same thing happened with at least a dozen other people I know who are not celebrities. Reaching a certain weight may happen under the pressure of something or someone else, but staying there requires the tenacity from within. Perhaps Kirstie was not “shocked” that she actually gained the weight, but surprised that it was possible for her to gain that amount of weight again.

But we are all the same, celebrity or not, when it comes to weight loss. That tenacity we need can only sustain us in a limited way. This daily weight loss battle is grueling and tiring, and, the icing on the cake is the realization that losing the weight isn’t as hard as keeping it off.

I’m thankful for this story as a reminder to myself that prayers are the ultimate food program and God is ALWAYS there for me to indulge. I’m thankful that I don’t need an unlimited amount of tenacity to keep the weight off; I only need to remember to ask for God’s help—again. And again. Amen.