This rim of flab never fails to shock me when I glimpse myself in a store window.
I stare and stare as my fumbling brain does its double take: Is that belly-heavy self really me?
When it comes to weight, the devil is in the details.
What typically follows is that the long-lost friend will step back in surprise, silently wrestling with etiquette.
By some counts, nearly 30 million Americansamong whom I numberare currently taking these medications.
“Listen,” I’ll say over the phone before we meet.
The devil is in the details, right?
A “bit” of weight means more than 80 pounds.
It can be fun, this almost Dionysian sense of abandonment.
On my end of the line, I smile.
“Beware,” I say.
“I look like a cheeseburger.”
Some people give thanks to God.
Even water tasted delicious.
I am a person who reacts robustly to antidepressant drugs.
Afterward, I became a grown-up: a wife, mother, psychologist, writersuccessful beyond my dreams.
I mean, side effects?!
You took this drug because you cried toomuch.
So what if you sometimes feel a little numb?
Let’s toast to a little numbness after a lifetime of excessive emotion!
Indeed, I thought these folks wereworsethan depressed.
I sank into a sea so deep that no one could locate me.
Until my psychopharmacologist reached into his bag and came up with a new concoction.
Take two, he said, and let me know how it goes.
The new drug was called Zyprexa.
I’d never heard of it.Zyprexa.
I imagined someone playing a scale, the notes arcing down and then back up.
For me, Zyprexa was manna from heaven.
I plunged my finger into that yellow pool, then sucked on it, enjoying the flavor.
The tangy acid of orange juice cut through the lipids and made my mouth taste fruity.
I didn’t know that morning that Zyprexa could cause massive weight gain, swift and severe.
Of course, many antidepressants and other mood-mending drugs have the potential to cause some weight gain.
(Se e “What Drugs Might Affect Besides Your Mood” on page 139.)
On Zyprexa, my weight skyrocketed, despite my efforts to diet.
My bottom became like a separate being, with a will and waddle of its own.
My 9-year-old called it Mama’s Patootie, then just Patootie.
he’d say, though whether to me or to my patootie, I wasn’t sure.
When it comes to weight gain, Zyprexa is in a class by itself.
Based on my experience, I agree with this hypothesis.
At least that’s what I did.
At first, all this taking felt really good.
Enchiladas tasted really good.
Mole sauce was really, really good.
Yet afterward, you’re still hungry!
But what is sanity?
How to define it?
Is it scoring high on a standard exam of mental status?
Holding down a well-paying day job?
Except I didn’t want to go to Target.
Mental health is largely defined by the ability to engage in social interactions.
Yet increasingly, I felt isolated because of my mental health regime.
I was also worried about my physical health.
The answer seemed obvious, and yet, it wasn’t.
After all, I had two children and a husband to consider.
My husband is a good man.
He wanted to love me regardless of my weight.
He did love me regardless of my weight.
But though he would never admit this, I didn’t feel as if hewantedme regardless of my weight.
I sensed a tension in his touch.
As with my social circle, my sex life got skinnier, filled with more awkward silences than kisses.
I didn’t blame him, not one bit.
After all, he didn’t sign up to marry Patootie.
He signed up to marry meLauren.
Summer heat felt searing.
Stairs seemed to double, then triple, topping off in the clouds, impossible to scale.
I gasped and sucked for air.
My daughter, on the cusp of adolescence, stared at this new body called Mom with wide-eyed alarm.
My daughter’s fear is what finally enabled me to feel some fear of my own.
If I was fearful, then how could I be happy?
I realized that I couldn’t be happy if my body wasn’t happy.
This, ultimately, is why taking the drug became intolerable to me.
But my daughter had fear in her eyes, my husband had hesitation in his eyes.
I was trapped by love.
Stay put and you’ll be eaten alive.
Within a few months of going off the drug, I shed 40 of my excess pounds.
And I did eventually find them, though the search has never been easy.
But it was necessary, because for me, fat and happy do not go together.
In some ways, I wish this wasn’t the case.
Yet, like it or not, I think of myself as a petite person.
In this condition, it becomes difficult to ignore death loitering at your doorstep.
I have also come to see that my body is not really mine.
Its atoms existed before me and will continue to exist long after I am gone.
My body belongs not only to me but also to those I love.
Photo Credit: Kate Powers
