Everything Must Go

By Cindy
We're having a fire sale on our excess fat!

We wish.
Like many women, we've always been vigilant about our weight.

CINDY: Remember the night we tried to hide the bag of M&Ms in the closet when we heard Kate coming down the hall to our dorm room?
JAYNE: Yes, and we didn't get there in time and she saw it and yelled that we were going to get as fat as pigs and stormed out.
(Note: Our friend Kate had worked hard to lose weight and get in shape over the summer, and considered it her mission to call out reckless eating whenever she saw it.)
CINDY: And we were mad at ourselves for even having the M&Ms. Neither one of us weighed more than 105 pounds but we were always so afraid of gaining weight.
JAYNE: And now look at us.
CINDY: I'd rather not.
JAYNE: I've delivered four babies without anesthesia but trying to lose weight at this age is harder and more painful.
CINDY: Not to mention impossible. I've tried low-carb, Paleo, Mediterranean, and severe calorie restriction and guess which is the only one that works, even a little?
JAYNE: I know, me too. Yesterday I had to decide between half a tomato and five grapes at lunch.
CINDY: I hate restricting calories. What I like is feeding myself on demand. Which is how I got to this state in which I'm heavier than when I delivered my babies (with lots of anesthesia, I have to admit).
JAYNE: I love to cook, and bake - especially bread. Food is one of the big pleasures of life, especially family life. When Gary and I get together with the kids we always have big dinners - big breakfasts and lunches, too.
CINDY: So what do we do? We're reasonably intelligent women - you're a PhD for goodness sake - and we should be able to figure out an answer. I don't want to go around looking 'hefty' or 'substantial' for the rest of my life.
JAYNE: Me either. I still see us as those cute skinny girls in little tee shirts and bell bottoms.
(Long pause.)
CINDY: So, calorie restriction?
JAYNE: I guess so. I think we have to keep it under 1,200 calories a day.
CINDY: Okay. Let's do it but try not to think about it. It's so depressing.
JAYNE: It's a deal. We'll compare notes at the end of every month.
(Note: We live hundreds of miles apart and rarely even Skype, so we're totally on the honor system here. But we've trusted each other with bigger secrets than what the scale says, so we think we can do this.)