LOVE IN THE TIME OF ATKINS

Mmm mmm. Boy, I tell you, thank god for that Atkins diet, I don’t know what I’d do without it.

Want a piece? It’s really yummy. No? I understand. Most people can’t do the rare meat thing. Reminds them of what they are really eating I guess. I love it. It’s my grandmother’s fault — all that holiday roast beef — she wouldn’t cook it any way but rare. Said if she was going to spend that much money on a piece of meat she wanted to taste it. Used to drive my father crazy. He’d disappear into the kitchen when no one was looking, pull out a frying pan, and go to town. God forbid my grandmother would smell the cooking. She’d charge in there, pull off her shoe, and throw it at his head — said if he wanted to eat leather, he should start with that.

Me, I love it rare, and now, with this Atkins thing, I can eat it all the time and not have to feel guilty about it. What a world huh? Remember when red meat was bad for you?

I used to try so hard, but nothing I did helped. Dad said I was big boned — from a long line of people with big bones. I was fat. Funny how you can be fat and starving all at the same time. That was me. I always watched everything I ate. Used to torture myself over the littlest stuff — how many green beans in a serving, if you can believe that. I was so diligent. But then it would all come crashing down. Middle of the night, there I’d be, spoon in my right hand, Ben and Jerry’s in my left, chocolate smeared all over my face, eyes wild like an animal. And in just 15 minutes I’d make a whole week of starving useless. I was kind of an addict, but now, thanks to this …

Well, look at me, what do you think? Pretty good, no? And I don’t have to tear myself up over it either. I sound like a spokeswoman, don’t I? Maybe I should write those Atkins people. Do a testimonial. Get myself on TV like that Jared guy. All I’d need would be the before picture, right? Of course that would be a little problem; I tore all those pictures up. I know what you’re thinking. It wasn’t like that though. I did throw away all those clothes, but that’s just logical right? If you don’t have clothes to go back to, then you can’t go back, right? The pictures though, that was a different story … they all had Jake in them.

He’s my ex, the one that got me on this Atkins kick. Sorta. Hindsight’s so funny isn’t it? Nobody liked Jake. My dad said he wasn’t smart enough for me, mom that he’d never amount to anything, my friends, well, my friends didn’t say much — they knew I wouldn’t listen — but I know they thought he was mean to me. He was. I can see it now. But look, it’s not every day a fat girl ends up with a guy like Jake. He had washboards for Christ’s sake. Washboards. But why am I defending myself? I was a different person then, so naïve and stupid. Weak. Before the meat set me free that is. Hallelujah brothers and sisters!

But I’m serious though; I was low esteem poster—child 2004. Jake could say anything to me, and I’d just break down and take it. Once, when I was getting out of the shower, he called me his “darling little sea cow.” That was Jake being nice. Affectionate. What really got to me though, was the lock. He put a lock on our refrigerator door. He worked at a bakery see, and he’d bring home all this stuff. Jake was the kind of guy who could eat whatever he wanted and not gain a pound — but me, those cakes, and pies, and pastries … like crack. I think he got tired of yelling at me, catching me like that, all those crumbs all over my face, the guilty look in my eyes, smile on my lips. He came home one day with a brown paper bag with the lock in it, said it was a little present for me. After that I was hungry all the time. Jake said he was going to make me thin if it killed him, it was more like if it killed me. He didn’t believe in any of those fancy diets, or pills, or any of that stuff. “Eat less, and you’ll lose weight, simple as that.” I had such a long way to go.

I started to get faint, light—headed. I mean, it was working; I was getting thinner, but apparently not fast enough. At least not fast enough for Jake. He could see a difference in me, in my body, little hints at what I “could look like” — like blood in the water. He started leafing through all these magazines — Vogue, Playboy — tearing pictures out and putting them up on the refrigerator door. There was less and less everyday — food, me, us. I started feeling like a puppet. Jake’s puppet. Couldn’t think for myself anymore, I was dizzy all the time. He’d tell me what to do, what to eat, and I’d do it. I was so hungry all the time, but it stopped feeling that way. I guess you can get used to anything. I felt like I was drugged; who needs Prozac when you’ve got starvation? But I was getting so thin. You could see my ribs. Jake loved it. He couldn’t keep his hands off me. We made love every night. I was his little plaything — like one of those blow—up dolls — only I could move, and make noise.

It couldn’t go on like that. Even though he couldn’t keep his hands off me, even though I was smaller than I’d ever been … I still wasn’t thin enough. I don’t think I was ever going to be. I think Jake wanted me to disappear.

The cake was what did it. That chocolate cake. Raspberry filling, cream cheese icing. It said ‘Happy Birthday Lawrence’ on it. Someone had ordered it, and never picked it up. Jake brought it home — that white box, that smell. He locked it up in the refrigerator, but every night he’d cut himself a big piece, pour himself a glass of milk, sit there at the kitchen table and make me watch.

It took 3 nights for me to finally snap. Jake really wasn’t that smart — he put a lock on the refrigerator, but not on the knife drawer — he really thought the food was dangerous.

I gave him a chance. I asked politely. All he needed to do was give me one bite. I didn’t even need a sip of milk. I would have taken it dry. He laughed at me, leaned his head back and laughed until the tears started rolling out of the corners of his eyes. He thought it was all so funny — his girl, his little puppet, holding a butcher knife, threatening him, all over a stupid piece of cake.

It’s amazing how fragile skin is; it’s like, if you push hard enough with your finger … POP, right on through. I was tentative at first, just a little TAP, but I got such great results. It came bubbling out, so pretty and shiny, like a fountain of rubies. Jake stopped laughing right away. It was so nice to get a reaction out of him, to know that I could hurt him, like the ways that he’d hurt me. I just kept going. TAP, TAP, TAP. So nice and sweet, like little love bites. He didn’t even try to fight back; he was too surprised. It was over so quickly. Too quickly, just when I was starting to enjoy myself …

The first thing I did of course was to eat that cake. God, it was so good — smeared all red with Jake’s blood of course, little drops of Jake — but I didn’t care. I smeared it all over my face; chocolate, raspberry, icing, and Jake of course. When I was done, when the dizziness started to go away, and I could look around and take it all in, that old feeling came back — that shame/guilt cocktail thing. I liked the way I looked now, liked that my stomach was flat, I was proud of my hip bones, I didn’t want to throw it away over some stupid little cake. But I didn’t want to be hungry again, I mean, being hungry made me kill my boyfriend right? That’s when I remembered this thing from NPR about the Atkins diet. I don’t remember the details, but here’s the punch line — apparently you can eat like three or four hundred more calories per day with an Atkins no carb diet, than a normal low fat diet, and lose the same amount of weight. I love meat. Oprah swears by it. And it’s not like I had any other options. I couldn’t just stuff him in a garbage bag, and toss him on the curb — people would have noticed. And now that I was going to throw away all that cake, and those pastries, there’d be all that space in the refrigerator, and the freezer. I needed a change, and so did Jake: Jake needed to be nice to me, to help me, to redeem himself.

And he did too. It’s sad really; this is the last little bit of him. He lasted so long. Almost as long as we dated.

You sure you don’t want a little taste? It’s really yummy. They tell you its like chicken, but that’s a lie, it really tastes a lot like pork. No?