I love a girl who can eat...

Last Monday a colleague of mine, let’s call him Jim, was describing his weekend to me. He thoroughly covered the highlights of the soccer game (I actually watched it myself but I decided not to burst his manly bubble), his new cool sneakers and his date Saturday night. After describing how the wonder looked (the girl) – tiny waist, longs slender legs, blond – he exclaimed “…and she ate almost as much as I did! I love a girl who orders a big steak with lots of sauce instead of a skimpy salad.” EERHHH, now wait just a minute, did he say tiny waist AND steak dipped in béarnaise? As Jim received slaps on the back from the nearest cavemen, the woman next to me looked as puzzled as myself but shook it off and continued with the news paper. As you might know by now – I talk before I think and even if I think first, I rarely find much reason to shut up – so I said what every female within earshot was thinking. “…and how long was she in the bathroom after you had dinner?” Well I never said I was elegant.

Now it was Jim and the buddies turn to look puzzled. If you feel the same way let me explain to you as I did to them. If a girl has long slender legs and a tiny waist she must have a certain diet. Either she eats healthy and is an excessive runner, or she doesn’t eat. If she on the other hand inhales a big steak with chips and cream sauce on the side and suggest dessert afterwards you have a binger. Which means she loves food so much that she sees it twice – second time in reverse.

Jim huffed and said “no no, she said she has a high metabolism,” Yeah…

Let’s set that one straight once and for all. High metabolism is a syndrome and is very rare. The people who suffer from this disease really struggles to maintain a healthy weight not to lose all the calcium, iron, vitamins and other essential things for the body to function that flushes through their system almost untouched. It is so to say an ‘error’ in the body that makes it unable to hold on to the nourishment it is fed with. Considering the rareness of this illness, the chance of you dating such a person more than twice in your lifetime, is very little. On the other hand, the chance of you going on a date with a person with an eating disorder is one to two.

The numbers are frightening high when it comes to eating disorders (ED) and includes everything from anorexia (the small-salad-and-a-pickle-girl), bulimia (king-size-in-reverse-girl), binge eating disorder (king-size-major-guilt-girl). The latest will often be overweight, while the first two will look ‘normal’ or under-weight. Did you know that the ED has the highest mortality rate of all mental illnesses? Including diseases as schizophrenia and depression?

This is why I reacted rather strong to Jim’s indifference. As he said, I ‘killed’ the fun for him, but it is really important to acknowledge that this exists. Now Jim can be a jerk, but I think he hadn’t realized the seriousness of his date leaving for the bathroom after dinner. Well, maybe it really was nothing. Maybe she always eats a big dinner on the first date, knowing she will get a guys attention this way, or maybe she actually has a high metabolism. But the next time you notice your date, a friend, a sibling, a colleague or anyone you are close to constantly going to the bathroom right after dinner, having cut their nails very short without reason, yellowing teeth or vomit in the sink after their visit to the bathroom… please be alarmed.

I cringe inside every time I hear a guy say “I love a girl who can eat” and sees how skinny his girlfriend is. A light bulb should go on in his head when he two minutes later makes fun of the fat woman in the street, commenting “she should eat less”. I am mystified of how this is still going on, because it really isn’t that hard to figure out.

Calories

Last week I stumbled upon an article on America’s most calorie-stuffed drink, the Cold Stone PB&C. I would normally gracefully have skipped it as my mother learned me calorie counting were for obsessed Jane Fonda’s. Yet, I was curious about this mysterious math piece (never thought that was going to happen) and decided to do the only logic thing whenever in doubt. I googled it.

Women’s logic #3: Google always has the right answer and you can choose the one you like best.

After much searching through several web pages I found a simple set up, where you should enter your age, sex, height, weight and level of daily activity. Then it would automatically give you an estimated number on just how many calories you were burning. “Hm… looks good” (read “I have no idea if that number is high or low”), but even I could come to the conclusion that consuming less calories than you burn will result in weight loss.

That afternoon I ventured out to the supermarket for a few necessities (pickles, crackers and cotton pads, exiting hah?), but the freezer desk was lurking for me. Yeah, I know what you are thinking… no, I did not expect to find pickles in the freezer. Turning the Häagen-Dazs cup around though revealed a calorie number.

Now, as I studied the web earlier, I found that a 1200 calorie diet was a good starter to kick things off. But apparently 1200 is not a lot when we are talking about the nasty little buggers. The cup consisted of 1000 of them, which would leave me with just a couple of carrots for the rest of the day. But since I already had breakfast and lunch, I would break it on the very first day. I don’t have much spine when it comes to ice cream, but I won’t break a rule the same day it is made. With a trembling hand I put the cup back in the desk and started an Indiana Jones search around the store for my favorite products. A snake was hiding in paradise and I’m sure Dr Jones would have made a smock comment about this, even though I changed it slightly to "why did it have to be [insert any good tasting product]". The ‘adding-invisible-sugar-to-your-product-conspiracy’ suddenly made sense, the products I buy over and over again which seems healthy, are actually filled with sugar or other addictives.

The next day I used most of my morning looking up calorie amounts in different products on my computer. Except for a couple of times when people rang and disturbed me for the job I’m actually paid for, I covered most of the contents of my fridge and what might replace it. So today my fridge is now calorie low except for half a jar of pesto… one must have some fun and pesto makes me feel sophisticated… yeah.

Have you ever tried counting calories and what is your best low calorie snack?

But it all comes with benefits. Whenever I have a craving I can simple turn over the box, cart, bag or whatever and read the number of nasty buggers, it makes it a lot easier to resist. Although my colleague today, who tried to convince me his chips was healthy as the label read 70% less fat, presented me with a new logic. “It might be 500 calories, but it’s much less than a normal bag of chips, so you are making the healthier choice”.

I often tell him he’s a girl.