How far is too far

It's been a long, long time since I posted here. I have gained and lost, gained and lost. I'm presently in losing mode again, again on Weight Watchers...quasi-ambivalent, but that's not actually why I'm posting here today. Today I'm posting because a young woman I know of (it's my daughter's fiance's cousin, but I never actually met her) in fact was so morbidly obese that she died of it. That's what morbid means, after all. She was super-morbidly obese, probably over 500 lbs. I only heard of her because my daughter met here and some of her similarly morbidly obese friends (and I believe I wrote about it in another blog, but can I find that? I cannot) and talked about her experience. And then this young woman got married just under two years ago, and her wedding was cause for a little bit of can't-look-away gossip. I haven't calculated my BMI lately (and I know all about the inaccuracies) but probably I'm classified as morbidly obese myself, or at least on the borderline. That doesn't feel too good, but I also spend a minimum of time thinking about it. But anyway, she was. I can speak mainly about her wedding, because I heard the story twice. She married a man of normal size, who is a chef, and I think a feeder. In a way this is ideal. In a way, of course, not so much. She got married in a church, but she didn't walk down the aisle, she approached the altar from a side door, and couldn't walk all the way from the side door to the front; there was a chair halfway, for her to sit in. My daughter and I discussed at the time that even if we weren't losing weight, we would have at least worked up to being able to walk all the way to the altar, if not up the aisle. Worked out, as it were. But anyway, she married this man and by all accounts, they were happy. She received disability (again, not too sure how I feel about that) but also earned money as an on-line sex worker, for men who had a fetish for super-obese women. Of all the things, that was what I have the least issue with. If you want to do that, and people will pay you for it, go for it. It's a strange world, but these were not the first ones to be doing it, access was just a bit easier. But apparently she had diabetes, her blood sugar was out of control, and she had a number of infections that wouldn't heal. This of course, put a strain on her system. She was in the hospital for some time, and was discharged to a rehab center, which was not close to home, because it was the only one that would take her. I have a bit of experience with rehab centers and I can only imagine that this was not a good scenario, on all counts. In any case, she got worse again, and neared death. Yesterday morning, at about 9, she died. She was determined not to lose weight. This was what she had chosen, to be this person, and she was going to stand by it, even if it meant she was going to die, and she did. I simply don't know how I feel about this. Do I admire her for having the courage of her convictions? Do I decry her for letting herself die, or "letting" herself die? Do I go all the way back to fat acceptance and say that this is the natural outcome of that movement, that you have people getting so fat they die? When I got the news, I was with my daughter and her fiance at a summer festival in rural Vermont, and if I wanted to do a statistical analysis on body types, well, I was richly supplied. Since this was Vermont, there were a good number of sinewy, crunchy-granola, vegan runner types, but they were probably outnumbered by woman, and men, who were...fat. Lots of fat people. I'm certainly in that number right now, and may always be, but again, that's not really the point here. So you're fat, you're overweight. You have rolls. How many rolls? You can walk, a lot, or not a lot, or a normal amount. You have a normal life, but your shoes are sort of far away. But you're young, so your joints don't bother you yet. You can get more cute clothes, because more people are making cute clothes in plus sizes, but do you look cute in them? I totally understand that society tells us what's attractive, I get that. But viewed through the lens of a young woman dying 300 miles away, because she believed it was okay, or good, to be fat, it all looked different. But when you get that fat--500, 600 llbs, you've made a real commitment. You've altered your body, the same as the people who insist on having a healthy limb amputated (except that won't kill them). I looked at it as a sort of body modification, but one that had an almost certainly lethal outcome, and did. It was her choice, and she followed it to her death. I have lost and gained and lost and gained probably her body weight in my life. Maybe not, but probably my OWN body weight. I've been fatter and thinner. Right now, I'm trying to be thinner, because my knee feels better when I am, and because I still love to walk, and because I don't want to look too large in the upcoming wedding photos I'll be in as mother of the bride. So I'm on the side of diet and exercise right now. However, I also oppose the tyranny of thinness, the belief that only the thin are attractive, and I fight against that in my life and in myself. But at what point have you gone too far? At what point is acceptance something else--the dreaded enabling? She refused bariatric surgery, which was, of course, her right. She was a member of an on-line community, of a real-life group, she made her living because of her body--just as a thin, conventionally attractive woman who chooses sex work does. All her right. And then she died. Her husband is, I'm sure bereft (and not just because he doesn't have someone to feed), I know my future son-in-law is bereft, and grieving. Her mother, her friends, her other family members. But the whole thing is freighted. (Pardon the pun). Her friends, in the group, what are they thinking, feeling? It can't happen to me? It can! It could probably happen to ME, though not in quite the same way. And, I feel myself wanting to make an endless stream of horrible jokes. I could tell, upon telling other people, that they were being equally restrained. And how about her customers? I'm pretty sure they're going to be sad, and not just because they'll have to find a new morbidly obese sex symbol. It's all very confusing. It's sort of like the people who refuse treatment for something like cancer--but even then, there's not the stigma attached to it, because it's not because of FOOD, it's not because they're FAT. How much is hating fat people and hoping they'll disappear (which, in fact, they frequently do, at least at that weight, because they can't get out) and so being glad that there's one less in the world? But I suppose the question is, what are our rights over our bodies? To an extent weight can be controlled, to an extent not, and body type not at all. So how many stones can be thrown? What do you get to say, or not say, or think, or not think? And, because, I guess, it's all about me, what does this mean to me? Well, I lost enough weight (5 lbs) so that I am now 100 lbs over my lowest adult weight. This sounds awful, but actually, there are so many people on Weight Watchers who have lost 100 lbs that it seems utterly doable to me. And after I got the news about the cousin, the first thing I wanted to do was get up and walk, no matter how much it made my back hurt, how much my feet hurt (and they do and I would like that to change) how much my knee hurt. Walk as fast as I could. After having lived in a more or less (literally) overweight body my entire life, this is what I have come up with: you don't need to be a stick figure to get love, or devotion, or even cheap sex. You don't have to be a stick figure to be chic, even. However: at a certain point, attaining any of those things gets harder. Also, from a purely mechanical standpoint, more weight is hard on your body. It just is. It is entirely possible to be overweight and be healthy, but it takes a lot more work, I think. But food tastes good and who wants to spend their life never eating Ben & Jerry's? But who wants to spend their life never wearing pretty clothes? But really, you have to like yourself, because why would you ever do anything good for someone you despise? So you have to arrive at that place of saying, I'm great now. I'll be great if I lose 25 lbs. I won't be better, I'll be the same degree of great. Or, if I gain. That's fine, too. But, as I asked, how much is too much? To some degree, my tax dollars paid for her to be fat, if she was getting disability. Is that right? Should I have to do that? And what is your right? Really? Was it just, as some say, slow suicide? (Because, in this case, it was). And let's not even get into insurance money, because that's such a freighted topic right now. I don't know. I don't have an answer. I'm confused.