OK, before I start ranting, let me get one thing straight. I do NOT blame the diet industry for my eating disorder. I give my brain and DNA the full responsibility for that. However, I will say this: if dieting and weight loss were not promulgated as a means to happiness, I doubt I would have been as entranced by food restriction in the first place. In fact, I don't even know that dieting as a concept would have occurred to me.

All right, what happened today, in a nutshell, was this: I go back to work after a six week medical leave for a severe recurrence of depression. My boss, who is wonderful, knows the basics but not the details. I'm nervous but looking forward to being back. I walk in the door and am greeted by a sign that says "Nothing tastes like looking good feels." Aside from the grammar...

Talk about a big slap in the face!!!

So I go check my emails, have almost 200 new ones, and I would say at least one-quarter of them have to do with the "Big Fat Loser" weight loss contest at work. I, at 26, am the youngest employee, and am convinced this is completely infantile. I do not realize the depths of this depravity until I go into the break room for some coffee and see posters that tally how many pounds each person has lost.

I think my jaw is still on the floor.

I'm not going to say whether some people needed to lose weight for medical reasons. I don't want to know. That's between them and their doctor, just as mine is with my doctor. Weight Watchers at Work...c'mon now. Do you really want Betty in Accounts Payable knowing how many Points you tossed back at the holiday party last weekend? Author and activist Wendy Shanker advocates a separation between Body and Business, just like there is between church and state.

My problem isn't with the dieting. It's that it just feels like a slap in the face to all of the hard recovery work I've been doing. It was so excruciatingly difficult, and then it almost seemed like it was mocked by my co-workers. I don't know- they say I'm so Cute! and Tiny! Ugh. That pisses me off. I'm not cute and tiny- I'm sick. People who have chemo lose weight, and no one yakks them up for it. It's because they're sick. Me, too. Only it's a "socially acceptable" illness. I have a problem with that.

Then, at the end of the day, I went back home and had a Payday bar as part of my evening snack. So appropriate on so many levels... :)