A Chat With My Mom

My mom stopped by today to pick something up. She is 75 years old, and very pretty. She has battled

with weight her entire life. She was telling me that she needs to lose weight to have knee surgery.
As we talked it occurred to me that at 75 years old, she is still battling with diets, I was wishing I could crawl into her head and free her those repeating messages that cause her to feel like she is failing at something. She was told she needed to look a certain way at some point and the battle began; causing food to become the enemy and peoples approval the unattainable goal. Its the paradox that says I hate food, no I love food; your bad to love food, OK then I hate food. I know this because I have had to repeatedly delete these messages from my own mind.
I had made oatmeal cookie the day before and they were sitting on the counter. I casually said "have a cookie". She answered with the standard dieters answer "I better not". This began a very enlightening discussion. It gave me a lot to think about.
Here is how the interview went;
Mom; It doesn't matter how little I eat I can't lose weight.
Me: Mom, Gandhi was pretty thin, I don't think that is true.
Mom: giggles, well, what I mean is I just don't burn of the calories
Me: Mom, there are skinny people that can't do a push up, it's not exercise, it's snacking and binge meals.
Mom: Maybe, but you know, I when I was younger I lost weight with my sister, we lost over 100 pounds 2 times.
Me: That is amazing, what do you think happened that caused the weight to go up again?
Mom: Well, that's funny, every time we would lose it, we would think, WOW I AM FINALLY NORMAL, FINALLY I CAN EAT LIKE A NORMAL PERSON!
Me: What does that mean?
Mom: You know, all the people around you that eat what they want and stay skinny. I really don't like those people.
Me: I know, you've told me that before, but that doesn't make them normal, they eat what is normal for them,. The difference is they just don't eat unless they are hungry. They have other things they battle with. There is no normal, no-one can eat more than they need without gaining weight. Its the Gandhi principle in reverse.
Mom:huh
Me: Do you think that binge eating is caused by dieting?
Mom: (with conviction) I know it is, every time I have a diet shake it's like I flip a switch that screams "I want to eat everything in sight"
Me: So when you lost all that weight what do you think would have worked to keep it off.
Mom: Well, we were obviously eating more than we needed for our metabolism.
Me: So, you wanted to eat what was right for someone else's metabolism.
Mom: I guess so
Me: How do you think you find what is right for your metabolism?
Mom: Well, if you are gaining weight, its to much.
Me: makes sense
Mom: Huh, it sounds so simple when you say it like that, interesting, I sure love you.
Me: I love you too.