Shedding a Bit of Bitch

I am kind of a bitch. And I try as hard as I can to do self-reflection but we live in a culture where women judging other women is a regular pass time. Here's the most recent example of this in my life:

I was shooting the shit with the program coordinator at a local nonprofit where I regularly volunteer. Because I'm in once a week, I've found myself pretty friendly with several of the staff and opened up recently about my weight watchers stint. When I was in last week, the program coordinator mentioned this to another staff member because she, too, is doing the online program. I'll call this staff member Ellen.

Ellen is approaching 60 and has been doing nonprofit work for 30+ years. She's born and raised in the midwest and identifies as a lesbian with a working class lifestyle/budget. She was thrilled to find out she and I could "talk points" and strategize, particularly in relationship to budget-friendly options. She's only six weeks in. As she's talking about all of the "switches" she has made in the past six weeks (which is weight watcher's lingo for not actually changing much about how you eat, just compensating with synthetic, processed low-cal alternatives) she mentioned how floored she was to find out the point values in her current eating habits. A McDonald's double cheeseburger is 2/3 of our daily points. A McDonald's cinnamon thingy is half. She says, "So I'm not doing that any more! I lost 4 pounds a week when I started for the first two weeks." She assured me that the weight loss has evened out to more like a pound and a half/week but she was glowing with this revelation. I notice her khaki pants gaping where her belt was cinched a hole tighter.

I have not had this kind of success. I'm not even sure I'm losing weight just yet. So I'm immediately jealous. Then jealousy turns to anger and anger to bitchiness (which I kept internal). I thought to myself, as Ellen is suggesting this brand of bread that is only "1 point a slice", "I'm not going to do that. I don't even eat bread that much. And I don't go to McDonald's. And I don't drink soda or coffee drinks with calories. Why does she get to lose all the weight? And why is she surprised about McDonald's food?" I think, somehow, that I am more deserving than Ellen.

When she asked me if I had anything I was working on in particular, something I was trying to swap or avoid, I said, honestly, "alcohol." She raised her eyebrows. I felt like jumping to my own defense but thought better of it. I just shrugged my shoulders.

Then yesterday, I made one of my go-to meals that I've been making since late college. Peanut tempeh stir-fry with rice noodles and lots of frozen veggies. I plugged my recipe (and I actually measured my ingredients as I put them into the peanut sauce, since usually I just eyeball and taste test) into the online point calculator. The recipe, in the bowlful amount that I ate (and I often eat two helpings) was almost half my points. And I thought, well, it's not a McDonald's hamburger.....

All this to say, if the weight loss doesn't work, perhaps I'll shed a bit of bitch and remember the complicated (class) politics of women's consumption. And be a bit more mindful of a mouthful.