Plantilla con las actividades

If there’s one thing about Shelley, it’s that she loves food. She loves to cook for people, and she loves eating. Over the years, my Sundays would be spent sitting in her lounge with my best friend as she cooked for us, and her food would always be the best. The week leading up to our interview, Shelley was texting me telling me about all the food she had planned to make me, including my favourite of hers – seafood broth. As soon as I arrived at her house on the Friday night, Shelley had already poured a glass of wine and ushered me into the kitchen to help her make dinner. Shelley’s kitchen looks into the lounge, so every time I’m at her house she stands in the kitchen, glass of wine in hand, and talks to me while she cooks dinner with an episode of Master Chef playing on the television in the background. When Erin came over for our interview, it became clear that

93

Erin also shared this love for food, and this had formed a major part of their friendship. The two talked about their love of pot luck dinners, getting together with friends and eating and their memories of going to the beach with their families and celebrating with great food and wine. Part of their love for food comes from their childhood, and feeling like they were never ‘good enough’. As mothers they now make a conscious decision to show their children that they love them through food.

Shelley: Mum was always holding back because we weren’t getting a lot of income so we were always brought up on this feeling of deprivation.

We were brought up feeling like we weren’t good enough… and none of us have gone on to find loving partners or be in happy relationships, and I know that’s because why would we go on to find loving partners if we never thought we were good enough? And when you have parents who don’t think that you’re worth giving good food to?

Erin: Dad was always really fit and never had any weight issues but I used to sit next to him at the dinner table and he would watch what I ate.

Like I loved peanut butter and I would always put lots of peanut butter on my toast and dad would always lean over and take half of it off. And I used to think I’m never going to do that. But I still remember me just thinking you can’t do this to me forever, when I grow up I’m going to just pile on my peanut butter!

Shelley: When I left home I would over-indulge in everything. I would treat myself to everything and I lived this life of indulgence. And now you and I have that thing Erin, you and I are both feeders and we love cooking. And I love feeling abundant and generous because I don’t live on much or earn much and food is a way I can do that, a way that I can be generous and sharing. It becomes a celebration.

Erin: And it creates a bit of a hub, people coming in and out of the house, sit them down with a feed. And I know all the kids who are friends with my kids because I want to know them and I want them to come over and have some food.

Shelley: I mean I always try to make my kids feel like they are the most important thing in the world to me because I definitely didn’t feel like that growing up. Well they are the most important thing in the world… I don’t have to make that up. We are feeders aye? I had someone say to me once I love my kids going to your house because I know they will be fed well!

94

It has been argued that under conditions of criticism and coercive parental control, food restriction or weight control can be a mode of adaptation that functions as a form of resistance to parental authority (Root and Fallon 1988).

However, Shelley and Erin have done the opposite, and have used food not only as a resistance to the parental control they experienced as children, but also as a way to avoid their children undergoing the same experiences they did.

Additionally, the current ‘obesity’ discourse that aligns fat bodies with fast food and out-of-control eating habits is challenged by Erin and Shelley’s narratives.

For these women, food is associated nurturance and love, rather than immoral behaviour and self-control.

Conclusion

In 2004, Morgan Spurlock released a documentary titled ‘Super Size Me’. This film follows Spurlock on a 30-day period in which he eats nothing but McDonald’s food. The film documents the effects on Spurlock’s physical and psychological well-being and explores the fast food industry’s impact on the

‘obesity epidemic’. Although a drastic case study, this documentary exemplifies one of the most common perceptions held about fat bodies, that they must eat too much, and they must eat too much ‘bad’ food, namely fattening, fast food. The narratives in this chapter challenge this discourse and demonstrate that there are a number of ways in which the participants relate to food. For Andy, ‘bad’

food is a part of his reality, and his fat identity. For Shelley and Erin, food is seen as positive, and a symbol of love and nurturance. In this chapter, I have also highlighted the impact that the prevailing discourse on the fat hungry body has, including heightened anxiety when eating in public and complex, routine relationships with food and eating habits. The hungry fat body is therefore one that is multifaceted; felt and experienced in multiple ways.

95