The Weight

For almost my entire conscious life, I’ve hated myself. In many ways I saw myself as a photographic negative of the Nietzschean Ubermensch. I wasn’t beyond good and evil, I was beneath both of them. I worthless and I didn’t deserve to be here. To clarify, I specifically hated the person I was; my personality, character, behaviour, conduct, whatever you want to call it, absolutely disgusted me. Because I hated such a low self-image, I took little or no care with my physical appearance, except in those rare times when I was actually happy in life. Of course, I knew this attitude of self-loathing wasn’t healthy, but it was all I’d known when growing up.

Then, while enduring my second major instance of severe depressive illness, a few years ago, I worked out that the emotional, physical and sexual childhood abuse I’d endured at the hands of my parents and sister was the root cause of why I’d always felt this way about myself. Not only that, I realised that this abuse hadn’t been my fault, but the fault of my abusers. As my father had died in 2009, there wasn’t a great deal I could do about his involvement, though at least in mitigation, he was a wonderful grandfather to my son and had belatedly come to recognise he’d been a vicious, weak bully towards me. My mother, though we enjoyed a brief period of rapprochement after my father’s death before she succumbed to dementia, had no sense of responsibility or guilt for the emotional and sexual abuse she inflicted on me; hence why her death in September 2017 didn’t bother me. The torchbearer for her legacy of emotional abuse towards me is my evil sister, with the assistance of the truly appalling Hird family, who I’m unsure whether they are mentally defective or mentally ill. One thing I’ve come to realise is that no matter how good a person I am, there are certain people who will always hate me; my sister is one of those who is seemingly cognitively hardwired against me.

Being positive though, the truly great thing about my realisation I wasn’t a bad person was the sense of relief engendered by finally being able to unburden myself. All along I’d been the victim and not the perpetrator, which was the essential knowledge I had always needed to grant and accept not only forgiveness to myself, but the right to judge other people for their conduct towards me. As alluded to before, I do have a fair number of enemies in this world who, regardless of the person I am now or who I become in the future, will hate me for the rest of my life. I won’t lose any sleep over my status as the number 1 folk devil among message board simpletons from the Wear and the Tyne whose hypocrisy I may once have called out and who regard me as the cyber bogeyman still, or the fake bullshit prospectors from down in the bunker that stretches from Ouston to Marsden, the bona drag popinjays from the Internet Threads Kommittee, together with their hard and soft self-centred pals from the unfriendly club and the hot heads, bald heads and air heads from the special school. If they want to waste their time and energy thinking about me, then that’s their lookout.  

I must admit that it is disappointing when you try and show forgiveness by reaching out to these unfortunates with a degree of compassion, only to encounter an imbarrathin tantrum in return. Then I remember; not everyone is as wise as me. Some of these violent heterosexual men who’ve tried, and failed, to lay a glove on me seem lack any insight into their conduct. However, it’s all words not deeds on their part and the fear and deep confusion I’ve seen in the eyes of a pair of them, tells me that perhaps mental illness is more prevalent thank we imagine. For the avoidance of doubt; I forgive you all.

However, there’s still one thing I can’t forgive myself for and that’s neglecting my physical health. This goes back a long while. I’ve always been a bevvy merchant; ever since my late teens I’ve loved a good session. Until I reached 30, I was slightly bigger than the average, wearing 34” strides, but I did enough football to stop becoming Mr. Creosote. What wrecked me, for years, was my first nervous breakdown in late 1994. Back then, with Prozac not being widely available, metabolism-stopping horse tranquilisers like Dotheipin were used to treat the symptoms of mental illness, rather than the causes or the patient holistically. Thankfully that has changed so much. However, it snookered me as I piled weight on and became more and more sedentary. It wasn’t until I headed out to Slovakia in 1999 that I could get back into 36” jeans.

Back in England after 2 years away, I felt cast adrift and lonely, which is when I discovered comfort eating. Although binging on crisps was the least of my problems once I’d embarked upon the worst relationship of my life in late 2002. At the end of 2004, I emerged from the wreckage of a particularly destructive and unhealthy period in my life, where in search of companionship I’d endured the most dispiriting time of my life with an OCD control freak Social Worker who’d used me as a walking wallet and surrogate paterfamilias, to shout at her two daughters; one of whom was a nightmare and I’m glad to say I’ve not seen her since and the other was a wonderful young lady who went on to make a good life for herself at university and then with work in the Home Counties West.

We’re still in touch on Social Media and I’m glad to have the occasional catch up on-line to see how she’s doing. That, indeed, is the only possible redeeming feature of the 2 years of hell with her mother that emptied my wallet, destroyed my self esteem and caused me to sink to just about the lowest physical state I could ever imagine. The mother lived almost entirely on coffee and cigarettes, while I ate nothing but pizza, or so it seemed. The penny finally dropped when, doing my first solo shop after the split, I went straight through the fruit and veg section of Sainsbury’s without buying anything, heading for ready meals and other junk instead. It was almost as if a lightbulb went off in my head.

When I joined Weight Watchers a few days later in January 2005, I was 19 and a half stone, with a 46-inch waist and an appointment with coronary care in the post. I must admit the meetings did nothing for me; I just used the pep talks when I went to get weighed and the meal record sheet as a way of spurring myself on. The great thing was the speed of results; 2 stones in the first 5 weeks for instance. Through a strict no carbs, no fat, high protein diet, I lost 4 and a half stone by early December. The lowest I got was 15st exactly, which wasn’t bad considering I only sacked the booze off for 6 weeks of that year. Losing that amount of weight allowed me to wear normal clothes, have energy I didn’t know existed and massively increase the amount of sport I did. Not only did I start to play 5 a side 4 times a week, I took up 11 a side again with an Over 40s team and reignited my passionate love of cycling. My hope was to get to 14st and then enjoy life. Typically enough, fate intervened.

On 18 December 2005, I was driving back from my parents when a Tesco 18-wheeler wagon rear-ended us on the A1 going North, just past the Metro Centre. Thankfully, my son and my ex-wife were safe. That said, instead of the small cut to the back of his head Ben suffered, it could have been so much worse. As we were about to leave my parents, he climbed in the car and I said, for whatever reason, “sit behind your Mam please.” Why I said this, I do not know, but it saved both of our lives as the rear driver’s side crumpled to nothing in the crash. The first copper on the scene told me bluntly, after looking at the wreckage, that I should be dead. In comparison to what could have been, the dozen stitches to my lacerated scalp and damage to my left leg was a great result. Unfortunately, the fact the button for moving the seat back had gone through my calf prevented me from walking for the next 6 weeks. Consequently, I was stuck in the house, unable to move and so the diet had to go on hold. Sadly, I didn’t get down to 14st; instead my weight crept very slowly back up to 16st by the middle of 2007. Whenever I sensed I was putting weight on, I’d go on a strict diet and cut out the booze; January and September were my dry months, after the Christmas and Summer excesses.  I knew my body and how to regulate it.

I managed to keep things like that until the autumn of 2014, which is when things in my life started to spiral got of control. Coming off a 6-week sobriety episode in early October, my return to booze and bad food coincided with my mother’s final deterioration into Alzheimer’s hell. The year before, 2013, I’d done everything to help her move to a new house and so spent the summer filling and emptying boxes, climbing into the attic and roof void in the garage; it kept me busy, fit and I was looking alright. Once she’d moved, her decline was slow at first, then rapid and I couldn’t cope with my role as her main carer, despite Laura’s wonderful help.

Early 2015 was when everything completely fell to bits; she was sectioned under a Deprivation of Liberty Order after being found wandering once too often on Whitley Bay prom in the middle of the night, my sister made up spurious accusations to the cops about Laura, Ben, Sara and me that caused no end of grief, and I simply couldn’t cope at work, partly because of the behaviour of certain weasels I’ll not name here. Hence, I had almost 8 months on the sick; I mean it could have been worse as I tried, on a couple of occasions, to end it all, by wandering down to Tynemouth pier, bladdered at 3 in the morning and slugging from a bottle of Brandy, ready to throw myself off. Thankfully, the first time I passed out and the second I changed my mind.

Eventually, things got appreciably better. I put my recovery down to the 3Cs of cats, cricket and coffee; if we’d not had Tromszo arrive as a kitten, if I’d not had friends to idle time away over a latte with and if I’d not fallen head over heels with NEPL cricket, I wouldn’t have rediscovered normality. My head was sorted, but the body was struggling; eating all the wrong things in huge portions and keeping up with plenty of booze meant I was starting to expand. Rapidly. Late November 2015, I get back to work.  Supposedly, in my best interests, work have downgraded my job from co-ordinating Access to teaching Functional Skills to bored 16-year olds; King Lear with adults to basic punctuation with unmotivated rabble. Sure, it’s easy work, but I felt like I had been comprehensively deskilled as a sentient human being. The people I worked with (in the main) were brilliant, but it didn’t stop me from daily comfort eating: bacon sandwiches, paninis, millionaire shortbread and a dozen other gorgeous treats that I selected from on a daily basis. It’s how I got through the academic year. Despite the removal of temptation over the summer, I wasn’t losing any weight and so, sadly, I realised I’d not be able to play 11-a-side football again. After 11 years, I retired from my role as sub keeper with Wallsend Boys Club (formerly Winstons) Over 40s, as I didn’t have the stamina or strength to play at a decent level. It was one of the most heartbreaking things I’ve ever had to do. No injury; just gluttony. All my own fault.

Admittedly I was still cycling and playing 6 a side twice a week as a way to keep sane and so I turned my thoughts to work. The academic year 2016/2017 was the busiest I’ve ever known; I had over 200 students to be responsible for. There was no support, but no time to think either. Somehow, I made it through, even though my energy levels were severely depleted. In June when they all left, I realised that Ben’s graduation was barely 2 months away and I was now grotesquely overweight. I felt guilty, fretted and did nothing. I had hoped to take up cricket again last summer; indeed, I registered with Monkseaton 3^rd XI and bought some whites. I didn’t get to play though. The nearest came one Saturday in July, away to Stobswood 2^nd XI. I was in the team and almost fainting with nerves. Then it rained, so the game was off. The weather wasn’t so bad round here, so I went to see my mate Gary turning out for Monkseaton 2^nd XI versus Whitley Bay 2^nd XI instead.

We did a few laps of the boundary and chewed the fat about various things. I’ve no doubt he was telling me what he did for my own good, but he basically tried to let me down gently and suggested that I probably couldn’t play cricket in the state I was in.  Slow right-arm bowling wouldn’t be a problem, but running between the wickets and fielding in the deep simply weren’t possible for someone my size. It was almost as soul destroying as retiring from 11-a-side. Consequently, I didn’t make any further effort to be available for the rest of the season. My cricket gear is in the wardrobe and I would desperately love to play, but sadly it seems as if that ship has sailed. Gluttony again and, yes, all my own fault.

In early September last year, my mother died, and I medicated myself with junk food and beer. It was getting ridiculous. Once the clocks went back and I had to wear long trousers again, I struggled to fit into my 40” waist jeans. That was a sign I had to do something. Another was my increasing levels of exhaustion and the wheezing from a long-standing chest infection that lasted for almost 3 months. Best, and most importantly, of all, was seeing Ben come home at Christmas. He’d lost 4 stones since graduation, by eating sensibly and looked wonderful. Basically, I knew the score; do something about my size or die. Consequently, I’ve signed up to Elite Fitness Transform programme; it costs the thick end of £250 for 6 weeks of gym sessions and a meal plan; chicken, broccoli, porridge, fish, brown rice, salad and not much else. It will be tough, especially as I’ve signed up to 6 weeks off the gargle, and at my advanced age, it won’t be possible to lose weight as rapidly as 13 years ago, but I must try.

The gym session was the element that scared me, as I’d never been in one in my life. I was even terrified to attend the induction, but I did. I was equally terrified before my first class, but I went along. I know I was hopeless at the exercises, but I will get better, if I stick at it. You see, I want, and I need, to lose 5 stones; I don’t want to lose it to play football or cricket again (although I’d love to, given the chance), I want to lose weight to feel better about my physical self. If I can feel good about the person I am, personality wise, then I should be able to feel good about my physical self.

Finally, I also want to be able to wear the North Korea t-shirt I got for Christmas from Dave and Heather without it looking like it has been sprayed on.  You need to be fit if you’re going to be a warrior against imperialism…