"More Acceptable to Be a Junkie"

Back in the day, I was a big Poison fan.  What can I say, I loved me some hair bands and went on to meet quite a few because teenage hormones are real.  I was particularly in lust with Poison's guitarist, C.C. DeVille.  I remember how heartbroken I was when he was kicked out of the band but not surprised because his drug addiction was becoming very apparent particularly at live performances.  I remember this performance where C.C. just went off and did his own thing, played what he wanted to play on live TV and knew, they weren't going to make it after that.

Anyway, I told you that to tell you this.  I watched an interview with him back in the day after he'd gotten sober.  He talked about his struggles to get sober,  how he gained 70 lbs. in the process and it was really hard to lose the weight.  You can hear a small snippet of it here.  They showed some pics of his weight gain including this picture

(via Pinterest)

Just Google CC Deville and you can see what he typically looks like.  Very thin, almost too thin sometimes but generally very healthy looking.  So to go from that to the picture above when you've been thin all of your life had to be quite the experience.  It was.

He said something that always stuck with me..."As crazy as that is, I think it's more acceptable to be a junkie than it is to be overweight."  Anyone who has a weight struggle that is over 40 lbs knows that is very true.  He'd never walked in those shoes before and you take someone who was on an international stage and the scrutiny that comes with that, I think it humbled him a bit.  Some people would recoil at the thought that someone would think that being a drug addict is more acceptable than being fat.  But let's face facts, obesity is truly the last acceptable prejudice.  While all people discriminated against face some issues, being fat is the one thing that even those discriminated against for their religion, sexual orientation, race, etc can all still have in common.  People don't want to give empathy to the fat person because they "did it to themselves."

Well, let's see, yes they did but so did the alcoholic and the drug abuser.  How is masking pain whether physical or emotional any different when you medicate with food over medicating with substance abuse?  It's not.  The only difference is, the second you see a fat person, you KNOW their secret.  You SEE their addiction.  It's apparent because it can't be hidden.  While an alcoholic or drug abuser can slur their words or act inebriated on occasion, it can be masked much easier to those not close to the person.  With food addiction, it is vastly different not just because of your physical appearance but more importantly, because you actually require food to survive!  So if you have an unhealthy relationship with food and medicate yourself with it, everyone knows your dirty little secret and suddenly, you're weak and less than.  If you equate "food addiction" with drug or alcohol addiction, it's a "cop out" or you're just trying to gain sympathy for something you did to yourself.  People are so quick to say "oh just stop eating" with a disgusted look on their face.  But when a substance abuser is confronted, it often is dealt with more compassion and sympathy.  Most people with a brain in their head would never tell an alcoholic to just have one drink or a drug addict just do one shot of heroine.  Yet people who announce they are trying to get healthy are constantly having to deal with their "pushers" of family, friends and co-workers telling them to relax their diet for one meal or one day.  How is this right??

They don't understand how when you have worked SO hard all week to track your calories, make the right choices, get in exercise and water that the one sodium laden bomb you have with them could bloat you to high hell and throw off your weigh in.  So what?  Well sorry but for most of us trying to lose weight, our moods and self worth are directly tied to the scale whether we like it or not.  So what might not seem like a big deal to them is a huge deal to those of us who have to claw for every ounce even when we're doing everything right on paper.  It can take a huge mental toll but you know, as long as they have someone to eat their nachos with who cares?

The bottom line is, if you've never walked in the wide width shoes, you have no idea how hard every day can be just to try to break even much less lose weight.  It is a mental mind f**k that most people with weight problems will struggle with for the rest of their lives.  Even if you're one of the ones who gets to goal weight regardless of the path you took to get there doesn't mean you stay there without effort every minute of the day.  So if you've ever been one of the ones to show empathy to a substance abuser, please consider that people with addictions of any kind deserve the same courtesy.

Do you think it's more acceptable to be a junkie than fat?

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