Questions about the Story of My Other Body

So. How are you doing now?

    I'm fine. Thank you for asking! Though my weight has fluctuated, sometimes outside the range
    where my body feels comfortable, it no longer dictates how I feel about myself. I've learned to
    focus on my behavior and activities, not my size or my emotions, as a measure of how well I live
    my life. Food is not medicine now. And it's taken me years to get here, but a day without
    exercise doesn't feel complete.


The compulsive eater, called "she" in the book, is you. Was it scary to include such personal
stories?

    My main fear was—and is—that I might reinforce the idea that every fat person has an eating
    disorder, which isn’t true. However, I do think that many people who become fat, or perceive
    themselves as fat, share some of the same psychological consequences. I can’t generalize about
    what those might be, but I could tell my own story and hope that it spoke for others.


Did your parents read the book?

    My mother, bless her heart, always reads the last page of a book first. Can you imagine? She
    said she wasn't going to read the whole thing, but it's hard to imagine an unread book in her
    house. My dad, on the other hand, read the book and told me that some parts of it made him
    cry. And he said he was proud of me.


Did they ever figure out what caused Joyce's weight gain?

    No one knows why my sister gained the amount of weight she did. Science doesn't know. As
    with any of us, her body was the evolving result of a dizzyingly complex interplay of genetics,
    environment, psychology, and choice.

    But to tell you the truth, I don't think the cause of her weight gain is as important as the
    question of how I could have loved her better. See, I have a chance of using that information
    again.

    I want science and medicine to find out what causes us to respond differently to nutrition and
    activity. I don't want anyone else to suffer a loss of mobility in a body that has become
    bewildering and unreliable. But for me, understanding weight gain isn't as useful as building a
    range of healthy mental and physical responses to life in this human body, as lived amongst
    other humans.


What was the actual cause of Joyce's death?

    Morbid obesity was listed on the death certificate as a contributing cause, along with peritonitis.
    The immediate cause of death was pulmonary failure -- her lungs stopped working. There was
    no way to list "extreme reluctance to visit a doctor for any reason" on the certificate.


What can I do for my [sister, mother, friend] who is struggling with her weight? I'm really scared
for her.

    Here's what you can do to be a great friend. None of this involves mentioning anyone's weight
    or body.

  • Tell her why you think she's wonderful and why you're glad she's in your life.

  • Spend time with her doing things you both enjoy.

  • Tell her you'll be there for her if there's ever anything she'd like to talk about with you.
    Then be there.

  • Don't give advice. Instead, ask questions. Learn about her.

  • When she asks you questions, open up about your feelings and experiences. Don't give
    advice.

  • Build your own healthy behaviors. When you invite her into her life, it can be a healthy
    place for her.

  • Appreciate the healthy behaviors you find in her life (and do it out loud); she has taken
    that time to build a healthy place for those she loves.

    If you can't invest this kind of time, please be quiet while you consider your own feelings. Are
    you really concerned, or instead, are you embarrassed, inconvenienced, frustrated? Those
    feelings won't help you be a friend. But they are all real feelings, and if you recognize them, you
    stand a chance of working past them.
The Sun Room
Frequently Asked Questions
Back to the main FAQ page
Back to the main FAQ page