When I was first reading the FA blogs, I read somewhere (possibly written by Rachel, fillyjonk, or meowser) that many people who come to FA from fat-bigoted cultures/families or eating-disordered pasts become angry when they learn just how far over their eyes the wool had been pulled, their whole lives.

It’s not just a matter of, “Oh, ha-ha, you got me!” Many people experience very real physical and psychological torture at the hands of fat bigotry (in its many forms). Whether it’s the pain, guilt, self-hate, elation, and accompanying regain-plummet of yo-yo dieting, being physically abused by school-children or family, or just being constantly bombarded with WW ads on the bus every morning, noon and evening, fat bigotry is practically common-place. Which means, of course, that it gets most of us, somehow. Which itself means when we find the house of bigotry is a house of cards we become very, very angry.

And I was. Perhaps I still am; I certainly am indignant at the thin-crazy/fat-invisible media, the vocal, unavoidable, and plentiful shills by Big Pharma and weight-loss industry members, the memories of the abuse I suffered, the constant reminders that fat people are second-class citizens in this country, the conventional wisdom fallacies about the connections between weight, health, the economy, global warming, &etc, &etc, ad infinitum.

But lately, I feel as if I’m quieting down a bit. I’m getting a much better sense of how to read and interpret the studies and literature; my baloney detector for such things has been honed. I feel as if I can absorb and understand a good deal more, and that’s what I’ve been doing: reading and absorbing, reading and absorbing. No longer reacting (as much); I’m a vessel, and I want to have as much knowledge, as much truth, as much ammunition, as possible.

Perhaps it’s a natural stage in the process of coming to terms with the truth behind a good deal of life lost to a lie. Maybe others can speak to this. But I’m more peaceful now, and very much enjoying ’shoring up’ after a long spell of indignant anger.