Et Tu, Brute?

So my husband, whom I love and in most respects is a pretty awesome human being, is a fat-ist. Size-ist? I don’t know. Whatever you call people who make negative assumptions about people based on their size. I would never have suspected this early on in our relationship. There were a number of screens up that prevented me from correctly reading the situation.

Screen 1: He met, fell in love with, decided he couldn’t live without, and married me at my heaviest, which was pretty darn heavy.

Screen 2: He always listened attentively and nodded in agreement when I complained about my ill-treatment from doctors and how annoying it was to have them CONSISTENTLY be surprised when my blood pressure/heart rate/ blood sugar were all better than average.

Screen 3: He finds a broad spectrum of women attractive based on proportion, face, hair, and personality. This was important to me, too, because I didn’t want to be stuck with a guy with a fat chick fetish, either.

Screen 4: He points out (when I’m on a weight loss stint) that he has no issue with the size of my body and often mentions that people are genetically destined to be in different categories.

So what’s the problem? Sounds like a dream, right? Get bigger…get smaller… it’s all good. What’s not to like?

This is not to like.

So I mentioned the other day that a challenge group I joined made doing 100 jumping jacks the daily challenge. I meant to use it like a desk break, doing 25 or so at a time when I needed to stretch, but since I was doing site visits most of the day I just did 50 in my office before running out of the door to get the kids and, don’t be alarmed honey, but I’m about to knock out the other 50 right here in the kitchen before we eat dinner. He looks up at me in all seriousness and says, “You can do 50 jumping jacks?” Blank stare from me. “I mean, you can knock out 50 jumping jacks real quick?” Blank stare morphs into are-you-freaking-kidding-me-I-run-4.5 miles-at-a-clip-and-have-a-resting-heart-rate-of-48 face. I wanted to say, “Who are you? Have you been listening to me at all in all these years? Do you realize how insulting it is to have you—YOU—of all people ask me that. You who I thought understood me and realized that weight and health are not always directly correlative and certainly not in my case.”

Instead I said, “Yes,” and knocked out the other 50.