By Paula Mandez
On Zealous Thierry
When I was a kid I never gave in to other people’s opinions about how I should look or how much I should weigh. Dieting was for weaklings.
I felt superior to kids who were always talking about their weight and how little they ate. If a girl turned down dessert for fear of getting fat, I’d roll my eyes and order the hot biggest fudge sundae on the menu. I never got on a scale, because I felt fine the way I was.
Some people referred to me as chubby: I didn’t care. But when my cousin got married and asked me to be in the wedding, I had to be fitted for a bridesmaid dress. I’d always hated shopping. I wore whatever my mother got for me. With elastic waistbands. Now I had to face a mirror, and the fact that I was a size 16. The biggest size the bridal store sold! I got a scale, weighed myself, and found I was what the chart called “obese”.
I went on the South Beach Diet. I gave up sugar and started obsessing about food and weight, including noticing other people’s weight and judging them on it! I’d never that done before. I was really strict, and lost nearly 2 pounds a week for six months– until I had some kind of breakdown. I was depressed and faint and went on crying jags– just like those dieting weaklings I used to feel superior to in seventh grade!
Now I’ve gained back half of what I’d lost, but I think I’ll be all right. Even though I’m not strict any more, some of the better eating habits– more vegetables, more protein, less pasta and sugar– have settled in.
Get in touch with me on social media
By the same author;
- Germany Can Only Field Five Battalions
Germany has, on paper, an army of three divisions. In practice, according to a research fellow at the Council on Geostrategy, even with three months’ warning Germany would struggle to field beyond five battalions outside its own borders. Five battalions. Against an adversary that has been on a war footing for four years, that deploys 8,000 kamikaze drones per day in Ukraine, and that has … - Only 16% of European Citizens Still Consider the United States An Ally
In November 2025, the European Council on Foreign Relations surveyed Europeans about their view of the United States. Only 16 percent still considered the United States an ally. That’s down from 22 percent eight months earlier. Twenty percent now consider the United States a rival or adversary. In Germany, France, and Spain, that number approaches 30 percent. NATO was built on the premise that Europe … - Nuclear Bomb Domino
Iran’s nuclear facilities were bombed. The IAEA says the sites weren’t destroyed. Iran still holds 440 kilograms of highly enriched uranium. The Cambridge Centre for the Study of Existential Risk says Iran’s capacity was “marginally degraded” but the incentives to go nuclear have “gone through the roof.” Iran goes nuclear. Saudi Arabia, which signed a mutual defence agreement with nuclear-armed Pakistan in September 2025 and …
Zealous Thierry 