Love Changes

How About You?

We roll into Rolling Farms, literally. The bus arrives and they pack the five women, myself and Elizabeth excluded, into a room. We all sit there staring at each other, nervous for what is to come. Suddenly, an energetic woman waltzes in and smiles at us, with a thick country accent she cries, "Hi y'all! Welcome to the first day of the rest of your life!"

People smile uneasily. The small blonde is petite and cute, but has a little bit of a stomach on her, something you wouldn't expect from a workout camp instructor. She sits at the front, "My name is Cassidy, and y'all are gonna be spending a lotta time with me! I find that in order to get the most perfect experience, we have to first share why we are here, to truly cleanse ourselves and our sins-- am I right ladies?"

The women look disturbed and Cassidy shakes her head and murmurs something, "Alright, so I will start! Growing up in the south I would always eat a lot of food because in my small hometown there wasn't much to do. I got really big as a kid and never even bothered to lose it. However in college right before I graduated I learned I was officially obese."

She showed us a photo, you could hardly recognize her with her massive face and big frame. Her thighs were so large they didn't fit in the frame. A few women gasped, "Uh-huh honey I know! It took me a while to get to this, but it started when I came here, I lost the weight and kept it off. Now I work here to help others like you!"

A few people clap but Elizabeth and I aren't yet convinced. Cassidy smiles and points at a woman towards the back, "Darlin' share your story and your name please." 

She uneasily stands up. Her face is angelic, despite being covered in fat. Actually, her face is flawless, it's so pretty its almost blinding, unfortunately her body makes you want to look away. Her lower stomach refuses to fit into her sweatshirt and hangs out, showing off her stretch marks and flab. She has a body type that is rather unfortunate, she doesn't gain much anywhere but her belly. The rest of her is large, her arms filling the seams of her sweatshirt to the brim. She shifts her feet uncomfortably, "Um hi. I am Brandy and um, well it is a long story."

Cassidy smiles angrily, clearly not here for her bullshit, "Well, hun, just give it to us we have a while."

Brandy groans and says, "Alright here goes nothing. Well, believe it or not I was once skinny, like supermodel skinny. In college I fell in love with this guy, for some reason. His name was, um, never mind, and well I wanted to do anything for him. I should mention that he was pretty fat, like borderline obese. We eloped after school and he started going to his job and I got a job at a nearby bakery. He ate so much I just started eating as much as he did. At my job I would eat nonstop all the sweets and eat everything he ate, and eventually more. He got even bigger too, in our first year I gained a hundred pounds and he gained fifty, now officially obese. He had a mini heart attack and the doctor told him he had to lose weight, so while I ate all his food and my own and the bakery food he was working out and getting fit. Another year passed and now he was just chubby, not obese and girls were all over him. He took one look at me one day, as I couldn't tie the extra large apron around my constantly bloated belly and said he was disgusted. He left me and I ate away my feelings. I had a doctors appointment a week ago where I discovered I weighed more than he did at his peak. My stomach is so big I have to drive a special car so my belly won't collide into the wheel. I have eaten non stop since the day he left me a year and a half ago. I don't fit into plus size clothes because my stomach protrudes out for ages. I got trapped in a taxi cab the other day, and in a booth where the firefighters had to come and cut out my gut, while I couldn't stop eating a cake. I got fired from the bakery because I ate all the food before anyone could buy it. But if it is any consolation, my ex got fat again and now is bigger than he was when we got married."

Cassidy smiles, "Honey, you have a classic food addiction, brought on from stress. This can easily be fixed, now please, stop eating the french fries."