Salads would be easier to eat now if it weren’t for the texture. I was devastated learning I’d never be able to enjoy a Big Mac again, a stupid condition I had developed last year took away my ability to taste food. My friend Farah told me I should look at the bright side of this, that I could drop the sixty extra pounds that have been literally weighing me down so much easier now. I did try to focus on that. I didn’t realize that a burger would still FEEL better in my mouth.

The sensation of chewing my meal was not only all I had left of the eating experience, but it was like I could feel the food in my mouth even more now that the taste wasn’t distracting me from it. Salad was still out. My family said I was being selfish, that I could have taken this set back and gotten healthier, start fitting in with the popular girls. None of the women in my family were below a size 20, and we were on the shorter side to boot.

Family get togethers were the worst, I could feel the heat of my aunt and cousin’s stares as I’d eat a couple of hotdogs, or go back for a second plate of ribs. My uncles and grandfather made comments and jokes at my expense. I couldn’t tell if they were trying to lighten the mood or actually found my situation funny. Either way it didn’t make me feel any better. Mom and dad said nothing. Maybe that was a good thing, maybe it wasn’t.

Grandma was the only one to really support me. “Don’t worry about it Layne, if you started losing weight they’d be pissed that you were skinny and how unfair it was. People have a way of making everything about themselves and will find things to be upset about” she told me one evening while we were the only ones to sit out of a family game of touch football. It made losing her that much more painful.