In my work with ASDAH and on the Health At Every Size(R) approach to wellness I’ve felt it my duty to watch HBO’s newest fat panic-mongering documentary “Weight of the Nation”.  Let me tell you, it can be a tough slog to get through this with sanity points intact.  It’s all there: the screaming about the “obesity crisis”, hand wringing and head shaking as folks ask, “What about the children?”, the headless fatties, the obligatory food porn shots, the mug shots of sad and distressed people of size.  It’s enough to make you crazy.  There’s a definite dearth of happy, healthy exercising fat people like those pictured on our Fit Fatties Forum.  Nevertheless, I felt I should watch this, so I can be prepared when my well-meaning friends, families, co-workers, bosses, and complete strangers feel compelled to share some little tidbit of “wisdom” from the show.  So I created a few special tools to help me get through this, and now I’m sharing with you.  To quote the amazing Ragen Chastain, I’m a giver.

Fat Panic Bingo: Just print out this handy FAT PANIC BINGO document, grab some bags of M&Ms and that fat panic video will just fly by.  Enjoy!

Dire Disaster Drinking Game:  Choose one or more of the items listed on the Dire Disaster Drinking Game game sheet and write it/them on index cards.  Every time one of the items on the card shows up on the screen, everybody has a drink.  (I usually suggest shots for this game, but given what I’ve seen so far, you and your guests will be under the table within 15-20 minutes.  Maybe a beer, with low alcohol content, will allow you to get through an entire episode.)

SECRET Word: Pick one or more of the words listed in Dire Disaster Drinking Game and let everybody in your group know what it is.  As you watch, every time the “secret word” is uttered everybody yells and screams.  This game is probably familiar to all of us who watched live morning television in the 80’s…

Target Practice: Who says that people of size should be the only targets?  Put a small piece of translucent tape at the exact center of your television.  Then give each person a nerf suction cup gun and give each person their own color of arrows (or do teams).  Every time the players get really annoyed, they can let the arrows fly.  At the end of the game the one with the arrow closest to the center, “wins”.  NOTE: Shoot objects at your television at your OWN RISK.  If you’re worried about your TV, just arm everybody with wadded up paper towels or folded pairs of gym socks.  Not as satisfying as suction cups, but probably safer.

Prove It: Pick one person to be the judge or the “referee”.  Every time somebody makes an unsupported assertion, the remaining players should yell “prove it”.  Whoever yells first each time, gets a point.  At the end of the game the points are tallied and the one with the most points is the winner.

I am working on some more sober and studious tools and plan to post them here as well.  But in the meantime, I’m hoping these five special games will help both you and me get through this thing.  Hang in there and hold on to those sanity points my little Chicklettes!

Love,

The Fat Chick