The Grand Delusion of a Fat Chick and the Attack of the Curry Spice!
By: tmhogirl (12 December 2008)
I had a routine medical check-up recently and had to blow into one of those blowy things that measure lung capacity and fitness. You know the thing where some tube-like thing is inserted in the mouth, you inhale and then exhale into the tube for as long as possible. Someone tell me what this thing is called as I can't be bothered to find out right now.
Following a couple of these tests, and a quick chat with the friendly nurse, I was called in to see the doctor to discuss my general health and the test results. She wasn't my usual doctor. She introduced herself with a shy, almost fearful smile and said that she was a registrar working with the consultant in charge of the unit.
I smiled warmly at her to put her at ease and to reassure her that I was really not that scary. Smiling was also a defence mechanism that somewhat closed my rather large nostrils, stopping me from gagging from the pungent smell of curry emanating from this doctor's small meeting room. There was also a dodgy smell of fart, but I will not go there.
"Well, I've looked at your results but it looks like the reading is incorrect. Have you been feeling OK?" She asked in a rather weary voice.
"Yes, very well, thank you." I responded but I wanted to know more about my incorrect results especially as the bouncy friendly nurse didn't say anything about the readings appearing unusual when she gave me the readings. As always, I had recorded the results in a little notebook where I had charted the previous 7 results in the four years I had been coming to that unit.
She studied my notes, looked at me and asked me what I weighed, sighed and said,
"Well the reading is obviously incorrect." This was followed by a rather annoying embarrassed laugh.
I smiled, encouraging her to continue and at the same time wondering whether I too would be stinking of curry if I remained cooped up in this smelly little room for much longer. I had a meeting later that afternoon and didn't exactly want anyone thinking that my so called hospital appointment was in fact an extended lunch time visit to a curry house, albeit one with a dodgy smell of fart. Hmmm yummy.
"Well, you see…" She started snapping me out from my curry worries. "The results show that you have the lung capacity and fitness of well…almost like an athlete and we both know that's not possible." She remarked with a little shake of the head giving me a sympathetic smile.
Being caught completely unawares by her comments, I found myself being totally uncool and switching into full blown defence mode.
"Yes, but I do work out 4 or 5 times a week and have done so for over a decade." I protested probably speaking faster than usual.
She looked at me, trying hard to disguise the sweeping glance at me, from my head with the sneaky double chin, the breasts bulging from my top, my tummy with plenty of love handles, the full childbearing hips which I had inherited from my mother without my consent, and of course my rather lumpy legs. The sympathetic smile was replaced by an even more sympathetic smile, if that was at all possible.
"Well…yes, it's good that you do some exercise, it might help you lose a bit of weight but even moderate exercise won't really produce these results."
"Moderate exercise? Right, I see." I mumbled but inside I was beginning to fume. I never said anything to her about moderate exercise. I wanted to tell her that I work my ass off in the gym for nearly 8 hours each week. I wanted to tell her that even though the said ass is in fact, a fat ass, something is obviously working because I am fit. In fact, I am very fit. My mega fit hunky personal trainer tells me that I am fit, so there you have it. I am fit goddamit.
The assault on my fitness was struggling with an even greater assault. A more pressing matter, a more important matter. It was becoming increasingly difficult to breathe and hold my nose up at the same time, without of course appearing as if I was holding my breath. I was also slowly accepting the fact that the more time I spent in that tiny office, the more any chance I had of going to my meeting without stinking of curry dwindled away. Perhaps, it was time to accept that the assault on my alleged fitness, and prevent any more attack of the spices.
The good doctor had won. I was about to say thank you and see you later, and hope that a brisk walk in the fresh air would remove any traces of the aforementioned curry smell.
But then she spoke.
"Well…even me won't get anywhere near as good a result as this." The skinny insect (no disrespect to any of you slim birds, I love you and I wanna be you) doctor said interrupting me from my white flags of surrender. Had she just implied that if a skinny bird like her wasn't fit, a fat chick like me couldn't possible be fit? Was she also implying that any differences in lifestyle wouldn't make a difference, and that the only thing that mattered in an examination of my fitness was just whatever random numbers appeared on a random scale? Now she has pissed me off.
I glanced at my previous results at the same time as it dawned on me that the war against the smell of curry was well and truly over. It had been lost. The shock and awe of bombardment by the good doctor had defeated my sensitivities. I was a fat chick who smelled of curry spices.
But all was not lost. The battle line had been drawn in the battle for my fitness. It was time to teach the good doctor some lessons. It was time to make her engage her God given brain that was obviously good enough to get her through five years of medical school.
Let the game begin!
"Doctor, I'm a little bit surprised because the nurse didn't say anything about the results being faulty and we did the test three times all with consistent results." I started in a quietly pathetic voice, calling her doctor in my most respectful voice.
"Yes…well, these things happen. Obviously the nurses don't interpret the results." She said with an annoying patronising laugh.
"I see" I replied in the same small voice.
"Well, if you've been feeling fine, then, I don't see any problems. Let's repeat the test next time."
"OK, doctor." I said submissively.
"Good. You'll probably see someone else next time." She said and I should have read that as my dismissal. In the game of adult languages, it was a polite way of telling me to piss off as my allocated time was over. I had been dismissed. She probably thought the game was over. But I still had one or two things up my sleeves.
"Sure, great. Doctor please can you tell me what my last results were?" I asked knowing fully well what the last result and the other 6 results were.
"Sure." She replied, tapped into her computer and read out a result that was almost identical to the current one.
I said nothing. I wanted her to work it all out all by herself.
"Well, yes, I see that the last result was faulty as well." She said and it was my turn to return the sympathetic smile.
"OK. Could you check the results since I've been coming to the unit?" I asked smiling at her. The make believe small voice was gone. I was the one serving and in control of this game. For my efforts, she returned my smile.
She tapped into her computer and the smile on her face quickly faded as her brain ticked away and she battled with the idea that either the tests results had been faulty the 8 times I had visited the unit and seen other doctors none of whom had ever noticed these false readings, or as improbable as it might sound to her, this fat chick was in fact a fit chick.
"Well… hmmm…something is obviously not quite right here." She murmured. I put on my best I'm-so-pathetic-I-know-nothing-and-I-am-so-concerned voice. You know the voice I'm talking about.
"What is the matter doctor?"
"Well… the results have been more or less the same all the time you've been seeing us."
And? Spell it out woman. I thought and as nothing was forthcoming from her, I played my next move.
"But I do not understand doctor. What does that mean doctor?" I knew I was taking the piss but I was having too much fun with myself.
"Well…maybe the machine has been faulty at the times you've visited…"
Oh, come on woman. Give me a break here. Time to bring this game to an end. Time to serve my ace.
"Have you had problems with anyone else doctor?" I asked.
"Well…no, I don't think so." She mumbled.
At this point in the game, I was no longer in the mood for silly games. I will no longer pretend to be a submissive, ignorant fat chick. The pathetic voice was gone. My normal confident assertive voice would make a welcome return. Goddamit, I may be fat, but I work extremely hard to be fit and I am fit and proud. It is time to claim my place in the glorious grading of the blowing machine. It was time to make the good doctor finally engage her brain. It was time to kick her skinny ass.
"Could it be that there has been nothing wrong with the machine or machines in the four years that I have been coming here and the results are consistent because I am in fact very fit, almost to the level of an athlete, after all I do work out extremely hard and eat very well?" I said not pulling any punches.
She looked at me with a shadow that could possibly be interpreted as surrender or maybe it was embarrassment, perhaps a touch of humility, or my personal preference, the realisation that she had learnt the meaning of that old cliché, never judge a book by its cover AKA a fat chick can also be a fit chick.
"Well…yes, it looks from your results that your lungs capacity are great and you are in fact fit, very fit indeed."
I rewarded her with a genuinely warm smile, not even a triumphant one, just a happy smile.
"Thank you doctor."
"Well…yes, keep up the good work." She said and I swear I heard some new respect in her voice.
"Thank you doctor." I repeated stepping out of her tiny smelly office with a spring in my step.
As I left her office, I wondered whether a splash of perfume or six would disguise the smell of curry now very much embedded into me. But it seemed like a lost cause. But I was happy. I might have lost the battle of the curry spices but in the battle of celebrating the real fact that a fat chick can also be a fit chick, it was game, set and match, fat chick.
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Comments on this post:
"I haven't laughed so much in a long time. Well done for fighting your corner. Some people can be so shockingly patronising and judgmental."
summer (14 December 2008)
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"It's called a spirometer and you should have stuck it up her patootie for being such a patronising old crone."
WelshKate (16 December 2008)
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"Thanks so much Summer. It took a while but we got there in the end. WelshKate thanks for the name! LMAO"
tmhogirl (16 December 2008)
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