Fit Is The New Black

who has a daughter with a tumor on her spine. Her daughter is only 36-years-old. Her story really bums me out.

Stories like this make me remember how important it is to be active and eat healthy. Many diseases and physical ailments are affected by our diet and physical activity level.

If you want to know more about the connection between the body and food, please read these books.

Skinny Bitch

China Study

The Rave Diet

Poor Natalia Vodianova. She did the unspeakable- saying what many think but are too afraid to say in this PC world. [

Last weekend, during the Vogue-Festival in London, Vodianova (30-yrs-old,model) declared during a press panel that it was better to be thin than fat. Her comments were met with much scrutiny and disapproval, of course.

Vondianova went to her FaceBook page to apologize for her comment, stating that she was really referring to the obesity problem.

Nice save, Vondianova. Nice save.

But does she have a point? While we’ve certainly entered a phase of “self-love” and acceptance in the body-image movement, is there still not cause for major concern when it comes to the state of health in our country? While it’s true that you can’t determine someone’s health just by looking at them, it’s also true that being obese comes with a sack of problems.

Allow me to list them off.

-Risk of Type II diabetes

-Risk of heart disease

-Joint pain

-Sleep apnea (See more of the risks here).

Come on folks, didn’t any of you ever watch the show Ruby on the Style Network?

On a weekly (if not daily), I come across post and articles about how the bmi is crap. People hate how the weight system doesn’t account for muscle or fitness activity. I get it. It’s a flawed system. But we’re not off the hook. I don’t have to pull some stranger onto a scale to see that they might be in line to suffer the horrors listed above. Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about. I’m not going to indulge you with examples.

The whole muscle weighs more than fat is not a bit of info that everyone needs to cling to. It’s a truth more relevant to body buildings and serious athletes-people who spend a fair amount of time devoted to cutting fat and gaining muscle mass. Think about it-How many people do you know who hit the gym 5-6 days a week? If you know less than ten I rest my case. Unfortunately, the fit blogger community is an exception-not a rule. There are not many who are enthusiastic about fitness and health as we are.

Our country is in denial about its health. We point our fingers at runway models-a ludicrous act, being that most runway models average the age of 15-and say, I can’t live up to that expectation.

I must have missed the memo, but when did anyone say that I or you, or any non-model person had to look like a model?

This is about health, not looks. The truth is that sometimes how we look on the outside can indicate what’s going on inside. Not always, but sometimes. Like when you’re sick, and your face becomes sallow and your nose gets red. People are upset with Vodianova, not because what she said was a little tacky (she is a model after-all), but because her statement alludes to an ugly truth-we’re still not on the right track. It was only a week or so ago that another report came out, stating that we’re fatter than we previously thought. How can this be? Oh, just denial, folks. Just good old-fashion denial. People think they’re healthier than they are.

Please don’t be offended by my words. If I’m accusing I’m also confessing. I have also been in denial about my health, and for the sake of literary journalism I will share a bit of my story with you.

Read the rest of my story here and join the debate!