Bulimia

Somewhere, in the otherwise pleasant community of Corona California, sits a woman. At least, I assume she's sitting since she's claimed for years that she never exercised and still lost 198 lbs in 11 months on her Kimkins Plan. Of course, that was a gigantic lie.

Anyway, this woman sits, most likely in front of her computer, and she's probably heaving a sigh of relief, because the story of her diet scam didn't appear on Good Morning America today as scheduled, although word has it she knew this story on what she's calling the Kimkins Debate might not appear today. But she shouldn't be too relieved, and she should put away those celebratory sugar cookies because the segment hasn't been canceled, it's been rescheduled, probably till tomorrow, Sunday, January 20, 2008. And as Heidi well knows, it isn't because they've lost interest.

One thing I find amusing: In one Kimkins Class Action Lawsuit court filing, Heidi K. Diaz aka Kimmer's attorney huffs that opposing counsel and plaintiffs are attempting to (paraphrasing) "try this case in the media." Keeping in mind that Heidi's lawyer is just doing his job .... well, yeah. I can't speak to the plaintiffs or attorney's motives as I am neither, but plenty of us are actively working to see that this is publicized. And why not? It works.

Still. The size and sheen of this woman's gigantic brass balls! Heidi was desperate to use the media to promote her deadly starvation diet wherever she could. It was, after all, the infamous Woman's World cover story which earned Heidi most of her ill-gotten gains. And make no mistake about it, if she could have gotten more magazine covers or any television airtime without revealing that she was, in fact, a morbidly obese woman who had never lost the weight she claimed at all, she would have leaped at the chance.

This begs the question as to just how she thought she was going to get away with never making a personal appearance indefinitely, but that aside, the media was for a time her friend. Sadly, as another blogger points out, the upcoming ABC News story will likely drive some traffic to kimkins.com and result in some new subscribers. That's unfortunate, but you can't save some people from themselves. The ultimate goal here, lawsuit aside, is to see that kimkins.com no longer exists. Until that happens, some people are going to be desperate enough to give her starvation diet a try and damn the risks. Eating disorders, at their cold and lonely cores, have little to do with successful weight loss and common sense and everything to do with desperation.

I know this kind of thinking all too well. For over two decades my weight 'control' method of choice was bulimia (note to other bulimics -- IT DOESN'T WORK!!!!). I knew full well, better than most people, how dangerous that is and what I was doing to myself, but you could not convince me that I needed to stop. Not that anyone was telling me to stop, since I was extremely adept at hiding it, and I outright lied about not having any eating disorders, ever, more than once or wildly minimized it. I honestly can't recall if I ever posted about it anywhere else. But the people in my day to day life -- family, close friends -- knew nothing about it. In fact, until I hit send, about the only people who knew the extent of my illness were my boyfriend, my OA group (who helped, and continue to help me recover) and now, the Internet.

And that, dear readers, is why I care about this so much. I know what disordered eating is like. I know how hard it is to admit you have a problem (there's a reason why most of the people closest to me still don't know), that it is out of control and I know how much work it takes to recover and I know how much easier it is to just take the path of least resistance and justify what you know is dangerous. I KNOW what an eating disorder looks like, and people, Kimkins is nothing more than an instructional pay site for anorexia and bulimia. Encouraging very low, very strict caloric limits and encouraging daily laxative use so fecal matter and water won't show up on the scale is ANOREXIA AND BULIMIA!

This is why, though I never followed the Kimkins plan and was not scammed by this woman, I want her stopped and will do whatever is in my limited power to help see that happen.

Elle