Confession from a chocoholic

Ever want to take a sledge hammer to your bathroom scale? Me too. I know better than to get on the darn thing first thing in the morning, but I have low self-esteem and feel this uncontrollable need to torture myself at least once a day. So I climb onto the contraption to see how my latest battle with the bulge is going, hoping the two pieces of the Chocolate Ambrosia pie with whipped cream and candy bar curls I had last night for dessert miraculously bypassed my thighs and headed straight towards a part of my body that could use a little enlarging. No such luck.

It doesn't help that I have one of those state-of-the-art scales that speaks in five different languages. Created by some emaciated individual with a twisted sense of humor, the new tangled contraption allows you no secrets; it talks loud enough to let everyone in the entire neighborhood know just how much you really weigh in English, Spanish, French, German, and Latin.

My main problem with weight control besides liking to eat, and I do love to eat, is the "c" word. It can be semi-sweet, sweet, milk, bitter, dark or light, and disguise itself under the brand names of Godiva, Fanny Mae, Hershey or Nestles, or be smooth, chunky, in pieces, or drinkable. I know you've guessed what the mysterious "c" word is by now. You're right; it's chocolate, and I never met a piece of it I didn't like. It's one of my many weaknesses and the one that usually gets me in the most trouble in the diet department. Possessing no will power where it's concerned, I only have to be in the same room with it and I gain weight.

I have a friend named Stringbean from the old apartment days, who has no fat cells. She was so slim that when one of us girls forgot our keys to the flat we would just slide her under the door and she would open it for us. It's not that Stringbean doesn't eat, she does eat and eats well. Her body just handles calories differently than mine. I nibble on a stale M&M and it shows upon my scale, but Stringbean can polish off 4,275 chocolate-covered peanuts in one sitting and never gain an ounce. She has the metabolism of a supersonic transport jet while mine is set somewhere between zero and -33.

I bet you know someone like this. This is the person who halfway through a chocolate sundae sweetly says, "I just couldn't eat another bite," while you're desperately licking dried hot fudge drippings off the table two seats over. It's willpower like that that makes you want to pull that stalk of celery from their mouth and force them to eat two dozen double whipped cream filled Rocky Road cookies.

If you want some help give me a call. You can find my number in the telephone bock under the heading Chocolate. And while your at it, please save one of those Rocky Road cookies for me. That's right—hand it over nicely, and no one will have to get hurt.

Susan Wildemuth is a writer who lives in rural Illinois with her husband, son and Spud the Dog.

DECEMBER 1996 ILLINOIS COUNTRY LIVING