Ron’s Reviews > Unbearable Lightness: A Story of Loss and Gain > Status Update

I should really know by now to just skim the epilogues to celebrity memoirs. They always seem to wind up as a dumping ground what whatever random musings the author couldn't fit in anywhere else. "It's controversial to say that you can get fit without going to a gym..." Only if you live in the land of infomercials.

The author mentions Naomi Wolf's "The Beauty Myth", which is an important book and I don't want to take away from it, but I feel like the author (circa 2001) misuses it. All through the book she's talked about her super competitive nature and her mother's inadvertent lesbian-shaming, but she reads Wolf and suddenly it's all Hollywood's fault.

Concerned family confronts the addict, addict promises to change, promise is quickly broken. Sad but not surprising.

"Every script I read described the female. Leads as 'beautiful yet doesn't know it' it 'naturally thin and muscular and doesn't have to work at it.' Effortlessness is an attractive thing. And it takes a lot of effort to achieve it."

After a difficult encounter with L'Oréal, the author wakes up the next morning and decides that she's taking control of her health. Her body doesn't know what's good for her, but Science does. We'll just give Science a little nudge: the nutritionist recommended 1,400 Calories, let's bump that down to 1,000. Except company's coming, so let's say 800.

The author hasn't specifically gotten into the causes of her eating disorder, but her mother raises some red flags. If Portia competed in something and didn't win, Mom wouldn't tell anybody she'd ever competed. And in one contest that Portia narrowly won, Mom seems fixed on "narrowly".

Naturally the book starts with the author's early experiences as a model, and goes up to the late 1998 when she joined "Ally McBeal". Back in those days, being outed was a career-ender, so this big break was not without its burdens.

I'm familiar with the obsessive calorie math and the negative self-talk that the author experiences, but she's on another level. We're just in the prologue and she's planning her whole day around the need to make up for losing control last night. And by losing control I mean she ate six ounces (one normal container) of plain yogurt.