Fat Fallacy The French Diet Secrets to Permanent Weight Loss

1 The Big Fat Myth IT WAS A BRILLIANT MORNING. Even by 8:15, the early Key West sun had sunk its deep, touchless massage through my skin and melted me into the wicker weave of my high-backed chair. My wife, Dottie, and I were lingering over our final breakfast at a conference on the neural control of movement (a bunch of scientists, tanning and talking about the brain and how it makes us move). Despite the delicious April sun, the meeting was over and it was time for us to head back home. With our suitcases already packed, we only had to check out and drive to the airport. After chitchatting with colleagues over our scrambled eggs and coffee, we stood to go. A smallish French physiologist from Lyon, also at our table, got up at the same time. Fate's funny like that. Strolling with us as we left, he tossed his query out there like a hopeful horseshoe heading for the stake. "You Americans wouldn't consider doing your postdoctoral work in France, would you?" The conversation suddenly turned into a foreign language film, with the picture above and the subtitles beneath. On the screen, Dottie and I stammered appropriate generalities, "Uh yes, very interesting. Well, certainly that's something to think about. Good-bye, we'll keep in touch by e-mail." But the subtitles read, "France!?! Holy Cow, Yes, Yes, Yes!" We drove to the Miami airport with our heads spinning with the thought. Living in France! This decision was a no-brainer. After many e-mails and two successful grant applications, we boarded a plane with two kids, two cats, my mother, and one-way tickets to work at the Institute of Cognitive Sciences for the next 2 years. During our wonderful stay, it quickly became clear why Americans are so often confused by French attitudes, which often seem to lurch straight out of left field. I realized, though, when my French friends acted like I was the one from another planet, that my American ways were just as bizarre to them. Being shocked by their strange views--and seeing their reaction to mine--became an exercise in self-reflection. No better example exists than diet. The French laissez-faire attitude toward fat and weight hit home on one of our first forays. We hopped aboard the bullet train and zipped across miles of the elegant French calico countryside on our way to visit friends near Lille, in northern France. On the first morning of our visit, our friend served the children (including my 4-year-old daughter, Grace) a shredded wheat breakfast cereal with a liberal dose of whole milk over it. "Whole milk!" I mentally winced, "It's got all that fat in it. Don't they have 2 percent in this country?" With such casual disregard for this major source of daily fat intake, you might think they'd be as large as cows. Of course they're not. Our friends and their children, like over 90 percent of the French people, are small in size and not concerned at all about the nonissue of their weight. It never comes up because they're too busy enjoying their food. It gets better. On top of the whole milk in the cereal, they add a healthy dollop of pure cream. This happens every day. It blares with a bullhorn that our cultural training has clumsily failed us. We've had it drummed into our heads in drill sergeant fashion to watch the fats! Back off the carbs! Scrutinize the labels! But even with all this dietary indoctrination, Americans are the ones with tar-baby obesity problems, who fret and worry about each pound, who drug themselves and starve themselves and have surgeons slice out their stomachs, all to help them handle something as basic as their weight and health. At some point, though, we've got to ask ourselves why on Earth we continue to follow the same dietary creeds that have brought us into this mess. Meanwhile, entire countries scratch their heads and wonder how our constant frenzy to control our weight could produClower, William is the author of 'Fat Fallacy The French Diet Secrets to Permanent Weight Loss', published 2003 under ISBN 9781400049196 and ISBN 1400049199.