On Love & Loss: The Break-Up Diet

My boyfriend is making me fat. Well, okay, it might be the steady stream of soda that I just can’t shake, or the fact that I’ve moved from big metropolitan cities where people, like, actually walk to a Texas town where people hop in their trucks just to check the mail, or the fact that said Texas town is renown for the best Tex-Mex and BBQ in the world, but let’s just blame the boyfriend, okay? After being in a steady relationship for nearly 10 months now, my love life is looking better than ever. My waistline…not so much.

It’s a sharp contrast from last year. Following a disastrous, heart-wrenching split with my ex, I squeaked by on a diet of salty tears and, well, a grape or two. It was the ultimate Break-Up Diet. Too distraught to eat, I pulled up my sliding-down strapless tops, bought smaller pants to replace my now oversized jeans, and admired my flatter belly as I bemoaned my love life to friends on the phone. It wasn’t healthy, but deep down, I saw it as the only silver lining in that messy situation.

Now, with my stomach bearing the brunt of too many dinners out and couch potato coupledom, I sometimes catch myself wishing for something (besides diet & exercise, of course) to trigger a fat flush. Not an actual breakup, of course, but maybe a bad case of food poisoning. Terrible, I know!

In the meantime, I’ll settle for the juicy breakup stories at TheBreak-UpDiet.com, the site for author Annette Fix’s book of the same name. I wonder how many calories reading burns?

-Erin Donnelly

 PS. Don’t forget to check out this month’s feature on beauty products that support breast cancer awareness.