I was never able to return to the confines of the liquid diet after that incident. My food intake went right back to cheese, cookies, and other high-fat foods. The little weight I had lost came back. Soon I shot up past 325 pounds.
At the end of the summer I was preparing to leave for college, and my mom and sister moved into a rented condominium situated closer to downtown Wiesbaden, outside of the military housing area. Neither parent was willing to travel to Florida with me to help me settle into college life—something they had promised to do, since I was nervous about living in the States again after being away for so long.
But I was on my own. Business as usual.
I weighed 335 pounds and I was nervous about traveling so far by myself. But as I boarded my flight for Florida everything besides those minor issues seemed right with the world.
Momentarily, that is.
ANOTHER PERSPECTIVE ON GREGG AT THIS TIME
By Amy Wright-Israel, Gregg’s High School Girlfriend
I’m not sure when exactly it hit me: I was dating the high school “fat kid.” I don’t deny that it was a little disconcerting to have classmates walk by and holler, “Skinny and Fatty!” when Gregg and I were walking together. But I wasn’t after the popular vote, so I wasn’t too fazed. Gregg had charisma. He made me laugh. He was indeed, as he liked to say, “Foxy for a fat kid.” While I was shyer than shy he just seemed to have no fear. He would talk to anybody. Do anything. Even outrageous stuff. That got my attention.
My parents made the mistake of saying, “Well, somebody needs to love him. Look at him. Obviously he’s miserable.” I think I took that as a challenge.
Gregg? Miserable? If he was, he hid it well. He somehow managed to be popular and fun. I was actually jealous of him. He was also incredibly talented so we were in community theater, in honors chorus, and on the yearbook staff together. I think his sister hated me. His mother was straight up weird—pretending he was adopted and forcing me to uphold that lie if I ever spoke to her boyfriend. It was ridiculous, because they all seemed to look alike to me. Who was she kidding?
My dad worked at the same hospital where Gregg’s mother worked and he would share rumors about her being the office “tramp.” Her nickname around the hospital was “Passionata Von Climaxx.” I was rather horrified.
“Dee-ahhhna”—as she insisted on being called at the hospital—pressured Gregg to lie about his age and say he was in his twenties. I sucked at lying. I screwed up at a dinner with her and her boyfriend and accidentally told the truth about us being in high school. That resulted in a trip to the kitchen for a stern lecture.
Gregg’s mom had him terrified and forever jumping through hoops for her. There was nothing he wouldn’t do. He would get on me for not playing along. I don’t think I realized how evil she was really being to him. My own mom was very strict, and Gregg and I would commiserate and fantasize about sending our moms to the “island of bitches” so we could live a life free from both of them. We were teenagers.
Despite her strictness, my mom was normal compared to “Dee-ahhhna” and her bizarre fantasy world. I think her delusional lying warped Gregg’s view of himself. Everything was about portraying an image. And it was all about lying, despite the elephant in the room: The elephant in the room often being Gregg.
Yes, Gregg really did break that damned movie theater seat and hollered out: “Amy, my God . . . I just can’t take you anywhere!” It was funny and it was sad at the same time.
I remember how disturbing it was when I found Gregg devouring a gallon of ice cream that he’d taken from my parent’s fridge. Back then I had no clue he treated food like a drug, and that he tried to numb himself by wrapping a wall of fat around his pain.
I had my own pain I was dealing with. My relationship with Gregg had always been a doomed love affair; for one, I wouldn’t play snob and pretend to be something I wasn’t. Gregg found the popular kids in high school for that. I couldn’t understand why he needed their approval and would feel used and unloved as a result.
I also didn’t understand his loyalty to his psychotic mother and to his sister. Fortunately, or unfortunately, Gregg had a confused perspective on what was going on around him. No matter how hard he tried, there was no denying the hell that was his world.
As our relationship developed, I became increasingly frustrated because I loved him. Every single pound of him. And I wanted him to love me. To really love me. I wanted him to notice me. But I was a pawn in his play for attention. I just refused to follow orders and didn’t behave the way he hoped I would. For most of our time together, Gregg seemed most interested in being “popular.”
After graduating high school, Gregg and I were in and out of touch over the years. We always find each other again as friends because of his damned sharp perspective and his blazing wit that can make me, literally, pee my pants.
I never would have thought that Gregg would fight his protective weight and take it all off and allow himself to be naked to this harsh world. Though I do remember when he once confessed how taken aback he was by something my father, a doctor, had said, “Fat people almost always die fat.”
Life as a young adult is trying for anyone. But imagine weighing over 300 pounds at eighteen years of age.
I was terrified of college. This represented more than just leaving home. It was also my first time back in the United States after living overseas for six-plus years. And again, neither of my parents accompanied me on my trip to begin my collegiate years.
The flight itself was harrowing, not because of any turbulence or other force of nature, that is unless you counted my massive belly as one.
Upon seating myself on the plane, I realized that the seat belt did not reach around my body because of my enormous stomach. I wasn’t sure what to do. Should I tell a flight attendant? Should I get off the plane? I decided to strategically place a jacket over my lap to make it appear as though the seat belt was indeed fastened underneath. It was one of many little secrets I used to fool the world into thinking I was a normal size.
Or so I thought.
In South Florida I took an airport shuttle to Lynn University, a ritzy little private school in Boca Raton. The campus was immaculate, as were the bevy of model-like students. I scanned the crowd for anyone who might be bigger than I was. Nada. I was king of the fat kids. In fact, I was the only fat kid.
Florida’s hot sun made matters worse. There’s nothing more devastating than having to make your first attempt at looking cool in front of new people wearing Sears shorts and T-shirts for the “big and tall”—all while sweating profusely.
Let me tell you something. No one knows how to make clothes for the obese male. The crotches hang down at the knees and the polyester shirts hug every inch of a fleshy belly. The Fashion Police would have hauled me off had they been around at the time.
It was okay, though. I knew the tactic many overweight people adopt—become
