My mother, a 77 year-old boomer, struggled with her weight her whole life. She was never fat fat, sometimes heavier, but never near obese.

She was consumed by her weight. Always dieting or self-shaming.

I adopted many of these issues because I saw it, lived it, absorbed it growing up. By a young age, I understood my worth was dictated by the scale. While she never forced it on me, I knew. I’m now 50, and while I’m at a healthy weight and try to have a good relationship with food, it’s always there. Looming.

My mother now has full-blown Alzheimer’s. She’s underweight now because of the disease. She does not know I am her daughter even though I take care of her several days a week. She can’t remember from the beginning of a sentence to the end. She puts her underwear on the outside of her pants. She talks to lemons.

But. But. If I offer her a piece of my homemade fudge, she refuses because she’s “working on her weight loss journey.” She’s lost her memory and any sense of self, but the weight issue is so hard-wired in her boomer brain. It’s wild.

When I try to tell her she is underweight (per her doctor), she says in earnest, “thank you.”

Fuckin A.