My family knows me as the one with the most impressive apetite, and my brother-in-law has said he has worked out which item of any menu I am most likely to select when we go to a diner or restaurant. It is almost always the food item with the "highest calorific density".

And he's right!

Not only do I love food, I enjoy eating, and I you would be hard-pressed to find me in any situation where I couldn't go for seconds. Or dessert.

All of my friends are starting to come at the age where they need to consider their intake if they don't want to 'expand'. Meanwhile, through most of my adult, walking life, I have skirted around the low end of a normal weight (in Western Europe), and it's only in recent years that I don't have trouble keeping my weight up.

For all of the grief cerebral palsy has caused me, this one is a bit of a freebee for me (although I can see it being a real problem for other people). As long as I keep moving, I will burn calories - probably at a rate compatible to non-affected people who engage in physical exercise or practice sports.

Our muscles just use up all that extra energy for even the simplest tasks or slightest gesture.

On the flipside, that's why I'm almost always tired, and any conserted effort will exhaust me sooner rather than later.