One of my favourite Little Britain sketches is the one where Marjorie Dawes, the portly leader of the FatFighters weight-loss group, challenges her students to guess how many calories dust has. "Dust. Anybody? No? High in fat, low in fat? Dust. Anybody? No? Dust. Anybody? No? Dust. Anybody? No? Dust. Anybody? No? Dust. Anybody? No? Dust. It's actually very low in fat. You can have as much dust as you like."
Anyone who has ever sat in a church hall - table-tennis tables leaning against the walls, creche facilities crammed into cupboards - listening to a woman talk about low-fat crisps versus popcorn can't help but experience a painful pang of recognition when they watch that scene.
So it was with a heavy heart that I slouched back into the weekly meeting of my preferred brand of fat-fighters last week. I've joined and rejoined more times than I've had hot FatFighters dinners, and I don't mind telling you I've had a fair few of those over the years.
After more a decade of feeling I was a bad person because I wasn't skinny, I've realised that being overweight doesn't make me a less worthwhile human being. But neither is being too overweight, which I am now, beneficial to my physical, emotional or financial health. Here's the evidence: I get breathing problems and I have less energy. I don't feel good in myself and the I'm-not-worthy feelings start creeping back. I spend a fortune on more clothes than I need because the biggest ones in the wardrobe have stopped fitting.
I don't want to be skinny; I want to be healthy. And the truth is that, unlike most fad diets, FatFighters or FlabBeaters or whatever church-hall meeting you are having yourself actually works.
I arrived at the hall the other day with my usual FatFighters accomplice, who recently had a baby. We are usually in this together, but since she went and created James the playing field hasn't been level. Cuddling her handy baby prop, she might as well have had an arrow pointing at her tummy, accompanied by a neon sign reading: "Not my fault." I had no neon sign. Just the knowledge I could not blame anyone else. I sat there berating myself for not borrowing a baby for the night.
It got worse. When I stood on the scales and the scales insisted I was heavier than I've ever been in my life I spiralled into blackness. I was comforted slightly by the knowledge that I was in the room to make a positive change, but mostly I was just raging.
Later, the leader - kind and slim and not at all like Marjorie Dawes - went around the room, asking people who had lost weight the secret of their success. Instead of being motivated by their can-do approach, I just felt worse. When I was asked why I was here (again) I adopted the Kevin the Teenager pose I've been perfecting since school. "Don't know. Sverydepressingactually. Don't know why I'm here. Snotgonnaworkanyways, sowhatsthepoint? Wasteoftime." The leader, sensing mutiny, quickly moved on to someone more motivated, in case my childish approach infected the rest of the group. The topic of the meeting was personal responsibility, which I have a lifelong aversion to. No mention of dust, though, so that was good.
Later that evening we celebrated our return to FatFighters with freshly delivered pizza. When my accomplice's husband came home from work he shook his head and laughed. He's been here many times with both of us. He has seen us try Atkins, Scarsdale, cabbage soup, only orange foods, Atkins again and, more recently, chocolate, Hula Hoops and Chipsticks.
He is a bit sick of us both, to be honest. He reckons that if we followed his simple advice we'd be fine. I made him promise to send me his miracle programme in an e-mail and promptly forgot all about it. A couple of days later the e-mail arrived. All I had to do was reply, saying "Yes, I will do what you say". "Congratulations! You have taken the first step to a slimmer you!" came the reply. "Before you start, please ensure you are wearing comfortable socks. Now pull them up. Follow these steps: first, eat less; second, exercise more. That's it. Guaranteed. Or your money back!"
My new regime is going well, even if it was challenged slightly by an invitation to celebrate a hotel's birthday with a five-course tasting menu and a €500 cocktail. I don't know how many FatFighters points are in a cocktail made with 200-year-old brandy, vanilla-infused vodka, lashings of cream and 23-carat gold flakes, but it's probably a fair few more than are in my weekly FatFighters allowance. Maybe I'll ask at the next meeting. Gold. Anybody? High in fat, low in fat? Gold.
Only six stone to go.
roisiningle@irish-times.ie