Nutrition
I Swear to Tell the Truth, the Whole Food, and Nothing but the Body
by Justin Kolber
Don’t do it Justin. But I need it. I was sitting in the parking lot of Dunkin Donuts in South Burlington, Vermont, in my rusted Toyota Camry filled with fast food takeout containers, debating how to order two dozen donuts just for me. I was an OB—original binger. There were no kiosks or self-checkouts or Door Dash. I had to stare a human being right in the eyes and order my obscene quantities. Rule one was obvious: Don’t just be my true self. Hi, I’m a 28-year-old lawyer and I’d like to eat twenty of your delicious donuts really fast and then feel like killing myself, please. Maybe I should pretend like I’m ordering for my office’s Friday morning coffee gathering: Umm, someone wanted powdered-sugar….. Oh, bear claws? Adrian likes those. Yeah, two dozen should be enough for everyone.
I can run up mountains, bench press 300 pounds, do 100 pull-ups, crash my snowboard over and over to learn a new trick, and endure all kinds of physical pain—but procuring food in front of another human being cripples me. Shame pain is inescapable.
I grabbed my donuts using the No-Frills technique—super-fast and low in tone—then hustled back home alone. I hurriedly dug in, popping my glazed donuts whole like a sad circus pelican. Then I moved onto the salty main event: two supreme pizzas that I had pre-ordered for delivery. Food isn’t supposed to taste this good. Then again, as quickly as I speed gulp everything, do I really taste it? Why can’t I stop? I assumed it was my weak willpower, clueless to the studies showing that ultra-processed food can be as addictive as smoking or gambling. Pizza ranks number one in addictive foods, with its holy trinity of cheese, crust, sauce—high fat, high carbs, high salt.
At least I wasn’t truly alone that evening. My childhood companions are always with me in my DVD collection: Conan the Barbarian, Mr. T, The Incredible Hulk, Rocky Balboa, Neo and Johnny Utah. Tonight’s viewing was Point Break. It seemed like a goddamn Oscar-worthy picture when consumed alongside fried dough. A washed-up law school graduate who learned to surf as an adult and solved bank heists? And more importantly, served up Keanu Reeves’ dramatic, whimpering, long-eyed vacant stares into a camera? Johnny Utah, you’re my spirit animal.
I’ve been like this for as long as I can remember. I grew up in the steroidal boom of the 1980s, on a steady diet of ripped male torsos: live action wrestling, barbarian cartoons, and an endless stream of R-rated Jean Claude Van Damme kick flicks. My mornings were spent alone chomping down sugared cereals with my hunky bare-chested companions. Left to my own interpretations, those ab-filled images created a washboard floor with no ceiling in my psyche. I learned that muscularity equals masculinity, and that real men rescue people in distress from other bad men. Which I meant I needed to be a good man, the hero. And that starts with the body. Like He-Man, my childhood mantra was “I have the powerrrrr . . . to get ripped.” Um, that was pretty much it. By age 28, I was still unconsciously and relentlessly pursuing little five-year-old Justin’s five-year plan to be a warrior in fuzzy boots. Part of that included law school, thinking I would fight injustice and help others.
It was a tough paradox for my sensitive nature. I wanted to help people, which meant I had to fight the bad guys. Except I hated fighting, and I avoided conflict.
In fifth-grade summer camp, tiny Stevie Wizniak punched my cheek because I was talking to Lauren Lipinski. I stood there frozen while he stood on his tippy-toes to reach my face. That was the extent of my fighting career: “O and 1” and I was done. I don’t ever want to fight you with my fists.
As a lawyer, I have to fight with my words. And maybe a little bit of my physicality, just for show. Let’s face it, I am tall and if I wear the right posture, the one we’re supposed to, and act like I have the confidence I project—with my broad shoulders back, chin up, chest out—you might think I was a V-framed warrior in a suit coming to take your testimony. And I was. I had patience—the slow needling kind.
But don’t be fooled by my ripped muscles. My outward success belied my inner contradictions. Sure, I could take your deposition, but afterwards, I take off my tie in my old beat-up Camry carpeted with sunflower seed shells and start my real fight—breaking down in a fit of steering wheel slamming repressed rage and tears. All over whether I was allowed to eat greasy pastrami on rye and jelly-filled powdered donuts.
Of course, I didn’t have this level of self-awareness at age 28 while I sat there numbing myself with donuts, pizza, and Point Break. The point of food and body obsessions is to avoid that knowledge. Bury it and keep it buried in my ever-expanding football-gut. Stay the hell away from myself. But it never lasts . . .
By the next morning my numbness wore off and I was back to myself. That meant a sugar hangover and crippling stomach bloat. On the plus side, being at the bottom of a pendulum swing gave me more jolt than a double venti morning macchiato. Eating a shitty greasy meal was a reason to eat healthy the next time. Screwing up was a welcome, distracting rasion d’etre. A mission, a purpose—it staved off contentment, boredom, and death. You can tell me to have a nice day. That’s easy to ignore because it’s fake. But tell me to have a regular day? I will freak the F out. That’s my worst nightmare, my Sisyphean mountain, my impossible challenge.
Crap. I am late to work because of my extended morning bathroom time, yet another embarrassing byproduct of my condition. I had recently gotten my first real job working for a small boutique law firm doing business litigation. The sole partner saw some potential in me that I didn’t. Still, I’m always game for proving myself, especially if it involves self-punishment.
At the firm, the days started to add up. I started putting in long hours, nights and weekends. Hustling for dollars and approval. On top of that, I was busting my elbows and kneecaps at the Vermont Brazilian Ju-Jitsu gym. My new co-worker suggested it—“keep our bodies strong, right?” he had proposed. Sure, I wanted to fit in. Plus, I worked out. How hard could it be? In addition to the long workdays, I was Muay Thai kickboxing on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
One evening at the gym, our Brazilian coach Julio gathered us around. “Justin, you gonna spar with Iron Ryan tonight,” he said. Pronounced with a hard J, Julio’s nickname was La Foca, meaning “the seal.” At only 5’6” with jet black hair and wild eyes, Julio was a world-class surfer and was known as the slippery seal on the grappling mat. Julio’s lessons included wisdom like, “hey guys, you don’t have to eat the pizza all the time or drink the beer all the time. Just have the one. I go out with my wife. We just have the one.” He also encouraged us to participate in the Burlington Brawl—an upcoming amateur MMA fight. Julio’s brawlers all talked about making weight and what they were not eating in order to do so. No ice cream, sweets, or snacks. No carbs. Definitely no pasta dinner with the kickboxing girls after training. “What’s the worst thing gonna happen?” Julio counseled. “You not gonna die. Maybe you get choked out…maybe you get knocked out. But you not gonna die!” Okaaaaay…good advice, I guess. Except I didn’t really want to brawl and get choked out, so I stuck to practice. I looked over at my sparring partner. Iron Ryan was tall as me, with a long, pointy beard wrapped in a rubber band. How is this supposed to go? Do we shake hands? I gave a little wave. Why am I smiling? I am such a dork. While sparring, Iron Ryan broke my big toe with a big kick.
It didn’t take long on the kickboxing-attorney-at-law treadmill for my old law school habits to resurface. And, being no longer ensconced in the gentle rhythm of academia, the 9-9 Life was rear-naked choke-holding me, squeezing my windpipe and extracting ever more precious minutes and hours out of me. I didn’t realize I was getting burned out and reverting to my only sources of comfort. My body was no temple, I treated it like a casino.
As the weeks ticked by, my sugar hangovers started to interfere with my morning sharpness at the law firm. The partner noticed me coming in late. My new solution was to stop eating altogether, though I called it intermittent fasting—with “intermittent” meaning starving myself for 24 hours after every failure. Each order of barbecue chicken tenders and M&M cookies reset the clock. I kept track of it all, filling up my kitchen calendar with a deranged scrawl of Xs and frowney faces. X was a good day, 24 hours with no food. The frowney face meant I gave in and ate. It was a tic-tac-toe challenge board of relapse and self-loathing.
The frowneys were winning, covering four to five days a week. Ignore the pain, I told myself. Julio was right—what’s the worst that’s gonna happen? Maybe you pass out… but you not gonna die. I have to work harder. Two Xs in a row. 48 hours of no food. Fasting. Starving. What’s the difference?
During that time, I also read about the Master Cleanse. It totally made sense to me. I used to obsessively clean our childhood house as a kid. I was the miracle mopper, why not my insides? Vermont pure maple syrup gave me an extra edge, I thought, as I mixed my lemon juice, cayenne pepper and filtered water. I am pure. After four days, I snuck an olive…..then a pickle……then a buffalo cheesesteak. Another frowney face. Reset the cleanse clock.
Practicing law on an empty stomach was fascinating. Because I was no longer using my salivary glands, I needed to chew extra gum at the law firm to hide my bad breath. The first 12-15 hours were the hardest. With no meals to break up the day, time became a standstill gelatin, neither liquid nor solid. I had to track my hours for the firm in tenths-of-an-hour increments so that I could get paid for writing a six-minute email. But I no longer needed the timekeeping software to remind me because my stomach howled in sharp pangs every fifth minute. Ignore it, ignore it. Time was the real enemy. Keep writing the brief. Don’t go downstairs.
The firm had a break room stocked with large tubs of chocolate caramel pecan clusters, cases of peanut M&Ms, popped potato crisps—it was a Costco snack-lover’s dream. I abused the treats only after hours when my boss was gone. During the day, I avoided it like a French medieval oubliette: a self-torture snack dungeon. At night, I scurried out to my rusted Camry with arms full of empty Costco containers and pockets stuffed with crumpled potato chip bags. A hunched-over trash goblin, hoping I didn’t get caught robbing my own firm of its garbage. And let’s be real, a whole barrel of pecan clusters for the road. An important rule of binging was hiding the evidence. It’s better to eliminate the entire container than to leave a ransacked box or bag.
After sixteen hours of self-imposed famine, it became easy, almost sublime. I was good at bench pressing. Now I was getting good at starving myself. Before I knew it, I was up to three days of no food. These were not peaceful, spiritual fasting periods, with rest and a sauna. Each day I was commuting through morning traffic to a busy law firm, churning out major stress briefs, grappling with sweaty dudes on a grubby mat, and lifting weights in a neon fluorescent gym. All done with zero calories.
Months went by like that. Good phase, Bad phase. Email clients through mind-distracting hunger, spar with Iron Ryan at the gym, gorge on weekend takeout. I almost passed out in kickboxing class. Then I actually passed out at work. The partner noticed that too and gave me an ultimatum. “Look Justin, I don’t know what you’re up to on the weekends, but it’s affecting your work here.” This got my attention. I knew I had to make some changes. But how?
While stuck in Burlington traffic one day, I noticed a bumper sticker ahead of me: “Both what you run from and yearn for are within you.” Hmm, I knew what I was running from. Sugar. Maybe love too. My mom taught me they were synonymous and that’s okay; it was her love language. I’ve spent my life believing I don’t deserve either. But wait, I yearn for them as well? Sitting there in my old Camry, surrounded by my mountain of car trash, the emptiness of empty Styrofoam started to make its point. No one was forcing me to eat sugar or deprive myself of it—nor was anyone knocking down my door offering me love. Let’s face it, I was pretty un-date-able, sitting in my car with zip ties for door handles. It was all up to me. I vowed to start trying.
That’s when the real battle began. For the next two years, I learned the limits of willpower, that throwing myself harder against the wheel was the problem, not the answer. Us weightlifters live to lift to fail: Failure to get that last rep is not defeat, but a sign that we’re working the muscle to its limit, so that it can repair and be stronger for the next lift. Though I understood how this worked in the gym, it took me plenty of backslides to apply that lesson beyond the barbell.
When I finally asked for help for myself, without being nudged or prompted, that’s when I was ready. My final failure became my first step on the road to healing.
Today I am a public interest lawyer, back in the food battle but on a different front, no longer alone nor paralyzed in the Dunkin parking lot. I am part of a public protection team that protects consumers from the systemic forces out to exploit or deceive us.
About the Author
Justin Kolber is a practicing attorney in Vermont. He is an athlete, activist, and author of Ripped, the first memoir on the dual extremes of muscle and food disorders. More info: www.justinkolber.com
