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Saturday, February 23, 2019

600 Pounds or Titan

Recently I have been watching "The Titan Games" on NBC. This show is hosted by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and is this physical and mental competition where incredibly strong buff people compete in these crazy strength games like Cyclone, where they use brute strength to knock down pillars with a wrecking ball.

When I watch this I immediately want to work out and lift weights.  OMG these people are amazing and they look so good.  Interestingly, most of them had difficult backgrounds or trauma that they had to overcome.  One woman had absentee parents, so she and her brother became emancipated when she was 15 and he was 17.  Then the brother died in a rock climbing accident, so very sad.  Ultimately, she was able to channel her emotions into working out and becoming this amazing strong fit person. One of the male contestants survived leukemia.

On the other end of the spectrum, I am obsessed with a show on TLC called “My 600 Pound Life”. Each episode tells the story of a person who weighs 600 or more pounds and how they try to turn their life around with diet and weight loss surgery. Honestly, watching these people is like watching a train wreck.  So sad and heartbreaking, yet you can’t look away. 

The people in “My 600 Pound Life” recount their childhood and what led them to where they are now.  Some of them went through terrible abuse; others more of the typical dad worked long hours, so I ate to fill my emptiness.  Or mom and dad fought a lot, so I hid in my room and ate to distract myself from the fighting. 
Is it just me or do other people see the similarities between these two shows? Both shows are about individuals who used different coping mechanisms to deal with life’s difficulties. One group, the Titans, used exercise as their coping mechanism and took it to the extreme –they are the 1% in Fitness.  The other group, the 600’s, used food as their coping mechanism and took it to the extreme – they are in the 1% of Fatness.  
Taken to either extreme, the end result is TV entertainment for me.

Thank you for reading!

Be a TItan

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