If you can hide it with a jacket, is it really a problem?

I had a mini-crisis this week. Not mini. Huge. A great big fat crisis.

Someone took a picture of me and when I looked at it, I was shocked by the grey-haired, beer-bellied old man in the image.

Probably it didn’t help that I was standing next to a coollooking dude who has been training for months to tackle a 400-km crazy ultra-marathon walk. Oh, and of course the walk is for charity because not only is he not fat and not grey he’s also just a really good person.

Hate people like that.

The photo sent me into a spiral of self-doubt, self-loathing and self-pity. I’ve been a flabby old guy for quite some time but I don’t get smacked in the face with it very often.

I mean, I guess I could have taken a cue from a recent Google search. I was typing “Best …” and by the time I got to “Be-s” Google suggested: “Best running shoes for a fat guy.” So, there’s that.

Plus, the problem with so many of us fat guys is that the size of our jeans does not change even as our body weight multiplies. My waist size has been the same for 30 years but I’m 50 pounds heavier and expanding. All those extra pounds clearly settle above the equator.

Also preventing me from accepting my growing girth and advancing age is that the mirror in my bathroom is a big fat liar.

When I look in the mirror, I don’t see how grey I am. I think my hair looks dark.

And I don’t see my gut from a side-angle so it doesn’t look nearly as bloated as it does in pictures.

That picture of blobbo me next to Mr. Svelte Marathon Walker jolted me into swift action. Not really swift. Swift enough to get winded but that doesn’t take much these days.

With not a moment to lose, I was making plans and setting goals — not to exercise, eat better and get in shape but to go shopping for some clothes that might maybe be a little more flattering to my husky frame.

I did a bunch of more Googling:

How to dress when you’re a fat guy.

Clothes that hide a fat gut. Fat fashion.

DQ’s new fall Blizzard menu. Hide my belly.

I found some good intel. For example, did you know that large checks or plaids such as the shirt I was wearing in that picture may not be that flattering to guys who are built like me?

I shouldn’t have needed the internet to tell me that. My check pattern runs normal, from the collar right down to past my chest then, all of a sudden, it gets all morphed and stretched as my belly pushes the checks out into a whole new and more rounded pattern. Lovely.

So according to the internet, I should ditch the checks and the stripes. What I should do is buy jackets. Lots of jackets.

Makes sense. Jackets hide a lot. Plus they just look sharp.

A jacket can upgrade an outfit just as much as a pair of sunglasses sitting on the brim of a ball cap can downgrade an outfit.

Not judging, sunglasses-on hats guys. It’s just fact.

The internet also advises fat guys to wear solid colours and to possibly go untucked, if possible, so as not to create a clear cut-off point at our waist. I’d say this can create a muffin top effect but if I merely looked like a muffin I might not be in crisis mode now.

I’m now pretty well armed with some jackets, some dark, solid shirts and some dark, solid pants.

What I should probably be doing is taking some steps so that I can stop Googling how to disguise my fat.

Last night I reheated some frozen chili with a plan to pour it over some nachos. I heated it, scooped it out over my plate of chips, added cheese, popped it in the microwave to melt and, wow, what a feast.

Except when I took a bite, I realized it was not chili. It was pasta sauce. And pasta sauce over nachos is just wrong and gross and I ate every bite.

This is the crisis. This is the kind of challenge I need to fight head-on instead of covering it up with jackets.