Leaving Large

How I Won a 42 - Year Battle With Obesity



It is the one thing found at the intersection of race, culture, identity, status, education, and economics-food.  The truth is: It's never about the food. It's always about the story behind the food.

In Leaving Large: The Stories of a Food Addict, Michelle Petties shares a collection of personal essays that chronicle her triumph over 42 years of obesity and ill-health. As a result of uncovering and understanding her Food Stories, Michelle untangled long held and mistaken beliefs around food and hunger. And learned to make peace between her mind, body and eating. 

After gaining and losing over 700 pounds, Michelle finally discovered the "secret" to gaining the body she long dreamed of was locked in the stories (termed Food Stories) of why she ate what she ate. In Leaving Large: The Stories of a Food Addict, she takes you deep inside her personal struggles with food addiction and yo-yo dieting with insight, candor, and wisdom.

By tapping into the power of her own Food Stories, Michelle unlocked and debunked the untruths she carried around for decades and discovered the underlying truths about the mind, body, and food connection. 

"My heart breaks for the four out five African American women who are either overweight or obese. My heart breaks for who I used to be. I was morbidly obese, once tipping the scale at 260 plus pounds.  I am a Black woman of a certain age, and for 42 years, I was in a fight for my emotional, physical, and spiritual life - unconsciously eating for all the wrong reasons, battling subconscious Food Stories, looking to food for joy, entertainment, companionship, pleasure, comfort, salvation, and status, using food to mask stress and daily discomforts that I never allowed myself to feel. This book is needed now, for the ever-rising number of Black women facing health crises-often weight-related, and for the nearly 70% of Americans who are overweight or obese. The Food Stories in my memoir hold the secrets to leaving those statistics in the dust. Presenting the truth in my Food Stories is my gift to anyone who is battle weary." - Michelle Petties

Leaving Large is for you. If you are...Exhausted from years of losing weight only to gain it, and then some, all back...Successful in your professional life, but a failure when it comes to managing your weight...Powerless over work stress, life stress and emotional overeating...Embarrassed by the amount of money and time you have spent chasing weight loss promises and programs...Afraid of the mirror, the scale and the camera...Sick of always being the biggest one in the room...Tired of looking at a closet filled with beautiful, "paid-good-money-for" clothes that are TOO small, tight or uncomfortable ...Frustrated by the affect your weight has on your social life and your relationships...Unable to control dis-comfort food cravings and private or late-night binges...Fed up. Period. I see you. I feel you. I am you. My stories are your stories. My win is your win. This book is dedicated to...YOU.