GLP-1s and the Limits of Knowing Better

Strega Nona centers on an Italian witch whose magic pasta pot can create unlimited pasta. Big Anthony learns the spells and accidentally produces so much pasta that it floods and destroys the village. He is punished by being forced to eat all the pasta, framed as a terrible curse. The narrator recalls reading the book at age nine and wanting unlimited spaghetti while also needing to avoid it. The narrator describes an intense love of pasta and uncertainty about whether the love comes from taste or from scarcity. Family history includes strong fixation on weight, fear of fatness, and body-image concerns, alongside personal experiences of being labeled chubby and feeling that eating pasta always carries guilt.

"Strega Nona is an illustrated children's book about an Italian witch with a magic pasta pot. One day, a young neighborhood deviant named Big Anthony learns the spells required to turn on the pot and accidentally makes so much pasta that he floods and destroys the village. His punishment is being forced to eat it all, which is supposed to be a terrible curse. Both then and now, however, this story just makes me jealous."

"I first read Strega Nona when I was 9 years old, and unlimited spaghetti was the thing I wanted most, as well as the thing I most needed to avoid. I love pasta to a ridiculous extent-I love how much bite it has, how it's inherently rich and sweet and delicious and hefty even when served plain. It is impossible to know, though, whether I love it for its extraordinary taste and texture or if it's a love born out of scarcity. I can never remember eating pasta without feeling as though I were doing something wrong."

"When I was a kid, my parents were terrified that I was fat and made their concerns clear. Food obsession runs in the family. My parents' parents-both pairs-are also fixated on weight: I have never seen my maternal grandmother eat dinner, and her sister died of anorexia in her 50s. My dad's parents drink only low-sugar wine. My parents always said their concern was for my health or, in my teens, my "body image"-a curious phrase, since worrying about someone else's body image implies they must already be ashamed of it."

"And I was definitely a chubby kid. I've been approximately 30 percent fatter than I should have been-according to a handful of doctors, pseudoscientific BMI calculators, and the imprinting of modern Western culture-since I was 9. Still, it was obvious that my parents were terrified not about my diet, or my "body image," but about my fatness. My sister, on the other hand, has always had extremely low (11 percent) body fat and eats 3,600 calories a day-1,200 of which are usually, say, Gushers-but instead of givin"

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