As A Matter of Fat

"FAT FAT FATTY FAT!"
(As Always, Fuck Your Unsolicited Opinions) 

A heartclogging beauty pictured in natural habitat. 

Year 2015. Los Angeles. Mondrian Hotel Sky Bar. 

"Hey. Should you be drinking?"

I painfully turn to my right where the intrusive, judgmental, distinctively male voice is wafting from like a hideous stench. Instant regret. I am met by the sight of a very hairy, very short, portly man who is at least fifty years of age. I immediately notice the hand grasping his drink is sporting a big old wedding band. 

Classy.

You got something to say motherfucker? 

Mentally I start wheeling through scenarios like a Vegas slot machine and land on "I'm feeling lucky."

"I can do whatever I want," I snapped.

The Mister who had been idling nearby his sister and our friend, Neema but has his creeper-radar-phasers set to kill. I am relieved when he pops up almost magically by my side.

"Hi! Is there a problem here?"

We both watch as the repulsive man belly laughs and then points at my abdomen which is draped in a pleather body con dress with a high thigh slit - I feel like fucking vampiric Batwoman right now, ready to fly away into the night and suck the life out of scumbags.

That's when he says, "But you're pregnant."

I can hear the blood pounding in my ears. 

"I AM NOT PREGNANT I AM JUST FAT."

YOU FOOL!!!!!!

Unbelievably, but believably the guy just keeps going.

"Well you should be - " Are you fucking serious? 

Unwisely, he continues, "You guys should have kids, I have kids!" 

That poor, poor woman...How can this guy have kids? (Also...where the hell are our drinks?)

Seething, I reply, "I don't want kids."

He seems genuinely appalled by this. Of course, it's none of his business really. I may have a Mister, but I'm very much still a Miss (remember guys this is 2015 pre-engagement). There hasn't been a wedding bell if I've heard it and with all the great lengths I've went through to ensure Hotel Uterus is closed, boarded up and sealed better than the Mummy's tomb...kids are not on the table.

To my further disgust, he begins whining like a small child, "Whaaaat? Why not?"

"I have dogs. Dogs are better than children," I said matter o' factly. "They don't wear diapers and I don't have to pay for their college."

He is stunned, but then bursts into laughter.

By this time the bartender has finished with our order and I slide up to pay the man, scoop up our drinks with the assistance of the Mister and without a second glance, stroll off into the night feeling dignified, but admittedly insulted.

I had the upmost sympathy from all of my friends.

All my friends: "Ugh really?"
Me: "Yes really."

Apparently I was not alone. There were many stories about presumptuous assholes who inappropriately assumed their bumps and lumps were in fact baby related. I cannot fathom why anyone would dare to ask such a personal and invasive question.

What if the baby had been lost? It has happened, my co worker told me. She shudders at the memory of a story she heard about a woman was carrying a stillborn baby and someone asked, "Oh when are you due?"

And others like my own.

"One time, some guy at the checkout tried making small talk and asked how many months along I was. I said none and it just was awkward for the next five minutes until I could get the hell out of there."

There is so much to unpack here:

• People aren't able to stop loudly and inappropriately ascribing identities or drawing conclusions about a persons' body. 
• People aren't comfortable with fat bodies. 
• People aren't comfortable with women who don't want children. 

FLASH BACK.

I distinctly remember a very serious conversation of a deeply shameful nature when I was in elementary school. It is hard to believe now at 26 and 5'2, but in elementary school I was among the taller and larger girls in the classes during my elementary schools days. It is rather funny now as many of the smaller persons I grew up with now tower over me or are the same height. I enjoyed food and as any child who was raised on away camps, girls scouts and loved playing outdoors, led a fairly active lifestyle. But, my diet which mainly comprised of the usual child approved foods: ketchup, chicken nuggets, pizza, fruit, fruit juice and popsicles, I had no idea I was somehow walking into danger. According to my mother I was in danger of being overweight and therefore my diet was the subject of serious scrutiny. I was too heavy she told me. She rose the alarm. I remember standing on the scale and being told,

"You're 113 pounds!"

The horror! 

We were standing in my parents' bedroom. The center of the universe was revolving around a plastic digital scale where the angry red numbers appeared over and over again with the sound of a very stern lecture. My weight, my mother said was inappropriate and something serious had to be done about it. I was 113 pounds and about 4 feet tall. 

I was eight years old.

END FLASHBACK.

My mother and the Mister are the kinds of seriously concerned eaters that I refer to as "healthaholics." Growing up, I was not permitted to eat an excessive amount of red meat or fried foods. I ate what was to be expected of a child with a limited palate. I ate foods on the kids' menus like burgers, hot dogs, chicken nuggets, ketchup but I did not care for red sauce on pizzas or anything green. I was declared to be a "picky eater", but this was grossly unfair. 

I mean, who fucking ate brussels sprouts and avocado toast when you were eight in the 90s???? I wanted a fucking grilled cheese and french fries! I did not even want pepperoni pizza.

For the record, the Mister hates spinach to this day! 

My consumption of soda, candy and other "bad" food was very regulated by my parents. We hardly ever went to places like McDonalds and I was raised believing pork and beef was only to be consumed at Christmastime. Pork actually was something that was more forbidden than the fruit from God's Garden. I wouldn't have put it past my young self to believe eating it led to immediate damnation.

I believed for years I was fat, because my parents seemed to think I was. I am so disturbed as an adult looking at our childhood pictures. My childhood pictures even recent ones from high school. Why on earth did I think I was fat? I look at my body. My arms. My chin and neck. My legs and thighs. I think about all the years I spent in the pool, swimming laps for hours on end. I think about the years of being subjected to PE. I couldn't do fucking pull ups, but at one point I was so fit I ran an 8 minute mile after cross training with swimming for so long.

And then in college. I remember sobbing myself to sleep in my dorm room my first year. I was horribly lonely. I did not know a soul at school and I was hyperaware that it felt like to me that every single person on my floor was a lithe, slender beauty and was simply the opposite of me: NOT fat. Of course this was absurd for many reasons: 

1) I had no fucking idea if anyone had body issues 

2) I didn't realize there was NOTHING wrong with me.

The pictures simply do not lie. Compared to how I look now, in my high school pictures I am less full in figure, but my figure was curvy and filling in. I had been too embarrassed, mortified to seek help from my mother (or anyone really) to go bra shopping. When I was fitted properly, I discovered I was moving up in size partially because of wanting more coverage but mainly due to my hips, the thighs, the waist and naturally bust, getting "bigger."

I didn't realize that bigger wasn't bad. 

That shaming incident when I was eight had led me being dragged off to nutritionists who had told me much to my relief that I was "just fine." My diet was good and healthy. I was getting calcium and loved to eat fruits. I was active. The nutritionist saw nothing out of the ordinary and off we went. My parents were not totally convinced I think. They hassled me to go running. They kept saying things like, "Are you sure you want to eat that?" But it only got worse as I got older.

In college, my independence and my onset of depression meant a lot of meals that consisted of caffeinated drinks, late night meals, fried food and sugary food. Yet, my mother's rigorous almost militant training stayed with me and even did my own obsession with being "acceptable to be seen" in public. I often hid my rolls with baggy clothing or pillows so that none would be visible in photographs or to anyone who might see them. I never gained a freshmen fifteen, that seemed to come after graduation. Post-Grad Pounds I guess?

But I did balloon. And so did my depression.

I was being ripped apart by my own consciousness while my physical, mental and emotional self was being mutilated by a vicious ex boyfriend whose callousness and utter disregard for me plagued my body to the point of vomiting, skipping meals or the dramatic opposite: constant eating. By the time my second relationship was on the outs, I suddenly had no energy to shower. No passion to cook. No amount of puppy prodding could get me outdoors. It didn't help the Willow house was in such close proximity to a decadent cafe that sold enormous chocolate chip cookies and exquisite fried meat sandwiches.

I took to sleeping most of the day, but was haunted by the reports that I was snoring or choking in the middle of the night, because I was not breathing. At the urging of my therapist at the time, my concerns about my steady weight gain as well as my inability to feel rested, I went to a sleep clinic. The diagnosis was not at all what I had expected: Sleep Apnea. So...I would have to look like a goddamn fighter pilot every night?

WONDERFUL.

When I protest, I protest like an adult.

I even foolishly believed I would have problems dating because of my weight. Silly me. When filling in my OkCupid profile and I got to the body section when my friends decided one night that I would have a profile because it was time. It had been now 2 years since the Shrub was gone and I did not protest. I looked at the options and looked up at the table, "Am I 'a little bit extra' or 'curvy'?" Unanimously, I was declared to be: "CURVY."

Huh. Curvy.

It had a nice ring to it. And well, I did have hills and valleys. If I drew myself it would be a lot rounded half circles and no edges.

And any pretense I had about how my weight was going to affect my ability to mate or find a mate was dashed by the uptick of hundreds of inquiries that soon were filling up my inbox and view count once my friends added pictures to my profile.

Could it be...I am...hot? 

I was stunned. The numbers were nothing extraordinary really, but I was an online dating noob. Even a hundred was more than what I thought I was going to get. And I knew a lot were bots and creepers and more creepers, but...weight, my weight was not going to stop anyone. And while numbers are just numbers and I thankfully never made the mistake of paying to see WHO liked me, having had my security crushed by the first man I loved, this was doing wonders for my self confidence.

This experience in online dating also taught me that I really couldn't let the media or even my own insecurity fool me into thinking being fat was a deal breaker. There are men, a lot of men who were very, very much into big women. Now, what the media likes versus what you like or what you think is liked, it is a very different picture. But hell, I am way heavier now than what Bridget Jones claims to be in her first movie and heavier than she was when I started dating for the first time in 2014. 

Finding mates was not a problem. Of course, the age old problem was quality over quantity. (Finding sex is easy. Finding a respectful person...not so much.)

Finding sex is easy. Finding a respectful person...not so much...but that is another story...

To this day, I feel I have to go on the offensive AND defensive when it comes to my diet, exercise regime and general weight. BMI is absolute bull shit, let me tell you. I refuse to hear anything more about it. According to BMI at 5'2 I should be 125 pounds. 125 fucking pounds and 5'2. Even if I lost all my extra poundage, the "wobbly bits" as Bridget calls it, I would look emaciated for my body type. I may be short but petite I am not. And never will be. And that is okay.

I have embraced being fat.

It was not an easy road and to be honest, it is still an ongoing love affair. I love being fat. Fat for me means that I will be healthy, but I am not going to stop enjoying life. I want to be healthy but that does not mean I'm going to go on a diet or a fat flush. 

The best advice I got from a friend was, "Clothes should fit you. Not the other way around." So I will stop feeling humiliated by mall sizes. And stop being around toxic environments where weight loss is strictly monitored and rejoiced. I am not going to let my confidence be dictated by the size of my body.

GTFO of my life

This really has not been an easy journey. Getting to this point was not easy and has had a lot of ups and downs. My insecurities have run rampant, but the fact of the matter is life is a whole lot better when I just know that my clothes fit, I look fabulous and if I exude this positivity, then to hell with everything else. It is not easy to remember this all the time, but I do my best everyday. It's a lot of mental, emotional work and physically well, thank goodness for the dogs. They keep me active and so does my obsession with shopping even if its groceries. I love cooking and cooking and cleaning up after myself...is quite a bit of a workout. (Which reminds me, today I have got to get up and do those dishes piling in the sink...)

#truestory #noshame

I've made my bed with it. I will not let myself get unhealthy, but I know what I know. I know that I can hike mainly uphill on the upwards of 2.5 hours and go over 6 miles without feeling like I've punctured a lung and giving myself arrhythmia. On a cool fall or winter's day, I can circumnavigate the city with my dogs doing multiple chores including toting packages or groceries for hours. I know if I have to mow over some asshole when out with friends, I have a good chance of inflicting maximum damage simply by throwing myself at them - the prognosis would not look good in their favor. And recently, I walked the water front from the train station to the other side of town dragging my sister with me, because even though she weighs half my weight...She is actually NOT fit. (Constant reminder from my friends who work out: just because someone is skinny does not mean that they are strong or healthy).

So yeah, my beginnings in life were off to a bumpy start and I have endured a lot of unsolicited comments from people about my weight, but this fat chick is pretty damn happy most of the time.

Laters!

Until next time.