Holiday Shrapnel
Posted on March 24, 2008
Filed Under Bodies and Family | Leave a Comment
I don’t know about your family, but mine is awful on holidays.
They’re nice, fun, sweet and loving - but it is difficult not to leave feeling so awful about myself that I want to cry.
My great-grandmother is basically bedridden at this point, so when we visit her home we all go in and visit her in the bedroom. She smiles, she greets us, we talk. My husband leaves the room, and almost immediately she says, “Honey, you need to think about losing weight if you want to keep your husband happy.”
*sigh*
I say, “Gram, he married me when I was fat, I’m still fat. What would make him suddenly dig skinny chicks?” Her response? “All men do. It’s their way.”
What can I say? She’s 92 and mostly deaf. So an argument is uncalled for, and wouldn’t even yield great results. She, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to feel pressing on is a bad thing by continuing, “You’re going to die of heart disease if you don’t shed some weight. And your baby….she is just so fat…you should put her on a diet.”
I tease her a little and ask her which one of my kids should diet. My 3 year old is skinny as a rail, you can count her little ribs (it’s very sad-looking, really) and my 2 year old is the same height and weights one more pound. But her body is solid. She’s pudgy and strong and tough. My kids eat the same meals at the same times - so why is one a willow branch and the other a little tank?
My guess is genetics, but my great-grandmother seems to think she’s sneaking food when I’m not looking. Seriously. She told me I should watch her to make sure she can’t get into the fridge when we’re not looking. She thinks my two year old has a binge eating disorder!
So I smile, say I’ll put her on the treadmill (ha ha) and make a graceful exit to get some air and put the conversation behind me.
But it still hurts. My baby already getting crap for her size. From her own family.
It’s just a little heartbreaking.
photo credit: kregarious
Hating Easter
Posted on March 23, 2008
Filed Under Bodies and Food | Leave a Comment
As a fat woman, I think Easter is the very worst day of the year for my personal food issues.
I don’t like chocolate that much, but I find myself being lured by bunnies and eggs and other chocolate confections I know I won’t like. My family will also have oodles of crap in open bowls at their house today. Which I won’t eat, but I will want to eat.
I know marketing. I’m very close to marketing. I know I’m being marketed to. Then I wonder if I’m more susceptible to the marketing because I’m fat. Now I find I’m stuck in a stupid loop of self-hatred and guilt for taking an M&M from my toddler’s basket.
I hope there comes a time where food and fat aren’t always in the same sentence in my head. I would like to see my body as a separate issue from food.
My food issues are twisted and deep. Not saying I’m special, I’m not. I’m just saying I have problems with food. Fruit has too much sugar, nuts have some bad fat in them, my veggies have pesticides on them and may not be organic.
I mean, seriously, do you ever feel that processed food is, at the very least, safe? Yeah preservatives are horrible for you, but they haven’t been proven to be poison like pesticides.
So my raw food diet that is rocking around the clock in my house - might be killing my children or giving them cancer. Because I’ve done the research and you can’t get all the pesticides off. Ever.
God forbid we have meat in the house. That’s even worse.
I’m going to write an expanded post on food phobias later. For now we’ll just stick with chocolate that is made up of more chemicals than cocoa. More high fructose corn syrup than sugar.
Easter makes me think of sugar a lot. Sugar is evil incarnate according to some people, but stevia…who knows if pesticides were used. Also, cane sugar isn’t supposed to be as bad as processed, bleached sugar. What about Sugar in the Raw? Is that okay?
Brown sugar? Is that death? How about powdered sugar?
There are so many ways to sweeten things, and I never know the right choice to make.
I mean, if sugar was so bad - if FOOD was so bad - how is it we aren’t all dead from eating all this stuff?
Why hasn’t food genocide occurred? Maybe….just maybe…because food isn’t going to kill us all.
Mike and Juliet Show | A call to end plus sized discrimination
Posted on March 18, 2008
Filed Under Bodies on TV | Leave a Comment
A light hearted morning show aired a topic close to my heart this morning.
It may be a rebroadcast. I’m not sure.
Click here to go to the Mike and Juliet site and watch a call to end plus sized discrimination!
Technorati Tags: plus sized discrimination, mike and juliet show, fat discrimination, haes
There are fat clubs? Sign me up!
Posted on March 18, 2008
Filed Under Bodies in Public | Leave a Comment
I’m easily amazed, let me just say that right up front.
When I ran across this article in the St. Petersburg Times (on tampabay.com) called “Fun, in a big way” my jaw almost bounced off the floor!
There are dance clubs that cater to fat people.
Clubs for fun-seeking overweight men and women are gaining popularity in Hillsborough and beyond. Every Saturday, partygoers from Brandon, Carrollwood and Tampa dance along with people from as far away as Jacksonville and Miami.
Well yeah, I’d travel too if I knew I was going to be hanging out with people that didn’t judge me based on my weight.
The article does discuss one woman’s weight loss, but it is done in a positive way, not a “thank GOD that fat chick slimmed down!” kind of way. I appreciate that. Because it’s okay to lose weight if you’re being active and it’s okay not to. What is important is just eating when you’re hungry, stopping when you’re not, and being active so you can be a more healthy you - NOT necessarily a thinner you.
If you lose weight it’s okay, but if you don’t, that’s okay too.
Because it’s all about being who you are and accepting your body as being the only one you’re going to get. So you better love it, treat it well, and give it some hugs…cause man…you don’t want it to turn on you *grin*
Congratulations, St. Petersburg Times, for handling this story like it deserves to be handled. A fun “girls’ night out” available and being used by everyone. Oh, and for giving free advertising to the fat-clubs…because more people need to know they exist.
What is your self-esteem formula?
Posted on March 17, 2008
Filed Under Body Love | Leave a Comment
What is your self esteem based on?
Is it about how many compliments you get in a day, regardless of the gender of the complimenter?
Does it spike if someone of the opposite (or same depending on your preference) sex gives you the “come hither” look in the grocery store? Do you need adoration from non-family-members to make you feel good?
Is it when you realize you like you. Is it when you realize you wouldn’t want to be a celebutant?
What makes you feel worthy? What is your worth based on?
I wonder aloud, because sometimes it spikes when someone buys me a drink when I go out with friends. Sometimes it spikes when I hear that someone saw a design I did and they thought it was amazing.
When I was younger (read: before kids) I based my physical self-esteem on my flat stomach. I weighed 260lbs and my stomach was flat as a board. It was soft, cause yeah, I’m fat…but it was flat. I had a kickin’ figure.
Two kids in a row later, I have a gut. I’ve been making peace with my gut over the last two years and we’ve had a few talks about how my gut just wants to be loved like the rest of my body.
For about two seconds I considered having lipo to get rid of my gut - but we’re going to have more kids. Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m never going to have lipo, but for some reason I feel the need to rationalize why I’m not having it right now.
It feels like if I just say “never” then something will sneak in and convince me to go have something done. A lap band, a vaccuum and a pair of scissors, who knows…but I need a new reason that works until the reason doesn’t make sense anymore for my circumstances. Then I make up a new reason.
Maybe it keeps my reasons for not mutilating my body more fresh in my mind.
Nip/Tuck helps as well. So does the Discovery Health channel. So gross.
What do you do to keep yourself from being less-than-nice to your body? Do you have a new reason every day for why you are okay the way you are?
Mostly I take it one step at a time, one compliment at a time, one kiss at a time.
I think that’s really all any of us can do. (But I’m still open to suggestions!)
Technorati Tags: self-esteem, body acceptance, love your body, liposuction
photo credit: adam coster
Girls’ Night Out
Posted on March 16, 2008
Filed Under Bodies in Public | Leave a Comment
Friday night I went out with a couple good girlfriends.
We all got dolled up, were lookin’ good, and we went to a local bar. Okay, not local, but a middle point between all of us. We even had a designated driver, because we’re all cool like that.
At the bar we went to after the first (filled with girls that looked 12 and snotty) we found a much more pleasant environment. Usuals at the bar looking tucked into their stools like children being tucked into bed. Comfortable.
I was a little warm and decided I was going to go outside. I found a bench not completely covered with pigeon poop and sat down. No one was outside, no cars were passing. It was 11pm on a Friday night. Everyone was either at the restaurant/bar they were settled into or they were home snuggled in bed or ensconced on a couch.
Without even thinking about it, I sat up nice and straight and fixed my shirt and sucked in my stomach.
Why?
I mean, who on this deserted street on Friday night at 11pm is going to give a shit if my shirt isn’t smoothed just so over my gut?
While I was pondering this assenine issue I was having with looking as good as possible on an empty sidewalk, the front door of the bar opens and out walk two women that are mid to late 30s and wearing cute (mostly) age appropriate clothes.
They are slim and laughing their asses off.
Spotting me almost immediately, they holler and wave a friendly “Hello!”
So we talk on the sidewalk out front while they smoke and I laugh and listen.
One has Chron’s disease, and the other found out recently her husband has a five year old child with someone else.
And even with this powerful reminder that my body is a lovely thing that gives me no problems…it probably won’t be the last time I check myself for lumps, bumps, and wrinkles…even though I know no one is looking.
Technorati Tags: fat acceptance, perspective, health issues
The dreaded first entry
Posted on March 15, 2008
Filed Under Randomness | Leave a Comment
This is a new blog. Well, it is if you can read this on the front page.
If you want to know a little about me, you can go to the about page. But for those of you who are wondering why you got a new trackback from a sadly empty blog, it’s because if you’re on my blogroll I’ve been reading and lurking on your blog.
I’m still not sure how “out” I want to be about this blog. I have an online business so it is entirely possible I’m going to be found out.
You’re probably wondering why I care. If I were you I’d wonder too.
Because it’s one thing to be fat, and to have everyone know you’re fat. If you find my pictures online (and there are pictures) it’s obvious I’m fat. I didn’t take a picture of my eye and pretend I was being artistic. My profile pictures on social networking sites always include the extra chin, or the magical camera jowls if I’m face-front in the picture.
But to go public with being ok with being fat…well…that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms isn’t it? Saying “I’m not going to diet and you can’t make me.”
I went on a diet once in my life. I was 21, and did atkins. I ate plate-sized omlettes and lost 30 pounds, had bad breath, and felt like crap all the time.
Sure it sucks being fat and not being able to go to 97% of the stores in the mall. Thank everything good and holy that Lane Bryant got trendy in the last few years. I’d like to kiss whoever came up with the new jeans they have. I’m a red size 5 and thrilled with the fit and comfort.
Through my two pregnancies I never bought maternity clothes - I got hand me down clothes from women that had WLS and wore ‘em like I stole ‘em.
I work from home, so don’t get out much. I have two toddlers, so get out even less. I network for business now and then, and don’t know if anyone has ever had a problem with my weight. No one gives me diet tips. I do a lot in the fashion industry downtown, and most of my business friends are single digit sizes. (Not Lane Bryant single digit sizes.)
They hate their bodies too. My closest business friend was anorexic for ten years.
I’m tired of being quiet about how being fat and how the impressions of fat people affect my life, my heart, and my soul….and my brain. How sometimes I’m offended by Weight Watchers commercials and occasionally I wistfully consider going on Nutrisystem. I can’t help having thoughts about it, it’s so incessantly THERE in my face.
So this is my body-acceptance blog. My fat-acceptance blog. My “I’m happy being me and you can kiss my fat ass if you don’t like it” blog.
Hope you enjoy it. It should be interesting if nothing else!
Technorati Tags: fa, fat acceptance, fat blog,
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Posted on January 1, 1970
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