I wanted to share with Tumblr the photos Patrick got of me in my swimsuit because my first instinct is to totally hate them and I’d like to not do that.

No, they’re still not my favorite of me—but they’re not completely awful either… Other than I was busy putting on sunscreen and my suit rolled up in back. Haha.

I had bought a new bathingsuit but it looked awful on when it got here and torrid sold out of the one I really want so I’m still on the hunt for a new bathingsuit… sad.

I really like seeing photos of skinny guys with bigger girls, it always makes me smile.

I like that I can relate, it makes me feel normal.

I’ve only ever dated guys that were smaller than me and with my ex-fiance I had serious hangups about being so much bigger than him. Patrick is the tallest and also the skinniest guy I’ve been with but I think I’m most comfortable with him.

I got weighed at the doctor when I went for my chest infection (on my papers they just said I had a cold, but I swear I felt like shit!) and it was about 270 according to their scale. I looked at Patrick and asked if he said he weighed about 170 because if that was the case I weighed 100lbs more than him. He told me “That’s not a whole person.” and I said “It’s a very skinny one! My friend ____ is my height and about 105-115 depending on the month!”

I’m 5’7” so that’s extreme because I’m fat and she’s very skinny… but still.

I don’t mind our size together so much anymore. I’m mostly over the hangups, but for a long time I believed that if I was fat and my boyfriend was skinny we were doomed to failure because we “look wrong” together. Now I think how perfect we look together and it makes me smile.

True love and junk

Probably my favorite photo of just me from the other day. I’d sat up from laying down and was getting ready to stand up when my friend told me to hold my pose. This was the second photo she took, I’m in love with it.

As she was taking the pic she said “Sadie is her sexiest when she’s just being natural, not trying to pose.” It’s so true, haha.

Patrick and I were models for one of my best and most beautiful friends yesterday!

She got some great shots! I’ll be posting them sporadically through the coming days. 

I love this photo because we rarely have any full-body pics of us together. 

I see so many girls talk about how they feel they need to lose weight to get a guy, there’s like 75lbs or so of difference between mine and Patrick’s weight and he loves every inch of me. And I have had several other guys express interest in me since before and after Patrick and I got together, so it’s not some fluke. 

Of course, as much as I love this photo and the others, my initial reaction to a lot of them was still horror to see just how big I’ve gotten. I still picture myself 30lbs lighter and I rarely see full-body shots because I’m the one taking pics—and I even more rarely ever get photos of me and Patrick together so I don’t realize just how different our sizes are. I came home and pouted a little about how big I’ve gotten, despite the fact I do love larger bodies (I love all bodies, but I do have a special fondness for the rounder ladies). Patrick has been taught well by me about size-acceptance and when I tell him how fat I am in a negative way he doesn’t try to tell me I’m not, he just reminds me I’m beautiful.

I was looking at a tumblr I found via fuckyeahchubbygirls2 that’s dedicated to big girls and I was disappointed when I was looking around on it to find where the author said they didn’t post anybody that was “obese” because that’s unhealthy and they don’t find it attractive.

I am fairly certain I fall under the obese category, although NONE of my doctors have ever called me that or acted as if I really need to lose weight. I’ve never been given lacking medical care and I feel strongly it’s that they can tell I’m a healthy person, the fact that I’ve only ever gone in for checkups and shots and when I have a sinus infection, those are all things that you can’t pin on my excess weight. I have had them mention “If you want to lose some weight, excess sugar is most people’s problem” but my old doctor even said “You actually gain weight slower than most people, you gain it at a healthy pace, just watch what you eat and you’ll be fine. You can try to lose weight if you want, but you’re not unhealthy.”

I felt that this is supposed to be a size-positive blog I’m looking at, and their insulting of me and my body type really bothered me. I felt as though they were trying to preach size acceptance, but only so long as you fit into their slightly more forgiving standards. I’ve seen blogs that post middle-of the road girls, and there’s no problem I have with that, just like people have a right to have skinny blogs or really fat blogs. But when the blogs is about “bigger” girls I don’t picture girls at 190lbs, I picture 230. And even then, we see things differently, that’s fine… but don’t insult girls that are bigger than what you post, you might be unlucky enough to find yourself one of us some day.

Tonight I had the pleasure of being insulted while hanging out with some of my closest friends, not by them, but by somebody I didn’t even know.

I went with Alice and her husband to an event for the “young professionals” at Mountaintop Community Church that was being held at his parent’s house. Joy and her husband showed up shortly and we had a good night talking and laughing and making puzzle pieces for puzzles that had been missing pieces for years.

A guy who I’d never met before was there and stayed there well after the others had left, apparently he’d been off talking to Michael’s mom for an hour or so before he came down and joined us. The boys went and started to play pool and I sat with Alice and Joy and we talked.

Eventually the guy came over and asked Alice if she was married to Michael or if he was joking and he started telling her how beautiful she was and yada yada, nothing wrong with telling a pretty girl that she’s pretty. I then proceeded to get up and walk behind the bar we were sitting at (and therefor behind his back) to the fridge to grab a drink. While I was behind him I hear “Lately all I’ve been able to attract are fat, ugly girls and gays.”

I rolled my eyes to myself, I wondered if he thought I wouldn’t mind because he didn’t deem me “bad fat” or if he just thought I wouldn’t mind him insulting fat people as I wasn’t one of the girls he had attracted. I don’t meet a lot of size activists in real life, I doubt he ever had, so I figured nobody had ever had the guts to tell him off when he made comments like that.

I walked back around the bar and as soon as he saw me he grabs my shoulder and goes “Oh, I’m sorry. I hope we’re alright.” Immediately my mind jumps to, “Does this douche think I’m fat and so he has to apologize, or does he think I’m ugly? Or is it both?” I recongized he was making an effort to apologize, and as in poor taste as it was, I decided since it had been a church event and it was somebody’s house I’d just let the issue slide. I tried to shrug his hand off my shoulder and said it was fine in the most gracious voice I could muster, but obviously I wasn’t too keen to stick around him anymore.

Why am I writing about this? It really didn’t hurt my self-esteem, I’m well past that point. I mean, the dude was completely un-appealing to me, when he said anybody was attracted to him, I was surprised. If it didn’t bother me, why am I staying up ridiculously late to rant about this?

The truth is, what happened tonight is un-acceptable, and I hope that all my friends recognize that. I know I’ve posted things time and again talking about size acceptance, about loving your body the way it is. I’m all for taking care of your body and working out and eating right, even if I don’t always stick to it, but that isn’t trying to force your body to be something it’s not. The truth is, some people are bigger, plain and simple. Some people have health issues that cause excess weight and can honestly not help it. And yes, some people are just not taking care of their bodies, but the same can be said for so many skinny people that are just lucky that they’re not overweight, who are lucky that one of the most shameful signs of unhealthiness isn’t visible on them.

I am fat, and I am fine with that. Dare I say it? I’m happy. Yes, I’d like to lose some weight, in the stomach region, but if I stayed fat, I’d be fine with that. I think curvy girls are gorgeous. And I know for a fact I’m not ugly, unless your only required qualification for ugly is excess weight. In that case, guilty as charged. And how many of you, my smaller friends, can say you’re happy with your body? Are you about as happy as me, the bigger girl? I’m like every girl, I suffer from insecurities and the desire to fit into the unrealistic ideals of the media (ok, maybe not so much… I want to keep my curves so I’d never want to be that skinny). But I probably look in the mirror without think ing “I’m so fat” half as much as a smaller girl. Or if I do, it’s a statement of fact.

 I am fat, I won’t try to deny it. But I don’t generally use “fat” in the deragatory manner most people do, I use it because it is the most truthful discriptive of my physical appearance. To say I’m obease gives the image that I have serious health issues and am on a fast track to dying. To say I’m “pleasantly plump” or “zaftig” or “chubby” I feel downplays my size and trys to sugarcoat it as if it’s something I should be ashamed of. To say I’m plus size is too technical, and the image of plus size is so skewed by the fact many “plus size” models are a size 8 when a size 12 is considered the start of plus size clothing . I am fat, and I am happy.

I dislike when a friend who is small pokes what little chub is on their stomach and tells me “I’m so fat!” but I’ve gotten used to it and now I just feel sympathy for them. I can’t tell you how many friends have said that in front of me, and when I pointed my own weight out to them got “But you’re just big boned” or some other well meaning, sugar-coating comment. And yes, I am rather stocky, I like to say that if I were a horse I’d be a clydesdale or one of the larger, stockier work breeds. But I could lose some weight. Heck, I was 40lbs smaller and super happy with my body, and I’d love to get there again, but I won’t lose sleep or hate myself if it takes me awhile. I’ve got other things going on right now. I don’t want anybody to feel like they can’t come to me with their body issues, but recognize that when you come to the girl who has been fat pretty much since she can remember, sympathy for having a little chub is harder to come by. And even then, that hasn’t really happened to me in years, I’m happy to say a lot of my friends have begun to accept that they are beautiful the way they are. I only have one or two friends who are obviously scared at the idea that they may ever become chubby, and I honestly feel sorry for them… if that’s the worst of your fears, you’re doing good. If that’s what’s important to you, you need to realize how lucky you are to have the body you do… to not feel trapped in a larger body that it seems almost impossible to get rid of. Trust me, I’ve been chubby, I’ve been fat, and I’ve survived… and you will too.

My point is that what this guy said was totally unacceptable. I’ve said it before, size-ism is one of the last acceptable forms of bigotry. I’m not saying the guy has to find bigger girls attractive, or that he has to seek them out to date… However, if he had even thought to say “The only people I attract are digusting (insert race here)” he would have likely not had the guts to say it to people he hardly knew. Hating on fat people is ok because we choose to be that way, don’t we? Despite the fact that some people honestly struggle to lose weight in a healthy manner. Maybe I can, but I am not all fat girls. The fact that I felt I had to be polite and accept his apology goes back to the fact that I have become accustomed to taking insult and mockery for my failure to conform to what is acceptable, and that I valued the comfort of my friends/hosts more than trying to make him realize what an ass he is.

 I want to challenge all my friends to stop hating on fat people, and I’ve seen many of you do it, and I’ve bitten my tongue. I can’t say I haven’t seen the obease person riding on the little cart at wal-mart and not thanked God that I was healthy and able to walk and something I found attractive. And I can’t say I’ve never wondered if they got that way because they just decided they weighed so much that it was difficult to walk so they make it worse by riding a buggy instead of burning some extra calories. But I don’t know their story, and I don’t know why they are the way they are, and I’ve tried to control it. I don’t want to continue seeing statuses ragging on larger people. And I don’t want to be out with friends and hear them insult somebody they don’t like saying how fat and disgusting they are. I’m not saying if they’re fat not to call them fat, I mean, I call myself fat… but the way you say it makes the difference to me. Is it a statement of fact or something you say because you want a good insult? And if you’re hanging out with somebody and they make a comment like that to you, or especially if they say something to that effect in front of a friend and then make it obvious they consider that friend to be what they just insulted, stand up for them. I appreciate he was trying to apologize, but he could have just acted as if I was not one of those fatties he was insulting. I was trying so hard to give him credit that he was talking of the bigger fatties, instead I was subjected to something that might have embarassed me had I not been with close friends and as comfortable in my skin as I am.

I could probably go off on this topic more, but I’ve been typing for a long time and it’s 4am and I’m tired and not able to word my thoughts clearly anymore, I was just hoping maybe somebody would read this and start to think about how they’re treating others. I know this made me examine my treatment of those around me, who I might judge for just as stupid of a reason as them being fat.