I must be really shallow because I've never looked across a room and thought 'she looks like she has a nice personality, I wonder what she thinks about the situation in Syria'. I'm attracted to people because of how they look, not in spite of how they look and I happen to think that large women are more attractive..to me.
I don't think it's a fetish, I think that we should all be allowed to fancy who we fancy, some people like blonds, some like lighter or darker skin and as long as no one is objectified for having these traits, it's all perfectly healthy.
I just wanted to put it out there that fat isn't, for everyone, a negative thing that has to be 'made up for' by a cheery disposition and a sunny personality.
Glamourgirl, I expect that this guy thought you were beautiful, his ideal and someone he was attracted to. I'm sorry that you (and the rest of us) were raised in a society that conditioned you to doubt that.
Oh, GG, I'm sorry your dad talked that way to you! My mom was the same way. Honestly, I think SHE just has body image issues (she's skinnier than I am, and she thinks she's obese!) and she was taking it out on her children in some kind of... misplaced body hatred/fear that we would become fat.
Of course, the only thing being called fat by my mother ever did was convince me that there was no use eating healthy/exercising because it was already too late. *sigh*
I went through all of high school refusing to date for the same reason as you. I even had my drama director tell me I was too fat to get a role, right to my face! And my sister and I were the president/vice president of the troupe! He was a pretty disgusting guy all around though (sexist, racist, homophobic, fatphobic) so it doesn't bother me much anymore, but it did at the time.
Luckily, I actually gained some self esteem right before I graduated, and I'm a lot happier now. Especially when I realized I don't give a rat's [beep] what anyone, especially men, think about how I look. Its a lot easier to be motivated when I'm doing it for me, not to please someone else. Yay for feminism, haha.
I can only imagine what that is like coming from your mom. I think being a mother of girls is scary especially if the mom has baggage. Not that soms are immune, but I am grateful I only have boys. I don't know how to raise a daughter that thinks she's beautiful and with piles of self critisism about their bodies.
I also had a teacher tell me I was fat once, when I was in 3rd grade. She was doing opposites and I was "fat" and another girl was "thin". I was so obviously hurt by it I remember the other students after consoling me and telling me to not let it get to me. And they kids can be cruel! It was the 80s then and times have changed, I'd like to think, and teachers dont get away with that stuff now, I hope. It amazes me some of the horror stories that were normal years ago...
Its strange, because there was only one time my dad actually called me fat. I was over his house and he has a friend that speaks spanish asa first language. For some reason, my dad would try to talk to him in spanish over the years, and I would tell him "I took enough in highschool and college to know what you are saying". On this particular day, he said to his friend that I was moy gordo, meaning very fat. It was awkard and weird. I told my dad that I knew what he said. But I think he always thought that I was exagerating on how much spanish I knew (which wasn't much, but more than he did) I think his friend felt a little awkard too...later I spoke to a friend of mine about it, and they said that sometimes gordo can be used in some spanish cultures as a term of endearment (not sure if that's true) and that it sounds like my dad was repeating spanish without really know what he was saying...idk, I was so hurt and embarassed I never brought it up to him.
Other than that, he only called every imperfect woman fat. And he also had a swimsuit caledar up in the garage for many years, even after marrying my step mom, which in my opinion is disrespectful. Some may disagree.
But it used to make me very uncomfortable, it just reminded me what I was supposed to look like.
My husband was a normal weight when we met, and I was probably near my high weight (no scale, so hard to tell, but the engagement pictures don't lie). If he had an issue with my weight he never said a word. I know he finds me more visually appealing now, but that doesn't mean there was an issue before, either! I knew then and am more convinced now that a healthy relationship relies far less on fleeting beauty and fitness (we all get wrinkly and aged in time!) and far more on intellectual, ideological, and emotional compatibility. That's what we had, and that was more than enough.
One of the great woes of the hookup culture is this increasing emphasis on hotness and attraction, with too little weight placed on the things of real value that build content, healthy relationships. It is to the detriment of all.
Wow GG that is some heavy stuff to think about. Thank you for sharing it as it reminds me that I need to tell my own daughters how beautiful they are.
You're welcome. Yes fathers have a huge impact on their daughter's self esteem.
From what I know of you from here, I don't think you do this, but also daughters hearing their father critisizing other women inadvertantly tells their daughter what they "should" look like and what is undesirable.
I must be really shallow because I've never looked across a room and thought 'she looks like she has a nice personality, I wonder what she thinks about the situation in Syria'. I'm attracted to people because of how they look, not in spite of how they look and I happen to think that large women are more attractive..to me.
I don't think it's a fetish, I think that we should all be allowed to fancy who we fancy, some people like blonds, some like lighter or darker skin and as long as no one is objectified for having these traits, it's all perfectly healthy.
I just wanted to put it out there that fat isn't, for everyone, a negative thing that has to be 'made up for' by a cheery disposition and a sunny personality.
Glamourgirl, I expect that this guy thought you were beautiful, his ideal and someone he was attracted to. I'm sorry that you (and the rest of us) were raised in a society that conditioned you to doubt that.
I agree we all have our prefrences. I think the issue was I was shown as a young child that fat=bad. That being fat is a reflection on who you are and that it makes you defective somehow. It wasn't just an appearance, it "defined" who people were. Fat slobs. Fat people were seen as less desirable overall as compared to thin people. And I'm sure that many many people believe this, unfortunately.
I agree society supports that fat woman are undesirable and even an embarrassment at times, nad at the same time says that a fat man can get a thin "sexy" woman. I realize that fit men are all over the media as well but there are definitely examples in mainstream media of the fat guy getting the fit woman, while no opposite examples come to mind.
It think its a very good point that Trudiha brings up. Some people have preferences, and while no guy gets looked at twice for preferring blondes or skinny girls, he MUST have a fetish if he prefers bigger women! /sarcasm
We're of course taught that fat=bad and fat=a lesser citizen, so the word fetish gets thrown around to try and explain "how on earth a guy could prefer something that we're taught to hate"
We stand in the way of ourselves. It's our own insecurities that tell us that we are not good enough. People in our lives accept us and love us, it's us that continue to harbor feelings of inadequacy and then project them.
Confidence is key, if you're confidence you attract admiration.
We stand in the way of ourselves. It's our own insecurities that tell us that we are not good enough. People in our lives accept us and love us, it's us that continue to harbor feelings of inadequacy and then project them.
Confidence is key, if you're confidence you attract admiration.
I think that there's a lot of truth to this, but it's also important to realize that our environment does have an impact on us (and how we view ourselves - kind of like what you were saying in the other thread about celebrity endorsements).
I think that there's a lot of truth to this, but it's also important to realize that our environment does have an impact on us (and how we view ourselves - kind of like what you were saying in the other thread about celebrity endorsements).
Absolutely. We get a lot of messages from the media and they are not mixed messages. They are direct messages that beauty is skinny. It plays a big role in our self esteem and some are more susceptible than others. At the end of the day feeling good about yourself plays the biggest role in how others perceive you. It's up to us to realize that beauty is within and the more comfortable we are with ourselves the less impact Kim Kardashian's backside will have on our self esteem.
I think there's a difference between how we view ourselves and how we think others view us. Acually I think there are seperate words to define that...self image? Idk, that's not my area of study.
IRL, I am actually extremely confident or at least I appear that way. I am very secure in WHO I am aside from being fat. Its weird and hard to explain. I have always been the kind of girl that can walk into a room and in 10 minutes I've fallen in with the the guys. I have the kind of personality that I attract a lot of male *friends*, which is fine because I'm married! But I feel worthless as a partener (girlfriend/wife) because I feel its just known that part of my role is to look the part (thin, perfect body).
Very few people have ever been let in on how I few about myself and they are shocked, because I don't have the presence of someone that has ill thoughts about themselves in anyway.
Its like I have my own critical judgments about myself, and so those are internal...*I* will not approve of myself until I am physically what I think a wife should be. And even though those beliefs came from external sources, they are part of an internal voice now. But I don't care what others think, good, bad, indifferent. The whole world could think I'm beautiful, but I don't work towards others approval, I work towards my own...which is really hard to achieve!
So I guess that's why I seem confident around others, because even though I feel that it is a common belief that fat women are of less worth than thin ones, I don't care if someone else is thinking it (which I believe they are), I only care if I think it. I know that's confusing, it confuses me too. lol
Last edited by GlamourGirl827; 07-06-2013 at 05:27 PM.
Wow...I understand all too well where most of you are coming from.
To the OP - much like you I always thought that boys didn't like me because I was fat in high school and I never took any kind of flirtation seriously. The truth looking back on it was probably more that I was kind of a bitca and had incredibly low esteem - not so much that I wore a size 16.
Before I met my husband I screwed up several relationships because of my weight issues. After watching my mother yo-yo diet her entire life I didn't think it would do me any good to try to lose weight, so I just berated myself constantly. I dated this gorgeous guy briefly but I couldn't wrap my head around why he would want to be with me, and eventually he didn't because he got tired of me constantly fishing for compliments and complaining about my body.
I'll admit when I met my husband the fact he was almost 340 lbs. was appealing because I thought he would be so grateful for dating anyone that he wouldn't care so much about my less than spectacular personality. Luckily he called me on my BS and helped me love myself and he never once said anything about my weight as we slowly switched places and when I started this I actually weighed 30 more lbs. than he did.
Through FB I caught up with some of the guys I crushed on hard so long ago and one of them even said to me that he thought I was hot and he had wanted to ask me out, but he never did because I was always so down on myself and spoke about my weight so much that he didn't think I would want to go out with another "fattie."
My weight issues really messed with my perspective on things. And sadly, it's just now that I'm in my mid-thirties that I've really reflected on how many missed opportunities I've had because of my weight. And most of it is in my head - I'm the reason I didn't go for this thing or that. Yes, there are superficial jerks out there of both sexes, but I think it was because of those jerks that the fat people of the world get this idea that we aren't good enough. And at least for me, the moment when I started to think I was good enough was when things got better for me...without the outside world changing all that much.
I don't think anyone should ever confuse who someone finds attractive with being shallow. If someone judges a person's character on how much they weigh that is wrong. And shallow, and quick to judgement, and just in no way right on so many levels. You haven't walked in anyone's shoes.
But not finding someone attractive that is a certain weight..over or under or whatever is what it is. I personally think most 'super models' are too skinny. I also find certain weights over not to be attractive either. It is what it is, no one should have to apologize for who they find attractive or not in a physical way.
I fully understand that I will be more attractive to my wife when I lose more weight. She loves me but I don't EVER ask her to find my weight attractive. I hold it pretty well but I know I will be a lot more attractive with more weight loss. Down around 15lbs or so since May 1 with a lot more muscle and I like how I look better a lot.
The looking better is not my prime motivation for losing weight but it is part of it. Being healthy FAR outweighs it. I see it as a nice extra side benefit. And there is nothing wrong with that either.
Last edited by diamondgeog; 07-09-2013 at 02:19 PM.
I'm of Eastern Asian decent, so being 150 and 5'2 would be considered too gross to date according to talk shows and other media. I often look at women who are happy with their body image and wish I can be like them. It is however hard when everybody around you tells you that you are too fat to expect much from life. I've lived in America for about over 10 years or so, I did not realize how awful the media is treating women, especially young women.
On TV, if an actress is over 125, they call her fat. They are actually normal looking and seems healthy, but they would make fun of her thighs and make sound effects like elephant, dinosaur, or pig noises. They make fun of her if she is caught eating at the night market with her friends, telling her "Wow, you don't need to eat anymore." I watched these shows, and the more I saw it the worst I felt about my own self. So I shut it off, it is a shame, I wanted to watch and keep current with trends and pop culture, but at the same time I cannot stand the way they talk about women's bodies.
Also I often hear these girls on the show (even just college students) saying how they cannot remove their makeup, because they will be seen. Applying a billion layers of false lashes, and eyeliner.
According to their values, I am currently morbidly obese, possibly a dinosaur girl because I don't like to wear makeup unless I am going to an event or work. I am not sure how girls can build self esteem over there.
Wow... Glamourgirl, thank you for sharing your story. I feel like a small part of me healed by reading it. Your father and his hang-ups on weight sound a lot like my father's, mother's and brother's. I grew up believing that I was unworthy and unattractive because of my weight; I missed out on major milestones in my life because it took me so long to realize that weight had much (MUCH) less to do with everything in my life than I believed for so long. I made myself sick trying to lose weight, then bounced up and down... who knows if that's damaged my body. It's upsetting to realize how destructive those beliefs were/are. Worse yet, I know there are parts of me that don't realize how unhealthy and inappropriate those kinds of comments by parents/fathers/authority figures are. I guess I got that used to them. That's sad...
I just wanted to share and let you know you're not alone. I bet the guy in high school liked you just as you were, and I hope as you make your way through this journey, you're able to accept love for yourself in all the ways you deserve to. Keep fighting the good fight, and again, thank you.
