“She walked to class day after day conscious of how she carried herself, hoping to draw attention from the athletes. She’d come home from another expected night of being taken advantage of and destroy herself — she was too fat, too quiet, too loud — too much, yet not enough. She fell into the arms of men who only loved the body she hated. Now, I sleep next to a man who loves the soul within my body.”
‘She was 50 pounds lighter. She looked like she had it all, but was an absolute wreck inside.’: Woman loving life 50 pounds heavier, ‘I sleep next to a man who loves the soul within my body’
‘You better stop, or we’ll haul you off to the loony bin with the REAL crazy people.’ My father was in a drunken rage.’: Woman overcomes eating disorder from childhood trauma, ‘I’ve found strength to set that baggage down’
“Conditions at home reached a fever pitch. My father was laid off again, my grandmother moved in with her hoard, and I became sick. I tried my hardest to suppress that cough, barricaded with my little brother in my room, holding him back as the sounds of my father’s drunken rage filtered from the kitchen. My grandmother turned cold, hateful. ‘You’re old now. You aren’t cute and you have a bad attitude.’ The chaos was too much to bear. So I stopped eating.”
‘You’ll ruin my life if you have this baby.’ I said, ‘Fine, I’ll do it alone.’ And I did.’: Single mom school bus driver with no maternity leave takes newborn on route with her, ‘This job saved me’
“I was scared. My job as a school bus driver doesn’t offer maternity leave, I had no savings (hello, single mom!) and I couldn’t afford to just not work. I was due 3 weeks before school started. Her father wasn’t in the operating room for her birth. ‘You robbed me of a great moment, never contact me again.’ He moved across the country without even seeing her. It was official. There would be no co-parenting, I was once again a single mom. I had to make this work.”
‘Stop telling moms they ‘have no excuse’ to not be skinny. Being in shape doesn’t mean I’m a better person.’: Mom claims we shouldn’t ‘feel pressured to punish our bodies’
“Oh, you lost all your baby weight and started exercising 2 weeks after giving birth? Great, but I just gave birth and my vagina in still swollen and bleeding. You have 3 kids and wake up at 4 a.m. to exercise? Impressive, but sometimes depression means I’m just trying to get through the day without giving up on life.”
‘Why are your legs so fat?’ She laughed. I took my headphones out. ‘Pardon?’ Passengers watched.’: Woman brought to tears by stranger’s rude comment, realizes her ‘fat’ legs have ‘done her well’ in life
“I sat between two teenage girls. They were getting louder, being obnoxious. She repeated, ‘Why are your legs so fat?’ The woman next to me berated her for being so rude. I could still hear them giggling. I could feel my face burning. I couldn’t get off the train fast enough. The first thing I did was call my husband, crying, barely able to get my words out.”
‘When people look at me, they see the fat girl. But no one ever wonders WHY I’m fat.’: Plus-sized woman says we shouldn’t tell others to ‘lose weight,’ we should ‘help them heal’
“You see, I wasn’t always this way. The weight came on after I lost my brother to a motorcycle accident. The weight came on after I had 3 miscarriages. The weight came on after my husband cheated. After I was drugged and raped. But you don’t see all that, do you? You only see the fat. You remind me to lose weight. In fact, you’re obsessed with doing that. But you’ve never once reminded me to heal.”
‘I have stretch marks, saggy skin, a weird fat fold around my C-section scar. I don’t really love myself. This has to stop.’: Mom insists weight does not define us, cannot keep letting ‘my imperfections consume me’
“I can’t pass this on to my daughters. I can’t have them looking at their bodies in search of flaws. I don’t want them to put all of their worth in what they see in the mirror. I want them to know, what I still am trying to convince myself. We might have fat, but we are not fat. This is not WHO we are.”
‘Oh honey, you should really wait until you lose the baby weight.’ Other customers heard. It took everything in me not to cry.’: Adoptive mom shamed for ‘baby weight’ by jewelry store employee
“I was taking my son to get my wedding ring cleaned. I was feeling so amazing with my baby boy on my hip. I asked about getting my ring soldered together. The lady looked at me and made a scrunched-up face. I didn’t even want to stand there to tell her he was adopted. This was just my body – I didn’t birth him.”
‘If not your breasts, they’ll attempt to convince you your worth depends upon your thigh gap, complexion, weight.’ Mom shuts down 8-year-old daughter thinking her body is ‘flawed’
“My darling girl, there is something I must get off my chest before you grow into yours. As you get older, society, men, even some women, will try to convince you that your breasts — their size, shape, level of ‘perky’ — are what define you as a woman. Hear me clearly when I firmly inform you, they are wrong.”
‘I can do this, right?’ I scanned the faces around me, absolutely mortified. ‘Of course. Just take your shirt off!’ Peopled waved, said hello. Where were the looks of disgust?!’ Mom embraces plus-size beach body to set example for daughter
“I spent years trying to sabotage my marriage in hopes he’d leave me for someone skinny. Day after day, I’d tell myself how nasty, disgusting, fat I was. I had no idea my gorgeous daughter was listening. She started saying how fat she was. How ugly. I was HORRIFIED. I knew I needed to make a change.”
