The trap of the healthy fat chick

When a plus size woman dares to love herself unapologetically on social media, a few things often happen.  One, lots of people are happy.  Yay! Because if we can love ourselves, maybe they can too.  Or because they already do and are happy that someone else does too.  Or because their plus size sexual partner is beautiful to them and they want her to see the beauty they see.  Or a million other personal reasons.  Yay for happiness and body love. 

Two, some people are dicks.  How dare this woman feel good about herself when she is aesthetically disgusting to them?  So they compare her to animals, threaten physical violence, or otherwise behave like the worst kind of human, because for some reason or other, her self love is threatening to them.  Or they’re bored or something.

So that’s kind of the best and the worst.  But there’s a third thing.  A sneaky thing. 

The concern troll.

“I’m so glad you feel good about yourself, but that size can’t be healthy.” “Promoting an unhealthy lifestyle.” “Glorifying obesity.”

Thankfully, I have been largely spared the aggressive and violent comments online, but I’ve been concern trolled aplenty.

And I haven’t been responding to that properly.

I have used language in my body love blog posts reassuring the trolls in advance that my fat body is healthy.  I have pointed out that I exercise and eat well.  I’m healthy, y’all. Fat and healthy.  Dont worry,  I'm one of the good fatties.  No need for your concern trolling here…

Except.  What a bunch of insidious ableist bullshit that was. 

I love my body and I’m worthy of love and I’m beautiful.  Full fucking stop.  Period.  Healthy or not.  Exercising or not.  Eating kale chips or potato chips. Diabetic or not.  In shape or not.  This is my body and I love it and I’m allowed to love it and celebrate it!  I’m allowed to take up the space I take up.  My health is between me, my doctor, and the people who love me.  No one else.

The trap of allowing and responding to the concern troll is that it says that I am only worthy of loving myself if certain conditions are met.  What a load of crap. 

Some things have happened recently that forced me to look at just how much I have allowed the concern trolls’ voices inside my head.

For the first time in my life, at age 42, I have a medical condition that could be partly due to my weight.

It also might not be.

I have hypertension.  I’m managing it with my doctor in the ways that we have decided together, and my health is fine.  But when it happened, when those numbers crept up, and I could no longer explain them away as “white coat hypertension,” I found myself on unstable ground. 

Shit, I thought.  They were right.  It was just a matter of time until my “unhealthy,” “obesity glorifying” lifestyle caught up with me. 

I felt ashamed because of some numbers on a blood pressure machine. 

Together, my doctor and I decided that before medicating, we would try weight loss, increased exercise, and reducing salt intake.  For months, I obsessively tracked every morsel of food to go in my mouth.  I exercised.  I reduced salt.  I lost ten pounds.  My blood pressure continued to increase.

I broke the Pam.

During that time, I had a nasty fall.  I slipped on some mud while walking in the woods with my kids, sprained a ligament in my knee and tore a ligament in my ankle. I hopped around on crutches, scooted around the house on a rolling office chair, leaned heavily on my husband for help, and eventually got to the point where I could walk with a limp.

I couldn’t stand or walk for long, and couldn’t do stairs.  Grocery shopping was enough to make my leg ache badly for hours.  I considered using one of those motorized shopping cart scooter thingies at the grocery store. 

But, I couldn’t ride one of those.  People would think I was just fat and lazy.  Every time I sat down when others were standing, every elevator ride, I heard the voice in my head, “fat and lazy.”  I felt lumbering. Like a fat caricature.  I considered wearing a knee and ankle brace, not because I needed them, but because they would signal to people that I was injured, not just fat and lazy.

Because if I’m fat and just feel like sitting down or taking the elevator, what?  I’m not worthy of the air I breathe?  The space I take up?  Can I be fat and (temporarily, in this case) not able bodied and have a medical condition and still be beautiful and love myself?

Uh.  Of course I can.

But for a minute, I didn’t know that. 

I had trapped myself in the story of a beautiful fat chick who was the exact size she was supposed to be, as evidenced by good health and an able body.

Pam, check your privilege. 

I’m plus sized.  I’m fat.  I’m fucking fabulous.  Sometimes I’m super duper lazy.  Sometimes I’m active.  Mostly I’m healthy.  In some ways, I’m not healthy.  My body is aging.  Some of that I’m embracing.  Some of it kind of sucks balls.  Exercise waxes and wanes with my mood and other factors.  I like salads.  And cheetos.  And bourbon.  And lentils.  And cake.  And dancing.  And sleeping late. Sometimes I wear fabulous clothes that make me look like a pin-up hourglass.  Sometimes I wear yoga pants and a tank top with no bra. 

And I’m beautiful and worthy.  I love myself and I love my body.  Full stop.  No conditions on that love.

Unconditional.  Just like my love for others.  I’ve finally learned to give that to myself.

TMI

If we are friends on facebook, you may know that I got my first Brazilian wax last week.  Because that’s the kind of thing I share with my friends and family. So when I am telling you that this blog post is about to be TMI, you should probably run away. 

Really, you should stop reading now.

Because I’m going to talk about my lady garden. Like, a lot. In detail.

Run.

No???

OK, you people still reading, you are my people.  Hi. 

Here’s the thing.  I got my Brazilian and I had it all planned out.  I was going to write a super funny blog post about how this friend of mine, someone I see socially, someone who knows my kids and whose kids I know… had to come eye to “eye” with my butt hole and how effing weird that is.

But that’s not the blog post that wants to be written about this experience.  I kept trying to go funny, but the stuff inside me isn’t funny.  Not, like inside me inside me. I mean, like, in my head, not in my snatch.  Just to be clear. 

So a bit of background.  Why am I forty-one years old and only getting my first Brazilian?  We have already established here on the public interwebz for future employers to see that I like to be relatively hairless down under.  I went so far as to try laser hair removal.  Apparently, my pubes are too light in color, so it didn’t work. 

And now you know the carpet is lighter than the drapes or whatever.  Yes, I have very light brown pubes.  You can sleep at night now that you know that.  I initially called them dirty blonde, but I don’t really want to use the word dirty in reference to my hoohah… you know?

Anyway. 

I like fewer pubes in the way of my general enjoyment of that part of my body, so I was shaving.  I tried getting waxed once, maybe eleven or twelve years ago.  It was the worst pain of my life.  And that includes gallstones.  I just remember thinking, something is wrong.  There is no way in hell that women do this every month.  I stopped her. It was awful.  I was very badly bruised for days after. 

On my junk, people.  Badly, badly bruised on my junk. 

So I swore off waxing until recently when friends convinced me that my first experience was an anomaly and I should try again.  So I tried again.  It hurt the normal amount.  I wasn’t bruised.  And now my vag is all smooth and soft and feels like the skin on the inside of my wrist.  It’s amazing and I love it and will totally keep doing it if I can afford to.

And yes, I know vag refers to the internal canal, not the part that was waxed.  But I’m not saying that word with two v’s.  I hate that word.  I can say moist all day, but I will not say the word with two v’s in it. 

Shudder.

OK, so here’s the part I need to talk about. 

OMG, I’m over 500 words in and I haven’t even started getting to the point.  I am a terrible writer.  You should all leave now. 

Still here?

OK.

I want to talk about shame and the lady garden.

Here’s what happened.  My good friend is an aesthetician.  She tints my eyelashes for me, and has waxed my brows.  She gives facials and knows a lot about skin care.  But mostly, she pretty much spends her work days ripping out pubic hair. 

Someone has to do it. We can’t do it to ourselves.

She was one of the people who convinced me to try again, and a few of our other mutual friends go to her to have it done.

I had already decided that I would give it another try.  But when faced with the idea of someone I knew down there looking at my junk, I balked.

Because that thing is not cute.

It’s not cute.

I didn’t know it wasn’t cute until pretty recently.  The first time I heard about labiaplasty, I was so confused.  I mean, what??  People are getting plastic surgery on their hoohahs??  What could possibly be going on down there to justify such a thing? 

So I did what any voyeuristic freak would do, I googled before and after pictures. 

Obviously.

And that was when I realized that the kind of labia I have is the kind that people think they need to get plastic surgery to fix. 

This wasn’t something I understood before.  No one lucky enough to get face to face with my taco has ever had any complaints.  I had seen a bunch of other people’s.  They all looked different and pretty.  Mine seemed fine and was in the mix.  It’s not freakish or anything.  Just… you know… sort of external I guess. It had never occurred to me to be bothered by this.

I’m in this group of women online, and several months ago, someone posted about the term, “busted ravioli,” to describe the kind of junk which is more inner labia than outer labia.  Like the opposite of the closed clamshell.  A couple of people said they couldn’t imagine having a busted ravioli type and how embarrassing it would be. 

This is generally an open and supportive group of women. 

I was like, uh, I’m not gonna lie.  Mine kind of looks like a ravioli.  Ravioli are delicious though.  I mean, yum??  Ravioli??  Right??  Or roast beef curtains?  I like roast beef too.  But I didn’t say anything.  Because I didn’t want anyone to know I had the bad kind.

What the actual fuck?  Is this really something to worry about??

My sausage wallet works awesome.  I have joked that I can orgasm from a stiff breeze.  I can have multiples.  I can come from just penetration.  It smells good.  It tastes good.  I don’t need synthetic lube most of the time.  My not-so-bearded-anymore clam is the effing bomb.  It’s awesome. 

I love that thing.  I love it long time.

But… I didn’t want anyone to know.  I wanted to go to a stranger, whose waxing skills were unknown to me, rather than to a friend because I didn’t want her to know. 

You know, about the ravioli.

Seriously??  This is something I’m worrying about?  It’s total bullshit.  She does this for a living.  She has seen all of the labia.  She has seen all of the buttholes.  She has no doubt seen inner thigh scars like mine before too, from ingrown hairs/cysts.  She has seen all of the junk.  She doesn’t give a fuck that mine looks like a ravioli.  She doesn’t care about my thigh scars.  She doesn’t care about the extra skin from my twin pregnancy that kind of migrated down to the lowest point on my torso because of pesky gravity, except inasmuch as she has to make sure I pull that skin tight so she doesn’t damage me.  She doesn’t care about my hanging belly skin except to get it out of the way.

Why am I feeling shame about this?  It’s stupid!

So I sucked it up and went to my friend, because I trusted her not to hurt me.  (Well, not to injure me, anyway.) And you know what?  It was fine.  She was very professional, and I really wasn’t worried about it once it was happening.  I was more concerned about the decidedly unpleasant sensation of hair being ripped out of my vajungle. 

But I still felt like I needed to talk about it with you guys.  Because this thing?  With the body shame?  It’s insidious and it feeds on silence.  Shame loves it when we keep our mouths shut.  So no silence.

I know women who are worried about how they smell.  How they look.  How it works.  Women who think that everyone else can come without clitoral stimulation and something is wrong with them because they need that.  Women who use damaging douches or weird perfumes because they’re worried about their natural smell. 

Fuck.  That.  Noise.

Enough.

Shame, I will not feed you.  You don’t get my silence. 

And ravioli are delicious. So there.

Big

I had a weird experience this week.  I posted a photo in a facebook group I’m in, asking the women about their favorite “curvy” fashion rules to break.  You know… black is slimming, no horizontal stripes, no sleeveless tops, no skinny jeans, belt at the smallest part of your waist. 

Maybe I’m the only one who used to obsessively watch What Not to Wear, checking my closet against the rules.  Jackets must close and have a “high stance” to “lock and load” “the girls” (i.e., boobs).  Nothing shapeless or oversized ever.  Straight leg, dark wash trouser jeans, no sparkles or flaps on the pockets because that draws unwanted attention to your butt.

I’ve let go of those rules, and I’m happy that I have.  It’s why I started the conversation.  Basically, I bought these jeans, and I’m in love with them even though “the rules” I learned were that big girls shouldn’t wear jeans like this. I was drawing attention to my butt, and I felt great about that, because even though my body is big, I think my butt is awesome.  Why shouldn’t I bedazzle that ass?  I totally should! 

I felt free and I wanted to spread the freedom, and that’s why I posted about it.

Three things happened in response to my post:

One, people shared their fabulous fashion rule breaking, and we had a “fuck the rules” moment of solidarity. Other sparkly butts.  Bikinis. And lots of curve-enhancing horizontal stripes.

Two, people expressed that there are no rules, and that the premise of my question was ridiculous.  I’m good with that, actually.  They’re just further along the path than I am.  While I still hear Stacy and Clinton’s voice in my head every time I wear skinny jeans, these other women reject the concept of rules completely.  Rock on, sisters.

But it’s the third thing that left me feeling weird.

A bunch of people basically questioned my “fat cred.”  They said that I wasn’t a “big girl,” which were the words I had used to describe myself.  It made me feel really weird.

And when things make me feel weird and I don’t know why… I come talk to you all.

Hi. 

So they’re saying I’m not big.  This was clearly meant as a compliment.  I get the same reaction, even more strongly, when I refer to myself as fat.  Which I do sometimes, because I am.  I think of “big” or “fat” as value-neutral descriptions of my body.  I’m not insulting myself.  I’m just describing my body. 

My body is big.  It is, in fact, considered not large, not extra large, but extra EXTRA large.  I can’t shop in regular stores.  I have to go to special stores for people who are bigger than “normal.”  I am considered “obese” by medical terms, and would have to lose more than 30 pounds to be merely considered “overweight,” and more than 60 pounds to be considered “normal weight.” 

Fat on my body.

And I am fat.  It is what it is.  There is a lot of extra fat tissue on my body.  It’s how I’m made.  I could probably get rid of some of it, but historically for me, that weight loss comes at the expense of a healthy relationship with food and my mental health.  I’m happier and healthier accepting my fat body and just making sure I put real, nutritious food in it and move it around a lot. 

By any definition you can come up with, I am big.  I am a fat woman.  By clothing sizes, by medical terms, by the tissues that make up my body composition.

But there’s one set of definitions by which I am NOT fat.

If fat equals ugly, then no, I’m not fat.  If big equals undesirable, then no, I’m not big. 

I think that’s why I feel weird when people tell me I’m not big, or not fat.  Because by doing so, it feels to me like they are equating fat with ugly.  It’s the only definition that makes sense to me.  Because by any other definition, yup, I’m fat.  Except for the definition in which fat equals ugly.

My whole thing… the reason I post bikini photos right alongside my clothing size and weight… is that I want the world to see that a woman can be plus sized, extra extra large, weigh 220 pounds, have lots of fat on her body, and be slammin’, gorgeous, sexy, beautiful, and effing awesome. 

Fat does not equal ugly.  It just doesn’t.

Not every larger woman will want to reclaim that word or even hear it.  Fat will probably always be a sensitive word for many of us, and even to some degree for me.  I can say it in a reclaiming way, but it could still be used against me if the intent is cruelty. 

But I choose to reclaim it as a neutral descriptor, in hopes that I can help to disentangle the concepts of fat and ugly.  Because my big fat body is hot as hell.

Photo by Rebecca Palmer of lifescapesphotoandvideo.com

The life vest

I spent last week at my parents' new house in North Carolina, on Lake Gaston (pronounced Gastin, not the French way, and also best pronounced with a southern accent).  

Even though they're just over the Virginia border (seriously, at one point we considered swimming to Virginia), it might as well be another country.  It's beautiful there, but man, rural.  Like, rural rural.  Like no internet no cell service rural.  The best internet my parents can get is one and a half somethings.  I don't know what the somethings are, but what it means is that they can't stream Netflix and if someone wants to Skype with their grandbabies in Idaho, their grandbabies in the house with them have to get off their ipads and their daughter (i.e., me) has to get off facebook.

And you can't use your phone as a GPS, because there is no cell service.

One day we went to a flea market.  We poked through antique jewelry, rusted cast iron pots begging to be rejuvenated, and old washboards that unfortunately didn't say anything unintentionally hilarious about rubbing something out.  Oh, and here's how rural.  At one of the stalls, we tried to buy stuff, but couldn't because the seller wasn't around this weekend.  He had his brother manning the stall, but his brother didn't know the prices, so we couldn't buy anything. "Maybe next weekend," we were told.  And this guy let us look at stuff for ten minutes and didn't tell us nothing was for sale until we asked.

It is so rural that stuff at the flea market is not for sale, but people just sit there all day anyway.  Because... there is nothing else to do??  I guess??

Or maybe he just didn't like our Yankee accents and didn't want us wearing his grandmother's old scarf clips.  I don't know.  I don't get it.

Anyway, we found plenty to do in rural North Carolina.  Mostly involving eating, drinking, playing inappropriate and dirty games of telepictionary, and hanging out on the lake.

One day we went tubing behind my dad's boat, and that is the story I really came here to tell.

We took turns on the tube. My adventurous little brother went first, and then the kids had their turns.  Next my brother's girlfriend went, and then it was my turn.  Let me paint this little picture.  My brother's girlfriend is something like a size 2. Actually, I asked her after writing the first version of this.  She's a size zero.  She's an adorable, extremely sweet and cool little size zero person.

So when it was my turn, she handed over the life vest the adults were all sharing, it having been adorably zipped and clipped on her tiny bod a moment ago.

It was a size medium life vest.  I'm a 2X.

So fuck.

It didn't zip, not even close. My heart sank as I tried it on and realized I was going to have to deal with the fact that the generic adult life vest that everyone was using wasn't going to fit me.  It was one of those times.  Those one-size-fits-all-except-not-all-because-not-me times.  

It doesn't matter how much self-love work you do.  When something is supposed to be appropriate for people in general, and you're too big for it, it's devastating and kind of dehumanizing.  Like when a chair has a weight limit that is lower than your weight.  Or worse, when you look at a chair and you wonder.  Will it hold me or will I break a chair? And yes, I have broken a chair.  Only once.  But it only takes once.  

Maybe a thinner person would have broken that chair too because it was structurally unsound.  Or maybe I'm a gigantic non-person who can't have nice things like chairs.  Or life vests.  Or tube rides.

Tube rides is suddenly dirty in my mind.  Just thought I'd share that.

Anyway, all of the big girls out there know what I'm talking about.  It's that moment when you fear you might need a seat belt extender in an airplane.  That moment when you realize there is literally no place you can go to try on and buy a bra.  That moment when they have to swap out the blood pressure cuff.  That moment when you realize that you're too big for something that is fine for (what seems like) everyone else.



It's devastating.

I had a choice in that moment.  Beg off and miss the fun.

Or don't.

I figured before asking if my dad had another life vest, I would see if I could at least clip this little size medium thing around my body, even if it wouldn't zip.

I managed to clip the two clips below hooter level where it fit slightly better, and a funny thing happened. The life vest basically functioned as a sort of bustier, and pushed my boobs up. Suddenly, even next to my size zero almost-sister-in-law, I felt beautiful, with my life-vest-corseted tatas all supported and on display.  It was my kind of beauty, not her kind.  We are both beautiful.  And if I weren't the size I am, I wouldn't have these giant boobs sitting adorably on their life vest bustier shelf.

It was my turn to ride.  I floundered like an awkwardly beached whale trying to get on the tube. And then I had the best time ever flying across the water, in and out of the wake, hanging on for dear life.  It was awesome.  And I was the only adult who didn't fall off the tube. And I was pleasantly sore the next day from the craziness of hanging on as the tube whipped across the lake.  

And my self-love was stronger than ever.

So here's the moral of the story: When life gives you a too-small life vest, turn it into a bustier!

Lines and curves

Two years ago, I put photos on the internet of my plus size bod in a bikini.  This past year, the curvy bikini thing has really taken off, and I’m honored to have been a part of that revolution.  But between then and now, my self-love has slipped some.  I’ve gained a little weight, coming back up to my extremely stable set-point.  I’ve had an episode of depression.  As part of that depression, I’ve been less active, so my body isn’t as healthy right now as I like to keep it, regardless of size.  As a body love advocate, it’s hard when I find myself self-hating.  It’s difficult to talk about.  But yeah, that shit happens.

I’m part of a monthly women’s spirituality group.  Once a month, we get together, make a meal, eat, share our joys and challenges, and do an activity.  On Friday night, I was the host, so it was my turn to come up with our activity.  In the past, I have done groups on trance dancing, the tarot, Zen meditation.  Over the years, we have explored everything from feng shui to past lives, dreams to Isadora Duncan. 

I knew I wanted to do a group on body love.  I needed it.  I know most women need it.  As I was brainstorming activities, I remembered posing for my sister, who is an amazing artist, as she sketched me nude.  I had seen her sketches of strangers, the lines of their bodies, the wrinkles, the rolls, the curves and shapes.  I had seen how the “imperfections” were the most beautiful parts.  So I asked her to sketch me.  I watched her click into artist mode, where she was no longer looking at my body as a body, but only as shapes, lines, curves.  In that space, there is no judgment.  There are only shapes.  I wanted to see myself that way.

Before the group met, I tried it.  I took a photo of my nude torso in the mirror, and then used the photo to sketch myself.  I don’t know if it would work for everyone, but I am enough of an artist that it worked for me.  My belly was no longer this sagging thing to be judged or hated.  It was a shape, a curve, that I was trying to accurately capture with my pencil.  It was a completely non-judgmental space and a very transforming way of seeing my own body.

When I finished the sketch, I looked at it as a whole.  It was the kind of body I would wish for.  And it was mine.  As a set of lines, it was easier to see the beauty.  The perfection of the imperfections came across in a piece of art in a way that doesn’t happen in the mirror.  I decided to write over the pencil lines with my thoughts about my body.  I intended to do affirmational positive body talk, but what emerged was just… what is.  “This is my fupa, my apron, my flap.  It used to hold my precious children.”  “This one [my right breast] is smaller and lower.”  No judgment.  Just… what is.  When I was done, I erased the pencil lines, and was left with my body shape, created out of my language about it. 

I was left with a sense of peace.  And this incredibly powerful piece of paper. 

My body, in my own words

The next night, the group met.  We ate and drank and talked.  And then it was activity time.  They did sketches of their legs, their bellies, their smiles.  I watched as they clicked into artist mode, trying to capture the beautiful lines of themselves.  I did a second piece with the group of my face in profile.  I have struggled with my nose for as long as I can remember, and more recently with my neck, which hovers just on the cusp of a double chin.  As a piece of art, though, my nose is the best part.  That roller coaster curve of bridge, bump, and ball.  That’s me.  It’s one of the defining curves of my body.  Although slightly larger in person than it is in this drawing, that curve of my nose is what makes this image identifiably me. 

Faces are way harder to draw.  If you try this at home, maybe don't do your face.  Because dude, hard.

If you struggle with body image, I encourage you to try this activity yourself.  In the aftermath of it, I feel a kind of calm acceptance I haven’t felt before.  It’s different from the exuberance, the “I am one sexy bitch,” of the bikini project.  This is a quiet love.  An acknowledgment of what is, without judgment or the desire to change it.  These curves are me.  These words and thoughts are me.  I am a perfectly imperfect piece of art.

The big time

This week, a high school friend posted a link on my wall of this gorgeous plus size woman in a bikini.  She was just like me.  Over 200 pounds, gall bladder scars, stretch marks, within a cup size or two of my prodigious hooters.  I look at her body and see only beauty and a flatter stomach than I could ever dream of, but for her, showing her body was a very big deal.  Just like it was for me. 

Except that she’s already kind of famous, so her post got picked up by Huffington Post, and then talked about around the world.  Big girls in bikinis are suddenly news.  Oh, hello, envy, how nice to see you.  Hi, slight tinge of bitterness, yes, yes, you did do this a year and a half ago and it was not picked up by the Huffington Post.  I know.  Shhhh.  Simmer down.

So, I did what any self-respecting blogger would do.  I stalked researched the hell out of her.  Turns out that she is effing awesome.  Her name is Brittany Gibbons.  She’s funny and real.  She doesn't like to wear a bra.  She reads smut and uses the word fupa in her blog.  OK, the more I read, the more I love this woman.  I want to be her new stalkery best friend.  (OMG you guys, she accepted my facebook friend request.)  She started an online magazine called Curvy Girl Guide. She appeared on Good Morning America in a bathing suit (one-piece at the time).  Her rationale for doing it was "Be the change you wish to see in the world," the same motto I have on a sticker on the driver's side door of my minivan so that I am reminded every single time I get in the car.  She did a TED talk in which she stripped down to a bathing suit on stage.  I love her.  Here’s the other thing I learned while stalking her, both from her TED talk and from an article written about her:

All of this attention she has gotten for showing her body has not been universally positive. 

People give her shit about her body.  People say that she is promoting an unhealthy lifestyle.  People call her fat and tell her they're surprised she managed to get a husband.  Two things.  One. Fuck those people.  Fuck them.  Two.  I’m really, really glad that’s not me. 

I posted my bikini photos, fully expecting that the 200 of my nearest and dearest friends would see them.  Instead, it was in the tens of thousands.  I still get hundreds of hits a week on that page.  My bikini adventure was a crazy wild ride for me given the small scale of my blog.  You know how many negative comments I got? 

One.

One person, not even on my blog, but on BlogHer’s link to my blog on facebook, said that I was glorifying an unhealthy body size.  Hundreds or maybe thousands of people were inspired to love their bodies more, and lots of them told me so.  One person made me feel like I didn’t deserve to love mine.  But of course that one cut me.  Of course it did.  It was outweighed by the outpouring of support, but it takes a lot of positive messages to counterbalance one negative one. 

Here’s what I learned from this.  You need a thick skin to hit the big time, and I don’t have that.  I pretty much have the thinnest skin around.  I’m not ready for the big time.  I’m not ready to absorb negative comments as the price of increased exposure.  I find myself grateful that my bikini post was not the one picked up by HuffPo.  I’m glad that strangers are not criticizing my body and making incorrect assumptions about my health.  And hurting my feelings.

I’m intensely proud to be part of the body love revolution.  But I don’t need to be the poster girl.  I’m glad I’m not the poster girl.  And the girl who is the poster girl?  She’s awesome.  Go read her blog.  Especially this post.  And this one.  And this less funny but very real and honest one. And then if you want to laugh again after that last post, this one.  

It begins

Yesterday, we had a play date with another set of twins, two boys who are six months older than my little monkeys. They played together really well, sharing, taking turns, making up games together. It was a delightful morning, but one thing happened that has me feeling a little sad for the end of an era, come too soon.

One of the little boys noticed that my daughter’s teeth are different. She is congenitally missing her top lateral incisors, just like I am. Those are the teeth just next to your two front teeth. If you look closely at my smile, you might notice that the teeth next to my front teeth are actually my pointy canine teeth, moved forward and slightly shaved down to look less vampirish. Or maybe you never noticed.

It mildly bothers me from time to time, like when the contestants on American Idol hold a big note and I see their perfect line of pearly whites close up, literally larger than life on our excessive TV. But in the scheme of things, this is so not something I spend time or energy worrying about. My parents made the decision to move all of my teeth forward rather than getting false teeth for the spaces. At the time, I didn’t like that decision because it meant 3 years of braces rather than 6 months, but after watching a friend of mine with the same teeth missing spend thousands of dollars dealing with false teeth, I am grateful for the simple solution my parents gave me.

Anyway, back to the play date. I honestly don’t think my daughter ever had any clue that her teeth were unusual, until yesterday when her friend pointed it out. I handled it as well as I could. I told her that she is beautiful and that her teeth are just like Mommy’s. I explained to her about braces, saying that when she is big like Mommy, a dentist will put special stickers on her teeth to make them look like Mommy’s, and that her brother would probably have special stickers on his teeth too.

She still just looked really thoughtful and sad. She said she wanted “lots of teeth” like her brother. It just about broke my heart.

And then her friend, innocently… these kids are all only four, remember… told her she looked like a beaver. At this point, I was so bummed about my daughter’s first body image issue that I didn’t even find it funny that she was chanting over and over “I am not a beaver.” I hugged her, told the other child not to call her a beaver, and reiterated her beauty. I didn’t know what else to do.

She was apparently talking about it again later with my sister. I can’t believe my child is not even quite four yet, and she has already lost the innocence of believing that her body is perfect in every way. I am hoping, with all my heart, that this is something that falls into the amnesia pits of childhood and she goes back to thinking that the sun rises and sets in her stunning smoke-colored eyes.

But whether or not she forgets, I will do all I can to remind her every day that she is the most gorgeous and amazing little girl I have ever seen in my life. That it is her differences that make her sparkle, her uniqueness that makes her who she is, the gaps in her teeth that give her the smile that lights up my life.

Someone loved each of us that way once. Breathe that in. And again. Your differences make you sparkle. Your uniqueness makes you who you are. Light up the world with your smile, gaps and all.