Curvy. Thick. Overweight. Voluptuous. Fat. Heavy.

I’ve been called them all throughout college. Staying at a consistent 195 pounds in college, I was without a doubt above the average weight for a typical female college student. You hear all the time about the "freshman 15," but with me it was more like the ‘freshman 50’. Between the stress of college courses, breaking up with my long-term boyfriend, and suffering from severe depression, I had somehow jumped from a size 12 to a size 18 in a little over a year.

While I was clearly "curvier" than many of my sorority sisters and friends, I never identified myself as being fat, at least not at first. It wasn’t until I began to date again that a snowballing effect began, tearing down by self-image, making me re-evaluate who I was and finally find out where my self-worth really comes from.

It started with my first party of 2015. I was meeting up with a boy I had met online, meaning we met on Tinder. This was the first boy I had clicked with in a long time and the first one to actually ask me to go out with him. We talked all night, laughed as people stumbled by us, and ended up spending the night out on my front steps talking about everything from our random music collections to why we chose our majors. To be honest with everyone, it was the first time in a long time that I had felt pretty, actually pretty. Not the stuff you force yourself to believe when you look into the mirror with a false smile, but that genuine, warm confidence you feel in yourself.

3 a.m. rolled around and his phone rang.As he picked up his phone I was vaguely aware of what was being said on the other end, just his friends checking in to make sure he made it back home all right. But then a comment his brother made jumped through the phone, “Did you leave with that fat chick?”

That fat chick.

Pause and rewind, wait. Me? It was the first time I had ever been announced like that. I didn’t realize that my weight had become my defining feature to those around me. Of course the poor guy immediately apologized, eyes wide as he realized that I had become an unwilling listener to his conversation. “You’re not fat; you’re curvy, and I like that. You’re beautiful.”

I knew he meant well, but by then it was too late and the blow to my self-esteem had done its damage. Soon enough I began to fixate on how others saw me. I wore ridiculous amounts of makeup, I perfected the red lip and winged liner, and dressed up every day in hopes that someone would make me feel pretty again.

I went on more dates, put myself out there more. My rationality was that if I met enough men who found me attractive, that it would erase all of my insecurities and that painful memory. This in fact, was a terrible idea. But I would have to go through months of terrible dates and awkward encounters to figure this out.

On one date in particular we were two hours into dinner and I thought things were going great. He was quirky, had great taste in music, was passionate about his work and even better, he seemed to really be into me. This beautiful moment was crushed once he told me that he had never met a "heavy woman with such confidence." To be able to embrace my weight was refreshing, he pointed out.

“And sexy,” he added before smacking my thighs.

I was out the door the moment I got my check.

I wish I said I had learned my lesson after that. Instead I went out more and more, and each time I needed more validation from another guy to feel good about myself. Not just guys either; I needed anyone to validate my existence: friends, family, even strangers were victim to my insecurities. My sole focus became my appearance. My hair had to always be done, my makeup pristine and perfect. I began to go on diets in hopes that once I dropped weight more men would find me attractive.

But the thing was, the harder I tried to be more attractive to other people the more unattractive I became to myself. I forgot about the other things that made me who I am. The favorite parts of myself that were being shoved to the side to make way for opinions from people who didn’t matter. The things that used to define me were no longer important; my passion for writing, the loyalty I had for my friends, the kindness I used to extend to others. And let me tell you now, living that kind of lifestyle is unfulfilling and lonely, and eventually it caught up to me.

Eventually I hit the lowest of lows with my self-esteem, rock bottom even. Here I was, the lightest I had been since starting college, plenty of people telling me that I was gorgeous, sexy, and pretty, but it wasn’t enough. It’s taken me months to try and figure out who I am and what defines me as a person. I may not have it all figured out, but the surprising thing about learning to love yourself is that you don’t have the pressure to have it all figured out.

I have realized now that you can be called hot, sexy, amazing, pretty, but is that all you want to be known for? Because I want to be called brilliant, inspiring, courageous, talented, or kind before being called beautiful.