I’m plus size? Great! It doesn’t change who I am, so I’m fine with it. It’s just a label that someone decided to give people who don’t fit their definition of perfect. It definitely does not define my personality, my accomplishments, or me.
In fact, I don’t mind being called “plus size” or “curvy” at all. If we live in an age where body-positivity and self-love rule, why would you be offended when someone considers you plus size?
In our society, "curvy" is the socially-accepted euphemism of choice for fat bodies. It’s the polite way to acknowledge someone isn’t thin without offending them with the word ‘fat’. I reject the notion that this euphemism is good enough for our bodies. I am plus size. I am fat. But fat does not define me.
Describing myself as "fat" is not an act of self-hatred, but an act of self-love. It took a long time for me to own it, but I got there, and I will remain there.
As a child, I was always bigger. I wasn’t fat. I was what many would have called “big-boned.” Growing up, I grew into a plus size body. I never didn’t like the way I looked. I never really hated being fat. The problem was everyone else. Everyone else made me scared that I wasn’t OK, that I was wrong to feel confident about my body. It was films, magazines, books, and classes at school that made me wonder if I had got it all wrong. Well, here’s what I came to learn: the media is NOT a reflection of reality.
I didn’t hate being fat. I hated being called fat. Not because I thought fat was bad, but because I knew that other people did. I knew that they were using ‘fat’ as a way to hurt me. It was so loaded, so malicious, always the first adjective to be used against me in a petty fight, and something I just couldn’t argue back against.
Well, here’s the thing. There is ALWAYS going to be something that’s “wrong” with you, and there will always be people telling you to change. But you don’t have to. You don’t have to lose twenty pounds, you don’t have to cake makeup on your face, and you don’t have to wear clothes that the world says you should. If you want to, go for it. But no one can make you, and no matter what your choice is, it doesn’t change who you really are.
If you want to exercise, do it to feel like a better you; a you that you’re proud of. But NEVER manipulate your body because someone told you that you need to in order to be more beautiful.
For me, when I talk about my body or someone else’s body and I call it plus size, I say it with respect and a refusal to participate in a hierarchy where thinness is aspirational, and fat is shameful. I say it to describe a body, to celebrate a body for what it is, not to wound it or treat it with shame.
So when you call me curvy or plus-size and think that it offends me, think again. I love myself. The woman who does not require validation from anyone is the most feared individual on the planet. But if I asked you to name all the things that you love, how long would it take for you to name yourself?
