Worth my Weight

Reflective surfaces seem to follow me wherever I go; in the water-stained mirrors in campus bathrooms, the polished glass kitchen table in my apartment, and the puddles of rain accumulated on the street after a heavy downpour, I find my eyes staring back at me. I hold my gaze for a second before reflexively peering down at my silhouette. After years of diligent effort unlearning anti-fat biases, I am relieved by the kindness of my eyes as they travel over the outline of my round stomach and wide thighs.

My eyes were not always this affectionate, though; my eyes were swords, striking every part of my body that I knew society deemed unacceptable. My soft, pillowy stomach became a testament to my inability to take care of myself, and my sturdy legs symbolized my laziness. I tried to ignore these baseless assumptions, but in a body that does not echo societal beauty standards, strides towards self-love alone could not erase my insecurities. Though my own eyes longed to warmly embrace my body, the world was persistent on shaming it.

Social media only exacerbated the difficulty of navigating the world in a fat body. Fat creators provided spaces for representation and body acceptance, but their comment sections were a hotspot for my self-loathing and over-thinking. With every post I made on public social media platforms, I feared the small yet tangible possibility of my body being re-posted on other platforms as “fatspo”—dehumanizing inspiration for others to avoid weight gain. I felt that I couldn’t share my experiences of living in a fat body, either; whenever I wanted to vent about the doctor who gave me pamphlets on weight loss when I was there for an ear infection, or about my depressing deficiency of photos with friends due to my discomfort with cameras, I remembered the awful comments I could be subjected to and opted to stay silent.

To cope with this burden, I found myself gravitating towards spaces where I could flourish in the absence of my physical body. Most prominently, school transcripts showed no indication of my body type. I obsessed over grades and college acceptances to overcompensate for my fatness. A harmful compromise took root in my mind: I would accept my body as long as I was extraordinary in another area of my life. Yet as I neared graduation and achieved all the academic goals I set for myself, I felt an emptiness in my chest. Exhaustion occupied the space in my mind where pride belonged, and I started to doubt the validity of using academics to justify my body. I longed for authentic self-love, to feel valued for all that encompasses my being, including, rather than regardless of, my body.

This longing for acceptance initiated my exploration into body positivity and body neutrality. Deconstructing anti-fat media such as My 600 Pound Life made me question the mainstream narratives of humiliation and negligence surrounding fat lives. I challenged the assumption that all fat people live unfulfilling lives, and I rejected the idea that even those who are unhealthy owe health to receive respect. I started reading literature surrounding fat liberation, specifically Sabrina Strings’ Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia, in which Strings explains that the societal obsession of slender bodies can be traced back to European thinkers who asserted that Black people are inherently fatter than white people. As a result, white women strived for thinness to distance themselves from Black women; in other words, the fear of fatness felt by many white women was an extension of a fear of Blackness and anti-Black racism.

As I dissected the negative stereotypes encompassing fatness, I discovered the freedom and bliss that comes with fat acceptance. I do not have to worry about getting fat and its potential impacts on my social life, love life, and societal respect; for many, the prospect of fatness is a nightmare, but for me, it is freedom in knowing that I am resilient and content in the face of an assumed worst-case scenario. There is an unspoken joy in having the ability to immediately detect shallow and disrespectful individuals before wasting months forming a relationship with them. The euphoria of finally developing my own style without concerns of what others think, because my fatness is visible whether I am draped in an abundance of layers or adorned in a crop-top, is unmatched. I can deeply empathize with and appreciate the beauty of individuals who do not conform to conventional beauty standards, partly because I underwent that process for myself.

Living as a fat person in a world obsessed with thinness will never be easy. However, as I start to acknowledge my beauty and strength, the stares I get when I order anything that’s not a salad at a restaurant, or use the elevator instead of taking the stairs, do not bother me as much as they used to. As I continue to learn to love my body, I simultaneously learn that my body is a vessel that is part of me, but not all of me. All bodies possess physical beauty, but the creativity, compassion, and love housed within one’s body is where the real beauty lies. This realization, coupled with self-love, will not eradicate individual and systemic antifat biases, but I will continue to live authentically and unapologetically in my own skin. As my eyes gaze over my reflection, all of the familiar rolls and stretch marks are still there, but they no longer retract from my being—they have helped shape me into the thoughtful, empathetic, and kind person that I am. And that is beautiful.

Written by Catherine August | Graphic Design by Rino Fujimoto