Love It Or Lose It: A Big Girl’s Dilemma
There’s an epidemic of obesity in the country and it is confusing our women.
It has been unacceptable for women to be overweight in this country for a long time, but with an unhealthy fixation on celebrity women and their weight it has spun out of control.
Because of this, big girls and their friends began to fight back. Starting movements such as #effyourbeautystandards and wearing the infamous #fatkini.
We have people like Gabi Fresh, (plus size blogger) showing women how to look fabulous at every size, in important quest that I highly agree with and Lady Gaga saying accept yourself because you were born this way (of course she meant in a broader spectrum than just weight).
The only problem is, you weren’t born this way. No one is born fat, they may come into this world with a genetic propensity to gain weight, but obesity isn’t coded into anyone’s DNA.
Being overweight, I have struggled with health and acceptance within myself. It’s confusing to know which one to choose, losing weight to be healthy or accepting your body as beautiful and loving yourself.
Well not everyone knows this, but you can have both. Most big girls won’t admit it, but when a member of the “fat” club decides that health is their final quest and they begin to lose weight, specifically mass amounts of weight, then they are then deemed to be a traitor.
In this country apparently you can’t accept yourself and change. Being overweight is starting to be treated as if it is an inevitable trait, much like the way Black women are encouraged to embrace their natural hair, big women are encouraged by some groups to embrace their unhealthy weight.
I don’t want to bash big women, especially since I am one, because women don’t need another reason to be ashamed of their bodies. I just want women to know it is OKAY to pursue health and lose weight. It doesn’t mean you don’t love yourself and it doesn’t mean you don’t love your big friends.
Being unsure of body-image is something every human deals with. I feel pretty confident in myself. I know there are curves on my body that are appealing and I have a beautiful face and nice hair. But I also struggle with low self-esteem just as much as any other woman, no more and no less.
The quest for weight loss should purely be about health because if you can’t find happiness at your current size you won’t find happiness at any size. I don’t think that as I lose weight and gain muscle that my self-esteem with evaporate into thin air, it comes with humanity.
Some days I think my figure looks nice depending on what I’m wearing and some days I want to break everything, eat a cake and watch Netflix, that’s totally normal.
But, I am only 25 and I have three daughters that I want to see marry and have babies, and no matter how much I accept my body and know that I am beautiful I can’t love the heart disease, Diabetes II, and hypertension risks away.
Life expectancy drops as your weight climbs, that is a fact, it’s not an opinion or a bias it is a fact.
That being said, there is no specific size that any woman should be or one specific shape that is best. If I can be healthy at a size 16 than that’s cool, if I have to get down to a size 8 then so be it, but one is no better than the other.
A big ‘ol ghetto booty is no better than a flat butt, because no matter what you have going on back there or up front you are beautiful, but make sure you’re healthy AND beautiful.
I know I’m hot, but I want to be healthy too, so 50 pounds down from now I hope my overweight friends won’t feel as though I’ve left them behind but rather feel curious how I did it.