"If I'm fat Stewie's fat too because we wear the same size onesie!" - Peter Griffin of Family Guy

    

     One of my favorite episodes of "Family Guy" was the one where Peter went to the doctor for a physical and the doctor told him that he was in good health except for the fact that he was fat. He was like, "What?". The point was that he was acting like he had no idea that he was fat! He was doing things that he thought was prove that he wasn't fat, like hula-hooping (it gets stuck on him); Brian shows him that he is so big that things go into orbit around him; he put on Stewie's onesie (hence the quote that starts this blog).

     It's funny, this episode because it seems sometimes that we are beginning to live in a society where people are getting like Peter Griffin, like they don't know that they are fat. Maybe it's because obesity is becoming such an epidemic in this country that you can see it everywhere. It's kinda funny that a fat person (me) would be talking about people being fat, but the truth is as I have said before I live under no illusion that I'm not obese. I'm probably bordering on morbid obesity actually. It sucks. I have said that before too.

     Our church recently got new seating, theater style seating. This means that we no longer have pews but we have individual seats like at the movies. This morning I was going to sit down and made the comment to my husband that I wanted to sit in an aisle seat (then I could straighten out my leg); the man in front of us turned around to my husband and told him "If you notice these seats are numbered. The ones numbered with a 21 are the biggest. If you find one of those, your wife may be more comfortable." I just sat there, a bit dumbfounded. I mean I was right there. My husband asks, "do you want to move?" I said no I was fine followed by "wow".

     This man's wife was also heavy, maybe he knew what it was like, I'm sure that he was just trying to be helpful. But there are few things that make you feel worse than having some one point out to you that you are fat. I mean, it's like Peter, you feel like saying, "What? Me?" Then there are those times that you get labeled as being fat when maybe you shouldn't be labeled that boldly. This happened to me as well. We were at a local theme park and got on a boat-type ride. The man gave me an extend-a-belt thing for my Velcro seat. Was it needed? No, not really, it was a boat ride. Did it make me feel about as big as an elephant trying to hide in the corner? Indeed, yes, it did.

     I guess that the point that I'm trying to get at is that if you see a fat person, we don't need you to tell us that we are fat. Even if you are saying something that to you is helpful, don't. You aren't making things better, you are making them worse. Even if we are one of the "fat and happy" crowd (rather fat and proud) who are ok with who we are, how would you feel if we were like, "you know I know a GREAT plastic surgeon that can fix that nose" or, "a good dentist could take care of that overbite." You would feel like crap is what you would feel like. Fat people DO NOT need non-fat people to tell us that we are fat. Period. We know. We know that you know.

     I just had another example come to mind about this. I used to date a guy that was a big guy. I mean bigger than me in size and girth. I went on a trip with him once to deliver a car that one of his friends was selling to his [the friend's] aunt. While eating lunch with this woman (who wasn't skinny...and actually I was a lot smaller then too) she looks across the table at me (not him) and says, "If you ever decide to get bypass, I know a great doctor you can see." His friend is pinching my leg under the table as a way to remind me not to come up out of my seat and go redneck on this old hag. I smile, say some kind of BS pleasantry and try to shrug it off.

     Things like this are hurtful and unnecessary. We really do not need anyone to remind us that we are fat.

     Tomorrow I will start to chronicle my journey into a healthier (and perhaps skinnier) being. I'm tired of missing out on my own life. I'm tired of letting things from my past affect my present and my future. I'm over this. I'm over being fat and 'happy'. I'm not happy, but I think that this will help me be happier. I know that things like this, meaning your body image, cannot necessarily affect your idea of your self worth, but I believe that anything that you can do to make you feel better about yourself will help you feel better about your life.

     Until then I leave you with the mental picture of a 300lb woman in an infant onesie.......yeah, take that to bed with you.