Sorry about your knees. My brother and sister have congenital joint problems which I seem to have avoided by pure luck so far… it’s such a pest if you have them. (They’re not overweight.)

I got on that team despite being chubby and inexperienced, and I’ll always be glad they took a chance on me. (No, I did not turn out to be their star player despite everything, but I had a lot of fun!)

Pie, thanks for this link to Kate’s post. I’ve been trying to process the whole “fat acceptance” thing for a long time, but it just won’t sink into my brain that it really is OKAY for me to be just the way I am, and I should stop hating and berating myself for not being what I’m not, and start loving and accepting myself for the cool-but-dorky, quirky, intelligent person that I am.

Reading this article kind of put a chink in the covering over my brain that’s making it so hard for me to comprehend these concepts. Maybe it will be the crack in the dam that finally lets me live the second half of my life better than the first.

And I hope you don’t mind, but I linked to you in my blog, and Kate’s article, and of course BFD, but y’all have been in my blogroll for months now.

Cheers!

HA!! I thought I was the only person that went sneaking around pulling that sort of thing.

Also works with dance companies.

Although the director did say, “You move well BUT you have to lose weight to make the company.” (I’m sure you know where I’m going with this …)

Being a brainwashed college girl, I did knock it off, subluxating my patella in the process, which has since aggravated a cascade of knee problems, which perhaps could have been abrogated earlier because it turns out I have congenital patellar difficulty which no one in my family discovered when I was a child, because I didn’t play sports because everyone assumed that I sucked because I was FAT. Oh well.

At least maybe I’ve learned something.

“…the process of change must go much more comfortably if you don’t hate yourself for not having got there yet. “

I think that’s one of the most beautifully profound things I’ve ever read. Certainly that I’ve read lately.

In many ways I’m lucky, because I stopped waiting to be magically thin around the time I went to university. Where I could try out for a sports team, because nobody there knew I had always been picked last for everything for the past 12 years. And so forth…

When Des says “It’s easier to hate fat than hate the person I am and try to change it…” that sounds sort of painful. Because yeah, maybe your problems ARE caused by something other than your weight (whatever it is), but don’t we need to accept the something-others, too, at least to some extent?

See, the other thing that happened to me just before I went to university was that I found out I have Asperger’s syndrome (AS). It was a relief to have a reason for not feeling quite normal (which I didn’t). But, on the other hand, although I deal with it pretty well, there’s no way I can make myself not have AS. I just have to accept it and work with what I’ve got.

Similarly, there’s no way I can be one of those effortless skinny people, but I’ll be miserable if I make that a reason not to do things. It’sTo live your whole life that way would be like being a child who won’t play if they can’t always win first prize.

If you decide you want to change your life (in whatever way), the process of change must go much more comfortably if you don’t hate yourself for not having got there yet. Nobody else is perfect, either, and like Kate said, you might find that what you thought you wanted isn’t actually the real you. And the hating is such a waste of emotional energy…

OK, I’ll stop waffling.

- When I’m thin I won’t be afraid to fly anywhere because they might ask me to buy an extra seat
- When I’m thin I’ll be able to buy clothes in normal stores
- When I’m thin I’ll be able to ride on rides at theme parks because I’ll actually fit in the seats.

Actually, all those should say THINNER. I’ve long ago abandoned the thought that I’d be the perfect person that I want to be when I get thin, but from a practical standpoint there are some things I know will be better when I’m thinner. And I know this because I’ve done all those things and liked them, but in this case, my fat really is keeping me from doing them.

Of course that brings up the whole other issue of how fat people end up basically getting the short end of the stick and everyone thinking it’s OK because of “practicality”

“I’ve been reading this blog for about a week and a half and I’ve really enjoyed the posts. Today is no exception. (and yay this is my first time leaving a comment!)

This entry is really eye opening for me because I only discovered the whole size acceptance movement about two weeks ago and this post describes exactly how I feel right now. I am full on in the cognitive dissonance phase you spoke about and I’m struggling to reach real genuine, bonafide fat acceptance land.

I think people should be happy with their bodies and get over all the dieting and obsessing about weight, but at the same time I’m sitting here feeling regret about a piece of chocolate I ate a few hours ago because yes, I’m on a diet. Ugh and I hate it!! Like, its ok for others to love themselves but it’s not ok for me, because how could I possibly like myself, I’m fat!

Everything you say about the Fantasy of Being Thin is so true it hurts me. I don’t want to be thin for a smaller waist line, I want to be thin because in this crazy mixed up world I have been taught to believe that skinny people are the happiest people on earth, and I BELIEVE IT. They live in freaking disneyland and I’m sitting on a rock in the middle of the ocean because I “choose” to remain fat. My fantasies include various things like:

When I’m thin, my father will be proud to be seen with me.
When I’m thin, I can go to my old high school and show everyone what a valuable person I became.
When I’m thin, I will have the guts to tell people how I really feel.
and my personal favorite….
When I’m thin, my life will begin.

I know that none of these are true, but in a sick sense I want these things to be true, NEED these things to be true, because that means that I can blame everything on my fat and not on, let’s say, my low self-esteem. It’s easier to hate fat and wallow in that than hate the person that I am and try to change it.

Thank you so much for posting about this subject. At least I know I’m not alone and that at one time you felt the way I do right now. I hope one day I reach the point where you are now and I can look back on this time and help others the way you do.”