Comments on: What Was Your Stepping Stone?

By: Eden

Eden — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 22:45:20 +0000

It didn’t occur to me that this didn’t pingback. I answered it in-depth (and have gotten great comments).

Short version is: I was looking at some photos of myself as a toddler & realized that even when I was tiny, I was a big gal. Since I’m adopted, I didn’t have a mother to look at with a body type like the one I had (and she told me to “stop gaining weight” at age 12 when I was 118 lbs). So it was through looking at myself that I realized, “Maybe I should be who I’m supposed to be, learn to be happy with that and move up from there.” And it worked. [And when I found my birthmother, it turns out she's a happy, healthy size 18 as well :)]

By: K

Wed, 20 Feb 2008 21:30:15 +0000

Probably going to university, where I decided to join a women’s football (soccer) team. I would have been too embarrassed to do that at home, where I felt my reputation for being unathletic was entrenched.

I was never very good at football, but it was fun, and it allowed me to start seeing myself as sturdy and strong (I was a defender) rather than chubby and slow.

I found sports completely humiliating at school, but since then almost all my good feelings about my body have been prompted by teaching it new things to do. I am the same size as I was at school, but I’m a lot happier in my body. I needed to realise that you can have fun even if you’re going to be last!

By: Bree

Bree — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 01:35:57 +0000

-When I was a high school senior and the junior class nominated me for prom court. Looking back, it’s rather silly, but for a 17 year-old fat chick, it’s quite an achievement!

-When I was in college, a good-looking young man approached me for a conversation, and didn’t care that I was fat.

-When I got back home after a walk and looked at the clock on the wall, it was an hour later. And people say fatties can’t exercise.

-And just last Saturday, I was in the Lane Bryant dressing room and realized my big fat ass looked pretty damn good in those Right Fit jeans.

By: carla

carla — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 01:25:46 +0000

mo? youre amazing.

By: Sherie Sanders

Sherie Sanders — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 00:23:15 +0000

To tell you the truth, I was born fat positive. I remember always liking my body, and refusing to diet as a matter of pride. No one was jumping thru hoops to gain my approval, why should I to gain theirs? I felt this way at a very young age. I also remember my grandmother’s friend talking about a woman who needed to lose weight. I immediately hated the friend. I think my last incarnation must have been in a very fat positive place. I briefly gave in to the diet brain wash as a teen in So Ca, but came out of it as soon as I started to study sociology in college. What really clinched it beyond any doubt though was a most bizarre experience I had before I left Cali. We sociologists have a concept called master status. It is something that eclipses everything about you. In Cali, weight is a master status. One could stand up to Satan himself and refuse to get sucked up in his vortex of confusion, and they would still only care how big your hips are. But before I left, I avoided a trap many other people fell into. It was so big, and so odd that the world was forced to look at look at me differently; it trumphed even weight (for about 5 minutes)! Of course, I’ll be dead before the whole thing comes out. But I know that fat acceptance was the best training I could ever have in being true to myself and refusing to go along with the crowd.

By: Maritzia

Maritzia — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 23:42:43 +0000

Hahahahaha…I never blamed my body for clothes looking bad on me…I blame the *expletive deleted* designers that thing 1) all fat women have the same build or 2) to design for fat women you had to just take something for a thin woman and make it bigger….assholes.

My real breakthrough came just after I turned 35. I found a doctor who actually believed that I wasn’t fat because I overate. He understood the metabolic issues I had and worked with me to treat them and to be as healthy as I could be. That was a huge breakthrough for me. For once I didn’t feel guilty every time I looked in the mirror. It was so empowering. I told him the last time I saw him that he had changed my life.

I wrote a poem not long after that called, “What’s the Matter Fella, Don’t You Like Fat Chicks”. I’ve since lost it in a hard drive crash or I’d share it with you. It expressed exactly how I felt when i saw some guy looking at me with the look of, “I can’t believe she’s wearing that as fat as she is.”

By: E. Black

E. Black — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 23:13:41 +0000

This may seem completely silly but my moment was when the bassist in the band that I absolutely love eyeballed me at the concert and continued to do so over the course of the evening. It was the moment I realized that my body wasn’t a source of pain, it was a source of joy, pleasure and beauty. His “admiration” caused me to appreciate my body. Like I said, silly.

By: HillaryGayle

HillaryGayle — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 21:48:55 +0000

Oh, Anon. 14-yo, how I have such high hopes for you!

By: sara

sara — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 21:22:12 +0000

It feels strange and wrong to be writing this, but my turning point came when I decided to kick a poisonous friend out of my life. This girl was not bad about the size thing, but she wanted me dependent on her for love and approval. She had me believing that a good portion of our friends did not approve of some of my actions. It got me thinking that if I respect myself and want other people to respect me then I have to get rid of this friend. Of course, this means that I have to respect myself and treat myself the way I treat others, which has been harder than one might think. It also lead me to the FA/SA movement and the movement lead to me making a big stink about the conditions in the dorms, with my family’s support.

By: deeleigh

deeleigh — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 15:39:40 +0000

When I was 19, I survived a roll-out car accident in which I was thrown half way out of the car and crushed under the chassis. I was walking again two weeks later – after dislocating a hip and breaking my pelvis in three places. I weighed around 190 at the time. After that, I decided that my body wasn’t “bad” or “unhealthy.” It was actually very healthy and tough, and I wasn’t going to start a life-long war with it over the size it wanted to be.