The First Time

Here's the second subject I'm choosing to write about from the Curvy Girl month of prompts - the first time you were called fat. I'll be honest - this is a tough one for me to write about. It makes me explore deep and very hurtful feelings from a long time ago. These things tend to really stick with you, as this incident has really stuck with me, and bubble up again to make me feel inadequate at random times.

I'm not 100% sure that this was the first time that somebody called me fat, but it's the first time that I remember it. I was a freshman in highschool and I was trying to figure out my place, my group in the new school. I'm not sure why exactly felt the need for this. The majority of my friends from middle school were also at this new school. All of my best friends were at this new school. I guess it's because of the influx of new people - new kids in our class and all of the upper classmen, too. I wanted to be considered cool, I wanted to be popular. 

Anyhoo, my friend Megan and I started hanging out with a group of older guys. Guys I wanted to impress. One of the guys, Troy, was interested in Megan. Because I was one of her best friends, I was her tag along. I was not the girl that guys were interested in. All of my girlfriends were the girls the guys were interested in. I was the friend with glasses that always tagged along. I was always the third wheel. (I still feel like the third wheel a lot of the time.)

Megan was a really pretty girl. Long red curly hair. A great figure. At this time I had short hair (and of course my glasses), but I really don't think I was fat (yet). I was a dancer, had been dancing since I was very young. I wasn't stick thin, but I had muscular legs and I'm relatively short. Most of my best girlfriends were much, much taller and quite skinny. So in comparison to them, I was definitely bigger.

Below is a picture from this time. I'm with my sister. I started wearing baggy shirts to hide myself, even though there wasn't really a reason to hide. You can see my legs a bit and now I can say I definitely wasn't fat, but I felt like I was. 

me & my sis in highschool

Back to the story. Megan and I were hanging out with Troy and his friends one night. One of Troy's friends, Brandon, called Megan and I "Crockett and Tubbs". Megan was Crockett because of her red hair. I was Tubbs because I was the fat one. I can't even convey how much that hurt. It actually devastated me. I was the fat one to these guys. They would never look at me any differently, I would never impress them.

I can honestly look back at that moment as the sole experience that changed the way I viewed myself and screwed up my confidence for the rest of my life. Yes, there have definitely been other incidents and experiences that have hurt since then, but this is the first. That defining moment.

From that moment on, I felt like I was less of a person because I was fat. I felt like I had to compensate or qualify things or make do. I had to try harder with guys or I had to lower my expectations. I didn't deserve a boyfriend because I was fat.

I also made excuses. I can't play lacrosse and run around because I'm fat. I can't go out for cheerleading because I'm fat. I can't come back from surgery to dance again because I'm fat. It doesn't matter if I gain weight now because I'm already fat.

Highschool essentially sucked because of my feeling like this. And I felt like this because one guy - Brandon - called me Tubbs and changed my view of myself forever.