What is so bad about being fat anyway?

This was a question posed to me by a book I started reading at dinner (half a skinless chicken breast, half a small order of fries guiltily consumed as reward for having half a yogurt at breakfast, half a diet dr. pepper). For someone who has spent the majority of her life consumed with thoughts of food, weight and thinness, this ought to have been an easy question. After all, upon discovering Steven Levenkron's "Best Little Girl in the World" in the school library at age 10, I already knew enough about body image, and the resquisite hatred of one's body, to pick up tips and yearn to take Kessa's place. And it didn't stop there. Middle school found me experimenting with halves, with what could in polite company be termed "portion control", and by the first year of high school I could often be found walking slowly, soft-eyed, trailing my fingertips along the wall to retain balance after four days of not but diet coke and water. I have become an expert at a single-slice-of-lunchmeat-lunch, knowledgeable of the calories in a meal of tictacs, a natural at the skill of hunger, one of those people for whom deprivation is fun, and excess is the true punishment. So I should know.

It's important to be thin. It's the reason Curves and Jenny Craig exists, why you often see solitary women pushing carts of Lean Cuisine and Healthy Choice dinners in the supermarket, why diet products exist. Thin is a symbol of the virtues of this society, spoken and unspoken. It symbolizes the modern woman's quest for power, control, strength. After all, you need strength to sip a Kelloggs protein water instead of a mocha frappucino, as in the commercial for Kellogg's water. Our foremothers fought for votes, education, property rights and independence. We carry it on a little further and fight for concave stomachs and razor-sharp hips. It makes sense, in our social understanding. Strong is good, so willpower must be good.

Thin also represents more oppressive virtues. Purity, for instance. Like the virgin foregoing sex, the modern woman displays her purity by foregoing a bite of chocolate cake, and virtuously stabbing her fork at lettuce leaves instead. Not chosen purity either, but forced, required, for if women were unpure in their eating...what? Thin means restraint. Passivity. A woman passively sitting by, idly watching those around her feed themselves, <i>enjoy themselves.</i> A starved woman has no energy to succeed in the workplace or finish her studies. She is no threat, then, to the men who have recently found themselves eclipsed by studious, ambitious women. All she wants is to lie down, perhaps leaf through a cooking magazine to consider the pictures of tempting foods. She won't tell on a boss who fondles her, or have the guts to make a political speech. Thin means weak, fragile, bones poking through pale skin, a body that could be blown away by a strong gust of wind. In other words, harmless. Thin represents women's weakness, proves women's subordination too. Is this why our society punishes the overweight, the obese, even the mildly chubby, "healthy" ones? To guilt them into restraint and subsequent extinction from the world of work, the "male sphere"?

Consider it. A fat woman. What are the arguments?

<u>She's unattractive:</u> Who determines this? You? Me? A fashion magazine spread, a Parisian designer, random people on the street. How do you know she's unattractive? Probably, only because you've had the images of thin as right and fat as wrong drilled into your mind since infancy, by people who have experienced this same drilling. Those we glorify as beautiful, as "right" are airbrushed, painted versions of women whose body type reflects less than 5% of the population. How can it be that the majority of women are ugly, and only 5% are beautiful? How do people fall in love? How does the species carry on?

Aside from this, the arguments are stripped bare. Fat women are unacceptable in our culture because they represent everything thin is not. In place of hard, strict control, they induldge. They take their share, perhaps more, in a world where women are still expected to scrape by on leftovers, to settle for second best. They don't deny their needs and wants the way a woman with a rumbling belly does when she purposely avoids eating. They help themselves. In turn, they may be strong, fueled, energetic Amazons capable of acheiving whatever they have in mind. It is only in extreme excess that a fat woman loses the ground she has gained from giving herself what she wants. Unlike her petite counterparts, she at least has a chance to fly.

It makes sense. The frightening thing is, even when one has the ability to comprehend this information, it makes relatively little impact. I <i>know</i> fat is not a crime, food is not a crime, allowance and self-respect are not crimes, but life is slow to catch up with what our minds have become aware of, even so.

x. Tampons are small, cotton/rayon plugs that, when inserted into the vagina during a woman's period, soak up menstrual blood. They are usually removed by pulling on a small, thin string.
x. The first forms of tampons are thought to have been made thousands of years ago by the ancient Egyptians and Greeks. They were made from all sorts of natural material, like wool, paper, vegetable fibers, sponges and even grass.
x. In ancient times, women may have also used these early forms of tampons as a way to prevent pregnancies.
x. Fax, Fibs, Wix, Holly-Pax, Moderne Woman and Nunaps are the very first brand-name tampons made in the 1920s and 1930s. These tampons were inserted without applicators.
x. It was a man, Dr. Earle C. Haas, who came up with the idea of making tampons with an easy-to-use applicator. His invention gave birth to what we know today as Tampax.
x. Tampons come in all sizes, but the most common ones are regular, super and super plus, depending on how heavy or light a woman's menstrual flow is.
x. These days, getting Toxic Shock Syndrome is very rare. Still, the bacteria responsible for causing this serious infection is thought to be associated with super absorbent tampons. Experts say if you're bleeding heavily, it's best to use normal absorbent tampons and to change them often.
x. Scientific research has shown that women give off odors or chemicals called pheromones that can alter when and how long you have your period. That's why you and your closest girlfriends can have your period at the same time! This phenomenon is called "menstrual synchrony."
x. These days, tampons are also made with natural materials, including organic cotton and sea sponges. These are usually sold in health food stores.


Actually, no -- I am not on the rag as I write this. For whatever reason the subject pressed itself into my brain and now needs to be exploited explored.

There is nothing quite so sickening in this world as having one's period. Despite the euphanisms --> a visit with the Cardinal, riding the cotton pony, have a friend to visit, on the rag, etc, it's still gross. One of those few times when then word "icky" truly seems to fit. For non-girls, it may seem mysterious or fascinating, one of those things with provokes morbid curiousity, makes men wonder. It is a subject that has fascinated philosophers for years, especially once they figured out a woman's cycle is controlled and dictated by the moon, as if we have a werewolf inside us, along the same lines as the ocean tide. There is nothing that ties women to earth and water quite like her period, where the pain is base and she can always taste that salt and copper tang of blood on her lips, where she is slave to gravity and moons and the waves of the sea.

The whole being of girlishness is tied in with the world for the most part, as much as we are depicted in art as otherworldly, lounging on clouds. The fact is, we're more likely to sink beneath the sea than slide through the stars -- we can't all be Sally Ride. Women, for all the centuries of literature on our mystery, our sensuality, our devil with an angel's face socially-inspired guilt trip, we're all still just Eve, wandering bewildered in a garden of delight and frustration, chasing after the taste of fresh fruit. To hell with Adam, good, noble Adam, whose virtue fell by the wayside at the merest temptation. His story is boring. He's like the clean cut American jock, the boy you know has nothing in his head, the dim-witted smile and earnest expression, the kind of guy who sat around doing what is good. What does he matter? What girl ever falls in love with an Adam? But all the guys love an Eve -- an exotic Eve with a taste for the forbidden, an Eve of experimentation and cat-killing curiosity, Eve the good girl with a rebellious streak like fifteen year old jailbait in a Catholic school uniform, promising something, maybe, that may lie beyond the wool of her skirt. Men like the unattainable Eve, the parts they cannot know. Maybe that is why menstruation, the ultimate secret, has fascinated philosophers and scientists for so long. They have all the facts, and they still can't figure us out.

What is it about homosexual men that makes them so utterly attractive to the straight woman? Perhaps not all straight women suffer with this the way I do, but just as a man who equips himself in sports garb and conforms to stereotypical social standards of "masculinity" consistently turns me off, I am easily turned on the the approach of gay men. They don't even have to be gay per se. Maybe a time I've fallen in love with a guy who is straight only to find he has a penchant for trying on my dresses or an unsatisfied curiousity about "the gay experience" that leads him to hang on men and continually, almost desperately, feign or hint at same-sex attraction.

On the surface, I suppose it could be attributed to being a sociology major. I mean, we are repeatedly taught that gender is a social construct, a fact which I know has coloured my perception of gender roles and certainly inspired a marked lack of respect for anyone, male or female, who demonstrates a stubborn persistance to fitting within the line, being easily categorized into little boxes. When I see a man who believes he needs to verbally comment on the appearance of every female who passes him by, I automatically write him off in my head as unworthy of interest, if not worse. Men who make fun of homosexuals, use "girl" as an insult to their male buddies (ie: "you throw like a girl"), fondle their crotch as if worried their penis has fallen off or are afraid to take care with grooming because it's effeminate to own a hair product or wash are even worse. However, it's more than that. Much more.

For some women, myself included, the world of masculinity is bewildering and more than a little scary. I'll admit that sometimes, the power of my own sexuality is fun to play with, and when I'm in the right mood it amuses me to no end to see the effect a subtle touch, whisper or flirtatious act has on a guy. Most of the time, though, the idea of dating a man, getting involved with him, frightens me. Likely, my experience is not representative of most women, but of the eight or so men I've dated, most were stubbornly pushy, even aggressively demanding, of sex before I was willing to give it. I am not asexual. I am in possession of a libido, and certainly there are times when nothing sounds better than having a man take me to bed, kiss my breasts and navel and have his way with me. The idea of being swept off my feet sounds delicious sometimes, but there is more to my life than this. I enjoy the feeling of recognizing a light in a man's eye when he looks at me, of being wanted, but my own sexuality scares me all the same.

Perhaps this is true of many women who were, like myself, sexually abused at a point in their life. My first experience with sexuality came far too early and is associated with pain, trauma, anguish and sadness. I equate it to a loss of innocence -- innocence which I was not ready to give up. Therefore, the very idea of putting myself in a situation where I feel obligated, for whatever reason, to venture into the world of sex and once again confront those old wounds, is unappealing. On the one hand, I know sex is a normal part of human existance. Being agnostic, I don't have religious "hang-ups", nor do I see sex as a sin, but I do consider it to have the potential for danger. It is easy to get hurt if you open yourself up emotionally and physically, which is exactly what one must do in order to have a successful relationship. While part of me longs for romance, lovemaking and all the Hallmark trappings of modern dating, another part shies away.

It was by coincidence, perhaps, that I have managed to befriend a significant number of homosexuals in my life. Certainly, it came as a surprise to me. Growing up in a fairly sheltered Protestant home, I was fourteen before I learned what a lesbian was. My best friend and I, who had been inseperable since fourth grade and dubbed "Bobbsey twins" by our teachers, were confronted one day by one of the guys in our class, who asked us if we were lesbians. In my friend's understanding, "lesbian" meant a girl who enjoyed the company of other girls, so we said yes. Laughing, the boy informed us that lesbian meant girls who loved each other. Well, we did, so again we said yes, learning only later, when everyone started to tease us and make gestures our way, the true definition. However, in my adult life I would meet many people who considers themselves homosexual.

Like most girls, I grew up with crushes on unattainable boys. I lusted over Keanu Reeves and kissed my pictures of Trent Reznor so much they became shiny from lip gloss. I never had the "boy band" phase, but there were plenty of starts who attracted my attention. However, unlike my friends, I never moved from fantasy love affairs with handsome, distant celebrities to a serious interest in local boys. Looking back, I can see that even early on, my attractions leaned towards the more "effeminate" men. I could be brought to tears by Robert Smith of the Cure, who wore more makeup than I ever did, and I was more likely to buy posters of long-haired, makeup-wearing men like Marilyn Manson than of men with the straight, all-American look. The boys I chose as friends, even as young as twelve and thirteen, were the type who would not object to me painting their nails or in trying on my skirts. By seventeen, most of my friends were male, and eventually came out as gay, marking them as unattainable to me, a girl.

Lest you wonder, I was never a tomboy. Oh sure, I loved to climb trees and even played soccer when I was seven, but I always wore my hair long and favoured skirts over slacks. Experimenting with makeup and going shopping were never the highlights of my life, but there was a time and place for them. I have always hated my period, but I have never wanted to be a man, and despite several brief, experimental encounters, mostly involving tentative makeout sessions or kissing, I have never had a lesbian relationship, nor been attracted to a woman.

What crushes on gay men did was allowed me a chance to experience the rush a crush provides without the possibility that it will be followed through. While my relationship with my best friend, a gay male, crossed borders from time to time, there was always a clear distinction. We could be flirtatious, even taking on many of the aspects of married people or long-term lovers, without ever arriving at the point where sex was brought up. This may not be true for the "fag hags" of the world, but in my case, most of my gay male friends have allowed lines to blur slightly, letting me experience attraction and romanance in a safe setting. Like a girl trying out relationships by use of Barbie and Ken, having a crush on a homosexual man is harmless. It is not binding nor is there the expectation of permanence. The basic needs of companionship, understanding and closeness are met in a setting where there are no expectations. I am free to leave at any time.

Sounds wonderful, doesn't it? And it is, to a point. But what happens when the crush becomes more serious? What happens to the straight woman who falls in love with the (gay!)man of her dreams? What happens when the woman is able to break down the barriers that she has not been able to alleviate in relationships with straight, eligible men, only to remember that this man she loves and perhaps has grown to need is not attracted to her in that way and is unwilling to carry the relationship to the conclusion it would have perhaps seen had he been straight? In a word, heartbreak. To a point, the relationship serves as an experiment, a safe place to discuss sexuality, romance, feelings, etc and get perspectives from a man's opinion presented in the trusting environment usually unique to female friendships. In the short term, or when it is kept carefully in check, this relationship benefits both parties. The straight girl has an opportunity to learn how to express herself to a man and slowly can become accustomed to a male presence, which will help her should she pursue a relationship with a straight man. The gay man has a friend who is non-judgemental and provides him with the female companionship he desires without the expectation of sex which he does not wish to provide. But when it becomes too much, the impact on both is great.

It is easy to be brokenhearted, especially if you are a woman who cannot have what you want. In my case, I've had crushes, ranging from hours to several months, on gay men friends, but I have also spent five years thinking I was in love with my gay male best friend. Because of him, I have learned a lot about men. It's fun to discuss my hangups, attractions, experiences and views with a guy who understands and listens without taking it personally. I've been able to be kissy and intense with someone who won't take it seriously or expect something from me because of it. Basically, it's free range to push all limits and never get raped, to sleep in a bed beside someone without waking up to find them peeling off my nightgown. I have even been able to experience basically all aspects of a romantic relationship, excluding sexual intercourse, in this relationship, which admittedly saw it's dysfunctional days. However, because of my nature and personality, I always wanted more. It became difficult at the end of the day for me to remind myself that this is only a friendship, and that we will not be making love or getting married or feeding each other strawberries and champagne one stormy evening. I love him, and I once allowed myself to get so tangled that it is hard for me to want someone else in his place, but he does not feel the same about me. I know it, having learned it the hard way, and while I don't blame either of us, least of all him, because he never did pretend it would end up different, there are times where I can trace back to this as another reason why I don't do relationships. After all, he was the only person to ever tell me no.

Intellectually, I know that no one ever expects these things to become more than what they seem on the surface, but factually, I know they can and do. So are these blurred relationships safe, or do they cause more harm than good? Does indulging a need for love and connection by involvement in a relationship that can never really provide what I need help me or hurt me? Can you ever go back to expecting or wanting only friendship once the barriers were breached? And if I can, what does that say about me and the way in which I love?