Several people in my life have urged me to write down a few of my thoughts on this topic. I am large, in fact by many peoples standards, and many clothing outlets, I am more then likely considered supersize. I myself prefer not to use such labels...as a way of describing yourself sure, but not as a label. I do not proclaim to be a large person, I claim to be me. Me just happens to weigh significantly more than the majority of the population.

All my life I have had problems with size, although I was not significantly harrassed about it until I reached a small town, with small minds. Growing up before this small town, I was always taller and bigger then the other girls, but everyone always reffered to it as being big boned, as I did not have any significant weight hanging or bulging or what not. I did not even notice my size at first, it never occured to me except that I wore a larger size then most of my friends.

A tidbit about my past...

Four years in that small town were too much for me. At the end of grade nine I tried to end everything, desperate to show these kids that they could not hurt others without some dire consequences. Now I thought that by giving up my life I could prove a point, but I was messed up, and the first night I spent in that hospital is a nightmare I never want to have to go through again and would not wish upon anyone. Sadly, I did not succeed in proving any kind of point and instead of my school dealing with the problem they had, suicide, which was not only my problem but many others as well, they shut us up and ignored it. I think I survived, not so much because of strength, but because of a well timed move by my parents, who for years did not realise the problems I was having. I will not blame them, it has been years and I am on very good and wonderful terms with my parents, but somewhere along the way, at that time, I got lost and all this happened.

More Recently...

I finally decided that I was carrying around too much weight. I see no problem with being who I am if I am healthy, and in regards to eating and so forth I have been, but my legs and feet were starting to have problems of their own. And well, not being very well off, I decided I needed to stay in the realms of what I could get in clothing stores. I decided to tackle the issue and went straight to my doctor. I was very lucky and had a string of very good doctors in Ottawa, and I must say I miss them all. We went over the options and what did and did not work in the past. Well, really nothing worked in the past. I have done the string of diets and what not and well, never did I succeed with them. We decided to send me to a prominent specialist in the field, an endocrinologist at the University of Ottawa.

She is amazing. She helped me when I thought I never could be helped. She felt that my weight gain was medical (big distinction, in other words, my weight gain is something in my chemical makeup more then psychological). Although no obvious thyroid problems, doing some research and in discussion with her, sometimes when the body hits puberty it can screw up more than how you look and it would seem that my body went into overdrive. I have/had a metabolism which is a storer and not a burner. So we needed to do something to get it burning and not storing. I went on a liquid diet for three months. I do not reccommend this for everyone. It is hard and stressful. Although for the most part it worked, I am now having a few other medical problems because of it. I do not want to be a size ten, I want to be me and I want to be healthy, so i will continue trying to loose until I again am comfortable. I am almost there and once the medical problems have eased up, perhaps I will pursue my goal again.

My Rant.

All I want of this world is for people to see me for me and not as a large person, or if they must see something physical to determine my value, to at least recognize that we are not all slobs and we do take care of ourselves, and dress up, and eat properly(if anything I think we are more conscious of what we put into our bodies then most are), and we DO excercise, just because we weigh more then others, does not mean we are not in shape, medically healthy and lead fulfilling and active lives. Being large does not depreciate our value, except in the eyes of those who refuse to look beyond the shape and size of our bodies. Being large is not going to make me be any less of an architect, a wife, a daughter, a student, it just makes me be me. And if I feel comfortable with who I am, then you should also feel comfortable with who I am. Honestly, when I have problems with my being a large person, or am down it is because someone noticed and was rude enough to point it out, on a regular basis, when taking care of myself properly, I like me a lot, just wish I had access to better clothes.

This world is attempting constantly to overcome racial, cultural and religious differances. We do our best to not persecute the mentally or physically disabled and yet a large person is still everyones Joke. I am not something to laugh at, I am not the amusement of the day, i am not a slob, I excercise, I probably eat better then the average person and I am intelligent and for goodness sake I am just as good looking as everyone else, imperfections included. How you like it if I looked at you and shrieked away in horror, or sidestepped you in the street because I might catch the fat disease from you. Think about it next time you look at anyone who is not from a magazine and realise we are all just people living in the world, next to eachother and enjoying and loving life! Be yourself.....just being is for more important then living up to the expectations of others.

The following are some links geared towards Big Beautiful Women, its not a very large list, but these sites have themselves a lot of good links. Enjoy....

International Size Acceptance Association
Council on size and weight discrimination
About Face
The National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance
BBWCity Mall
CASA