Maile's Story

I’ve been overweight for over two thirds of my life. 

In elementary school kids teased me not only because I was overweight, but also because my mother was overweight. Those horrible “yo mama is so fat” jokes that everyone thinks are so hilarious? Those were my life. I hate those jokes. On the playground kids liked to inform me that Jenny Craig was offering deals, lose weight for $1 a pound. But, cackling with glee, they told me that I’d never be able to afford the program. I was fifteen pounds overweight at the time. Maybe. 

Being plus size, my body issue images are very complex. I look in the mirror and see a girl who needs to lose weight. The scale agrees. Medical books agree. For me it’s not about loving my image, it’s about loving my body enough to get healthy. Girl in the mirror or no girl in the mirror. 

Growing up overweight, I learned to hate myself. I’ve been dieting on and off since the age of 10. I lived on fat free products while my peers were eating wholesome all American food. They would condescendingly ask how my fat free cream cheese was, while they enjoyed their peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Meanwhile, I felt like I was ballooning in front of them, like Violet Beauregarde of Willy Wonka fame. 

When my peers started to date, I withdrew. I thought that I was pretty, but it didn’t matter. I was sure that no one would want to be seen with me. I believed that fat girls didn’t date. I withdrew deeper into myself. 

Here’s the part that’s hard to admit, the part that borders on cliché. I found comfort in food. I developed a habit for binge eating. I would eat, and eat, until the eating was a compulsion. I hid my eating, locked it away. Around people my eating habits were, are, fairly normal. I match what they eat. Try not to look out of place. Try not to look like the fat girl who loves food too much. 

We’re given such mixed messages. Magazines tell us that boys want a girl who’s not afraid to eat, but they want a girl who looks like she never does. TV characters like Liz Lemon from 30 Rock and Lorelei Gilmore from Gilmore Girls have horrendous eating habits, but it’s okay because they’re played by the beautiful and skinny Tina Fey and Lauren Graham. If the same role was played by a plus size actress, she’d be a slob. A pig. A glutton. But the skinny girls who eat? They’re endearing.

I try to monitor my eating. This results in more diets, which inevitably fail because diets are designed to fail. I don’t need a diet – I need a lifestyle change. 

That’s where you all come in. If I had one word to describe how I feel about all of this; about my body and my relationship with food, the word would be shame. I’m ashamed of how much I hate how I look. I’m ashamed of how I look. I’m ashamed of how I eat in secret, the food that eat when I’m no longer hungry. I’m ashamed of what this post reveals me to be, a fat girl who eats too much. I’m ashamed because I feel that my story isn’t worthy of sharing. 

So I’m taking shame out of the equation. I’m living a life that I am comfortable sharing with you all. I’m coming to terms with my past issues, as painful as this is. I’m realizing how many of my own issues stem from being overweight at a young age. 

My story is twofold. I will talk about what it’s like to be plus size and coming to terms with the fact that weight loss or not, I probably always will be. The other is my relationship with food. How can I stop binge eating? How can I find a balance between crash diets and eating everything in front of me?

-Mahalo