Love Your Body Day: Fat is Sexier Than You Think
In honor of "Love Your Body Day" 2009, here's an essay from among my "greatest hits" titled:Fat is Sexier Than You Think
By Kim Brittingham
"Oh, my God." My mother slapped the steering wheel in percussive disbelief. "Can you believe the nerve of that woman? Where does she get off wearing a skirt that short? At her size, she's got no business!"
We were driving along Byberry Road, past the old abandoned lunatic asylum. A fat woman was walking with relaxed purpose along the side of the road in a black mini-skirt and t-shirt. Her arms and legs were thick and alabaster, her rear end ample and heart-shaped.
It was summer and I was fat too. I wore jeans and a boatneck tunic with three-quarter-length sleeves to hide my sausage-like upper arms and flabby elbows. I was keeping my fat to myself, sparing the public of my hideousness. Just as "The Elephant Man" John Merrick wore a burlap sack over his head when walking the streets of London. It was a simple matter of courtesy.
I was in my twenties then. I'm thirty-seven now, and I still wear three-quarter-length sleeves in summer. And I only bare my legs when I swim. The difference is, I don't think my body is ugly anymore.
But you do.
The fact is, I think my body is beautiful. Really. That's my honest-to-God opinion.
To the touch, I'm scrumptious. The pinkish-white swells of my hips, breasts and belly beg to be caressed, stroked -- kneaded like so much pie dough. And if you've ever actually kneaded dough, or pressed your fingers into a lump of dense but pliable clay and felt the sweet, aching satisfaction in your hands as you molded it -- feeling it give beneath your palms, subtly varying the pressure from your fingertips as you slid them across the endlessly fascinating surface -- then you know the pleasure of a body like mine beneath your touch.
Aesthetically, I'm pear-shaped. The contrast between my waist and hips is dramatic and unmistakable. It's an exaggeration of femininity; like a promise of extreme fertility.
And for an observer to be aroused by the sight of me should not be surprising, because my fat casts a floodlight on my pelvic area and is shamelessly suggestive not only of the babies to which I was designed to give passage, but of the sexual stimulation of which I am capable. It is a pelvis that can writhe with abandon and thump like a bass drum in arousal. The sway of my generous hips is like a neon yellow highlighter wiped over the word "woman". My oversized hips are a bull horn screaming "woman!" I am a siren song to every other human being capable of seeping with desire for the female form. I am woman -- lots of woman, abundant woman, ultimate woman.
This is what breast implants are meant to do, you know. Cast a magnifying glass over the inherent womanliness of breasts and attract. Women get boob jobs to give themselves a certain edge. Frankly, I don't see why they nearly kill themselves trying to diet off their equally bulbous hips. Besides, my belly feels just like a nipple-less breast. It's like one giant porn boob implanted at my waist – a sexual bonus, if you will.
Archaeological discoveries like the Venus of Willendorf have taught us that early peoples, untainted by contemporary definitions of the body "ideal", really responded to the big-hipped, big-bellied woman. They idolized her, literally.
And when I see myself naked, I see that body worthy of worship.
Everything changed when I got my first digital camera. It was a gift, and it came with a tripod. Alone in my apartment one afternoon, I decided to look at myself – see myself as I actually was. I pulled the blinds and stripped down to my cheap polyester bra and teal cotton granny-panties. I slipped on my black satin special occasion pumps, then erected the tripod at the end of the hallway that led from the front door. Pressing the camera button for a ten-second delay, I hustled to the opposite end of the hall and stood, hands-on-hips, letting the camera's flash shower me in white. I returned to the camera and reached for it, tentatively. I looked in the viewer.
Yep, I sure was fat. And at the same time, something about my body pleased me – the milky fullness, the inviting topography of its curves. So I set the timer again, this time to take my picture as I sashayed away from the camera, capturing me in movement.
I was stunned by how sexy I looked. I'm talking drop-dead bombshell sexy. The kind of sexy that makes sailors in movie musicals spin 180 degrees on their heels and whistle, white caps comically askew or twisted in their hands.
There was a line to my body like an elongated "S" that riveted me. And I liked the way one of my ass cheeks cocked upwards as I threw my leg forward. Like a wry smile, or the cheerful buttocks in the old Underalls commercial that made a cute staccato xylophone sound with each side-to-side wag.
I liked these pictures. I liked the body in them.
Now I understand why every lover I ever had couldn't resist tucking their hands into the warm, baby-smooth pockets of skin on either side of my pudendum, just under the fold of my overhanging belly. I understand the passionate abandon with which one man took my left leg into both arms as he knelt before my reclining body and kissed the leg's thickness, stroked it wildly from tree-trunk calf to thunder-thigh, his eyelids half-lowered in a state of near-madness, overcome, a stream of pleasing filth dripping from his slack lips. I no longer discount the lovers who reveled in the rolling cashmere expanse of my ass as having had "something wrong" with them.
Do people view fat women as unsexy because it's what they've been taught since birth? And are they eating that opinion obediently off a spoon like a dozy infant in a high chair?
We look at fat women and are conditioned to think their thick limbs and juicy middles are putrid. But these same features fail to disgust us in other contexts.
We bite into a plump and succulent fruit with relish.
We put the corpulent plaster bodies of cherubs on display in our gardens, on our bedspreads in one-dimensional brushed cotton and on glossy paper we frame and hang in our powder rooms.
Every fleshy newborn baby inspires cooing and cuddling. We can't resist fondling their soft, stout and unshapely limbs, tickling their pudgy bellies and nuzzling their swollen apple cheeks.
Every time I see a dog show on TV., I'm struck by how fervently we adore our fat little breeds of dogs: the endearing rotundity of lumbering bulldogs and chubby pugs, the sad heavy-lidded eyes and loose sagging skin of the sweet shar-pei. (Ironically, the fat breeds are among the most popular in status-conscious/body-conscious human circles.) We derive joy from the appearance of these creatures. We can't resist reaching out for them, encircling their barrel bodies with affectionate hands.
We survey lush landscapes with variations not dissimilar to an "imperfect" female body with absolute pleasure -- say, an expanse of Irish countryside with grassy rolling hills, and clusters of boulders and sudden valleys, gullies and ridges and bald patches. Do these wide swaths of earth nauseate us? Is it really so much uglier when it's made of flesh instead of soil?
I think men in particular are ashamed to admit to their buddies, even to their families, when they find themselves attracted to a fat woman. Sometimes I think they sublimate their natural desires just to keep up appearances. And that's just plain unhealthy.
Some of you may have read about my "social experiment" in which I created a fake book cover, "Fat is Contagious: How Sitting Next to a Fat Person Can Make YOU Fat" and displayed it openly on public buses. It was pure mockery on my part; a snarky response to the many people on buses who'd made nasty remarks about my weight and/or refused to sit next to me. And yet I stopped riding subways for the opposite reason: I was tired of being molested.
Every other trip it seemed I was getting grabbed or squeezed or jizzed on. I've seen some clever, applause-worthy ruses for trying to get a hand on a boob. I even sent a stalker to jail -- a wiry, drunken fool whom I first noticed when he tried to slip his hand under my ass while I sat. Men did strip teases to impress me; they pulled it out and shamelessly started whacking off as they stared.
It's compelling, isn't it? It's as if guys are literally taking their desires underground.
As for me, I'm ashamed of myself. Ashamed that I'm not strong enough to shrug off your shame for finding me fleetingly attractive. So when skin is bared to the emerging sun of summer, eagerly unwrapped and unsweatered and flaunted in the light of day, it's your disgust for my kind of body that keeps me covered up. At least while I'm out among you. I don't want to tempt your cruel comments, don't want to imagine the ones you might be making as you drive by.
And I don't want you to think less of me. I don't want you to miss my engaging personality, and my wealth of good jokes and even better ideas, because you're distracted by the details of my obesity: the translucent tiger stripes of my stretch marks; cellulite like a dappling of fairy fingerprints on my skin. I want you to give me a chance. For a job and equal pay, for a table near the front of the restaurant, for courtesy when I shop in your store, for lasting friendship, for unconditional love, for everyday kindness. So I hide my fat as best I can.
Which is probably a good thing anyway, because if I really let you see it all, you might die from an overload of primordial lust.
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At least the Nigerians told me I was gonna get rich.
Mary writes: Check out this fake email my husband got over the summer… i've seen a lot of phishing scams, but this one is new to me! hilarious!!
Thankfully, my husband was not terminated by the hit man and he lived to forward me this email (even though he did not "comply good" with the assassin). LOL.
I was pretty surprised to be asked a question like that. It made no sense to me. And then finally I asked her, '"What do you think I fought for over on Omaha Beach?"
, or high
. Either way, it's not even 11:00am and he is OFF his HEAD.
I don't know why it is so funny to hear little mouths say naughty words, but this one always makes me laugh out loud!!
Make sure you teach your kids the right words, but record it for posterity before you make the correction.
This is an amazing photograph of the earth (and moon) and Jupiter (and a few of its moons) in the same frame. Now I know what you're thinking, and no, God didn't take this one. Sometimes the planets line up in such a way that you can see Earth and Jupiter in the same wide-angle shot. That is, if you were aboard the Mars Global Surveyor on May 22, 2003. When the Mars Orbiter Camera snapped this unique view, Earth was 86 million miles away, and Jupiter was 600 million miles away.Wow, that really gets you thinking, doesn't it? Like about how far objects in space are from one another. Really far. And speaking of which -- will one of you be so kind as to walk the remote over here? Hit the jump to see a diagram explaining how the planets were aligned.
For over a year and a half, I took a medication that made me sick, for a condition I didn’t have, because of a diagnosis based on side effects of another medication. And all because a doctor refused to put down the BMI chart and look at the scared patient sitting directly in front of her.
Full post here
-- Posted from my iPhone via BlogPress app
It’s so infuriating that I’m going to have to do some deep breathing before I can go find a pic to go with this one…By the numbers, Alex is in the 99th percentile for height and weight for babies his age. Insurers don’t take babies above the 95th percentile, no matter how healthy they are otherwise.
“I could understand if we could control what he’s eating. But he’s 4 months old. He’s breast-feeding. We can’t put him on the Atkins diet or on a treadmill,” joked his frustrated father, Bernie Lange, a part-time news anchor at KKCO-TV in Grand Junction. “There is just something absurd about denying an infant.”
Bernie and Kelli Lange tried to get insurance for their growing family with Rocky Mountain Health Plans when their current insurer raised their rates 40 percent after Alex was born. They filled out the paperwork and awaited approval, figuring their family is young and healthy. But the broker who was helping them find new insurance called Thursday with news that shocked them.
” ‘Your baby is too fat,’ she told me,” Bernie said.
Cuz, of course, height/weight charts (especially for children – and especially ESPECIALLY for babies) are oh so accurate and predictive of health. One sec while I beat my head against the wall…
And, ya know, BMI is like the most accurate tool ever made – ESPECIALLY for children and ESPECIALLY ESPECIALLY ESPECIIIIIIIIAAAAAAALLLLLLYYYYYYY for infants.
But, let’s forget about all that. What the heck kinda health care system denies four month olds anyway? Does that baby deserve less care (or even no care) because he hasn’t taken up his own personal responsibility to not be so fat? What is up with infants these days??!! Like… ya know… all they do is eat and sleep and OMG BABY DEATH FAT!!! Someone needs to put that kid on a treadmill. Do they make diet breast milk these days?
Hahahahaha… idiots…
Deep breaths…
Thanks to my hubby for finding this one. To read the full version of the insanity, click here.
–AngryGrayRainbows
Dieting is hard work. Cutting back on all your favorite foods when you're used to indulging in whatever you want until you are about to burst is no easy task. Yeah, I know, some people just have a light bulb moment and *boom* change everything and work hard and the weight comes off, period. But I think most people struggle with the whole lifestyle change thing.
How do you turn a taste for cheesecake and Reece's cups into a desire to eat more broccoli and cabbage? How do you train yourself to eat reasonable servings of food instead of entire packs of Oreos and pints of ice cream?
When you are used to eating a LOT of crap food, hour after hour, it is a big change to switch to a way of eating that is conducive to weight loss. I used to get up in the morning, drink a Coke, eat 3 or 4 slices of cold pizza, and then an hour later eat a couple of pieces of cake. By lunchtime I'd eaten at least 3 "meals" already... some of them consisting only of sugar and fat. My afternoon snack was a Big Mac meal at 3pm. And if you think dinner... with seconds and thirds of heaping plates of fettuccine Alfredo, 5 bread sticks, and banana pudding for dessert is the end of the day's eating, you're delusional. Because at 8 I'd have some ice cream and after I got the kids to bed I'd be eating 4 or 5 donuts at 10pm. Is it any wonder my heartburn was so bad that I often had to sleep propped up on pillows in a sitting position to avoid waking up choking on my own acid reflux? How do you go from THAT, to having breakfast, lunch, and dinner with maybe a snack or two in between? How do you cut your caloric intake by at least 75%?
You just do it. Sorry, there's no magic answer. You put the food down and tell your inner toddler, "No, you may NOT have 6 pieces of cake in one day." You let her tantrum and you just deal with it until she gets the point and accepts the food you've set out for her.
I want to clarify something. You do not have to be hungry to lose weight. "Dieting" does not mean deprivation. YES, it means you have to cut back. YES, you have to say *no* to things. But you can say *yes* to so much more!
YES to hundreds of varieties of crunchy, creamy, soft, sweet, and savory vegetables.
YES to an entire produce section of delicious, sweet, sour, juicy, tasty fruits.
YES to moving, walking, swimming, biking, feeling alive.
YES to fitting into restaurant booths, carnival rides, airplane seats, and smaller clothing sizes.
YES to life.
David writes, “This was an email in response to our University’s latest mailing of our Alumni Magazine. I have removed all specifics to protect the guilty.”
I’m skeptical of this gentleman’s assertions, but he seems so sure of himself. I think I’m going to have to listen to the ladies a bit more carefully. Who are they, really?You should know that before I throw in the trash your stupid “alumnus” magazine, some of us have good education and recognize evil when we see it. Where is the report questioning the awarding of degrees in Sociology, Women’s Studies, and the like? Where is the article questioning the renaming of the Business Administration school to something from outer space like management? There isn’t such a thing as “management”, it’s just a title awarded to employees instead of giving them a pay raise. Come on Uof__, get with reality. Jeepers. You’re looking like a bunch of fools.
Look, its time to realize that woman aren’t people. They just repeat yesterday all over again each day. If you listen to their conversations, you will note the absence of verbs. They can’t do life. They can’t do Earth. You shouldn’t have all your staff positions occupied by non-humans. It shows in your Alumnus magazine. Fake nonsense is not a good idea.
Class of ‘65
Submitted By: David
This video shows the effect of the high-energy laser beam from the Boeing Advanced Tactical Laser (ATL), fired at a stationary truck from a US Air Force NC-130H (Hercules) flying over White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico, on August 30, 2009. The ATL is a chemical oxygen iodine laser (COIL), and is a scaled-down version of the megawatt-class high-energy laser in the Boeing YAL-1 Airborne Laser (ABL).
Each year, the Turner Prize is awarded for ‘an outstanding exhibition or other presentation’ of art. It’s named for the brilliant English painter JMWTurner, a bit of a visionary who was a genuinely gifted fellow when it came to wielding a paintbrush and putting a few splodges of colour down on canvas.
Quite how the art prize that bears his name managed to morph itself into a competition for adults who appear to have severe learning difficulties and delusions of adequacy is a mystery to me.
[...]
Like a lot of modern artists, [celebrated artist Joseph] Beuys must have been barking mad. He once covered his head with honey and gold leaf, wore one shoe with felt on its sole and another soled with iron and then walked through an art galleryfor two hours, explaining the art hanging there to a dead hare that he was carrying. Now I’m no art critic but if that isn’t a display of complete mental breakdown then I don’t know what is.
(Note: our customer support number is close to a local driving school’s number.)Me: “Thank you for calling. How may I help you?”
Customer: “How much for my daughter?”
Me: “Um…”
Customer: “She’s 16. It’s her first time. She needs training.”
Me: “Sir, I think you want the driving school.”
Customer: “Oh, what do you guys do?”
Me: “Adult websites.”
Customer: “Oh…OH! Oh my God!”
* Bachelor’s degree in English, Communications or related field
* High School diploma or equivalent is required.
