Mountains and Ridges
On the other side of losing weight
For a school assignment, I was tasked with writing about what made me an Other and my experiences being Otherized. I decided to reflect upon my experiences before and after I lost 40 pounds within a few months.
At night, my hands like to sit on my hip bones, which feel practically alpine under the loose cotton of my pajama bottoms. My fingers are oversized spiders, pitter-pattering along the topographical features. Sometimes, when I get out of the shower, my fingers trace my ribcage, my collarbones, my jawline. They’re still novelties to me. I’m still occasionally caught off-guard by the body parts that, to most everybody else, are normal.
Every other day, religiously, I wake up earlier than I’d like, lace up my sneakers, and I run. I run until I can’t, and the next day I run farther. On days I have access to a trail with elevation, I race the sun to the top; I beam just as brightly when I look back down on where I came from. When I’ve gone as far my body permits, my euphoria carries me back to campus. On my days off, I teach dance lessons and lift weights. I normally pride myself on what I can do with my body.
Yesterday, on two separate occasions, I walked into people precariously carrying plates and bowls laden high with foods I used to eat more often. After various “I am SO sorry”s, with my cheeks redder than maraschino cherries, luckily the only result was a few pieces of pasta plummeting to the floor. This is not an unusual occurrence; I’ve developed an extreme tendency to bump into things all over. My incoordination is due not to clumsiness, but to the fact that my body starts and ends in different places than it used to. My brain hasn’t yet caught up.
Although, of course, weight is a spectrum, it’s never felt that way to me. It’s always appeared so binary — you are fat, or you are not. I slipped so rapidly from one side of the sliding scale (pardon the pun) to the other that it appears in my mind as a clear, chasmic dividing line — a line that bisects those who are Normal and those who are Not.
It’s strange to think of the brief few years in my life where I didn’t know just yet what it was to be an Other. I’m in kindergarten, and the first person I meet in Mrs. Grinrod’s Yellow Kindergarten Class shows me in the mirror of the girl’s bathroom that if you put your head back — Yeah, like that — you can make a double chin. We look at the reflections of our brand new best friends in the mirror and giggle. Wow, I’m so good at it!
Most of my least pleasant childhood memories come from an intense, acute awareness that developed a few years later of how I was different from other girls, in my ballet class or the beach or at endless other locales, and a resulting debilitating fear of being judged. I feared changing in the same locker room where the petite ballerinas-to-be would see that I was anything but. I feared going on the see-saw with someone else, only for my side to maintain solid contact with the ground no matter how hard I tried to push myself up into the air; I feared the disappointment or great amusement of my playmate, either reaction devastating.
Perhaps even worse was the feeling of isolation, of being alone, of knowing that I was usually the token fat person in any given room at any given time. I know there are so many more of Us — I still feel, at some level, that I will always identify with that group of people — in other places in the United States, my former suit of flesh sometimes more the norm than the exception. But having spent my whole life in suburban Connecticut, I knew only that I was an Other in a healthy, wealthy town of those who were Normal.
Not to say I’ve never been subject to the occasional snide comment, but I’m fortunate to have never been seriously bullied about my weight. I’ve faced few overt acts of injustice or unkindness from those who were normal to myself as an Other, although I know others haven’t had it so easy. If you spoke to me a year ago, I would say that beyond objective health risks and a few aesthetically-founded self-esteem issues, there was nothing much that demarcated me from the rest of the world, Thank You Very Much.
And, yet, as I transformed over the course of a few months, the way I was treated by others changed at least as drastically. The friendliness, kindness, and respect of acquaintances and strangers around me skyrocketed as soon as I dropped from obese, to overweight, into the normal range, regardless of whether the other party viewed me romantically, platonically, or professionally. If you plotted how many times people smiled at me per day, the result would be an inverse of how much I weighed. If you graphed how many times doors — both literal and figurative — have been opened for me, the slope would be even steeper than the last mountain I climbed just to see if I could.
It’s difficult to accurately judge the significance or impact of any single one of dozens of interactions throughout the day. Perhaps I’ve always been so desperately attuned to the way others treated me that I’ve been hyper-aware of any patterns that have appeared. Each small act of courtesy augments my newfound feelings of being fit, and beautiful, and normal, and worthy; each small act of courtesy reminds me to be grateful that I’m no longer still one of the few, the gross, the large, the invisible.
And, yet, my own choice of words reveal a scary truth: they show that I, too, view those who are overweight as Others, despite having spent the vast majority of my life as an Other myself.
I’m ever balancing — no, teetering — on a ridge of minuscule width, infinitely high. Ferocious winds bat me every which way. On each side of me lies danger.
To my left lies a steep drop into the abyss of feeling that my weight and my body are entirely out of control. If I fall, I know I’ll spend my whole descent thinking not only that I have nothing to be proud of, because I’ve had no control over how far I’ve come, but also thinking that I’m powerless for the future, and that I could return to my former state at any moment. To my right lies an equally sheer drop to the abyss of knowing that I am entirely in control. If I fall, I know my last thoughts will be that yes, it was my fault for becoming that way. Perhaps even more terrifying, this line of thinking paves the way for judgment against others, the same that I experienced for most of my life.
At the bottom of each, both so far away and yet far too close: catastrophe.
I know what it’s like to feel alone, and judged, and mistreated because of my weight. I know how terrible it is to be Otherized. I know how terrible it is to channel surf on TV and never see anyone your size except for Melissa McCarthy in Bridesmaids, Rebel Wilson in Pitch Perfect, or a few other identical relief side characters. Their comedic appeal lies inevitably in being both fat and exceedingly confident or overtly sexual in a gross or inappropriate manner — reinforcing the message that those who aren’t thin don’t have the right to be either confident or sexual in any way. I know what it’s like to be bombarded with cultural messages that repeatedly hammer home the sentiments, You are not desirable. Thus, you are not valuable.
I feel strongly that I have a deep and pure ethical obligation to withhold this judgment against others, and that if I were compassionate enough I would never feel any such judgment in the first place. No one should feel like I did. And, yet, unlike other Otherizing characteristics, such as race, body weight is one of the few categories over which one has control and which has negative impact on one’s self, one’s friends and family, and society at large. I know we can’t normalize obesity without facing objective national health and economic consequences.
Perhaps my negative gut reaction is a result of this objective knowledge, or perhaps it originates in a deep fear of regressing. Perhaps it’s a subconscious strategy for keeping myself from regressing, to avoid falling victim to complacency and total acceptance. If I don’t hold these views, I’ll slip back. I’ll feel gross, and alone, and invisible. I’ll have bad knees and high blood pressure and a shame so overwhelming it feels like a black hole.
Perhaps when I run my fingers along my collarbone, I do it to reassure myself that it’s still visible. That I am still normal. That I am still not one of the Others. I run each and every mile through the heat and the wet and the cold to distance myself as much as is humanly physically possible. I walk outside my dorm building, lined with dark windows, each morning as I go to class. I glance at my reflection; I double-take and check to make sure that yes, that’s me. Yes, I look like a normal college student.
When I return in the evening, I’m reminded by physical indicators that I haven’t always been who I am now. That while, to most people, I may now seem normal, I can’t escape from my past. Some reveal my secret to the public. Battle scars, some people call them. Racing stripes, say others, as they wear them with pride, or, at at least, acceptance. I haven’t quite gotten there yet. The stretch marks that line my torso and arms — commonly associated with pregnancy or the morbidly obese — feel more like shackles or a brand that still hurts from the hot, painful memories of when I was Other.
Sometimes I feel that I’m finally in the clear. I’m safe now. My hard work paid off. I’m not going to die of a heart attack at fifty. I won’t get diabetes, my greatest fear since my mother sat me down to warn me of its danger when I was in second grade and urged me to always count how many times I peed per day. My physical pains are gone — uncomfortable realities like chafing and sweating and being just so tired, all the time. I do things like run and lift weights and hike and dance at least partly because I’m still discovering what I’m capable of. I am free and ecstatic and exuberant and powerful and strong with each new accomplishment.
Sometimes I feel that I’m in the clear. I’m safe now, from judgment, from stigma. I escaped the trap, and most people may never know my past. While clothed, I have no remaining physical distinguishers. I make truly lovely, dear friends with truly lovely, nonjudgmental people. The inevitable shame and discomfort from both myself and the listener if I ever mention my transformation in passing — a time and an accomplishment that I consider core to my identity — let me know that I’m mistaken. Considering the stigma attached to being overweight, one would think that getting into shape would be an accomplishment of which to be proud. And, yet, at least in my demographic, the state of Having Been Other seems to be nearly as condemning as being an Other itself.
There are times when I feel subject to involuntary Doublethink, forced to reconcile the opposing ideas that I feel simultaneously. I’m proud of what I accomplished, and indignant that those who aren’t at a normal weight are Otherized. Yet, at the same time, I feel shame about where I’ve come from, and guilty that I feel that way.
I’m balancing — no, teetering — on a ridge of minuscule width, infinitely high. Ferocious winds bat me every which way. On each side of me lies danger. But for now, I think, I’ll keep running, and running forward; maybe one day, I’ll find my way down.
