All I ever wanted was to be thin

And that is all I am not right now, but I am still the happiest I have ever been.

Let’s begin from the start, shall we?

I have never been a very thin person, but I don’t remember being too fat either. I was always somewhere in the middle, which I thought was healthy. But when I was a young girl at 7, I had cousins who were too thin, and would always call me names like moti(fat) or bhais(buffalo). They never did it out of some hatred for me, but it was their way of having fun. And with time, I have learnt how to let go of those terrible memories and not hold a grudge against them, because they don’t even remember any of this. Looks like it was never a big deal for them, but it hampered my confidence with my body to a level that I would not want to look into the mirror also.

Fast forward a few years, puberty hit me at 10 (I know it was early). I was one of the tallest girls in the class, always standing towards the end during the morning assembly. I majorly look like my mom, which I think is the biggest blessing ever, because my mom has defied age and looks spectacular even to this day. But I have some features of my dad too, one of them being his thick eyebrows, and for me they were joint. I had coarse dark hair all over my body, but what bothered me the most were the hair on my upper lips and eyebrows. My already dwindling self confidence hit a new low when my cousins started calling me mucchi (moustache). By that time, I had attained my full height, was slightly overweight, and had a lot of hairs. You can imagine as a teenager, those are not the most attractive features.

I remember this one incident when I was 12 years old and I had gone shopping with one of my aunts. She selected a nice jeans of waist 30 for me and asked me to go try it. When I went to the trial room, I was praying god that somehow I fit in this jeans. I remember telling god that this is the last thing I want from you. I can only laugh at the desperation I had that time. I hated shopping, because I felt like I owed it to the clothes to fit into them, just somehow fit, close the button and zip, even if they are killing me. It wasn’t until a year ago that I learned that if I am paying for something, I have all the rights to demand comfort and good looks, despite my shape and weight.

I had been in a girls school till 10th standard, it was only in 11th that I had my first interaction with boys who were not in my blood relation. I went to Kota, a hub, as they like to call it, for aspiring engineers. When I first landed there, I had no idea what I was there for. I simply followed the herd, which were my friends, who were intelligent enough, and thought if they are doing it, it might be good. I was too lazy, maybe, to apply my own brain. I was away from home, and had meals in my hostel. The food their was pathetic, and if ever mistakenly they made something good, they would not let us take a second serving. My self confidence by now had dug a grave and rested peacefully, and I had no intentions of ever pulling it out. I was happy being just who I was, which at that time meant fat, tall, hairy, ugly, not so intelligent girl. That was what I thought of me. Since the food was so pathetic, I naturally stopped eating it. The only good meal they would prepare was aloo paratha,on Wednesday, and that was the only day I would eat something.

I would have 2–3 parathas in the afternoon, take a couple more and put it in my room to have in night. Rest of the days, I had a glass of milk in the morning, and if I am too hungry, a chapati in the night. As a result, my weight started going down, down to the lowest I have had in all my teenage years. All my clothes had become loose, and I started feeling the high that only a fat person can when something is loose for them. When I went home during vacations, everyone complimented me on my weight loss, but my parents and grand parents and aunt and uncle were concerned. They asked me to eat properly. Specially my granny. She thought I am in a race for zero figure or something, although even then I was very far away from a zero. But you know how caring grannies can be.

Not eating became my thing, the longer I would go without eating, the better I would feel. I felt like being fat was a crime I had done, and now I need to punish myself for it. It was during that home visit that my elder sister took me to a salon and got my eyebrows threaded and my upper lip hair removed. I still remember the first time I looked at myself in the mirror, I could not recognize myself. Suddenly I was a different person, I was beautiful.

All that weight loss and the new look made me super attractive for the guys around me. All of them wanted to be my friend, but I had no prior experience in dealing with attention from the opposite sex, so, as expected, I freaked out. I felt like everyone was mocking me, because I was never beautiful, I was never attractive, why on earth would anyone, ever, want to be associated with me?

That was my confidence level at that time. What I didn’t realize was, I was anorexic, and nobody, not even I myself knew of it. You see, in India, we have bigger problems to focus on, like IIT-JEE, the Joint Entrance Exam to get into the “most prestigious” institutes in India. Because if you don’t get in one, you will be struggling your entire life. Amidst issues as important as this, anorexia seems like a joke. Ok so you don’t want to eat food because you will become fat, what’s wrong with that? And why would it be a big deal? You are fat, so in a way it is good for you to not eat.

I didn’t clear JEE, so I ended up in a local private college near my house. I stayed with my parents and grandparents. So there was no question of not eating. My father would make the yummiest chocolate milkshake for me every morning, with an inch of froth. My mother would pack me 2 delicious parathas and veggies for lunch. When I would come home in evening, my mom would make a tall fat cup of milk for me, after which I would have a full dinner. I was loved and pampered, like any kid would be, and soon all the weight I had lost starving myself became a thing of past.

4 years of my college, my family fed me their love in form of food, and I loved love and food, so I took it all in. Although my self confidence wasn’t topping the charts, I was still quite content. It was around this time that I got the first phone which had camera in it, and then started my journey of taking selfies. In an year, I had taken around 6000 selfies, and all of them better than the other. Some of them were so good that even my mom could not recognize it was my picture. She said I looked like a model. With trial and error, I just figured out the best camera angles and lights and spots that worked for me. And those pictures were a therapy. I would look at those pictures multiple times in a day and remind myself that I am beautiful.

It was somewhere around the last year of my college, that I joined a yoga class. It was not anything fancy, just a lady in her thirties teaching yoga in her house. Within a month, I knew more asanas than her. I loved yoga. I was very flexible, even though I was overweight. I didn’t lose any weight, but I gained a lot of confidence doing yoga with her.

Then I moved to a new city for an internship, which later converted in a job. I was still overweight and a little shy, but I found some amazing people and life was cool. This was 2000 kms away from home, and my anorexic tendencies started to return. This time, I knew what anorexia was, and I knew I had it, and I knew I should not give in to it, as lucrative as it might seem. But there would still be days where I would starve myself just to feel good about me. I again started losing weight, but only very little, nothing noticeable, not even to me. Towards the end of my first year in this new city, I realized I wanted to do something I have never done before. So I enrolled in a 5K marathon. Before this, running even 500 mts was a challenge for me. But I started practising. I started eating healthy, and getting in great shape. I participated in the marathon and was able to finish it, then participated in a half marathon and was able to finish that too. Preparing for the marathons had toned me quite nicely, although I had not lost much weight. And then I got married, and moved to an entirely new city.

My lifestyle had changed, along with my place. I was thrown out of my comfort zone, and I was struggling everyday to fit in. I did close to zero exercise and binged on pizzas, and was always tired. My weight shot up faster than the space rockets, and in 3 months I had gained 12 kgs. I left the job I had joined there and stopped stepping out of my house. Because stepping out would mean wearing clothes, and nothing fit. Everything was tight. I started feeling depressed, looking at my old pictures again and again and crying how beautiful I looked in them.

My husband, who always teases me about being fat, but does so with so much love that I cannot even be angry about it, changed his job to move back to the city I was in earlier. So that I could have the life I was so happy in. I knew meeting my old friends would mean hearing Oh my god you have gained so much weight again and again on repeat. So I prepared myself for it.

The best thing I did was take my best friend to shopping with me. She is an angel. I told her very honestly, that none of my old clothes fit me, and I cannot magically lose 12 kgs in a few days, so I need to buy new clothes. She selected the best clothes for me, and for the first time I felt that joy of shopping even if you are overweight. I deserved to look good and feel comfortable in my clothes, even if I was on the heavy side. So I bought some wonderful clothes. When I went home, I tried all of them again, and realized I looked pretty great.

I realized that my beauty has to come from within. I need to love myself first, and not rely on some one else to make me feel great about me.

I am not advocating to be fat, I am only advocating to be in love. Yes I still crave to be thin, but I know my happiness is not tied to my weight. I am in love with myself, and whatever steps I take next to lose weight would truly be out of the love I have for me. It will be like taking a really bitter medicine when you are sick because you want to be well, and not like punishing yourself to fall sick in the first place.

I know this piece is way too long to grabs anyone’s attention, but this time, I wrote for myself. I wrote it because I wanted to realize how I have grown from that fidgety teenager who was praying god to fit in a pair of jeans she never wore more than twice to a self loving badass fat girl who demanded comfort and good looks if she was paying for them.

To all the people who call me fat, yes I am. And I still love myself.

If you are still reading, thanks a lot. If you are someone who is going through something similar, or who knows someone who is going through something similar, please know, that all good things in world are born from love. Dare to love yourself, unconditionally, in all shapes and sizes, through thick and thin. Marry yourself, make yourself a vow, to always be there for yourself. Because if you cannot do it for yourself, how would you do it for someone else?

We don’t realize how hard we are being on ourselves at times. We deserve a little self love.

Thank you,

The fat lovely girl!