A lifetime of being overweight

Define overweight, asked me to Google.

Weight that is higher than what is considered as an ideal weight for a given height is described as overweight, replied Google to me.

What is the ideal weight for a 5 feet 1 inch female, asked me to Google.
J. D. Robinson Formula (1983) Female: 49 kg + 1.7 kg per inch over 5 feet, replied Google to me.

What a shame! said me to me. For the last 35 years you have carried 15-20 extra kilos around your skeletal structure. What a burden on mother earth!

I have waged war against those kilos, replied me to me. For as long as I can remember, I have battled my weight, but like the Crusades its never ending. I diet, I exercise and diet and exercise some more. Some days I win, some days food wins, some days efforts win and some days genes win. And at the end of the week the scales balance out.

Define body shaming, asked me to Google.

The action or practice of humiliating someone by making mocking or critical comments about their body shape or size, replied Google to me.

Friends and neighbors would often ask my brother, “Your sister eats up all your food, ha? It’s evident she leaves nothing for you”. “You look like a hippo”, my classmates would say. When I boarded a classmates car at college, someone said to him, “You have two cylinders one in the dicky and one on the seat”. When I sat on my husband’s bike, he looked at the tyre and remarked to his friends loudly, “Just checking if the back tyre is punctured”. Oho! So that’s body shaming, realized me to me.

What does a “fat girl” mean, asked me to me.

Replied me to me- A fat girl is a female dissatisfied with her body weight, is insecure when she dances, runs or even walks, is vulnerable to people even looking at her, is scared that she will be judged for her weight. A fat girl feels ineligible to wear fitted clothes. A fat girl feels she would be deemed as lazy if she curls up in front of the television or with a book. A fat girl is forever on a diet- she skips meals, she substitutes normal food with salads, soups and sprouts, she hits the gym, she joins weight watchers, she does yoga, she goes on brisk walks. Her weight comes down painfully slowly and the time she resorts to normal food and normal exercise her weight is in a hurry to pile back on. Its not just the caloric connection that defines a fat girl, a fat girl is an entire emotional package. A fat girl reads every book that speaks of weight- be it “Don’t lose your mind, lose your weight”, by Rujuta Divekar or “Confessions of a serial dieter, by Kallie Purie. She even reads novels like Big Girl by Danielle Steel and fat girl romances like Worth the weight or Love for scales.

Well, well, so I have been a fat girl all along, realized me to me!