The Shadow

So I am up late with nothing to do, and I just got done looking through a whole lot of facebook pictures. Do you ever look at a picture of yourself and think "Damn... I look good"? I don't know if you have but I am not going to sit here and lie like I don't. When I was a little girl all the white ladies used to tell me that I was going to grow up to be a model. This was pre-fatty. I looked older than all the other kids, I was tall, had a head full of wild hair, and was gorgeous. You know those type of kids that you know will be beautiful when they get older? That was me. I am not trying to sound conceited because trust me, I do not feel that same way anymore. But truthfully my mother was told she had a gorgeous child all the time. Now people, especially my family, ask me when I am going to lose weight, and I am told that I have a "pretty face". The compliments have faded, and part of that is due to age, but most of it is due to the fact that people cannot look beyond fat. Old people love me still, for some reason there are more perceptive to bigger women, I will never hear my grandmother question my weight.

I hang with a beautiful group of women. When I say beautiful, I truly mean it. Guys ask me all the time to hook them up with my friends (something that I will come back to later), and they always ask me if my friends are attractive. When I tell them that I don't have any ugly friends they do not believe me. For some reason men believe that there has to be at least one ugly friend, since we don't have one in our group, I guess that means that the fat one replaces the ugly one, and that's me.

I have always been friends with beautiful people, and it is not because I am shallow or because I think they would make me look better ( and they don't), but my friends are more than just pretty faces. They are smart, charming, well-liked, articulate, educated, have morals... etc. more importantly single, just like me. I never really understood why, and it still is this crazy paradox that I am trying to decode. Regardless of the reason, this is not part of my problem. Hanging with gorgeous charming women is great, and it attracts men that I tend to love. But there is a down fall...

I do not want to sound bitter towards any of my friends, because I am not. I love them, and they are my family, but I do want to express my personal experiences and the emotions and thoughts that come along with me on this journey. More times than not I find myself feeling like a shadow, the dark ugly figure in the corner that exists, but is rarely noticed. A shadow is the absence of light, and most people don't notice them or want them unless things gets too hot or too cold, and that's how I feel people view me at times. I do not matter until things get tough and you need to notice me in a situation, because I bring a lot to the table. When a group of men approach me and my female friends, I have to take a specific approach. I can't be too loud, which most of the time I am, because they will think that I am obnoxious and trying to block, if I say nothing, then I go completely unnoticed. Can you believe that I have actually been with a few of my friends and a male came up to talk to me girl, completely ignored me, and didn't even introduce himself to me. I was completed offended. I have walked down the streets with a girl and felt like Solange two steps behind Beyonce.

The crazy part is I do not think that any of my friends are particularly more gorgeous than the others, and this includes me. I have even been told that I am prettier than the rest of my friends, regardless if that is true or not, I will never be recognized in public that way ever, because I am a fatty. I was once having a conversation with a male friend of mine about New Year's resolutions. I was talking about my weight loss plan, and he told me that him and another friend were talking about how I am probably the most gorgeous girl on campus, and if I lost weight everyone else would see it. Its hard to take that as a compliment, because essentially he is telling me that underneath the fat, which is part of me, I am great, but with it, not so much.

My purpose is not for you to feel sorry for me, because I am blessed beyond belief. I want those who share these experiences to know that there are people that feel the same way, and those of you that don't, I want you to be empathetic to those who are different, because although most of the things that happen to me are minute and subtle, they slowly impact me and are subtle. I was speaking with my ex boyfriend the other day, and he was telling me about how insecure I was in our relationship two years ago. He was a college football player in Georgia, and I was just this random girl he had met. He consistently reminded of how inadequate I was to him. He walked two steps ahead of me, and even called me a liar, because I told him about how I wanted to lose weight and I didn't. I know, I was stupid and I learned a lot from this relationship and a lot about myself.  One summer I had lost 15 lbs, I wasn't as big as I am now, so that was a very good accomplishment. I asked my boyfriend at the time if he noticed, and he simply answered no. At this moment I gave up. The person that I wanted to notice my weight loss didn't. I was devastated.

People want to know how the hell you can let someone else mess with your self-esteem, and let me tell you, my ex was not the first person to make me feel the way I did at the moment. He was one of many, and although it is easy to ignore one gnat, have a swarm of those mutha f*&$ers come up on you and ask me how you feel then. You will be swatting and running around in circles like crazy. That is pretty much how my life operates when I am down and out, and these gnats are yacking in my ear about crazy bullshit. It is much easier to believe the negative than the positive. Think about it. If you are having a standard day, and someone tells you something great, then someone brings you down, your day is no longer great, it sucks. You instantly forget about the compliment or good deed that you received earlier in the day. It is the way that the human brain operates, and it is unfortunate.

When I am no longer a fatty,( I will always be one at heart) I wonder if I will still feel the same about this situation?


Just remember: We are all insecure, I am just the first to admit it!- Kanye West

Tiffany