T Minus Eight Months, Eleven Days and a Shimmy and a Shake...

I have been thinking a lot about fat acceptance lately. Getting married creates a whole new kind of angst when you are trying to feel at ease in your own skin. The nanosecond you announce an engagement on Facebook, for instance, the targeted marketing software that the social networking site has embedded in it immediately bombards you with ads touting the latest and greatest methods and products for getting that perfect "Bridal Body".

Sod off, Facebook targeted marketing software.

I am torn on the issue of fat acceptance. I am a believer in the idea of human bodies, especially women's bodies, being healthy and beautiful at any age, size, or shape. I know that no matter how much weight I lose, I will most likely be considered overweight by those infamous weight/height charts in doctor's offices. That is the way my body is shaped. Those evil broadsheets of lies and shame do not take into account my rather mammoth bosom, nor does it consider my always, er, we'll say "lush" bum. I will always be considered "fat", even after I lose 70, 80, even a hundred pounds. Thus, I want to know that there is an element of fat acceptance out there where I can find a place.

But I do finding myself disturbed by a growing trend amongst the "big and beautiful" community that women of so-called "average size" are somehow "too skinny" and "unhealthy". I saw a friend of a friend comment recently that a plus size store that topped out at a certain size catered to "overly skinny women" and that women over that size were "healthy". I was rather shocked. I don't care what the rest of your health profile looks like, if you are well into the 20s clothing size-wise, you are at risk health wise. It's an indisputable fact. Even if it is simply that you have more aches and pains than an "average" person, or a unmanifested but still higher risk for heart disease, diabetes, etc, it's still there. It's still an added issue, much like a sun worshipper that hasn't gotten a suspicious mole...yet. The friend the person was addressing is one of the most active and busy larger ladies I know, but I would still hesitate to try to say that overall, women that are moving well past a bit overweight are healthy.

It's a slippery slope. Most of the wedding sites I am part of cater to the weirdo bride (Offbeat Bride, Indiebrides, etc) and they have a strict policy of no diet talk. I like this, because if it shut down from the start and left to other websites to address, there isn't the chance that every thread will become a lament about it. There is a lovely new site by the author of the DIY Bride books that is about fashion for the plus size bride. When she was approached by a solicitor of a weight loss product and subsequently gently rebuffed the request to advertise, explaining her policy, she was treated to a diatribe about the evil evil evils of Fatty Fatty Two by Fours and how she was indulging a lazy, sedentary lifestyle. Maybe I am just contrary (peanut gallery: "Yes!") but this annoys me as much as the ridiculous notion that 120lbs is too skinny and 220lbs is healthy. There are people that are heavy duty folks that are most emphatically NOT lazy (not me, of course, I am lazy as shit) and the automatic assumption they are is nasty and inaccurate.

So as I often do, I proudly sit atop the fence-watching scrawny girls dash about on one side, full of energy and verve, but clearly missing out on something; and then there are the chubbos on the other side, a little slower and not as spry, but picking up on that indefinable something the other girls are missing out on. That something is butter.

I think I will see it as this: I have some definite goals for the future of my body, and for the wedding in particular. But that doesn't mean I can't love and accept the body I have in the mean time.