Comments on: I used to be a skinny person

By: Karen Johnston

Karen Johnston — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 17:48:23 +0000

I read your blog with great interest. I am one who has “lost the skinny”. I weighed 103 lbs. from the time I was 14 until I was 39. I may have varied up or down by a pound, but never more. Then at 39 after I met the man of my dreams, I quit smoking (from the time I was 14 also) I went though invitro fertilization, and had twins. But, after they were born, I didn’t keep much of the weight. I was down from 160 to 112 in about 3 months after they were born. By now, I’m 40. Well, a year later, my thyroid apparently went haywire, causing depression problems as well. So, at that point I’ve really started packing it on. And I really don’t know how to eat after a lifetime of eating what I want, when I want and how much I want. Then came a total hysterectomy. Now, long story long, I’m 170 lbs. And I feel like I’ve lost my identity. No one looks at me the same, if they look at me at all. So what do you do? Obviously the lesson learned from this is that you are not your body. But what a slap in the face. I always knew I was more. I was smart and funny. Was I really so naive to think that my skinny body didn’t matter to other people? Okay, yes, I knew that people (by that I mean men, mostly) looked. I had a great figure. Even though I was skinny I still was a 34 D cup, so not bad in the hooter department. But, now that I’m slightly enormous and yet somehow invisible (how ironic) I have to ask myself, did anyone actually like me for me? I’m guessing they didn’t even care to find out. I’m not looking for sympathy. I had a great ride in the attention department. But it makes you realize how shallow people (including myself) are.

So I guess, I can relate to how you’re feeling.

By: Chris

Chris — Sun, 08 May 2011 03:55:28 +0000

Hey girl,

I am turning 30 soon. Man I used to be skinny, and everyone kept saying it to me, it was in a bad way unfortunately though. Cause, as I am sure you know, for a guy it isn’t always a good thing. I kept at sport, and even though I was sronger then most of the guys I stayed skinny. I kept at gyming hard, hoping I would get somewhere. But I never got the size my friends did. I ended up taking steroids and got to where I waned to be with a LOT of hard word. But I then stopped gyming and kept pushing in the food as hard as I could,and now I sit here, just under 100kgs, 1.79,and very unhappy with the way I look.

Sad thing is, I know I have a fast metobolism, because if I eat ‘okay’ for a week and work out I see big results. But, for somereason I struggle to persuade myself to just take the good root. Insted it is frequent beer and kebabs, chinese, whatever I can shove in.

Long story, I know, sorry, what I wanted to say in the beginning was, most people pick a bit with age. But babes, a girl with curves is HOT! Not a woman that doesn’t look after herself, but a woman hat does with some curves. Eat, right, work out, and have fun girl!

I mean, who are the girls the guys like? Beyonce, J-Lo, Kim Kardashian… You get the point. Be proud girl, look after yourself and I hope you get to love yourself, the beautiful way you are. Oh, and btw, as for the breasts, don’t stress, I am i a really close group of friends, and only three of the eight are into big ones, the rest of us just want a girl with a firm body .)

By: Chelsea

Chelsea — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 04:08:48 +0000

Your wedding dress comment made me think of a comment the salesperson told me, recently while trying on dresses. She kept commenting on how slimming this this and this would look on me, and how this slimmed my waist, accentuated things etc, BUT…I’m 5’3, athletic and about 100lbs. Why would I WANT to look any slimmer?! Really, I think women with curves are GORGEOUS and frankly, I look forward to the day that I pick up a few more pounds and fill out more!

By: Link Love | The Demoiselles

Link Love | The Demoiselles — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 13:03:10 +0000

[...] of our favorite blogs, Eat The Damn Cake, wrote a great piece titled “I Used To Be A Skinny Person.” Definitely worth a [...]

By: slickpig

slickpig — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 21:06:09 +0000

excellent post. I know exactly what you mean. I used to play basketball at college. I worked out up to 4 hours a day, running, lifting weights, for three years. After I quit I, naturally, expanded, and I was happy, until my ex-boyfriend, my family, everyone kept commenting on my weight gain.
Thin Sucks. When I was working out, I never felt like I was thin enough. I never thought I was beautiful. Now I look back and I’m like, wtf?! I was beautiful, I am beautiful.

By: alexandria

alexandria — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 19:58:51 +0000

I have lost my personal skinny, and it is a struggle every day to learn to love myself for how I look now, which is truly different than how I’ve ever looked. In my teen years I was uncomfortable in my skin; my own mother made comments about my weight, so that didn’t help either. When I was 19, I made the commitment and shed the excess weight I hated so much. I lost 10 pounds through exercise and changing my eating habits. It was just enough to make me feel great, and I looked great – I had noticeably slimed down, but I still had curves (which was important to me). Then I met my now husband, and we did what all new, happy couples do – ate a lot of ice cream together. Both of us have gained weight; I know I, personally, have gained about 20 pounds, give or take. And so I’m now the heaviest I have ever been, which is shocking and disheartening. I didn’t just go back to square one, but ate that and the brownies that were hiding under it.
Also, since the time of the great weight loss, I’ve been through too many car accidents and just the fact of my body getting older, and I can really mess up my back doing the “wrong” kind of work outs. So that depresses me, which in turn makes me eat the ice cream that started this whole disaster.
Yesterday, I finally went through my clothes and any pants or skirts that still said size 3 (juniors sizing) on them, I pulled them out. Any shirts that are a juniors size small are gone too. I cannot keep living in the past if I am to ever come to love myself enough again to be strong enough again to make a difference. What worked for me then is not going to work for me now. My body has changed in 5 years, and the first thing I need to do is accept that. Looking wistfully at my skinny jeans is not going to change anything.
I also went on a bit of a shopping spree and bought myself new pants that actually fit, and don’t give me the worst case of muffin top. I cannot live with the mindset of “these will fit again, some day.” I am doing my best to not let the little number on the pants get me down. I am constantly reminding myself that every designer has different sizing standards, that nothing is consistent. I also vowed to stop shopping for pants in the juniors department. Their bodies are not my body. I have hips and an ass, and I’m quite proud of that.
I love my body best when it’s naked, laying in bed and my husband is looking at me in the same way he has always looked at me. I wish I could see myself through his eyes.

@Annabel – My wedding dress was dark purple.
And speaking of that, I never set foot in a bridal store – I ordered my dress online, where I sent them my measurements and they made a dress to fit me, as I am. No one told me my measurements were weird, no one ever told me to loose ten pounds. It was the least stressful part of my wedding planning.

(Fun fact: I keep typing “points” instead of “pounds.” Ten points for alexandria!)

By: Anchun, Day 319: Sejeongian Beauty « Joelle Pearson's

Anchun, Day 319: Sejeongian Beauty « Joelle Pearson's — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 06:36:36 +0000

[...] I came to identify with. Perhaps this has permanently damaged my self-perception. I came across this article on Eat The Damned Cake , which spoke to me as a once- skinny person, who has spent the year terrified of, as the author [...]

By: Evy

Evy — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 18:53:52 +0000

“When I tried on wedding dresses, the saleswoman kept saying, “That is SO slimming!” And “Look how tiny your waist looks in that!””

The same thing happened to me. I’m 5’10 and have an Hispanic body, humongous hips, small waist and smallish boobs. I had three consultants during the experience and they all kept telling me that the dresses were not made for my body and that I would need to order a dress that was two sizes bigger just because my hips wouldn’t fit in the “normal sizes”. I heard at least 5 times that my “weird body” wasn’t made for wedding dresses and that made my experience so much more stressful than it needed to be. In addition, the majority of the dresses that are amazingly pretty stop coming at at bridal size 10 (which is between a 6-8 straight size) and after that most of the dresses look hideously out of the 80′s.

I’ve never heard so many times that I needed to hide my hips when they’re one of the parts of my body that I love the most.

Retaking your losing the skinny thing, I also made the mistake of gaining 10 pounds before wedding dress shopping and that gave my mother and all consultants all the “permission” they needed to keep blasting my body.

All I can think now is how much I wished I could’ve read your blog before going to wedding dress shopping hell.

By: Shyra

Shyra — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 17:29:46 +0000

You can’t be scared of losing what u never had. I was never skinny and will never be skinny. Even my “skinny” sister is muscle and curves. I just want to get to that point where I am the right balance of muscle and curves. I consider myself a wordsmith and by definition someone who likes to define everything. Is skinny a 24″ waist or less than 20% body fat or a size 00? Everyone’s definition is different so how can u say ur losing something when u just maybe moving into someone else’s definition? Perhaps life is a scale and depending on the day u move up or down.

By: On body image « What Are Years?

On body image « What Are Years? — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 15:07:02 +0000

[...] reason I recall this fact now is because I read this blog post called “I used to be a skinny person” by Kate Fridkis. In it, she talks about how looking great has become synonymous with looking skinny [...]