"Art is not the application of a canon of beauty but what the instinct and the brain can conceive beyond any canon. When we love a woman we don’t start measuring her limbs."
Big girls shouldn’t have sex. No, scratch that. There are plenty gorgeous and sexy big girls out there. Only fat girls shouldn’t have sex. It’s too embarrassing, too mentally taxing, too… gross! If any poor man has to endure the wrath of seeing me naked he will surely be scarred for life.
Being well over 200 pounds most of my life I admit to having given into these self-sabotaging thoughts time and time again. That is, until I learned a few tricks to accept myself and finally feel empowered in bed. Before I get to that, let us get acquainted.
I’ve been fat all my life. I was a chubby baby, a husky kindergartener, a fat teenager, and an even fatter 20-something adult. As a kid I daydreamed of a future with marriage and passionate sex (hey, I watched a lot of soap operas), but I knew I would only achieve either of those goals if I got skinny. I resigned to living a life of solitude until then.
When I was 15 something unthinkable happened. I got a boyfriend. Crazier than that, I eventually lost my virginity to him 4 years later. Sex, while fat! Shocking, I know. We ended up staying together for nearly a decade. Throughout my life with him he continued to love me for who I was on the inside and rarely acknowledged my weight. I considered this a dream come true and felt my weight was a dirty secret he pretended not to notice for the sake of making me feel better, which I thoroughly appreciated. Sadly, as loved as he made me feel, the truth is I went all those years without truly feeling confident or sexy in my own skin. It was standard for me to keep my tank top on during sex to conceal my fat stomach. I didn’t get naked in front of him. Ever. He thought he was being respectful by letting me carry on that way but in reality things would have been much different if I had been forced to face my own body earlier on.
Life happens and that relationship ended a couple years ago. The concept of dating and having to inevitably face my body issues with new men seemed a task too daunting to handle. What guy is going to get excited by a fat chick who is a basket case with no self-esteem?
Luckily I quickly met the man I am still with today who helped me to drastically reshape my body image. We have passionate sex, daily, and I have no problem taking my clothes off! Based on our own personal experiences together, I’ve realized the simple, yet effective, way I started to embrace my body, and I have confidence it will inspire you to do the same.
Laugh at yourself.
In other words, lighten up! It’s so simple, it’s brilliant. If you’re anything like me, your fat is pretty damn humorous if you think about it. My belly jiggles when I move around, my fat legs feel stubby and awkward when I wrap them around my guy, and my double chin looks like it’s trying to swallow my face when my neck is scrunched up during missionary (I know from sex pictures). Even during orgasm we all look downright scary when we squeal and scrunch and scowl, and that doesn’t even have anything to do with our weight.
The most valuable thing my guy does for me is something that previously resided in “worst nightmare” territory: he acknowledges my fat, often.
He tells me he loves my fat, that it’s warm and soft and squishy. He proves it by jiggling my tummy, letting me squeeze my fat thighs around his neck because he thinks it’s hot how my “Super Woman Legs”, as he lovingly calls them, are so strong and powerful. He sometimes falls behind me when we walk to ogle my jiggling calves. He admires how strong my muscles must be to constantly carry around a sack of extra weight. He plays with my body and embraces my shape, and by doing so, he has shown me that it’s no use trying to hide from my size because he notices every inch.
He doesn’t condone being unhealthy and neither do I, but he has fun enjoying me at this weight and expresses hope that when I do eventually approach a healthier weight that I still leave a little extra padding for him. I have finally discovered the thrill in being found sexy in part because of my size, not just in spite of it.
If you’re not with the right person who makes you feel empowered and accepted when they touch you, keep looking. Self-acceptance isn’t a gift your mate can simply hand to you, but with the proper help their appreciation of your body and all of its amazing curves is certainly a big nudge in the right direction.
We are doomed to a lifetime of self-hatred if we continue to take ourselves too seriously. Let’s lighten up and actually notice our bodies instead of hiding from them all the nuances, quirks, so-called flaws, and even the gorgeous parts too (they’re there, trust me).
Just remember, yours is the same body that gets chills up its spine when it’s touched the right way, the same body that shivers and quakes with pleasure during orgasm, the same body that lulls into dreamland with peaceful satisfaction after a night of torrid sex, and the same body that makes your mate explode with pleasure. You gotta love that!