Morbidly obese, perpetually hungry and unapologetically in love with myself
A 27-year-old plus-size man reflects on his life, the hypocrisy of body shamers who mask their bullying as concern for his health, and the future of the body positive movement in India
In her book Designated Ugly Fat Friend, author Kody Keplinger describes a high school where students use “DUFF” as an acronym for anyone who is unattractive. Everyone in this school tries to befriend a “DUFF” to make them feel better about themselves and appear more attractive to their peers. The novel asks a pertinent question: must fat people feel apologetic for their mere existence? Must an already shamed population be shamed for their appearance?
Growing up with mental health issues which sometimes took the form of intrusive OCD, other times debilitating anxiety, I was prescribed antidepressants by my psychiatrist. For the uninitiated, prescription drugs work well to alleviate severe symptoms but they can also lead to an increase in cravings, appetite and subsequently lead to weight gain. For me, 10 years of antidepressants meant significant weight gain over the years. Weight gain, in itself, changes the way people treat you, which affects your mental health, making symptoms more severe. Thus begins an unbreakable cycle of self-loathing and worsening mental health symptoms.
“I used to be like you.. you know. I was fat too. But I am not anymore,” a well-meaning gym freak told me after class at college. He really thought he was making mountains move with what he was saying. “But then, I hit the gym. Started bench-pressing. Exercising. Worked hard on myself and got better. If I can do it, you can do it too,” he said. I didn’t know how to react so I just looked at the protein shake drinking (possibly steroid-abusing) human and said “Thank you, you are right. I should work on myself”.
Years later, I still wonder why this person (and many others like him) assumed that a) I wasn’t doing anything to keep myself fit and b) I needed his advice on hitting the gym in the first place.
In her memoir, Hunger, author Roxane Gay talks about Oprah Winfrey’s quote: “Weight problems are never weight problems. There is more to the story”. An abusive environment at home, stress-eating and thyroid fluctuations are some of the many reasons why people struggle to lose weight. Given the set of circumstances an individual finds themselves in, it may or may not be easy for them.
“Regardless of what you do, your body is the subject of public discourse with family, friends, and strangers alike. Your body is subject to commentary when you gain weight, lose weight, or maintain your unacceptable weight… This commentary is often couched as concern, as people only have your best interests at heart. They forget that you are a person. You are your body, nothing more, and your body should damn well become less,” writes Gay.
“I wish I did not see my body as something for which I should apologize or provide explanations,” she confesses. The quote brings back traumatic memories of a teacher in my English undergraduate class, who asked me in the middle of an exam: “Why are you so fat?” I was numb.
This seemingly-progressive academic, who taught us Agatha Christie one semester and Virginia Woolf the other, called herself a proud feminist. In hindsight, I wish I could have pointed her towards books on intersectional feminism and how radical self-acceptance is a part of being feminist. But as I write this, my heart weeps for the 21-year-old fat boy who was humiliated in full public view and instead of raising hell, felt apologetic. Does this professor even know she made me feel terrible about my body?
Much of Gay’s discourse is around such people who treat fat as “an enemy that must be destroyed, a contagion that must be eradicated.” The author has, in the past, shared experiences of being humiliated at the gym, of people picking up food from her trolley at the supermarket, and refusing to sit next to her on planes.
“He has told me, “I am only telling you what no one else will,” but of course, he is telling me what the world is always telling me, everywhere I go,” writes Gay, emphasizing that it is often those closest to us who fat shame and mask it as concern.
Sometimes I wonder: Do people not know that fat people own mirrors? Even if they didn’t, make no mistake, fat people do know they are fat. They live in the boy you call fat. They also know that being fat puts them at an increased risk of diabetes, heart attacks and makes them instantly unattractive (to most) if they are dating.
In The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things, author Carolyn Mackler touches on why losing weight isn’t as easy as eating salads and hitting the gym. Fifteen-year-old Virginia ‘Ginny’ Shreves, the novel’s protagonist, has a larger-than-average body. Her parents are obsessed with her weight. Her mother, who grew up chubby, forces this unhealthy obsession with diet and fitness on her teenage daughter. Ginny’s father cannot help but comment on women’s bodies and doesn’t hide his bias for thinner women. As a result, Ginny rarely leaves her house. She watches TV and binge eats, which makes her gain even more weight. Her family is abusive — her sister, Anais, who couldn’t tolerate the abuse, has left to live in a different country while her Rugby star brother has been accused of date raping a girl at college. On realizing that her parents are stopping her progress, Ginny decides to leave home. She learns kick-boxing. Towards the end, having made a name for herself as a journalist, even though her parents are against it, she decides to interview the woman her brother raped.
Every fat person has a story like Ginny’s. Even if their families are not abusive, they grow up with other challenges. “Everybody, whether thin or fat, has a history and a story,” writes Gay. Then why do people, especially uncles and aunts at Brown weddings, not mind their own business when they see a fat person? What sadistic pleasure do they get from attacking someone’s body and fuelling their insecurities? Since when has this type of behaviour been acceptable? And will I be arrested if I punch someone the next time they give me unsolicited advice on weight loss?
I was body shamed as a child and in adolescence, and I continue to be body shamed as an adult. I realize now that more often than not, the body shamers are projecting their insecurities on me. Unlike me, they are not comfortable in their skin and would probably fat shame themselves too if they gained a few kilos. “People can only meet you as deeply as they have met themselves,’’ says author and spiritual healer Matt Kahn. Body shamers probably need decades worth of “meeting themselves” to understand just why they would shame someone for existing in their body. Some of these people have children and I shudder to think that they wouldn’t hold back from fat shaming their own kids regardless of the impact it is likely to have on them.
Shaming an already shamed population is, well, shameful. For some reason, body shamers believe they are doing God’s work. They think negative reinforcement will magically make the fat person lose all weight. According to them, fat people should always be in a constant state of unhappiness. If they happen to love themselves and where they are in their weight loss journey, all hell will break loose. According to this train of thought, the sight of a Lizzo or a body positive influencer doing well for themselves would make the fat person lose all motivation to hit the gym and *gasp* will remain fat through their lives!
What I like about body shamers, though, is that they are consistent. They would shame themselves too if they were fat. I have met plenty of fat people who are fatphobic themselves. Invariably, they were surprised that I, a fellow fat person, refused to feel bad about myself. I challenged their world view because I am the main character in my story — the handsome hunk with a paunch who refuses to be treated like the comic relief character in a Bollywood film. This makes people (especially fat people) around me uncomfortable. Folks who used to be fat once often become fatphobic once they lose weight and get the “ideal body type”. The world probably treats them better so they disown the fatter version of themselves, much like Ashneer Grover, who, earlier this year, asked media houses to not use his older photographs where he looks fat.
It’s also true that men are more fatphobic. I blame toxic masculinity for this need to constantly be in the gym, and the refusal to accept that a person can be fat and thrive. If Anant Ambani could be fat shamed at his own wedding, what hope do lesser mortals have?
On the rare occasion when body shamers encounter someone like me — a 27-year-old morbidly obese man who refuses to be ashamed of his body, they are perplexed. “Why is he not ashamed? Should we fear-monger him about diabetes? Should we make him feel guilty by suggesting that he is a bad son and a failed human being? Oh, we should definitely tell him that his weight will affect his performance in bed. That will bother him for sure”.
After 27 years of being fat shamed in every possible way, I have now built a fortress around me. No insecure body shamer can penetrate it. Each time an uncle comments on my “man boobs”, I ask him if he is jealous that mine are bigger than his. This is a radical act of self acceptance. All I am trying to do is make space for my fat body in a world that makes me feel less. As Gay wrote, “When you become fat, the world becomes lesser”. And if this lesser world is triggered by our large bodies, then the world be damned!
Deepansh Duggal writes on art and culture. He tweets at Deepansh75.