The Joys of Being Fat

This is one of those times when I hear two things from two different sources in short order. Usually when that happens, it's time to sit up and take notice. So what did I hear twice in a row? "Normal" people don't like fat people.

This is something that I can attest to as I'm currently fat and have been morbidly obese for quite some years. A MO person can be in a room with dozens of people, stand right in the middle of the room, and be completely invisible. It's not that people can ignore your physical presence--if they bump into you, both you and they will know about it. But when it comes to social acknowledgement, MO people just don't exist.

Unfortunately, it's a universal phenomenon that knows no bounds. I'll spare the details of most situations, and just relate two examples from my old church. One happened all the time. I would be in our fellowship hall, needing to talk to someone, and be standing right next to him/her. I'd wait until he/she finished talking to whomever they were conversing, and then, without fail, both people would walk off even though I would be standing two feet away from them. If I wanted results, I'd have to chase after them and force the issue.

The second example is a little more painful. It was related to me, or rather confessed to me, by our interim minister. He told me that when he first met me, he took an initial dislike to me because of my fatness. He said it took him weeks to get past that dislike, and once he listened to me and saw my capabilities, he found that I was a very nice, very capable and very knowledgeable person. Even with all that, he still had a problem with my weight, and still does to this day.

So what made this come up? Yesterday I was talking with my friend Yizong about what I had noticed after I started losing a lot of weight. I commented that once my obesity-emotion-coping mechanism adjusted, I started to see just how much cruelty and inhumanity is shown to fat people.

That was reinforced today when I was talking with my doctor. He asked me how I was doing mentally, and I told him about being rejected for the seminary. Immediately he asked me if they had requested a picture, and I said that they had. He also asked if I had been interviewed personally; I said yes. He said he thought the reason the seminary rejected me was due to my weight. I hope it's not so, but if it is, I'll never be able to look at a BDS graduate the same way again.

So what happens when a person becomes visible again? I don't know. Can I handle it? I hope so. But the real question is: can I cope with all the emotional scarring now that I can see it? Only time will tell...