The Negative Connotations “Fat” and “Skinny” Hold

A diagnosis of a debilitating illness can be devastating.

You know when something isn’t right with your loved one. Either it’s a gut feeling or little clues that just don’t add up. My mom: intelligent, ambulance vivacious; suddenly became uncharacteristically subdued. There were a few days that she would disappear for hours for medical appointments and then wouldn’t speak about them afterwards. I was maybe 11 or 12 at the time, medicine but I knew something wasn’t right. This new quiet person just wasn’t my mom. My breaking point was the day she and my grandmother looked like deer caught in headlights discussing x-rays. I wanted answers. She wanted to protect me from the burden of her new reality.

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My mother was formally diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, known as MS when I was 13. No family history. No warning. No time to come to grips with it. MS is an illness of many faces. It is an autoimmune disease that targets the brain and spinal cord. Mainly it affects the protein coverings to nerve cells that can diminish spinal and brain function such as vision problems, loss of fine and overall motor skill, as well as tingling in the extremities and moderate to severe body pain. No two people have the same symptoms and there is no known cure for MS. My mom shares her illness with names such as the late Richard Pryor, Montel Williams, Jack Osbourne (Ozzy Osbourne’s son) and singer Tamia Hill, who is also the wife of NBA player Grant Hill.

My mom’s condition rapidly declined right before my eyes. It seemed like she went from strutting in her heels to giving them all away and buying more flats. Then she started walking with a limp and having slight dizzy spells. Then she bought a few canes (because she needed options in her support). She’d have the cane in one hand and my steadying arm in the other. All in the space of a year.

I was 14.

Although I knew it wasn’t her fault, she didn’t set out to be sick, I resented her a bit. I was now 14, basically minding myself and my brother because physically, her body would not cooperate with her mind. I was filling out the important documents because her handwriting at the time was basically unreadable. I cooked, I cleaned. I had to step up and become the woman that the illness robbed her body of.

I was 14 and frustrated. I was young. I just wanted to be a normal teenaged girl and do all the things that came along with that. Instead I had to grow up quickly, had to be more mature than what was expected of others in my age range. I wholly resented being called a good kid by members of the family who saw me struggling but yet, still had unrealistic ideas as to what I should’ve been doing more of. I was 14 getting a crash course in life.

Nobody thinks about that. They see the service done for loved ones who are ill under the guise of “oh, well that’s your mother and you should have anyway.” The offers of help were few and far in between. Care of my mother and younger sibling boiled down to my grandmother and I shouldering the bulk of the responsibility. Nobody really thinks about the toll the illness takes on the caregivers. We give support emotionally, physically and mentally. Everyday. There is no vacation when you have a close relative that isn’t well. It’s heartbreaking to see your loved ones grow frustrated with the limitations their illnesses impose upon them.

The dynamic between my mother and I changed vastly. It didn’t feel like a parent/child relationship when I was the one covering majority of the tasks that she always attributed to being a woman and taking care of the house. Power struggles were frequent. Followed by overwhelming guilt, because I knew what my mother was when she was healthy. All my younger siblings will know of my mother is the very real effects of her illness that they see day to day.

MS is a daily struggle that has as many high points as it does low ones. My mom has basically lost 85% of the functionality in her legs, but some of her finer motor skills are coming back, such as writing. We’ve grown together in the 10 years she’s been diagnosed. We’ve cried, we’ve laughed. We’ve adapted. As long as there is no known cure for MS, it’s all we can do.

Written by Aubri Elle
Growing up in a society where the main cause of bullying and low self-esteem is being overweight and women being fat-shamed, rx it is easy to forget that this group of people are not the only ones to be targeted when it comes to body-shaming bullying and it is even easier to assume that being called ‘skinny’ is ‘better’ than being called ‘fat’. 

Let me stop you here. The words ‘skinny’ and ‘fat’ are two very ugly words, which should only be used when referring to milk/dairy products/meat. Personally, I have heard the word ‘skinny’ used towards me enough times to last a lifetime and I can say from experience that those comments; even those made out of concern, had a negative impact on my self esteem and subsequently body image.

The earliest ‘skinny’ comment that I can remember, was made by one of my best friends, back in YEAR 3 (!!!) –

‘You’re so skinny, my parents told me to ask you whether you have anorexia?’

Right. As if I was I was meant to know at 8 years old what anorexia was (eyes emoji) … Despite not understanding what this little girl said to me, I remember coming back home, visibly upset and and angered at what had happened.

Throughout adolescence I encountered similar situations but by then, I had developed a certain resilience to ‘skinny’ comments. I grew to understand my body type. Both my sisters and I are very tall and also thin and that is basically the end of the story. Before, I had always felt inadequate in my skin because of people’s comments and the media’s obsession with the latest trend – the curvy, Kim Kardashian and Nicki Minaj body ideals. I have grown to accept myself as I am, without wishing to own a certain type of body. I also realised that I can’t possibly own and preach about self acceptance and cry about people making comments to do with my weight, when I, myself, still referred to other women with different body anatomies as me, as ‘fat’ and ‘ugly’. It doesn’t work that way. I am still in the process of learning about the power of words and it’s my everyday duty to make sure I use the right words to bring up the women around me. As women, we should always strive to validate, rather than tear each other down and the easiest way to start is by picking those confidence-boosting words to cheer each other on!

Let’s abolish the terms ‘skinny’ and ‘fat’ when talking about ourselves, or others. Instead, let’s use words such as ‘beautiful’ and ‘unique’ to embrace the body type that we’ve been blessed with. Self-acceptance is the most important thing we can do for ourselves in this day and age, and if you see someone flaunting their stuff; be it BIG, FLAT, ROUND, SAGGY bums, tums or boobs; literally let them do so! It’s none of your business to comment on someone’s looks, we’re all fighting an internal battle, so why don’t we all try to make each one of our journeys through life easier by complimenting, rather than shaming?

Written by Melissa Zuu

Visit Melissa’s blog: https://itsmelissanotmel.wordpress.com/

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