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    Do I Look Fat in This?: Life Doesn't Begin Five Pounds from Now
    Do I Look Fat in This?: Life Doesn't Begin Five Pounds from Now
    Do I Look Fat in This?: Life Doesn't Begin Five Pounds from Now
    Ebook195 pages3 hours

    Do I Look Fat in This?: Life Doesn't Begin Five Pounds from Now

    By Jessica Weiner

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    About this ebook

    For any woman who has bonded with a stranger by complaining about how fat she feels, here is a thoughtful and inspiring guide to breaking the cycle of body criticism and creating a powerful and healthy self-image.

    Let's face it, you're tired of dieting. You hate counting calories and carbs and fat grams. You're sick of the pressure to work out three times a week. Bottom line: You're tired of feeling fat.

    But here's the thing: Fat is not a feeling. Happy, angry, sad -- those are feelings. When you say you feel fat, chances are you mean something else. And when you ask someone if you look fat, you're probably asking, "Am I good enough?"

    Whether you're a size 2, 12, or 22, it's considered normal to hate your body. Society practically encourages it. But this discontent is really just a way of masking deeper issues such as insecurity, low self-esteem, or a longing for love and acceptance. By focusing on what others tell you are your shortcomings, you miss countless opportunities to feel connected, sexy, and powerful.

    Do I Look Fat in This? brings good news: Life doesn't begin five pounds from now. In this book, acclaimed author and speaker Jessica Weiner provides real solutions to real problems, from surviving a closet meltdown when you can't find anything to wear, to how to cope with being bombarded by images of perfect-looking models.

    With quizzes, guides, tools, and tips, Do I Look Fat in This? offers a step-by-step plan for creating a more fulfilling and positive life. You'll feel better about your job, your relationship, your family, your friends -- and most important, yourself.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherGallery Books
    Release dateJan 31, 2006
    ISBN9781416940487
    Do I Look Fat in This?: Life Doesn't Begin Five Pounds from Now
    Author

    Jessica Weiner

    Considered this generation’s “go-to authority” on women, girls, and confidence, Jess Weiner believes that if we want to change the culture, we have to work together with the media makers, marketers, and influencers who create the messaging. She is a social entrepreneur and the CEO of Talk to Jess, a consulting and strategy firm that advises brands about the issues facing today’s women and girls. Jess has over twenty years of experience working in the field as a speaker, writer, and educator. She’s authored two bestselling books and has proudly served as the Global Self-Esteem Ambassador for Dove for almost a decade. Currently, she’s an adjunct professor at USC’s Annenberg School of Journalism teaching personal branding and entrepreneurship. Jess was recently named by Forbes as one of the “14 Power Women to Follow” on Twitter. Learn more at JessWeiner.com.

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    • 5/5
      Jessica is wonderful! This book is encouraging and inspiring to anyone like myself who has been struggling with their weight for a long time. She encourages us to be healthy, but her definition of healthy includes accepting and loving your body and rejecting the media messages about what healthy should look like. Reading this book was like a refreshing talk with a close friend.

    Book preview

    Do I Look Fat in This? - Jessica Weiner

    Introduction

    "Do…I…Look…

    Fat…in…This?"

    Ihad to spell it out for him. He—my new, supercute, and very loving boyfriend—had no idea about the tornado that had just blown through my self-esteem. I was getting ready to attend his cousin’s wedding, and as I was zipping up my dress, the zipper broke, leaving me to come to the only rational conclusion possible: I wastoo fatto go to a wedding, enjoy myself, have a good time, or be remotely worthy of love. Ever. The end. I am so gross. And…scene.

    Those thoughts floated through my head on a regular basis, just looking for a reason to spill out of my mouth. And spill out they did, as my boyfriend sat there—fully dressed and content—flipping through the channels on the hotel TV. We were in rural Pennsylvania, so there wasn’t much of a choice, but I guarantee that whatever he was watching (skeet shooting, I believe) was way more interesting than watching me do my body-loathing dance.

    The busted zipper was just adding insecurity to my day. I was meeting most of his extended family for the first time that evening. And now I had nothing to wear and no time to fix the zipper. He suggested that I just put on something else I had packed. Hmmm…like what? The cloud-and-lamb-covered flannel pajamas I had packed in case his mother walked into our hotel room? I had no other clothing appropriate to wear to a wedding/meet-the-family event, and I was a wreck.

    I kept asking him the same question—Do I look fat in this?—while modeling the completely broken dress. I don’t know what I was waiting for. For him to say, Yes, honey, you look like a huge fat cow and I can’t believe I am introducing you to my family? Or, Yes, babe, truth be told, your flabby ass busted right through that zipper. Next time try putting on a girdle before zipping up? I mean, really, what did I expect? And besides, no matter what he might say to me, it would never rival the disgusting, self-mutilating thoughts I had going on in my head. If there were such a thing as a terror alert for poor body image, mine would have been elevated to emergency status: red for stop her before she ruins this relationship with her insecurity!

    I watched his face turn and twist and contort itself into all sorts of expressions as he tried to compute an answer. See, my sweetie was a scientist, and I’m sure he was completely baffled by the fact that there was no straightforward, calculated, easy, breezy way to answer me. So instead, he just stared at me and smiled. Lovingly. Of course, this only made it worse. Way worse. Because in my sick, twisted mind I thought he was laughing at me and at my broken-zipper fatness.

    And then he scooped up my crushed ego from the floor—where I had slithered down to form a total body mush pile—and suggested we go to the nearest department store to try to find a substitute outfit. Exhale. Yeah, I guess that could work.

    So we went, and I found a very suitable dress. In fact, I loved it way more than the original choice, and my spirits were lifted, with at least some semblance of sanity sneaking back in. And my boyfriend felt like a hero. He had thwarted an epic disaster and still had time to get back to the hotel to finish watching the skeet-shooting competition. I put the finishing touches on my hair, fixed up the mascara that had been washed away by my tears, and went to meet the family.

    space

    Do I look fat in this? It is perhaps the most dreaded question in modern relationships. At some point our partners, boyfriends, and husbands learn to expect this question, as if we have some sort of horrible body-image Tourette’s syndrome. We are most likely unaware of how many times during the day we assault our loved ones with this insane and unanswerable question.

    The episode in the hotel room wasn’t the first or last time I uttered those six words to someone who loved me. And I would continue to use them against myself and toward others until I realized that those six little words mean so much more than we initially understand. They are part of a secret language: the Language of Fat. It’s a language most women speak. We whisper it to our girlfriends, shriek it to our boyfriends, and say it to just about anyone who will listen.

    In our desperation to engage in the Language of Fat, we use the phrase Do I look fat in this? as a greeting, a question, a salutation, and a general tribal warrior cry to other women when we are looking for bonding and support.

    If I knew then what I know now, I would have spared my boyfriend the agony of having to entertain such a ridiculous question that day back in that hotel room. I would have understood that my freak-out was not about the zipper breaking (which happens, by the way, when you buy a vintage dress from a used-clothing store). It was really about my fear that his family wouldn’t approve of me. It was my old belief system kicking into gear, the voices that told me that in order for me to be appreciated, I should look like I just popped off of a magazine cover…perfect! Not an imperfect, flawed, nervous, crazy-in-love woman who wants to do the right thing and have people love her. Nope. Just being myself wasn’t good enough.

    Today, if I listen closely, I can identify you by the language you speak. In one sentence I can know that you are one of us, part of the tribe of body haters, speaking the Language of Fat to anyone who will listen. And maybe you don’t even realize you’re doing it. Perhaps this bonding ritual is so ingrained in your daily life that you walk around completely dissatisfied and you don’t know why.

    Those of us who speak the Language of Fat are everywhere. We are:

    The twelve-year-old girl who pulls at her low-rise jeans as her belly hangs over the waistline, wondering if she will ever be thin like the popular girls.

    Your beloved boyfriend, who spends an extra hour each night doing sit-ups because he can’t control the belligerent boss he does battle with every day at work.

    The high-powered executive who, after catching sight of her reflection in the mirrored glass buildings on the way to the office, pledges to begin yet another diet on Monday morning.

    A mother yelling at her daughter because she broke the rules by eating a piece of bread while the whole family is on a no-carb diet.

    Your best friend, who always lends you a shoulder to cry on but inside feels that her shoulders, arms, and the rest of her body are just too fat to deserve love in return.

    The pretty, skinny girl asking everyone around her if she is fat, because she doesn’t know how else to communicate her need for comfort and connection.

    The elementary school teacher who doesn’t bring a lunch to school and goes hungry during recess.

    The Hollywood actress high on a pedestal, admired for what she looks like, who is really starving, literally, for permission to just be herself.

    The panicked grocery store shopper who loads up her cart with trendy diet foods, none of them anything she really wants to eat.

    A new mother who spirals into anorexia and bulimia while trying to lose her baby weight—fast.

    A group of girlfriends who, when they greet one another, always say, You look great, have you lost weight?

    Yet another fabulous woman full of guilt, eating ice cream and contemplating plastic surgery while watching the latest makeover/dating reality show.

    Me, wasting precious years of my youth despising my form and forsaking my curves, in favor of and in search of a body that just looked like someone else’s.

    You, who hoped that by picking up this book you would, just for one second, better understand why you dislike your body so much.

    Out of my own recovery a career was born. For the past fourteen years I have had the chance to speak and hold workshops across the country, visiting with thousands of people in their dorm rooms, boardrooms, and living rooms, discussing this pervasive and distracting language. Many of the people I work with e-mail their stories and ask for help and guidance in translating the Language of Fat in their lives. As someone who has lived through the destructive and damaging impact of this language, I am well aware of how easy it is to believe that your worth is tied up in your weight or body size. The Language of Fat is a language most women are taught to speak in this country. It is its own separate communication that women first learn as children and then cultivate as they mature in life. We sprinkle this language into our everyday dialogue like it is a zero-calorie condiment.

    Do I look fat in this? doesn’t mean what you think it means. It is actually code for Help! Please help me, something is terribly wrong in my life. I feel like shit. Worthless. Hopeless. Scared. Overwhelmed. Confused.

    Or it can be code for Pay attention to me! I am desperate to be loved, need your approval, or want your affection.

    Or it can be code for I am trying to fit in. I want to be your friend, I am just like you, trust me and confide in me!

    It can mean a hundred things, and all of them are more than what it sounds like. This language leaves in its wake millions of women who feel unfulfilled in all areas of their lives, and it impacts millions of men and best friends, who are forced to find an answer to an unanswerable question.

    What we haven’t realized yet is that this body insanity doesn’t end with the rage you feel toward your stomach, the disapproval of your upper arms, the disgust you find in your thighs and calves. The way you feel about your body affects your entire life. It impacts your health, wealth, family, relationships, and career. It doesn’t stop with the embarrassment you feel for your breasts, or the hatred you have for your nose, chin, or thighs. Those are just the obvious ways we communicate something much deeper: a lack of passion, a longing for love, and a severe absence of self-esteem.

    Bathroom Babe

    Throughout my career I have experienced some intimate and powerful exchanges with women. Anyone who knows me knows of my karmic relationships with bathrooms. For some reason these are the places where I meet the most interesting people and experience the most life-changing events. Even the impetus to write this book came from a bathroom bonding session I had in a Manhattan bookstore a few years ago.

    I was applying the finishing touches to my lip gloss in the tiny bookstore bathroom, which boasted only one stall and a larger than life fluorescent light that kept blinking and threatening to turn off at any minute. I was gearing up for an afternoon discussion and book signing for my first book, A Very Hungry Girl. In a few days I would be embarking on a four-month book tour that would take me across the country and connect me with thousands of amazing people and their stories. I was experiencing a roller coaster of emotions—equal parts trepidation, pride, elation, and terror. Will people get it? Will people like it? Will people buy it?

    After two more coats of lip gloss were added to my already shiny lips, a woman entered the bathroom to wash her hands. We squeezed side by side to share the mirror, and I noticed that she was staring at me. I met her stare with one of my own. I’m sorry, you look familiar to me. Oh, wait, she said. You’re the author speaking today. That’s where I know your face—I just saw the sign with your picture on it!

    Yes, that’s me, I responded, surprised.

    Is this your first book? she asked.

    Yes, it is!

    Wow, how exciting. Are you going to write any more? Do you know what your second book will be about? She went on, asking me more questions, but my mind was frozen in time with this one.

    What? What are you asking me? I thought. I’m about to deliver the first of many first book signings relating to my first book ever, and you’re asking me about my second? Are you crazy? Oh my gosh, the pressure…And then, interrupting my drama queen moment, came a sweet dose of reality.

    She had moved on from inquiring about my dreams and intentions for a second book, and instead had focused on her thighs. Well, maybe I’ll write a book someday, once I lose this weight. I tell you, I keep carrying around this extra ten pounds right here on my thighs. And with that she reached down to grab a piece of her thigh and show me the culprit that she perceived was covering up her aspirations and ambitions.

    You’d think that this kind of random intimacy between women in a bathroom would scare me off or make me think twice. But nope, not me. Women, whether they are a size two or twenty-two, feel this kind of body-loathing and obsession. I have seen it manifested everywhere, from bathrooms to boardrooms. Women of all sizes always have something to say about their bodies. And I always find myself on the receiving end of these kinds of admissions.

    In a superhero world my title would be Bathroom Babe, able to leap bathroom stalls in a single bound and rescue the tormented body haters who inhabit the restrooms of America, pinching, pulling, twisting, and mutilating their bodies into submission.

    I can meet a woman in the bathroom and we can talk about the size and shape of our thighs before we even know each other’s names.

    We can become momentary best friends bonding

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