10 Honest Thoughts on Being Loved By a Skinny Boy

September 18, 2014 / Rachel Wiley

Walking through the world as a fat woman has its own challenges. But when you’re a fat woman who’s dating someone with a thin, more socially acceptable body — someone people don’t think you deserve — well, that’s something else.

Watch Rachel Wiley express some of the honest thoughts and anxieties that come with being loved by a skinny boy in this spoken word performance.

Click for the Transcript

Ten honest thoughts on being loved by a skinny boy.

One: I say, “I am fat.” He says, “No, you are beautiful.” I wonder why I cannot be both. He kisses me. Hard.

Two: My college theater professor once told me that, despite my talent, I would never be cast as a romantic lead. We put on shows that involve flying children and singing animals, but apparently no one has enough willing suspension of disbelief to buy anyone loving a fat girl.

Three: On the mornings I do not feel pretty, while he is still asleep, I sit on the floor and check the pockets of his skinny jeans for motive, for a punchline, for other girls’ phone numbers.

Four: When we hold hands in public, I wonder if he notices the stares — like he is handling a parade balloon down a crowded sidewalk. I wonder if he notices how my hands are made of rope.

Five: Dear Cosmo: Fuck you. I will not take your sex tips on how to please a man that you do not think my body will ever be worthy of.

Six: He tells me he loves me with the lights on.

Seven: I can cup his hip bones in palms of my hands, feel his ribs without pressing very hard at all, sip wine from his collarbones. He doesn’t believe me when I tell him he is beautiful. Sometimes I fear the day he does is the day he leaves.

Eight: The cute hipster girl at the coffee shop assumes we are just friends and flirts across the counter. I spend the next two weeks replacing my face with hers in all of our photographs. When I finally admit this, we spend the whole night taking new pictures. He will not let me delete a single one.

Nine: The phrase “Big girls need love, too” can go die in a fire. Fucking me does not require an asterisk. Loving me is not a fetish. Finding me beautiful is not a novelty. I am not a novelty.

Ten: I say, “I am fat.” He says, “No. You are so much more” and kisses me. Hard.

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Rachel Wiley is a native of Columbus, OH. She graduated from Capital University in 2006 with a degree in Theatre Studies. She is the 2011 Grand Slam champ for the Writing Wrongs Poetry Slam and a member of the Writing Wrongs NPS team that placed 4th in the 2011 National Poetry Slam. She released her first self published poetry chapbook The Ballad of SweetWhatser Name in October 2009 and her second, Misery Loves Backup Dancers in January 2011. She recorded and released her first CD All of the Spoons in My Kitchen in April 2011. Visit her Tumblr to get your copies, and follow her on Twitter @rachielouwho.

Video courtesy of Button Poetry. For more amazing spoken word performances, check them out on YouTube and Facebook.