"You're not fat." "Well, yes. I know that."

Whenever I "feel fat" I'm going to try three things:
1) remember that fat is not a feeling
2) write here
3) wrap my fingers around my wrist and go, "whoa, my fingers touch, so that's proof I'm not fat."

First off, hi. I'm a 26 year old midwestern white gal who has been battling that nasty, internal "fat talk" for about 11 years now. Yup, you're good at math. I was about 15 when it started, or 2 years after I became a biological woman. (Yup, you're good at science, I was born a robot. Haha, no I wasn't.)

I've thought about why I think I'm fat for some time now. Most of me thinks it's because my hormones that synced my vagina into the mating game at around 15 also perked up some of my other senses. Namely, my eyes and ears. Eyes and ears are the tools of social awareness, and those are what I was using when I unhappily found out that guys "don't dig fat chicks." (Excuse the lingo, it was the 90s.) It was unfortunate for me because I'd been on the biggish side my whole life being the tallest person in my entire class of K-4th grade. Then a few people grew past me, but I'm still 5'7" and 160 lbs. That's what I was at 16 yrs old, and I'm still that today.

"OMG, GRRL, THAT IS NOT FAT" you say?

Well, yes. I know that.

But let us please define "Well," "yes," "I," "know" and "that" in the more complicated terms that they are.

Well -interjection
1. Used to begin a sentence
2. A way to begin a thought without making you feel like I'm about to say something jarring. Which I'm not. Because a girl's first priority is making everyone around her feel safe and nurtured.

Yes -sentence substitute
1.  Used to express affirmation or assent or to mark the addition of something emphasizing and amplifying a previous statement
2. Another thing us girls've gotta do is reaffirm that what you've said is rational and smart, even if we disagree.

I -pronoun
1. The nominative singular pronoun, used by a speaker in referring to himself or herself.

2. You see, this is a tricky one. "I" am the one that both knows you're right but also secretly thinks you're fucking blind and what do you know?, so a simple "I" isn't really the whole truth here.

know -verb
1. To be cognizant or aware of
2. Hahahaha. Yeah. How many people say they know something when they a.) have no clue or b.) are fucking with you because they don't care about what you're saying or c.) they want to sound  intelligent.

that -pronoun
1. fuck off, I don't even want to repeat what you're asserting (that I'm not fat) in real words, so I'll just use this dismissive, generic pronoun to both undermine your support and minimize how much it hurts to wallow in low self-esteem to you.