Body dysmorphia is like a special kind of astigmatism. A pair of glasses can fix the normal kind of astigmatism, but there aren’t corrective lenses for the body kind. I happen to have both. Since I regularly lose my glasses, I end up relying on others to reflect reality to me—whether that means reading street names aloud while I’m driving, or telling me that I look like a normal, healthy human being.
The way my dysmorphia works is that I look in the mirror, or shop windows, or any terrifyingly reflective surface, and see a whale. Everyone else looks at me and sees a tall, unremarkable-looking girl of average BMI (body mass index). I look down at my medium-sized clothes and wonder how they’re even containing my bulk. I walk up the sidewalk in amazement that cracks aren’t forming in the cement beneath me. At Starbucks I try not to let anyone see me pouring cream into my coffee, so that I won’t offend the other patrons, whom I’m sure would like to think that someone as large as me is at least trying to change her ways.
You might be thinking, “Wow, an entirely warped view of things! Is her view of everything warped?” Sadly, I don’t get to look around and see ballooning Dr. Seuss table legs on the coffee table, or massive squirrels in the trees being miraculously supported by frightfully narrow branches. My funhouse mirror vision applies only to me.
I look at my reflection as a blob overflowing its intended human frame, and feel like an irresponsible child who… [Read more…] about Do these jokes make me look fat?