“You’re fat.” That one phrase; that one short sentence; that one contraction that allowed my twelve year old brain to realize this statement was meant for me. The statement I would hear sporadically over the next four years. Of course, when I was younger I didn’t think about how my body looked to others, for all I knew was that I clung to my ‘baby fat’ a little longer than my peers. It was never a problem for me until I started to become interested in the opposite sex. I expected rejection and expected ridicule for those who actually decided to like me back. I pushed the negative comments into the back of my mind, but each day the same subconscious thought jolted me into reality. “You’re not like the rest of them.”

What could I do? I was beginning to realize that while all of my friends could shop at Hollister, I had to buy the majority of my clothes at JC Penny. I wasn’t allowed to enjoy the freedom of being a nearly thirteen year old girl. I was trapped in the extra padded encasing of my own body.

My doctors were a tad nicer than my peers. They always said, “You just need to get thirty minutes of exercise everyday.” Little did I know, they were trying to spare me from the inevitable truth: that my peers were right. I was different. I was living my life in the unhealthiest way possible. So, I attempted to change. Logging everything I ate along with my- what I guess you could call ‘exercise’, was not so easy for a now thirteen year old girl. It continued to get worse. By the beginning of eighth grade, I made a goal for myself. I said I would lose weight for high school and prove everyone wrong.

Instead, I just proved myself wrong. Freshman year-I was the same girl that left middle school, except I was wearing a bigger jean size. What shocks me the most is that I didn’t care at all. I still had friends that loved me and family that stood by my side regardless of the way I looked.

But that wasn’t enough for me. I still wanted to do all of the things that my friends were able to do just because they were ‘skinny.’ I wanted to wear certain types of clothing and even take pictures without deleting every one of them because of my shape. I wanted to be healthy, not a statistic.

By the time I was 16, and nearing the end of my high school journey, I decided to make a change. My junior year, I put my foot down. I had had enough. Enough of the missed opportunities. Enough of the ridicule and passed judgment. It took me six months, but I did change. Changed my entire physical appearance and my mental outlook as well. Even after doing all of this, I look back on it, and say, yes, this journey was worth it, but I’m still surrounded by the same group of friends I had before. The ones that taunted me and laughed behind my back are the very ones who are apologizing now. The very ones that I don’t need, and never needed, in my life.

I realized who and what was important throughout this lifelong battle I have had with my weight. I now know that if someone loves you for who you are, it doesn’t matter what you wear, how you look, or how much money you make. You are you, and the only thing that matters is how you treat them. What I received out of all of this is not only a healthy lifestyle, but a realization of the fact that the ones that matter will focus on the weight of how much they show they care for you, rather than the weight on the scale.