Fat Discrimination - Tumblr Posts

Why. Are. These. People. Doctors????

Background: for the past 2 years or so I’ve been dealing with some health issues, that have progressively been getting worse. I’ve been tired all the time, sleeping for 12 hours isn’t enough, weak, had pain in all my joints and muscles (top to bottom), when I get home from work I lay on the couch until I get the strength to get ready for bed, and my most noticeable symptom is weight gain. Over the last 2 years I’ve gain almost 100 lbs in bursts, meaning I’ll gain 50 lbs in 3 months, 2 months later I’ll gain 70 lbs in 4 months, etc. obviously this isn’t normal and I needed medical attention.

Experience with doctors: over the past 2 years I’ve gone to about 5 doctors for these issues. They’ve refused me blood tests because these are all “symptoms” of weight gain, completely ignoring that my weight gain is a symptom. I even had a doctor refuse to treat me until I lost 75 lbs, he literally said he would even give me antibiotics for an infection if I didn’t lose weight! The same guy also told me “of course your joints hurt, you’re getting fat.”

Then, about 6 months ago I started getting horrible, can’t get out of bed, crying all the time depression and decided to seak mental health services. My psychologist is wonderful (we’ve talked about fat phobia and she told me she knows sometimes bigger people are worried about talking over these issues with her because she’s tiny, but she always tries her best to reassure us she is not a bigot and wants to help no matter what - she’s the best). My psychologist thought I could use some meds, so she referred me to a psychiatrist, who is also amazing and probably the best doctor I’ve ever been to. We started talking about mental and physical symptoms and he asked me why I hadn’t been to a doctor about the symptoms I was having, I told him the story, he became visibly angry, and said those people shouldn’t be doctors if they don’t want to help people! The psychiatrist tested my blood for everything, I had to give 5 tubes. Last week, after 2 years, I got the results. It turns out I have a significant vitamin D deficency, which cause all of these symptoms, both physical and psychological. All I needed were supliments that you can buy anywhere. I’ve only been taking them a week and I already feel amazing, including less hungry, no sugar cravings, and way more energy.

There are good doctors who will treat you, unfortunately some of us have to live with horrible pain for years before we can find them. I can’t help thinking that if I had started at 100 lbs instead of 180, I wouldn’t have had these problems getting treatment.

I hate the world we live in.

Thin privilege is better pay, particularly if you're a woman.

Thin women are paid more than fat women -- tens of thousands more by some estimates. This means thin women are valued as if they had more years of education and experience than fat women. To be at parity wages with thin women, fat women need to be much more educated (almost two years more education than thin women) and experienced (about three years more experience than thin women).

Researchers trying to determine why, have discovered that fat women are more likely to work in physical jobs and less likely to work in public-facing jobs than thin women. Public-facing jobs are generally better paid. Discrimination against fat women in public-facing jobs, like upper management and performance and waitressing and modeling and sales, could be the reason fat women on average make so much less than thinner women.

The most pay on average nets to relatively thinner women--about a 22 on the outmoded BMI scale.

Finally, take a gander at this absolutely devastating graph that shows a significant negative relationship between BMI/body fat and income for women from the St Louis Fed (2011):

This is thin privilege---massive, obvious, thin privilege.

-ATL

Thin privilege is saving money, or even being able to access air travel at all, by being able to relatively comfortably book middle seats and tight-pitch seats on budget airlines.

Thin privilege is that last-minute $100 round trip.

Thin privilege is being able to afford to visit a dying relative, or being able to afford to be there for a milestone family occasion, or being able to interview outside of the local job market.

I work at a daycare with infants.

One of our baby girls is fat, in the 99th percentile for her age. She is super cute and sweet. Lately, she has been sick with various breathing issues, so she has been reluctant to take her bottles. Normally, she’ll take 4 ounces of formula at lunch and 8 ounces in the afternoon. Today, I was lucky to get to her take 5 all day.

There was a substitute covering a lunch break in my classroom today. We emphasized to her that we need to keep trying to get the baby to drink her bottle until she finished it. She said, “Why are you guys so worried about taking her bottle?”

My coworker replied, “That’s where all her nutrients are. She needs the nutrients and the water.”

To which the substitute replied, “But she’s so fat. She doesn’t need it.”

Thin privilege is a small, pretty baby getting better childcare because the caretaker doesn’t think she’s too fat to be allowed to eat.