Love Me Curvy

Preface - Revised

My name is Erin Cooper and I'm 25 years old.

I grew up in central Wisconsin where the summers are hot and humid, and winter seemed to last forever. My father is a well-known surgeon and my mother is a nurse. If you're wondering if they work at the same hospital, they don't. Because according to my parents, coming home to each other after a long day of work was always more rewarding. 

My whole life I have been surrounded by the medical field. By the time I mastered cursive writing, I could already define and spell: Cholecystectomy. That was only one of the many medical terms that I have learned from my parents.

However, it didn't matter how much I knew about the human body, I never wanted to follow my parents' footsteps. I wanted to do something different; something that interested me.

So, I decided to become a teacher and am currently a first-grade teacher at Oakland Elementary School. I couldn't be happier than I was at this moment with my choice of career. Those kids are practically the love of my life. Maybe it is the fact that I know I might never have children of my own, that makes me want to be a teacher so bad.

As much as I love my job and my parents, most of my life revolves around my adorable younger sister, Grace. Just recently turned 22, she is three years younger than me. She might be over 18, but she is still very much considered the baby of the family and will be forever loved and spoiled by all of us.

Unlike me, she hopes to one day make a name for herself in the medical field. That's why she is currently in college hoping to become a surgeon just like our father. The only difference is she will be specializing in pediatrics.

However, as much as I love her she is everything that I am not.

Where Grace is tall, slim and beautiful, I'm short, fat and plain. Being the unlucky person that I am, I inherited my father's black curly hair, while Grace was fortunate enough to have my mother's, silk strawberry blonde hair full of volume.

She is gorgeous from head to toe and is everything that I wish I could be and more. Yet I know deep down that I could never reach the level of beauty that resides with Grace. I am not even close.

Heck, even her name is beautiful. She got the name Grace, defining elegance and beauty, as I was stuck with the plain common name, Erin.

I've always wished to be as gorgeous as my sister one day, but it didn't matter how many diets I went on or how much I worked out, I could never lose any weight. I was doomed to be big forever.

People always liked to use words like big beautiful women, big-boned, or curvy to describe big girls like me. However, I think those words are not in every girl's dictionary. Sure, there are plenty of women out there that are on the bigger side and yet extremely beautiful, but hell, I am not one of those women. Yeah, I might have curves, but I'm still fat nevertheless. You can phrase it any way you like but fat is fat and that is exactly what I am. Does that mean I like myself this way? Of course not! What woman likes themselves the way they are?

I have tried over the years to love myself and my body, but that is something that is easier said than done.

What makes me hate myself more is that I live with people who are practically perfect in every shape and form. Both my parents look great for their age and are extremely healthy. My mother teaches Zumba as a hobby and my dad goes to the gym about every other day to keep in shape. And as you know already my sister is perfect. Yet here I am the black sheep of the family.

Do you know what's even worse? It's that my family supports me in everything I do. They don't hate me for how much I weigh or that I decided to become a teacher. In fact, they love me for who I am and that makes it so much harder.

Sometimes I wish that they would hate me for being fat, hate me for not following in their footsteps, or hate me for being different. But they don't, and I find that harder to live with than anything else.

Unable to tell my family my struggles and what I was going through, when I turned 23, I moved out. My mother might have disapproved of me leaving home, but I knew she couldn't stop me from moving on. I moved to a new location, got my own apartment and even changed school districts. Everything was new and fresh, I wanted to start my own life.

I might have moved to a new location, but it is literally only 20 minutes away from my parents' house. Regardless I love the fact that I have my own place and can drown in my sorrows by myself. My family does visit me on occasion and honestly, I enjoy their company, but I like my solitude too.

Sometimes being alone is enough to heal me.

Because do you truly know what the hardest thing of all is? It's not the fact that I'm the oddball in the family or have extremely low self-esteem issues. What hurts me the most is liking someone only to witness them falling in love with my younger and prettier sister.

I have had guys who tried to befriend and pretend to be nice to me just so they could get close to her. It truly hurts knowing I was being used for someone else's goals. I don't blame Grace because it's not her fault that all the guys I knew or liked, fell in love with her instead. In fact, my sister has never known about any of this and I hope she will never find out.

I have just come to believe that some people are not meant to be in a relationship or lucky enough to find their significant other. Sometimes fate is cruel, and some people just never find true love. I know that I can be one of those people.

Maybe I am not meant to fall in love, because I am starting to wonder if there's really a guy out there who is willing to look past my weight and insecurities, and not fall in love with my sister at the same time.

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Hello Everyone,

Thanks for reading "Love me Curvy."

I hope you will come to love reading this book as I enjoy writing it.

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