If you don’t know that I’m plus size, then you are quite possibly both blind and deaf. I honestly talk about it 3,000 times a day, I post pictures of myself FREQUENTLY, and the word “booty” is in the title of this blog. I have been “overweight” and “bigger” for as long as I can remember, there was no rapid weight gain, there was no huge change, it’s been a constant for my whole life. I’ve more recently, mostly upon entering college, began to not care about my weight or my size, however, there are still times in my life where I wish I was a “normal” size.

The most insecure I ever am is when I go shopping with my friends. I have very few plus size friends, and they aren’t usually the girls I go shopping with. The girls that I tend to hit the mall with fit into the standard small, medium, and large, sizes in all the typical stores, Forever 21, American Eagle, H&M, and every other classic female clothing store. I have no issue with my friends being smaller than me, it’s not the fact that they are smaller than me that makes me insecure, it makes me insecure that out of all the stores in the mall, I can buy clothes from usually 2, sometimes 3, Forever 21, Charlotte Russe, and Torrid are the big ones.

 

 

I don’t hate shopping. I don’t hate my friends. So where’s the issue? My issue is that sometimes my friends forget that I am bigger, that I can’t fit into anything under an XL (on a good day). We’ll go to the store and I’ll pick something up and make comments about how cute it is, and someone will tell me “go try it on!” or “that would look so good on you!” I appreciate it, but I know in my mind that it would never fit me. I’ve started saying it out loud more, not in a harsh or mean way, just a simple “they don’t make my size.” I’m trying to show my friends that I don’t actually care that these clothes don’t fit me, but that it is frustrating that they have a whole mall of options and I have less than a handful of options.

I have an issue with the fact that most clothing stores geared towards female teens and young adults actively ignore a large chunk of the population. In 2015, 34% of teens (aged 13-17) were purchasing plus size clothing or considering purchasing plus size clothing. I have shopped at the same 4 or 5 stores for the past four years of my life, very rarely deviating. Not because I don’t want to, but because I can’t. I went jeans shopping last week, and I wanted to scream by the end of it. I spent over an hour in Kohl’s looking for the right size, length, and fit. I ended up with subpar jeans that I lowkey regret buying. And that was Kohl’s, a store that actually sells clothing above a size 12. Going to Forever 21 I am limited to the Plus Size section, which has been TRASH lately, at least at the mall that I normally go to. At Charlotte Russe I can’t even buy clothes in the store because most retail locations don’t even have a plus size section. Torrid is WAY to expensive for my broke ass. It’s frustrating beyond belief.

Moral of the story is: clothing stores need to start making plus size clothing because it’s fu**ing stupid that they don’t offer it. The world does not exist between sizes 0 and 10.

The irony of all of this is that I do love to shop. I spend insane amounts of money online shopping and buying stupid things at the mall. So shopping is equal parts my favorite activity and equal parts makes me want to vomit.