Gordita
"It’s very hard for me even now to accept myself, and society doesn’t
make it much easier."
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to this Commentary!
By Carolina Herrera
Ever since I was little my family has called me “Gordita.” Gordita
is Spanish for chubby girl. But it doesn’t exactly mean the same thing
in Spanish that it does in English. It’s more affectionate in Spanish.
It never bothered me. I liked the way it sounded when it came from my parents’
mouths. I knew it meant I was their cute, special little girl. None of my other
sisters had nicknames like that. Just me.
Then when I was around 12, the word began to change for me. It
started when I got into a fight with my sisters. They’re both younger
than me and we fought all the time. But in this fight, one of my sisters called
me fatso. Then the other one said it. They said it with so much anger that it
scared me. I couldn’t believe my sisters would use something like that
against me.
Around this same time, a girl at school – someone I looked
up to and wanted to be like – called me fat and then cursed at me. I cried.
This was the beginning of my sensitivity… when I became self-conscious.
It got to a point where I never wanted to be looked at because I knew someone
was judging me and I hated who I was. I became more vulnerable to a lot of other
things about myself besides how I looked. Like my mother’s family would
criticize how I spoke Spanish. I never cared about it before, but it started
to bother me. I just took a lot more things to the heart. Whenever someone joked,
I’d take it personally… even if they didn’t mean it that way.
It’s very hard for me even now to accept myself, and society
doesn’t make it much easier. When I was watching TV once I saw a preview
for a movie that I thought looked sweet because it showed some guy who was attracted
to a girl that he saw as thin and beautiful, but in reality she was really overweight.
As the preview continued, they began making fun of the girl for being so overweight.
She jumped into a pool and they showed a tidal wave forming, and a boy being
thrown out of the pool and into a tree by her splash. I didn’t get affected
by it until later, when I realized that I related so much to this girl. I cried,
out of pity for myself. Again.
I have a dream that one day I can be myself and not pay the price
for being that person. I have friends who are overweight but don’t think
of it the way I do. They are much stronger about it, and are even actually happy.
This is how I want to be. I’m working on it.
I’m Carolina Herrera.
Carolina Herrera comes to us from Youth Radio LA, a collaboration
between LACAAW, KCRW FM, and Youth Radio.
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