An Open Letter To Matt Walsh

Oh, Matt Walsh… the day has finally come. I've been a fan of your blog for a while now, but knew eventually we'd have to disagree on something, and here it is: Hot Mom.

Let me begin by saying Maria Kang is GORGEOUS. Anyone with eyes in their head can see that. She’s also confident and obviously works her ass off. Literally. From what I can tell she has three happy, healthy children, and there’s no reason to believe she’s not an excellent mother.

Add all that up, and hopefully you will realize I’m not a “hater.” I had actually not even heard about this “controversy” until your latest blog post.

That said, let’s not look at this so much as me disagreeing with you, but as me simply adding some extra insight that you, as a person of your gender, might not have even considered.

First off, I do not believe the entirety of the reaction Mrs. Kang is getting is from a bunch of fat, angry trolls, as you seem to be implying. I posit the real root of this backlash is a generation of women who are so sick and tired of being told they are not good enough. All. the. damn. time.

We are not allowed to just be us - fat, skinny, in-between, or otherwise. Our boobs are always too small or big, as are our ass, arms, and legs. We’re told if we do not squeeze into whatever mold the world sees fit, we hardly deserve to serve you hot wings, let alone be loved and respected as human beings.

So did this pic sting me a bit? If we’re being honest, yeah.

Why? Well, because I’ve been "fat" since I was thirteen.

I grew up riding horses, and because of that I had these disgustingly muscular thighs. I used to stare down at them in the shower and cry because the resemblance to a Thanksgiving turkey was uncanny.

When I was fourteen I became even grosser as one of my breasts developed faster than the other. No one else ever noticed, but I did. Paired with my thick, flabby arms I was always self-conscious about waving at friends or embracing a loved one with my offensive upper body.

“Why can’t I just be pretty like the girls in Seventeen or on the cover of Cosmo?” I thought. I read all about their diets, workout routines, and beauty regimens. But there was just no fixing me. I was not enough and never would be.

In a given day I probably thought about how fat and ugly I was no fewer than 500 times. I am not even exaggerating. Sometimes they were little thoughts like, Sit up straight, so you don’t have rolls, while other times they manifested themselves as hours in front of the mirror, picking and perfecting.

I worked out, starved myself, and did every diet under the sun by the time I was fifteen. Coupled with the fact that I had a less than desirable home life and some major daddy issues, this created the perfect storm. I became such easy prey.

Any time a male would show someone as repulsive as me the tiniest bit of attention, I would pounce all over it. How can I get him to like me more? What else can I offer him so he’ll keep ignoring my giant nose, tiny lips, and huge legs? By fifteen I was sexually active. By sixteen I was pregnant and alone.

At this point the cycle should have stopped, right? I should have snapped out of it. But I didn’t. Now it was worse than ever. Now I had a body that had expanded to create a new life, then deflated all the way back down (and then some) with less than aesthetically pleasing results. I wore girdles constantly, trying to pull my skin back in, and had microdermabrasion done to my stomach to reduce the appearance of my stretchmarks.

(Do you know what that is? It’s basically a machine that shoots out these sharp little crystals from the tip of a wand while simultaneously sucking them back up in order to sandblast whatever surface it comes in contact with. And it hurt. But no pain, no gain, right? That’s what Cosmo told me.)

Cosmo was also telling me that I needed to know my best "naked angles" and be a sex kitten in the bedroom while fulfilling every one of my man’s wildest fantasies (with a fold-out section full of ideas in case he was less than creative).

So now, not only did I still have to compete with all the other girls at my high school who were so skinny and pretty and perfect already, but fat ugly me had a disgusting saggy stomach, and a matching set of boobs from feeding a newborn. Not to mention, I had to make up for the fact that I had a child, and responsibilities, and a curfew on the rare nights I got to go out. 

Needless to say, after my crisis pregnancy I became more promiscuous and vulnerable than ever. Which is so stupid. Had I not learned anything from going through this? There was this unwritten rule, though: I’ll stoop to dating someone like you, but you have to make it worth my while.

Only by the grace of God did I not become pregnant again or contract any diseases.

And with each “relationship,” whether it lasted a week or a night, I became fatter, uglier, less worthy of love and respect, and more willing to exploit myself in search of it.

While certain aspects of my story might be unique, young women as a whole are subjected to these same pressures every day. We live in a society that tells them their bodies and sexuality are where all of their value lies. They cannot escape these messages being constantly beaten into their heads, even if they want to ignore them. Billboards proclaim it, movies celebrate it, music demands it, television normalizes it, and magazines tell them how to become it.

This is why, as you mention in your post, a picture of a man with no legs climbing Everest can be seen as inspirational, while a picture of "Hot Mom" will provoke an entirely different emotion, even though both achievements took a massive amount of work and perseverance.

Here’s the deal: we just want to be us. We’re sick of constantly being beaten up because we’re not the ideal woman, wife, and mom like Mrs. Kang. We get it: we’re not perfect. We’re not enough. This is not news to us. It’s the record that’s been playing in our heads since we were old enough to look in a mirror and notice all our flaws.

Women, and more dangerously, girls in America are given a very specific set of instructions to live by: 1.) You should constantly be working to become perfect. 2.) Odds are you will never be good enough though, no matter how hard you try. 3.) Any love and attention you do get is charity, so don’t be picky or bother with standards, and 4.) Finally, the saving grace: if you’re good enough in bed, maybe he won’t realize how fat and disgusting you are. 

Matt Walsh, it’s my guess (and correct me if I’m wrong) that you’ve never felt this way, and if you have it was likely an isolated incident. But for many females growing up in this day and age, it’s not. It’s our constant. It’s the headspace we live in and call home, no matter how much we may hate it. And we do. We work tirelessly to be enough. 

Until one day we grow up and see a picture of ourselves at thirteen… and realize that overweight, thick-legged, chubby little girl in the picture was all of 98 pounds. And we suddenly see her for the first time. Like, really see her. Her arms were skin and bone, there wasn’t an ounce of fat there, her legs were absolutely perfect and we’d kill to have that body now. 

And you want to know why? Because the one thing in that picture that hasn’t changed is the self-hatred lurking behind her smile. It’s still there, stronger than ever. It never left her side.

And that’s when we decide to grow up. We decide that no matter how hard we work to perfect the outside, the inside is what needs our full attention now. We do it for the little girl in the picture, and we do it for the next generation of women who we want to see themselves as more than just bodies, even when the world will tell them that’s all they are. We want them to see themselves as whole individuals capable of changing the world with their minds, and so yeah, “positive encouragement” like Maria Kang's picture does strike a nerve.

She may or may not have ever been that little girl hating herself. I do not know. And while she has worked so hard, and deserves to be proud, the sting came from the words “What’s your excuse?” I also believe that’s where a majority of the backlash came from. Sure, some people will be ugly and hateful just because that’s how they are, and I am in no way trying to justify their behavior. But for the rest of us, her message perpetuates the mentality America has adopted that we, as women looking nothing like this, are not good enough because we must be lazy or gluttonous or unmotivated. And if we don’t change it’s because we're making excuses.

So, the excuses end here. The real ones, the ones I battle everyday. I will no longer hate my body because it does not look like Maria Kang's. I will no longer allow others to treat me as "less-than" because I feel I deserve it based on my outward appearance. I will no longer say horrible things to myself in the mirror because the world might see me as “less-than.” 

Screw the world. 

I will be happy for mothers who are able to bounce right back to their pre-baby body, and I will be okay with the fact that I didn’t, haven’t, and perhaps never will. My new body is squishy and striped, and whether it’s being used as a trampoline beneath little toddler feet, or a pillow for my daughter’s head, I know what this body is capable of, whether the world sees it or not. 

Strength. Creation. Compassion. Protection. And Love.

And those are all things that I’m NOT celebrating when I’m wasting my energy thinking about how inadequate I am. So, no more excuses. I will not allow anyone to say those things about me any longer, myself especially. Because I am enough.

So way to go, Mrs. Kang. I will see your meme, and raise you one of my own…

If you find this motivating, awesome. If you don't, feel free to never look at it again. And if it makes you feel bad about how little time you have to write or pursue whatever your passion is, please print it out and stick it to a dart board, because ain't nobody got time for that. (Added bonus if your passion is darts.) But I do hope it'll at least prompt you to ask yourself: what it is that you are phenomenal at? For Maria, it's 6-packin'. For me, it's writing open letters. 

Where are you sowing your time and energy? Quit obsessing over your weaknesses, and start focusing on your badassness. Stop letting the world change you, and start changing the world. 

As for you, Mr. Walsh. Sorry for getting all Tony Robbins mid-letter. But as I said, hopefully this will shed some light on why Nick Vujicic has it easier than "Hot Mom." We're not "hating" on her in particular, we're just pretty much done with this message. 

Keep on getting it right 99% of the time,

D.