Ask Bodyposipanda: Can I Still Be Cute And Fat And Rock My Pixie Cut?
Dear Bodyposipanda,
I just had a discussion with my mom, and we were talking about my hair. Two years ago (40 lbs ago), I had a pixie cut, and I loved it! Well over those 2 years, I've grown out my hair, I quit dieting (after 15 years of constant yoyo weight issues), and I'm learning to love my body. Here's my problem: I told my mom (a super-active, always dieting kinda lady) that I want to cut my hair off again. And her answer was that I was so much smaller and cuter before. That I probably wouldn't look as good now because my face isn't as angular and thin as it was. I'm really upset because a huge part of me wants to be thin and cute again. But I'm 100% done with dieting. This whole conversation has me wondering if I'm doing the right thing.
Can I still be cute and fat and rock my pixie cut? What should I do?
- J
Hey J!
You know what is so NOT cute? Feeling like you can't make decisions about your own appearance because of other people's internalised fatphobia.
OF COURSE YOU CAN BE FAT AND CUTE. You can be fat and cute, fat and sexy, fat and gorgeous, fat and stylish, fat and badass, fat and anything else in the world that you want to be. And nobody else gets to impose limitations on you or dictate what you're allowed to do with that glorious body of yours.
There are so many rules in our culture about fat bodies and how they should appear, and ultimately the message behind them is that fat bodies should appear as little as possible. They shouldn't stand out. They shouldn't draw attention to themselves. They shouldn't be embraced or enjoyed or exist unapologetically in the space they take up.
Instead fat people are told to disguise, to blend in, to flatter, to skim, to appear as small as they can and if they can't to simply stay hidden. Fuck that. And fuck the idea that you can't be fat and cute and rock whatever hairstyle you can think of in your wildest dreams.
Go get that pixie cut. See it as a defiant act in a culture that's constantly trying to shrink you and tell you who you're allowed to be. Or just see it as you being a grown ass woman who can get any haircut she damn well likes.
And the next time you see your mum, let her know just how cute you feel, and that absolutely nothing about you needs to be smaller to feel it.
Love & bopo,
Megan
