Title (as given to the record by the creator):  Survey: How does being fat affect your sexuality?
Date(s) of creation:  April 1996
Creator / author / publisher:  FaT GiRL
Physical description: Two black and white zine pages with the title spanning across both pages in a larger font and two columns of anonymous answers.
Reference #:  FG5-020-021
Links:  [ PDF ]

Q: How does being fat affect your sexuality?

A: I think it enhances it in some ways.

I feel better and more comfortable in bed, nude, making love, than I do out in public.

I consider myself bi-sexual but have found many more women than men who accept my size and find me sexy. I can’t say my weight has made me a lesbian but I do believe it’s influenced who my sexual partners are. Then again, it’s probably just that women are so much cooler in general.

Due to some recent experiences, I’m in a shell—not planning to come out. It really hurt. 

I often think, when I have a crush — oh, she’ll never like me, I’m too big. But when someone does like me, I’m usually able to be very comfortable in my body. 

Mostly I think it affects my confidence in seeking out sexual partners. I’ve only had one, and she made the first move sexually. I’ve been in love with several women who I’ve never even told. My lack of confidence isn’t entirely due to being fat, but a lot of it is.

I think I’m somewhat more self-conscious when I’m with a woman who is smaller than I am, but it hasn’t really been an impediment. I do everything I want to do, and have no trouble getting my needs/desires met by and with lovers.

I feel sort of embarrassed to talk about sex. I am uninhibited in my fantasies, but I’m shy about acting them out. 

I have always been fat and always loved being sexual—don’t know if I can separate the two. I am and feel abundant in my flesh, this extends to an abundance in my sexuality and a desire to share. I like how my breasts and stomach shake when they are caressed and I get excited when one of my body parts moves against another body part.

I can never find cuffs big enough for my lovers and I.

It’s inhibiting. I’m so much better, more liberated sexually than 10 years ago. It was hard to be naked. I’m pretty OK now. I can do it. Sometimes, on bad days, I might not want to get into a certain sexual position because I think my ass looks too big. It’s hard to come when you’re feeling inadequate and insecure. I still have nagging doubts about my appearance. For example, I’m still very uneasy about making a pass at someone. At least now I can name it. Helps that first I should determine if they’re fat-friendly. I’m interested in the question: How does your sexuality affect being fat? I’ve been working on that one for awhile.

Physical movement can be restrictive but other than that it really doesn’t.

I don’t know. I’ve always been fat so I don’t know how I might be different if I weren’t fat.

I am always, to some extent, hiding.My body is like a peep-show. People see what I want them to see. Or at least, that’s what I always tell myself. It’s really hard to stay present when someone is running her hands over my ‘fat parts’ that I’ve been mentally erasing my whole life.

I’m not sure it does.

Dealing with being sexual and feeling sexually desired as a fat woman by other women has also given me permission to be a promiscuous dyke slut. Breaking down those walls and feeling like “Yes, people really do lust after me” makes me want to test it and see how far I can go. Partly liberating, partly dangerous. Sometimes I just like to keep my body to myself and it is a completely empowering sensation to feel like when I’m allowing women to worship my body, it’s because they know what I have to offer and they would pay almost any price—and then I give freely.

I like to include food in my sex life. Wine, frappes, marshmallows, butterscotch sauce, olives.

I don’t have an attraction to really skinny girls with hip bones that stick out. I love women who are full, thick, and know it. I feel powerful and strong sometimes, and other times I feel like a big kid.

It makes me feel bad about myself sometimes.

Well, I play almost exclusively with other fat women. I use longer dicks when I fuck to accommodate bellies and asses. Sometimes I get weirded out when a skinny woman is interested in me, afraid she’ll be squicked by my body. It makes me less likely to respond if someone’s cruising me. I just can’t believe they mean it.

Hmmm…

The media certainly makes me think I’m not very sexy and it’s a constant battle to remind myself that I can be very sexy!

I’m 31 and just took all my clothes off and really had sex with another woman for the first time last year, after living as an out dyke for years. It ended badly and confirmed my worst fears—that a lover would reject my body. Sex is really scary for me, I really want to be able to lose myself (and hang ups) in sex. I’m trying to overcome years of fears, negative messages, etc. about sex, particularly as a fat dyke.

Fewer positions work than when I was thin. That’s about it.

This is so painful to think about, but … I do feel dykes—even most of my intimate lovers who really love me—will find me less attractive, by the sheer fact of my being fat, than they find slimmer women. Unless a lover shows a consistent genuine bias and lustful preference towards fat women (like, I’m not just some exception), I can’t help but fear that if she finds a slim woman attractive, there’s no way I can ‘compete.’ And I can’t help but compare us.

As women, and especially as femmes, we are always comparing and gauging beauty, to calculate our worth and standing, although among friends, we are gracious and supportive (or perhaps I’ve been lucky). And although I genuinely do personally find skinny women less attractive than women with meat on their bones, I think I will always feel that I will never rate with the skinny pretty girls, and that my lovers will find me inferior. When that actually happens, it makes me sick. Fat/think is all I can see, and I am that sorry, ‘pathetic’ fat girl for thinking I can rate with someone who’s thin.

I am far more reticent to pursue or even initiate contracts or relationships, both out of fear of rejection and a desire not to complicate my life more than it already is.

I am much less concerned about other people’s opinions and expectations when I am heavier.

I don’t know how it does, but I’m sure it does. Oh, I won’t date small women. I’m sure that would be different if I were smaller.

I’m more self-conscious around thin women in a sexual situation. Otherwise, it doesn’t affect it.

Being fat doesn’t affect my sexuality, but it does affect my sex life. I’ve had more sex when I’ve been fatter. Maybe because I’ve lived in places like China, where fat is sensuous, and NY, a melting pot of cultural attitudes about size, and of course, SF, birthplace of the Fat Liberation Movement. Maybe being larger makes me feel safe about taking risks, because I can back up a “No” with all the strength of my big body. But how I look has never affected how sexy I feel nearly as much as how I feel inside has.