Female Competitive Syndrome: Part I
When I was transitioning from junior high to high school, I lost a significant amount of weight – almost 60 pounds. My family was very proud of me, and I basked in heretofore unheard of praise for my hard work and diligence, nevermind many accomplishments prior that frankly did a lot more to make the world a better place. No one paused to consider that a)my IQ seemed to have dropped 30 points and b)my weight loss was timed at a significant developmental stage known as a “growth spurt.”
At about the same time, we had some new neighbors move in next door. Before I saw the new neighbors, my mother began talking about how the girl “could have made two of Diana when she was at her largest.” As it turned out, I knew the girl – and I had never once even contemplated that she might be fat. She was just her, and her body was not significant to the persona she projected. It also told me that my mother had a very warped view of my body and that her opinions about my appearance were from then on very suspect.
I don’t know if this girl’s family were gypsies, travelers, or con artists but they wound up robbing many people in the form of “borrowed” items along with skipped-out-on bills and were of, shall we say, “low character.” There were daily threats and harassments towards my family, and several rumors about me climbing out my window and running around the neighborhood – which would have been more effective if I could have fit through that window and if it would not have been a 20 foot drop down. It was a darned small window. I’m not sure if they were eventually evicted or if they cut and run when their entitlement went just too far with someone who was shadier than they were, but the entire neighborhood breathed a sigh of relief once they were gone.
But the daughter was not fat. Not all size 16s are fat. Some are people without bellies or butts or breasts who just happen to have larger bones and muscles. She was a horrible person, yes. A liar, thief, con artist, and petty person, yes. But she was NOT fat. Which now makes me question: was I ever really fat, or did everybody just tell me I was?
I’m definitely fat now, but that’s a whole other ball of yarn.
What this was was my first encountering of female competitive syndrome. My mother was displaying it: my daughter is better than your daughter. My daughter is thinner. I was certainly a better person – I didn’t lie and make up stories about my neighbor, and for the most part I ignored her. Of course ignoring her was taken by this girl as part of female competitive syndrome, because females playing the game not only do not respect females who don’t want to play the game but get some kind of high on dragging the resistant into their drama.
Since I learned very quickly of how dishonest and untrustworthy this girl was, she couldn’t get close enough for the more subtle girl-on-girl hate, so she and her mother went for the overt stuff: telling their landlord I didn’t look behind me when I backed the car out of the garage (I wasn’t allowed to drive yet) and claiming that I was stealing things and sneaking out at night when it later turned out to indeed be the daughter laying all the accusations for her actual acts on me.
Ultimately, the only reason I was getting my name dragged through the mud was because I was thinner than this girl, and because I wouldn’t allow her to steal from myself or my family. And because I used to be fat, people were willing to believe I was dumb, slutty and sneaking out of my house – despite no one ever seeing me doing any of these things because, in fact, I wasn’t doing them.
It makes me wonder: were people willing to believe the lies about me because, at that point, I used to be fat? Fat is not and should not be a character assessment. The girl next door was not fat, but she was a rotten excuse for a human being. I was fat, but I was a really good kid and I worked at being a good person in the face of people who were under the delusion, nursed by their parents, that I owed them something.
I also suspect that my mother’s attitude may have triggered behaviors towards me and mine that might have been held in check a little longer. I was used as a pawn in a women’s status game, and I suffered for it.
This female competitive syndrome is one of many reasons I sidestep direct conversation about weight loss choices. I think people should be active, because activity does help with health issues, just not necessarily with weight concerns. I think they should be happy with who they are. I couldn’t care less what size people are – the meannest, laziest and most narrow-minded people I met were quite thin. But I’ve known lots of thin people of exemplary character, and fat people seem to have that same range from hard working (most that I know) to horrendously entitled (one, maybe two people, and karma’s already taken its chunk from them.)
All too often the weight loss issue turns into a perception game, to see who succeeds more on a diet, and for the thinner friends to sabotage the larger friend in order to keep status, with no thought as to what status actually brings you (nothing good. But it sure makes me think you’re an asshole.) It comes down to the circular question: what on earth are you going to win by being the “top female?” And do you even know what we could lose by playing these games – say, the hard-earned right to vote?