Getting through life while being skinny is one of the toughest challenges that you can overcome. Not only does it take a toll on you physically and limits a lot of things, but it can also make you build up a lot of insecurities about the way you look, especially from all the comments that you receive from people. I struggled with this personally ever since I was a kid and I’m here to share with you my own experience. In other words, what does it feel like to be skinny?
Being skinny can be both a blessing and a curse, it’s the only body type where you can eat whatever you want without consequences, fit through tiny places, and not worry about clothes being too small. However, it’s also the body type that’s the weakest and that gets the most negative comments from people.
In this article, we’ll talk about what does it really feel like to be skinny and if it’s a good or a bad thing.
Table of Contents
What Does it Feel Like to be Skinny?
In order to answer this question, I’ll talk about my own personal experience. As a little backstory, ever since I was a kid, I’ve always struggled with being skinny, I used to be 15, 5 foot 8 tall and weighed about 120 pounds. No matter how much I ate, gaining extra weight was simply an impossible task for me (or so I thought).
I was always the skinniest out of all my friends and was constantly getting bullied in school due to my size. People would come up to me and put their fingers around my wrist just to emphasize how skinny I look, I used to always laugh it out but deep down, it got to me hard and made me build up a lot of insecurities about the way I look to the point where I always preferred to just stay home and play video games to avoid social interactions as much as possible.
Although being skinny was one of the hardest things that I went through in my life, it was also the best since it motivated me to change my life completely. I decided to join the gym and kickstart my fitness transformation journey that I’m still going through to this day and I’ve never looked better in my life.
However, during those years (before I transformed my body), what did it really feel like to be skinny?
You’re Weaker
Although there are some skinny people that are surprisingly strong (I was always able to handle my own in a fight but it all comes down to genetics) but generally speaking, you’re a lot weaker than most average people since you’re lacking both fat and muscles. You won’t be able to lift heavy objects, perform duties that require physical strength and will probably get overwhelmed in most fights.
Negative Comments
When you’re skinny, you’ll hear all sorts of comments. You’ll be surprised at how creative people can get sometimes:
- Don’t they feed you?
- Why don’t your bones break when you walk?
- What is your weight, like 20kg or something?
- Oh my god, you ate so much food you didn’t leave anything for us
- Are you sure you want to take the stairs, isn’t a lift safer for you?
- Be careful or the wind is gonna make you fly
- Do you buy your clothes from the kids’ section?
- Do you have an eating disorder?
Although these types of comments are meant to be taken as a joke, when you constantly hear the same words over and over again, it can really take a toll on you psychologically which is why most skinny people tend to build a lot of insecurities about the way they look (including me when I was a kid)
Wrist Grabbing
When you’re skinny, especially as a kid, you’ll always come across those types of people that would come up to you and wrap their fingers around your wrist and tell you how skinny you are like you didn’t already know. It’s the absolute worst thing that you can do for someone that’s skinny and that’s what most of us have to deal with on a daily basis.
As a little side note, the size of the wrist isn’t a sign of being skinny since that area, in particular, doesn’t store any fat and it all comes down to genetics. Even though I managed to transform my body and grow my muscles, the size of my wrist is still the same (except for some tiny change due to my bones getting bigger)
A Lot of Bullying
I’ve struggled with this the most, especially during my school years. Skinny people are most likely to get more bullied compared to fat people since everyone assumes that being skinny means that you’re weak (which is correct most of the time). I’ve personally got into so many fights because I couldn’t stand when people made fun of how I looked and it was pretty common.
Negative Self-Image
I always had negative thoughts about my self-image (until I transformed my body). I avoided most situations that required me to be shirtless in public like going to the beach or the pool with my friends.
Is There Anything Good About Being Skinny?
I’ve been babbling all this time about the struggles that I had to go through with being skinny, but was there anything positive that came with my body type? There are a lot of pros to being skinny:
You Can Eat Anything
This is probably the best thing about being skinny. With the incredibly fast metabolism that comes naturally from this body type, you can eat whatever you want without having to worry about putting on extra pounds. But still, that doesn’t mean that you can get away with overeating and a diet that consists mostly of junk food, even skinny people are prone to be overweight if they overdo it.
You Can Fit in Most Clothes
I always see skinny people complaining about never finding clothes that fit, but that never happened to me. For example, even if there were some jeans that don’t hug my waist, I would simply tailor them to my liking. Same thing with shirts, jackets, and so on. Clothes can get tailored to become smaller to fit skinny people but they can’t get bigger to fit overweight people which is why we have an advantage.
Additional Pros
Other great things about being skinny are:
- You can squeeze into any tight space
- Seats are never too narrow
- It’s easier to find shade
- You look younger
- You have a natural attractive jawline
- You’re more agile
Conclusion:
Although being skinny was one of the toughest challenges that I had to overcome in my life, it thought me a lot of important lessons and it managed to change my life. If it wasn’t for all the negative comments, bullying, and insecurities, I wouldn’t’ve had the guts and dedication to change my body for the better.