Pat Gaudette

I was reviewing the various spam emails I’ve received that have been blocked over the past month since I signed up for Postini’s email filtering. At $3 a year, it’s a real bargain.

When I saw “Make your fat friends envy you” as the subject of one email, it didn’t take a genius IQ to know why it was blocked as spam. Ordinarily I just hit the “delete” button and move on down the list. But there was something about those words that made me stop.

First, why would I want any of my friends to “envy” me? Is that the kind of relationship true friends have with each other? And do friends really call friends “fat” when they know how hurtful the term is?

When I was growing up, my mother set the rules for the types of friends I was allowed. Fat friends were off limits. In her dysfunctional world fat people weren’t socially acceptable. ”You’re judged by who your friends are,” she would tell me as she tried to steer me toward the “in crowd.” Unfortunately for her, the in crowd wasn’t having anything to do with the likes of me, either.

I grew up being taunted for being too tall and too thin. “How’s the weather up there, Fat Pat?” In college, when I was chosen to model for Mademoiselle Magazine’s college feature, the in crowd whispered behind me, “They chose her? Why?” Some of their own hadn’t made the cut.

And now, middle age and an underactive thyroid have pushed me into the fatso lane. Oh, I can call myself fat because I’ve always been my worst critic. But calling a friend fat? I’m a better friend than that. Wanting a friend to envy me? I’m still a better friend than that.