Growing up I was always taller than everyone my age. My height was so unusual, that I had regular visits to see doctors who would test my thyroid and pituitary glands to see if they were working properly. Because of this I was treated differently than most girls. Adults treated me as older, and I was expected to act older and more mature at a younger age. To my peers, I was the giant.

At one point my peers started calling me fat, even though I wasn’t. Giant, fatty, humongo, Everest, the tower…it was relentless. At six years old I hated life, I hated going to school, and I hated myself. Worst of all, as a child I began to believe them. I was an active child who didn’t overeat, but I slowly fell into conformity with what people expected of me. Of course, this made things difficult leading into adulthood.

My chiropractor growls at me for my “tall person slouch” as he calls it, which is really just me trying to lower how tall I am by slouching. When it comes to clothing, being plus sized makes it hard enough, but being tall makes it extremely difficult to buy pants. And even though I love heels, I cannot wear them. In our media driven world, ideally the man is taller than the woman - that ideology makes it impossible to date when you’re taller than most guys. Heels make it even worse.

I like to say I am proud of who I am, and yes that is a truth mentally, but physically I can’t stand to look at myself. Ironically the physical feature I get the most positive reaction to is my height. It is very annoying when everywhere I go everyone says, “Wow you are so tall!” “How tall are you?” and “so jealous I wish I could be that tall!”