Whitney Thore shot to fame after starring in dance videos that took the world by storm. We sat down with her and found out how she manages to exude such confidence.
Did you expect the attention that came with ‘Fat Girl Dancing’?
Actually I have to say no, and the reason for that is by that time I’d started living my life freely and I’d accepted myself. To me it didn’t seem like a huge brave thing to do it just felt like it was the only thing to do. So no, in hindsight I think of course people freaked out about it. I remember going on all the press tours last year and I thought I’m really happy to be here, but why am I here? Like what is so subversive about a fat woman who’s a good dancer, making a dance video? What is so strange about that? So yes, I was very surprised.
CHECK OUT WHITNEY'S DANCE TUTORIAL FOR CLOSER!
How do you cope with Internet trolls?
I really don’t engage with it at all, but I also don’t go seek it out. I try to keep my heart closed to that kind of stuff because it’s insidious if you let it in. Lucky for me I don’t see negative things unless I go looking, unless I go to YouTube or article comments or something like that. It’s really hard to give two seconds of thought to the negative as I hear the most positive things that I could hear in my entire life at least ten times from perfect strangers on a daily basis. So, it’s not that hard to ignore the haters!
Have you always been this confident?
I had really severe body image issues. I struggled with eating disorders – even though my weight never got over 140lbs. Then when I went to college I quit dancing for ten years because as I started to gain weight, I didn’t know why, I would later find out that I had Polycystic Ovarian syndrome. It was so difficult for me to look in the mirror that I dropped out of my dance class within weeks because I was so ashamed of my body. I felt that I did not have a place in my physical environment or in society. I hated if I had to squeeze past someone or made someone else uncomfortable. Today those things aren’t great and I feel sorry for the person sitting next to me on a plane sometimes cos’ we’re a little cosy. But mostly I don’t have to apologise for my body anymore because I am what I am.
I think we have a misconception about confidence, we think that you’re either born with it or you’re not. Or we think we have a finite amount and once it’s depleted you can’t get it back – none of that is true.
Confidence is something that you have to work on every single day because there are so many negative forces out there, and people are really committed to hating certain groups of people – fat people being one of them. So, if you’re not working overtime to feel deserving, to feel worthy, to feel confident it’s not going to happen. It’s something that you have got to be pro-active about, and I think confidence is a product of action. So it’s not like “Okay, I want to wear this bikini but I don’t feel confident”, well of course I don’t, the society we’re raised in why would anyone?
When people get in to a situation that makes them uncomfortable or where they feel insecure they just stop and don’t do it. You’ve got to push through that
What caused your weight gain?
With my Polycystic Ovarian syndrome I’m insulin resistant and that’s what leads to the weight gain. I gained 100lbs in eight months pretty much uncontrollably. Now I certainly don’t think that I’m 380lbs simply because of Polycystic Ovarian syndrome, but is it because of POS and the shame of the stigma that I deal with being a fat woman and depression and not wanting to take care of myself, all of those things? Yes.
What I’m struggling with now is finding a balance of healthy diet and exercise, and just feeling good so that I can lose some weight. I’d definitely like to lose probably about 100lbs that would still classify me as morbidly obese and if I’m morbidly obese for the rest of my life but I can be just as active and healthy as I want to be then, then morbidly obese is ok with me!
What can we expect from your reality show, My Big Fat Fabulous Life?
It’s really just an inside look at my life, I mean dancing is a big part of it obviously but it’s also just my family, my friends. This show humanises fat people because I’m a full human being with a love life and a family life. Mostly it’s just a candid look at a young, obese woman who thinks she’s fantastic.
My Big Fat Fabulous Life starts TONIGHT at 9pm on TLC