Thank you Thank you Thank you.

Usually my blog is all about the ranting and raving of a sometimes negative nature. Trials and tribulations.

This quick post (or not so quick post) is not. I just wanted to put out there-to the universe at large-a HUGE thank you for the gift I was given today!

I have a child who has special needs. I have been blessed by the fact that the needs are not the drastic or life threatening type of special needs, but they are special needs none the less. My child will probably always need a little extra. You do what you can as a parent to prepare children for life as it comes at them at warp speed and but I always wonder am I doing enough?

We have been blessed to finally find a school, a public school, who understands and helps as much as state funding allows.

But we wanted, needed, to do more.

We have been blessed, with a very close friend to our family, who loves my child almost as much as I do. Through that friend we were able to find a private organization that has services that could help to supplement all the good work that is being done at school.

Now, private organizations have to have money just like every other business in order to keep its doors open, but we do not have lots of extra money and these services are not covered by insurance.

And just when you think the opportunity to give you child something potentially great towards their preparation for life is about to slip through your fingers, yet another blessing steps in and says let us help you.

Those who helped know who they are and I will be forever grateful for the opportunity you have afforded my child. We would not have been able to do this without you.

I know who you are and I thank you. It just goes to show that even the baddest day, or the toughest times, or the most stressful situations, if you really need help, it will come. It may take time, but it will come.

Okay enough sappy stuff, negativity will resume in next post :-).

Sisters of Size Unite!

Okay people here's my gripe for today....for what it's worth.

Here, in these United States of America, land of the free to eat whatever the heck you want and live with the consequences, home of the brave enough to accept the fact that you are fat or large or obese and still hold your head up high as you walk down the streets and are criticized silently or out loud for the extra weight you carry and how you dress your bulk, there is a new show called More to love.

Okay I get it, we're reality TV addicts over here, so coming up with new and exciting shows about the dysfunction of the human populace sometimes is difficult to do. But some brilliant person decided that this year, this year is the year of the Large and in Charge. There are two new shows (one reality and one not) actually that specifically target the larger portion of the population (and I mean that as size and in numbers of humans...you skinny people are becoming out numbered). The one mentioned above - which I will get to in a moment - and the second, called Drop Dead Diva.

Now, this DDD show, I find this one to be interesting and irritating all at the same time. I get the premise, skinny self righteous shallow girl dies and comes back as fatty, kind but hugely underestimated and mocked plus size girl. I realize the story line deals with the issues that touch some of today's larger women:

how some feel they are really skinny women trapped in large size human suits;

the issue of how larger women are penalized in the world for not being sexy, or pleasing to the eye as our counterparts (skinny women, or at least women who don't completely tip the scales);

how large women feel so pressed to diet and exercise, not just so we'll be healthier and live longer, but because if we don't try to conform we won't get very far in a world that is largely based on packaging.

How truly it is all about packaging. The typical stereotypes are played, pretty but not skinny, great personality but to big to even talk to, let alone find out that there is a person in side there, clothes that are made to hide the human and create a blend in with your surroundings state so you won't be noticed and the generalities that always follow larger size women.

Now, not to be one sided, the poor skinny women stereotypes are being explored - exploited you choose- too:

the beautiful but dumb;

the stand there and look pretty but please don't open your mouth and ruin it;

the self centered it's all about me.

I'd probably have more skinny women stereotypes to gripe about so this isn't so one sided if I wasn't a large girl, but this is the best I can do.

But here is the rub. It's fictional, fake, a story to be told. These people are telling a story. They are using the story to try and address real issues in today's society, but it is fake. No humans are being exploited for the television viewers. This is where my rant really comes in....I know, then what was all that ranting before, just wait.

Last night, for one of the few times in my life, I felt humiliated, not for myself, but for the women who are on More to love a new reality show based on the same premise as The Bachelor and the Bachelorette.

I have to be honest, I tuned in only because a friend told me it was on and I had to watch the car wreck this show seemed to be heading towards. I was prepared for some variation of a chubby chasers dream date type set up, but this was just sad. On other shows of this ilk, they put demographics for the women/men who are involved on the bottom of the screen, for example Brad from LaBrea CA Age 35.

Okay not an issue - but these women on this show were titled like this:

Melissa, Age 29 from Dallas Texas, 5/5" 220lbs.

REALLY, REALLY folks....we HAD to include their height and weight in their titles??? WHY - they are large women, anyone with eyes could see that, they were wearing dresses that ASSURED you'd know how large they were - side note, if they are happy and feel comfortable in what they were wearing more power to them! - I'd hate to think the show had them dress that way just to add to the hype - but did you really have to put in their height and weight. I'm sure those women are self assured and happy with who they are, heck they may not even care that their weight and height were included in the title but again - the other shows - of the same premise, people looking for love on national television because OF COURSE that's the way to find love, don't include height and weight in their titles ...why I wonder....BECAUSE IT'S NOT FREAKING RELEVANT!!

I understand the show is called More to love, and truly I applaud these women for letting it all hang out there for the American public to watch, dissect and be entertained by, but really how much exploitation is too much.

Now, you may say, but wait you don't have an issue with or have not expressed an issue with these other shows and their exploitation of their contestants, so is this just because you're fat and unhappy? No, this is just, at the moment, the last straw for me. Listening to these women talk about why they were there and what they were trying to achieve while reading that they were so and so from where ever, at whatever height and tipping the scales at whatever weight was just the last straw. AND you could see, maybe it was acting maybe it wasn't, I'll never know, but you could see that a lot of these women were broke, heartsick, tired and broken. And did I mention broken?

Have we come so low that we must exploit these women and men in order to find satisfaction with ourselves and our own lives. Why must the larger women be singled out by their height and weight when their counter parts on very similar shows never were and why in heck would they allow it?

Okay I think that's all for now. This blog is long enough.