Yeah, well, the OP took it in exactly the spirit in which it was intended so your opinion is irrelevant, thanks. I’d invite you to fuck off, too, but I’m in a good mood this morning.
Depends on what you mean by judge. I shouldn’t judge someone’s worth as a human being based on their size, but I can say “I don’t find them physically attractive.” Or “I don’t think Stephan Colbert is funny.” Or “I don’t think Einstein was all that smart.” Or whatever. I am entitled to my opinions and judgments about subjective attributes - and attractiveness is subjective.
If Lane Bryant would stop making every blasted thing out of polyester with sequins… I am not going to a 70s disco anytime soon, I do not need that crap. I did however manage to get a really cute blue top and black skirt last time I went there, both in (mostly) natural fiber and making me look Awful Cute.
I hate shopping at just one store, though, and I’d love to not only buy but look completely smokin’ in one of those cotton sundresses that just came back into style. To do that, I have to play more racquetball, I know, and eat more salad.
Sadly, outside of putting a slender person in a fat suit it’s not possible to completely explain this. I myself, even if I diet down to below my preferred body weight, will always be bulky. I’m of average height but from Polish peasant stock; you couldn’t knock me down with a crowbar, so put a beard on me and you have a dwarf. 
I feel unaccountably like Cheery Littlebottom when I go dress shopping…
(and something deep in my heart really really wants one of those dresses in black with little red cherries all over it)
I think the problem is that being fat is an “in between” issue. If people are making fun of you for being black or female or tall there is absolutely nothing you can do about that so you learn to love yourself the way you are. If people are making fun of you because your hair is a drab color and because you wear aviator glasses and you have big, bushy eyebrows you can go to a salon and get dyed and waxed and go to lens crafters and get new glasses. 3 hours and a couple hundred dollars later what people were taunting you about is competely gone.
If I am taunted because I am fat I really have very little recourse. It is something that CAN be changed so if I try to learn to love myself for who I am and be happy at my current weight I have, “Oh but your health! And your looks! Why won’t you lose weight right away?” spouted at me from everywhere. If I try to lose weight it is a process that takes years and forces you to focus on the negative about yourself. Even though you are working to turn the negative into a positive it still forces you to think about the fact that you are too fat and there is a part of you that is socially unacceptable on a regular basis. To top it off, the second I mention that I am trying to eat less or it becomes obvious that I have lost a few pounds I practically have to duck under my desk to avoid the cake and candy that fly into my cubicle from every direction.
I have lost 49 lbs in the last 11 months but it has been like dodging bullets the whole time. When I mentioned my weight loss off handedly to another woman in my office who was also trying to lose a few pounds (she is a size 6 and doesn’t need to lose an ounce but of course she won’t be happy until she makes Kate Moss look obese) within 48 hours she had spread the word and women from every department at my company showed up with baked goods, candy, etc. I came to work one morning and found a box of Little Debbie’s on my desk! I mentioned to my roommate that I had lost some weight and less than a week later I come home and she has ordered each of us an entire large pizza for dinner. It is a never ending attempt at sabotage that is completely unnecessary since I still have another 60 lbs to lose before I’ll be anywhere near a healthy weight.
Saboteurs are everywhere. They do it because if you succeed (and btw - yay for those 49 lbs), they then are forced to look into their own failures. If you fail, they can avoid that introspection.
But worse than the saboteurs (who I have learned to ignore and fend off with my Wonder Woman like deflector bracelets - zing. zing.) are the “well intentioned”. If I have allowed for an upcoming celebration (made room in my points bank, calorie count, what-have-you) so that I may have a small piece of cake, I am assaulted by “you can’t have any” or “are you allowed that?” “are you sure you want that?” “I thought you were trying?” “you were doing so well” There are only so many polite ways to say “fuckoff” or “myob”. I am tempted to counter with something equally as obnoxious, tailored to the individual.
That’s horrible! These people should have their snack cakes thrown back at them.
Maybe, in your weight loss, you could take up bulimia - and therefore return their generosity appropriately.
Good luck with your weight loss.
A friend has had some luck (I’ve noticed) by prefacing her treat with “I’ve been extra good this week just to make sure I can have some of this - you aways make the best brownies.” She manages to inform everyone standing around that she is making a conscious choice, she has allowed for this treat in her plans, and the compliment often deflects additional comments.
I was going to start laughing about the tall = easier to find stuff then I realized it was grouped in with the size four and twenty.
I’m mid-twenties, 6’ and a size 15/16 (depending if I buy junior or women’s) and only recently have I found that people who carry tall also started carrying larger sizes. Not everyone does (many still stop at 12 or 14 for the tall… ) but more than before. It was hell as a teen growing up, I defaulted to guy’s clothing in high school and only in the last 3-4 years have I been able to find more stuff that looks decent.
AMEN!
Not to mention that someone in the fashion industry seems to think that a size 4 and a size 12 have the same proportions, when in reality a size 12 will usually be much curvier in the hip than a size 4 (not that there aren’t exceptions on both ends… but as a rule, this is almost always the case).
My kingdom for a pair of pants that fits my ass AND waist at the same time.
So I did indeed discover that it’s the American car culture that makes me fat. Proof? I went a week without a car in a pedestrian/public transport city for a week and lost ten pounds. And I ate like a hog, let me tell you.
However: where’s the solution for me? Should I go to live in Toronto and walk everywhere? Should every fat person do that? What’s the universal solution to this problem? It sure as hell isn’t “demolish the cities and burn all the cars”, especially in the steamy summers in the South (unless you want me to smell like a gardener by the time I get through the door; besides, my commute is about thirty miles, and I’m not walking that). Modern American cities are not set up for pedestrians, so the natural exercise a person would get is barely possible and replaced with the necessity of gym memberships, pink pastel weights, and a thousand leg lifts.
That’s because you are young and skinny. 
You’ve met me a couple times, and I think (hope!) you would agree that I am in relatively good shape, considering my age and the fact that I’ve recently had a baby (ok, not that recently, but it’s hard to lose the pregnancy weight at my age!) But still, I look massively pregnant in those tops.
The funny thing is, back when those babydoll dresses were really hot back in the 90s (watch old episodes of 90210), I LOVED them and wore them all the time. That was when I was young and skinny, too.
See I think that’s a big part of the problem. Thinner women tend to be closer in shape but heavier women all gain weight differently. Some women put it on in their hips and have booty but a smallish waist, other women gain it all in their upper body (chest and shoulders) and then there’s the gals that gain it all around the waist. So to have a properly fitting size 16, you really need to have three different cuts. That’s asking a lot for a store that maybe carries three of an item in one size.
Catherines, at least, does take that into consideration. Tho I think only for their slacks and jeans.
I am a size 10 or so, 5’11", and 30. I need a 34" inseam for pants, and I have good luck at Banana Republic (I love their jeans - they have a whole category for talls now) and NY & Co. Their stuff tends to run big though, but I got a bunch of spring tops there just last weekend. I admittedly am not very curvy though (I have added cleavage now b/c I am breastfeeding, but no real hips.)
Whenever I watch “What Not To Wear” they always suggest the empire waist to slenderize, because it emphasizes the narrowest part of you, just under the boobs. I actually love these tops that are out right now, I find them really flattering as long as I get the kind that fall straight down, and not balloon out. You want to get the “empire waist” tops and not the “trapeeze” tops. The trapeeze ones are the ones that make people look like tents.
If it makes y’all feel any better, I’m a little twig person who’s having no more luck than you at the shopping game. I’m developing a nice little phobia about it. I’ve learned to limit my shopping efforts to no more than one hour, because after that I want to cry and hit people.
I wore an empire-waist dress for my wedding because I am relatively thin and have small breasts. Empire waists make my top look larger, or at least cuter, so I think I looked fantastic. And not pregnant. 
But you’re right, I don’t think empire waist tops are the right thing for a large-breasted woman to wear, unless she wants to further emphasize what’s there.
Toronto’s a good place for pedestrians?
Of course, I guess if your weight loss plan was to walk everywhere, a city that was BAD for pedestrians would cause you to lose more weight. So move to Toronto.
Take a friend along who is honest with their opinions without making you feel terrible by their words (it might also help if that friend doesn’t mind if you take some of the frustration out on them in some way, lol).
Oh no, opinions I got. I’m not suitable for human companionship during shopping trips (or for hours afterward). It’s funny because I’m such a swell person all the rest of the time.
BTW, the sixteen year old in the OP? Super bitch.
If they had popular dresses that were Flemish peasant knockoffs, I’d be all over them. For some very strange and fun reasons, I look most flattering in styles that emphasize my waist to hip ratio like those clothes do and mostly not the stuff that’s popular these days. I also look fabulous in 1940s/1950s cut outfits, as long as they’re built to my proportions.
This would be excellent. I can’t shop in plus size stores most of the time (my size and the size below it often fit like highwater circus tents), and it’s rare to find stuff that fits, let alone fits well, in a “regular” store.
I think I may take up sewing again once I get my life back after grad school. It’d be so much easier to find a pretty fabric, draft some patterns that work for me, and wear pretty dresses all the time. For now, however, I’m just going to work on trying to be healthy and closer to a more flattering size for me.