The fat lady sings, writes Twinkle Khanna

My leg is healing up and it’s time to get back on my stationary bike which — despite me asking doctors all the time, ‘When can I start cycling again?’ — I use primarily to hang various items of clothing. But now, since weight-bearing exercises are not possible for the next few weeks, I dust my bike and start cycling endlessly while simultaneously reaching nowhere.

After six minutes of this mind-numbing endeavour and desperately needing entertainment, I start watching MTV and after three songs about dolls, baby dolls, pussy dolls, I get jolted out of my ennui and start pedalling a bit faster, seeing a promotion for a new movie Dum Laga Ke Haisha which features a rather corpulent heroine, who I assume also uses her stationary bike just to hang clothes. 

I watch her in fascination, she seems to weigh at least 100 kilos in my judgment and her dance movements startle me. All this, only because she is not the cookie-cutter size that some people would deem acceptable for the movie business or to be honest, for real life as well.

A beautiful woman my age, weighs 88 kilos, has not had a steady boyfriend for the longest time and now, is losing hope of ever finding the right man and having children. My cousin has a college friend, Her parents don’t allow her out of the house beyond 8.30 pm, have no clue about the fact that even in the meagre hours that they grant her freedom, she is in a relationship with someone. When I probe at the possibility of her telling her parents the truth, she says that they will then get her married off immediately. At this point, they are already looking for suitable boys for her and her rebellion is simply to try and gain enough weight, so that the arranged prospective suitors reject her.

A young girl with a wonderful, warm smile and a pretty face works for me. Sometimes, I think the only thing holding her back is her weight. From finding a man who will respect her for what she is and not judge her for what he thinks is a lack of control on her part. 

I see a woman with beautiful kohl-rimmed eyes still single at 43 and some people may wonder if it’s because 43 inches is also the size of her waist. Can life really be such a simple mathematical calculation? I have empathy for every tubby chubby wonder I meet because once upon a time, I was the fattest girl in my class. This self-inflicted adversity caused me endless torment.

Children are cruel. Either you endure the humiliation of being the butt of every joke or you become the one cracking all the jokes -- the latter, slightly less humiliating option seemed a lot more appealing to me.

I took up the challenge, became the class clown and spent a little time systematically beating up children who teased me as well. Both attributes which formed my basic persona and have served me well, time and again. And I only have my former chubby girl to thank for that.

So, my tubby wonders who are growing up. Yes, life is unfair that we are judged by appearances and that we don’t live in the Rubenesque era where fat was prized over muscle. But look around you, there are plenty of women that don’t let size get in their way.

Tess Holiday weighs 260 pounds and is the largest professional plus-size model in the business and has also been featured in Vogue magazine. She takes great pride in her shape and size. Oprah, also not a perfect 10, seems to do very well for herself with a fortune of around 3 billion dollars and is probably the most famous woman in the world. Adele has a voice that makes you feel like thunderstorms are drumming through your heart. She, too, has bags full of money.

So, do dimensions truly matter? Well, if you believe they do, you stop yourself from taking centre stage. Shouldn’t we follow the same thing  we always tell men? “Darling, size doesn’t matter, it’s what you do with it.”