You are not alone

Maddie+Zahms+Fat+Funny+Friend+came+out+on+Feb.+4+and+has+been+a+relatable+song+for+so+many+people.

Courtesy of Spotify

Maddie Zahm’s “Fat Funny Friend” came out on Feb. 4 and has been a relatable song for so many people.

Rachel Dvareckas, Editor-in-Chief

The life of the fattest girl in a friend group is difficult, mentally draining and can make someone feel alone. Maddie Zahm’s newest release “Fat Funny Friend” perfectly describes what these girls experience. An experience I know all too well. I know what it feels like to absolutely hate looking in the mirror and hate being in pictures. I have always stood out in my friend groups as the tall, fat girl living in the much thinner shadows of friends who would drop me in a heartbeat. This song has been playing on repeat since it came out on Feb. 4.

The lyrics “can’t be too loud, can’t be too busy. If I don’t answer now, are they still going to need me?” ring true. Growing up as a second choice weighs you down. You feel like you have to work so hard to stay in a friendship and to make up for your lack of conventional beauty with humor.

The most gut-wrenching lyric in the song is “I’ve drawn out in Sharpie where I’d take the scissors if that’s what it took for me to look in the mirror. I’ve done every diet to make me look thinner. So why do I still feel so goddamn inferior.” It is an experience that most fat girls have where they cannot stand to look in the mirror or they want to cut the fat out. I have stood in front of the mirror, tears streaming down my face while I squeeze my stomach wishing I could just take the fat out.

Looking back at photos of myself in high school where I thought I looked massive I see a girl who was bigger than the rest of the girls around her but was still an appropriate size. I can appreciate that now as I am the heaviest I have ever been in my life and I wish I could tell 16-year-old Rachel that she is still beautiful no matter her size. I am trying to break the habit of hating myself by learning how to accept the way I look because even if I do lose 100 pounds I would still find something to hate about my body. The mentality of being the fat funny friend will most likely never go away as Zahm sings I will still feel inferior.

This song proves that all girls who were or are fat funny friends are not alone. I have never related to a song more in my life than I relate to this. It has opened my eyes to see that we may have been the biggest in our friend group but outside of the small worlds we live in there are so many others like us.

“Fat Funny Friend” is an emotional song that is relatable to many people and gives power to those who felt alone for so long. It shows that the pain of being the fat friend is not ours to bear by ourselves. We do not have to feel like the second choice or like the side character we can love ourselves no matter what we look like.

I recommend listening to this song if you have ever felt like the fat funny friend and check out Maddie Zahm’s Tik Tok. She has been stitching videos of people sharing their own experiences as the fat funny friend and it really shows we are not alone. If you have never been the fat funny friend I still recommend listening to the song to understand how we all feel. You can find the song wherever you stream music.