Sex & The Curvy Girl

Arguably, the media can make the romantic landscape more perilous for overweight women. Even though there are more overweight women than ever before, there is great cultural stigma surrounding fat women wanting love, or worse, sex. The stereotype that overweight women would (and should?) be lonely is so culturally understood that the motif has been woven into commercials for national companies like Weight Watchers and Subway. Recent movies like Shallow Hal and Norbit are intended to disgust viewers with the concept of overweight women's sexuality. But, ironically, getting sex isn't always a problem for overweight women.

"The one thing I like about fat girls is that they'll always sleep with you," is what Rhiannon* heard a guy say when walking near a strip of bars popular among the college crowd in her city. "I personally had a good six months of being a total tramp in my early 20s," she says. "I see these bigger girls out at clubs or at coffee shops, and they'll just throw themselves at anyone who looks their way." Says Wendy Wimmer, "It goes back to this whole idea of settling, this theory that fat girls are easy because they haven't had any sex, so their ankles are up by their ears."

But what if a gal wants more than just sex—something like, well, love? "There are 'BBW' dating sites and parties," suggests Shannon, who blogs about her weight ups and downs at musingsofafatchick.blogspots.com. In some scenes, craving overweight women has emerged as a fetish. And online communities and dating sites catering to the overweight have cropped up, but they're not a cure-all.

"In theory, these parties are awesome," says Wendy. "But I would never go to something like that looking for a long-term partner..." Wendy has had some success finding guys at regular bars with her friends, and at one point dated a guy who "looked like a rock star." The bottom line on dating if you're overweight? "There are plenty of women who are fat who are in great relationships and plenty of women who are thin and dating unsuccessfully," says Dr. Rosenfeld. "Women should be focusing on the things they bring to a relationship other than just their looks."