Chapter 1 - prologue 1 - thanksgiving the year before

Today's the day, the one you've been increasingly dreading for months now. Thanksgiving. The day your entire family would see just how massive and helpless you've gotten over the past 11 months. What happened at last years thanksgiving was so humiliating that contemplating how much worse it'd be this year was almost too much to think about.

Last year you waddled home for thanksgiving break to the gawks and stares of your family weighing a whopping 360lbs at just 5'5, having put on more weight in the previous semester than any of the ones before that. Sure you had put on weight every semester for the past three and a half years of college, having entered freshman year an inshape 135, but previous breaks between semesters when you showed up fatter than ever, you family assumed you were going through something and hoped you'd lose it eventually. But that semester was clearly a turning point in the way you were looked at, having turned into an undeniable hog. You could hear their whispers behind your back, things like "dear god what happened to her", "I thought she was massive when I saw her this summer, I didn't even think she could get even bigger", and "she clearly has no self-control, being that big and out of shape has to be embarrassing". You of course had spent the whole day with food in your mouth, trying to cope with the embarrassment of knowing that everyone could see how pathetically fat you were.

Previously, as you put on weight over the past 3 years, your mom always tried to be understanding, usually offering friendly advice on losing it. But once all your relatives had left for the evening and it was just your mom, dad, and sister in the house, you were sitting on the living room couch, comfort eating even more pie, watching tv, and trying not to think about how pathetic everyone must think you are. That's when your mom came in, took one look at you cramming even more food into your already over fed, lard filled body and said, "jesus Melanie, that last thing you need is more pie, look at yourself"

You were completely caught off guard, trying to mumble through a mouth full of pie.

She then walked right up to where you were sitting, standing over you, and said "can you even tell that your shirt has ridden up and that your gut is is hanging out, or have you gotten so fat that you can't see anything past your own belly button?"

Clearly you had become so shamefully fat that your mom snapped and could no longer dance around your size. You scrambled to try and pull down the hem of your shirt, blushing with embarrassment, while trying to say sorry.

She continued, "You were big over the summer, but this, this is pathetic, how does someone eat themselves this massive. Do you know how embarrassing it is to have a daughter as fat as you! I don't even know what to tell people anymore"

At this point you started to tear up, ashamed and not knowing what to say.

"Most people would've been so ashamed of themselves they would've started losing weight 100lbs ago. Yet here you are, only 21 and so fat that a flight of stairs has you winded, yet your continuing to gorge yourself."

By that point you were quietly sobbing in shame as she berated you, unable to even look up and look her in the eye. Eventually she stormed off in a huff, mumbling that she gives up.

At the time you felt so huge and heavy that you didn't even want to contemplate being any bigger. Realistically, you probably knew you were continuing to get fatter, but were so ashamed that you couldn't bring yourself to acknowledge it to even yourself. In hindsight, what you did after being berated by your mom should've made it pretty obvious that you were just going to get fatter.