October 28, 2002 | 4:13 PM

So I am home sick today. I have a really bad cold or the flu or something. I feel bad because this is the second time this month that I have been out. I try to space out my sick days by six months or so if possible. Having the reputation of being the �girl out sick all the time� is something to avoid. I really hope nobody�s mad at me but I just couldn�t get out of bed this morning. My sinuses were on fire and my chest hurt and I was running a fever. I took some Tylenol and feel better now than I did. Even if I�m not 100% I�ll go in tomorrow. I feel guilty because I probably brought this on myself by partying so much this weekend and not getting enough sleep.

Oh well. I�m going to the doctor in a little while.

Back to the whole self esteem/fat issue, thank you so much Tremble for what you wrote. I too never look at other people and think �you�re fat and thus unattractive��in fact many of the most beautiful people I know are heavier and look wonderful at the weight they are. But I can�t see myself that way. I am trying to, but I don�t have a lot of encouragement in that area. I know my friends think I am beautiful, and I truly appreciate that and it has made all the difference in the world. But otherwise I don�t have a lot of positive reinforcement in that realm.

Once a long time ago somebody on diaryland wrote something not particularly nice about me on his site. A lot of what he wrote was really funny and true and even though it was quite mean spirited and hurt my feelings, it was also insightful and in the end I felt like I learned something about myself.

But the thing that was just totally wrong was as part of his diatribe, this person made fun of my weight. I mean, he never would have made fun of me for being a different color or being blind or gay or something like that.

It seems like in this culture it�s always perfectly acceptable to make fun of someone�s appearance. That it�s OK to be a good liberal and despise racism or bigotry of any kind, except in regard to someone�s size. When you are heavy people make all kinds of assumptions about you. That you must be lazy and have no pride in yourself. You must sit around all day eating ice cream and scratching your ass.

And really truly and honestly, men don�t pay any fucking attention to you. And if they do, they don�t turn out to be very nice.

I�m just going to be frank and say this.

Every man that I have ever been involved with has treated me as though he is doing me a favor by being with me. That he�s dating me despite my weight. That it�s something he�s choosing to look beyond as though that makes him a big person. This isn�t just one person in particular�it�s all of them.

It would never occur to me to go out with or sleep with someone I didn�t think was just wonderful and beautiful. I mean yes we all have our faults and there are of course always things you might wish were different about someone else. But I never would go out with someone deciding to �put up� with how they look or who they are.

That�s what I meant when I said I am like a consolation prize. Someone I dated awhile back actually told me after a somewhat long relationship that he never ever wanted to go out with me from the beginning- he just wanted to be my friend and sort of �wound up� dating me, that I wasn�t his ideal. And I know that if I were thinner, he wouldn�t have said that. If I was thin, he wouldn�t be dating me as some kind of favor. To know that people are not capable of loving you the way you love them is a truly upsetting. I just someday would like to be with someone who didn�t like me �despite� something, who isn�t with me �even though� I am fat.

I don�t want to be done any fucking favors. I want to be revered and respected and adored for exactly who I am.

I want to be loved and adored not despite something but because of it. Isn�t that in the end what everyone wants? To be told it�s OK to be who you are?

And I know that�s never going to happen.

I have come to face the fact that I will never ever be loved in that way. That�s pretty fucking sad, but I think it�s true. I learned a lot a few days ago and it�s better to really know the truth than operate under false assumptions about the feelings others have for you.