The Torrid Quandary

Tent couture. Granny garb. Muumuu fashion.

These are all phrases my mother has used to describe my oversized dresses and t-shirts.

If I had to guess, I think I’m a size 8 currently, but I prefer to shop at online stores which cater to sizes 18 and up.

At my heaviest, my 5’1 frame boasted a whopping 220 pounds. About a year ago, due to asthma and generally worsening health, I vowed to lose the weight quickly, dropping around 60 pounds in two months.

As I cannot recommend losing weight this quickly in good faith, I will spare the details of how and why I accomplished this feat—which, frankly, almost landed me in the emergency room. In hindsight, it has become obvious that taking a more gradual path would have been better for both my mental and physical health. Nonetheless, my impatience won out, and I have forgiven myself for the temporary damage I caused to my psyche during that time.

Thankfully, my diet and exercise regime is more lax now, and I have maintained a weight that fluctuates between 145 pounds and 140 since abandoning my initial crash diet plan. My hope is that with continued therapy, I will develop a healthy relationship with food that nourishes my mind, body and soul.

In any event, during my 200+ pound phase, I discovered a store called Torrid.

How?

It’s a bit complicated.

When I was eating myself nearly to death, I preferred to watch a genre of YouTube known as the “Mukbang” section. Now, while the term originated in South Korea, and apparently began only as a way for (potentially) lonely people to watch other (potentially) lonely people enjoy a hearty meal, modern American YouTube stars appear to have (d)evolved the concept.

Today, the most highly viewed Mukbangs on YouTube seem to be extreme, at best. For example, I follow one YouTuber who calls himself Nikocado Avocado (a.k.a. Noodle King) who boasts millions of followers across his various social media platforms.

About a year ago, I sat down at my laptop, enveloped by a hard pink plastic shell and a keyboard protector for the inevitable mess to follow. A typical meal for me back then was a McDonald’s Big Mac, a large order of fries, a small order of chicken nuggets and some brand of dark caramel-colored soda. As I set my feast up on my bed table (yes - I really used a bed table) I watched Nikocado (a proudly overweight man who looks to be in his mid- to late-20s) eat a large piece of fresh, raw honeycomb on camera.

At first, the honey seeping through the honeycomb pores looked appetizing. However, as I watched Nikocado gnawing tentatively through the crunchy, golden shell, I noticed something disturbing: live bees and larva were crawling visibly through the hexagonal prisms. It then became painfully obvious that Nikocado was attempting to avoid swallowing these tiny creatures along with the honey and beeswax.

How he was not stung (and how he did not vomit) are mysteries that remain unsolved.

Alas, dear Nikocado, while he did inspire my Mukbang obsession, did not inspire many fashion choices for me. I should note that he does (quite emphatically and hilariously) boast that all of his similar-looking plain t-shirts come from Wal-Mart and Target. The humor there lies mainly in the fact that many of Nikocado’s fans assume he is a millionaire due to his extremely successful YouTube antics. He likes to remind his audience, I suppose, that his infamy has not yet engulfed his humility.

In any event, I decided I would turn to the women Mukbangers for my outfit-of-the-day (“OOTD”) inspiration.

My two new fashion icons? Amberlynn Reid (and another popular YouTuber who alternates between calling herself “Chantal Marie” and “Foodie Beauty”.

Both women have described themselves as morbidly obese and have weighed themselves on camera on multiple occasions. To avoid being callous, I will just say that neither woman currently weighs under 400 pounds. As I was, in clinical terms, morbidly obese myself at the time of my Mukbang obsession, I felt that I lacked the authority to judge these women’s dietary choices or health struggles. Today, despite “losing the weight”, I will take the same stance and avoid discussing their health .

After all, this post is about fashion! Torrid.com, specifically.

If you are not familiar with the site (I certainly was not), Torrid is an online boutique that sells women’s clothing sized 10 (00 / Medium) through 30 (6X).

This store inspired YouTubers like Amberlynn and Chantal to record “shopping hauls” whereby they (or their doting fans) purchase numerous clothing items from the website. After the items arrive, the YouTube stars try them on for their audience to assess and, hopefully, mimic.

I found these videos to be quite entertaining.

But, ironically, when I was (by clinical standards) a morbidly obese woman, I was too embarrassed to shop at Torrid. I had a silly thought that shopping there was a sign that I had “let my body go” permanently. In hindsight, I wish I had relented and purchased flattering garments from Torrid that fit properly, but I chose to remain despondent about my weight gain instead.

Today? I shop at Torrid proudly, even though I can only fit their smallest sizes “properly” (meaning, according to my mother’s standards).

I discovered, however, that much I prefer the loose, baggy boho-chic style of Nicole Richie a la 2011.

And, at 28 years old, I’m finally going to wear what I want.