Mean People Suck.

I recently bought two dresses to wear out and about. (See above.) 

I wore the top one to a job interview. 

I wore the bottom dress to a cousin's engagement party, and I got a lot of compliments on it from people in my family and people in the bride-to-be's family.

Feeling proud of my really good shopping skills (the two dresses cost me less than $25 altogether), I posted the pictures of the dresses on my Facebook page and tagged my friends and family in order to show them the dresses. I really hate getting my picture taken because I feel that any picture of me is absolutely awful, so the fact that I had the pictures taken in the first place should tell you how nice I felt I looked in the dresses. 

I did get a lot of positive compliments on Facebook for both dresses, but unfortunately, one bad apple did spoil the bunch.

An older female relative of mine wrote the following comment on Facebook about the bottom dress:  "Not very flattering. The other one looked better on you."

To which I politely replied:  "Well, I got a lot of compliments on it at K-- and L--'s party tonight."

To which the female relative replied:  "Oh, well I guess feeling pretty is the most important thing."

Now, I have a lot of body image issues. I've struggled with my weight in recent years. I had lost about 80 pounds, but I've recently regained about 40 of those 80 pounds. As you can see from both photos, I am rather short, so it is very obvious that I have put on that weight again. I've also never thought I was pretty, even when I was thin. That is another major reason behind why I don't like to be photographed. I think I'm ugly, and I know I'm fat.

That relative, who is a retired diplomat from the US State Department, ruined my night. 

Even though a bunch of friends and family members chimed in on Facebook that they thought my dress in the bottom picture was super cute, all I can hear in my mind is that I look unattractive.

All I can think now when I see that bottom dress is:  "I got called ugly by a woman who is notorious for her hideous sense of style."

That really hurts.  

So, please, people, if you can't say something nice to someone, even over the internet, don't say it all. You don't know what they're going through and how crushing your words can be.