I'm fat. I make no excuses, don't try to play a thin woman on the internet - outside of my online Dungeons & Dragons game that is.

As a fat woman I need special clothes. Clothes that hide my flaws and show off my good points.

Sadly, designers seem to not realize that means fat women cannot wear bigger versions of skinny girls' clothing.

Let's start with the issue of sleeves. Fat women need to wear sleeves. I don't mean capped sleeves or what I call slash sleeves - in that the sleeves slash inwards towards the armpits. I'm talking about sleeves that fall AT THE VERY LEAST to the TOP of the elbow. I'm not saying 3/4 or full length sleeves. I'm saying traditional short sleeves.

Sleeveless, capped, and slash sleeved clothing makes a woman's arms look bigger. Don't believe me? Take a look at this monstrosity from Sydney's Closet. Look at how huge the girls' arms look. One swing from those batwinged things and those girls could take out Godzilla, especially the blond.

Next is the horizontal stripes, animal prints, and big patterns that are suddenly so popular. No matter how many times I say it, people just can't understand that these things make a woman look ten pounds heavier then she really is! Put a bone thin girl in a shirt with horizontal stripes or a big pattern and she'll look like she's actually got curves rather then being all angles. Put a normal size woman in them and she'll look like she's five to ten pounds overweight. Put a fat cow like myself in them and I look like I'm the stunt double for the Goodyear Blimp.

Don't believe me on the horizontal stripes? Well, even "reality" tv show hosts Stacy & Clinton from What Not To Wear and Tim Gunn from Tim Gunn's Guide To Style have said the same thing. Though in a much nicer way then me. And believe me, the same applies for big patterns and animal prints.

Some people have tried to say they make a fat woman look thinner, they're 100% wrong. Take a look at the picture I found. First off, the sleeves are the dreaded capped sleeves so like the girls in the sleeveless dresses, her arms look a lot bigger then what they really are. Then the stripes make her look heavier, they even make her look like she has a pot belly issue. I bet you anything she's probably at the most 145 in real life but that top makes her look about 160.

Then there is the terror that is the empire waist. For most plus size women it does not make us look thinner, it makes us look pregnant. I, for one, do not want to have to say to people "I'm not pregnant, I'm just fat." Please, for the love of all that's good and beautiful in this world, stop with the blasted empire waists! Now when I was a teenager in the 90s I had these two dresses with what I guess you'd call a V-waist. It started out as a normal waist along the hips, but both in the front and behind dropped down into a v-shape. This was MUCH more slimming then the empire waist. And certainly did not make a fat woman look like a pregnant woman.

I'll spare you the image for the final one - but let's talk about this moronic trend of cutting tops short in front.

When you're fat like me you often have what my mom calls a "front butt." It's a roll of flab at the bottom of the stomach that goes upwards in the middle, lining up with the belly button, so it looks like you were born with your butt in the front of you, instead of behind.

Tops cut short in front expose this front butt to the world.

NO! NO! NO! Like batwinged arms, no one wants to see the front butt! Unless they have some sort of weird fetish.  

Now some women, those with cup sizes between A and C can get away with the 29 inch long tops. Larger cup sizes, such as myself whom messures as a DDD, cannot. I need a least 31 inches. However if I buy a top 31 inches long it's usually a shapeless tunic. At the very least the designers could add what my mom calls "princess seams" and others call darts. Two small seams along the brests that slant downwards. It at least gives the top a little shape.

It's very simple in the long run. Fat woman cannot wear what skinny women do. Different shapes and sizes require different clothing. It's like trying to put a round peg into a rectangle's hole.

Just like designers need to wake up to the needs of people when it comes to purses and shoes, so too do you all need to wake up to the needs of fat women.

Like it or not, the population is growing fatter. Your main body of customers are going to be women (and men) with weight problems. Instead of designing for the stick figures on the runways. It's time to design for real human beings. For the people who'll actually pay for your clothing and therefore help pay for things you need and want.

Stop trying to just make bigger versions of the thin girls' clothing. Fat women need pretty clothes too. Clothing made just for us. To hide our problem areas. To show off our good spots.

It's time, designers.