Chonk’s Bikini Experience. Since today marks the first day..

Chonk’s Bikini Experience. Since today marks the first day of fall, and the summer has now officially come to a close, I thought I would share a story about “My Summer Vacation” that I am sure all of you will appreciate. Every year my whole family gets together for a beach vacation. My sister and nieces make a 12 hour journey for this occasion, so they stay with my parents for a few weeks surrounding our week at the beach. In the week leading up to our trip to the beach, my mom noticed that my 11 year old niece was planning on wearing a very modest two piece bathing suit that she picked out herself and really liked wearing. Then later that evening I overheard my mom telling my sister that they needed to go and get my niece another bathing suit before going to the beach. So at that moment I spoke up and said “Why do you need to get her another bathing suit?” … There was a long pause and finally my mom said “Well you know, she’s a little too heavy to be wearing a two piece”. I think literal smoke started coming out of my ears. First of all, my niece is NOT FAT. She isn’t thin, but she is nowhere in the range of fat. She doesn’t have a belly or extra chub anywhere. Solid is how I would describe her. (Exactly how I was when I was her age) Of course I gave my mom a piece of my mind. I told her that it was unfair for her to project her own insecurities onto my niece and that it was extremely damaging to a girl's self esteem. But it didn’t make any difference because the next day they went and got my niece a more “modest” one piece bathing suit. My sister just went along with it all, agreeing with my mom. It was then that I realized what I needed to do. I was going to wear a bikini on our beach vacation! That night, Bean and I went to Target and I picked out the bikini you see me wearing in the photos attached to this post. Then the day came when we were all headed down to the beach. It was beautiful outside and the beach was very crowded. I started to get a bit nervous. I had never done anything like this before. I wasn’t even sure how I worked up the courage to do it in the first place, but I knew it had to be done. Then everyone started getting ready to go down to the water and that’s when it happened, I took off my coverup and exposed the gut in all its glory! Everyone noticed, yet no one said a word. I could tell it was making everyone uncomfortable, everyone except one person, my 11 year old niece. She later pulled me aside and said to me privately “I really like your bathing suit! It is so cute and I like the colors!” Just writing this makes me want to cry because I knew in that moment that it was all worth it. It was a moment I will never forget, and I don’t think she will either. In conclusion, I just want to say thank you to all those who support what we do. It has given me so much confidence to be myself and I don’t know if I would have had the courage to do it without you. I also want to thank Bean for holding my hand proudly on the beach while I sported my teeny bikini. It made it a lot easier for me to go through with it, having you by my side. Hope you liked my story! Love, Chonk