Today, I got the opportunity to shake Maria Kang’s hand and give her a hug. I had the chance to sit down and chat with her and get to know her. And guess, what, we have some things in common.
Yes, we agree to RESPECTFULLY disagree with each other. But, that doesn’t mean we can’t both be bigger then the sensationalism that was our lives for the past month and shake hands, talk, get to know each other in person and support each other. If you know me at all, you know I have three passions. I LOVE helping people to have GREAT sex, I LOVE to help women feel sexy and beautiful and I LOVE supporting other women business owners.
I know that many of you will disagree with this blog and many of you will disagree with me meeting Maria at Curvy Girl today. But, I also know that I can’t please everyone all of the time.
I think it was extremely brave of Maria to come to our store, Curvy Girl, while she was in the Bay Area. I am not sure I would be as brave if the tables were turned. It was very nice to meet her and get to know her. She is a woman, a wife, a Mom, a daughter, and a friend. She is beautiful and I love her passion around her family and her business.
I laughingly suggested that we take a picture with our fists up and we could really bring those words ( that the media loves) to life – FIT MOM vs. CURVY GIRL! We laughed and decided against it. (And, when we both agreed to this meeting, we agreed NO press. We wanted to have a quiet opportunity to sit down, face to face and talk and get to know each other. Not create another publicity circus.)
It really is not an “US vs. THEM” kind of thing. All of us women are in this together. There is a war going on out there and it’s a war against women’s bodies. We all have our own struggles with our bodies and our image of our own bodies. It’s a very personal struggle and we can never really know the struggle another woman is having with her inner mean girl. We all have that inner mean girl – thin, fat, plush, thick, athletic, rubenesque – all of us.
I believe, in life, we all need to LIFT each other up and NOT tear each other down. That is why I liked the idea of meeting at Curvy Girl. I knew it would give us an opportunity for us to find common ground and each get back to our jobs of helping women to feel sexy and beautiful – each in our own way. So to Maria and her husband David, I am grateful for their idea and grateful to them for reaching out.
And, for the record, the ONLY negative thing I ever said about Maria during this entire brew ha ha was on Nov. 25th when the people at Yahoo were messaging me for a quote about Maria’s blog. I was in the make up chair at the Bethenny show and they asked me for a quote via text. I had NO idea who she was or why she was calling out my “Unphotoshopped, Regular Woman” campaign.
So, I told Yahoo that I was annoyed that this whole thing was “killing my buzz” as I was about to go on the Bethenny show to talk about this super cool campaign. I gave them a quote and I said “and oh yah, you can tell her I said to fuck off” because that was how I felt at the moment. I was there to enjoy this little bit of cool press my store and campaign was receiving from the Bethenny show – trying to wrap my head around exactly what to say while on the show – and I was pissed that some total stranger was saying anything negative at all about this campaign that we launched to create compassion and empathy. I was just annoyed by it, so I reacted. I am a REAL person with a lot of passion around my mission. It wasn’t very professional of me, but it’s exactly how I felt at that moment.
Merry Christmas and in the spirit of the season, please be kind to one another.
Sincerely, Chrystal Bougon
Owner and Resident Curvy Girl