The End: The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things

The end of this book was probably my favorite part of the entire story of Virginia's life. Towards the end of the book was when Virginia finally realized her self worth and realized that she actually CAN stick up for herself and do what she wants to. It all started when she went to Walla-Walla in Seattle over Thanksgiving to visit her best friend Shannon who moved there at the beginning of the year. Her mother nixed the idea as soon as Virginia brought it up to her but something inside Virginia pushed her to go and buy a nonrefundable round trip ticket to Seattle with her own money and without her parents knowing. Then a couple days before she was going to leave, she just straight up told them that she was going to Seattle and that she had bought a ticket. Her mother immediately reminded her that she said no absolutely not and that she forbids her to go and Virginia counts to five and simply replies with "I'm going."

At this point of the story is where the turning point occurs. While she is in Walla Walla and reunited with her best friend, Virginia's spirits are definitely lifted. She forgets about everything that is going on back home and just let's herself be happy again. Her and Shannon end up getting body piercings together. Shannon gets her tongue pierced and Virginia gets her eyebrow pierced. She doesn't even care what her parents are going to think because she loves the eyebrow ring and she's finally doing what makes her happy and not what makes everyone else happy. She's no longer feeling numb. She comes back home and everyone is complimenting her on her eyebrow ring, even Brie the popular girl says something to her! She also dyes her hair purple after her mom said that the cute dress she bought doesn't match her hair color. Virginia clearly did this out of spite just to get a reaction out of her mom and Virginia was loving every second of pissing her mom off. Of course everyone loved Virginia's new hair and complimented her on that as well. Virginia joined a kickboxing class and now goes a couple times a week and has met two new friends in that class since then. She has also started a webzine at school for all her classmates and even got some of her classmates to join her club including Froggy. Everything is finally looking up for Virginia and to top it off, at the end of the story Froggy asks Virginia to kiss him in public for the first time in front of all of their friends.

I think what the author of this book is trying to say is that you should always do what makes YOURSELF happy because at the end of the day, it's your life to live and no one else's. Virginia lived her whole life always trying to gain approval and acceptance from her parents by doing what she thought they wanted but she never received that acceptance from them. However, when Virginia finally realized her self worth and started making her own decisions on what she thought was right for herself on her own, that's when she started gaining that respect from not only her parents but also from all of the other people around her. I really enjoyed reading this book and would recommend it to any teenage girl to read! Most teenage girls suffer from body image issues and even if a teenage girl hasn't, every teenage girl has some problem or struggles that they are dealing with in their life.

 Do you think you could relate to Virginia in any way? Why or why not?

The Middle: The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things

In the middle section of The Earth, My Butt, and Other Round Things, a lot of huge and somewhat devastating things happen to Virginia. First, she decides to go on a new diet which causes her to basically starve herself and hurt her own body. Then, she finds out that her older brother Byron, the one she has always looked up and adored since she was a kid, was kicked out of his college for date raping a girl named Annie Mills and has to move back home. This incident also caused her to ward off anything sexual or anything to do with boys for that matter which resulted in her telling Froggy to flake off. She was distancing herself from everyone and letting all of these problems affect her more than she should have. If I was in her place, yes I would take it hard but I don't think I would let it affect me as much as she let it affect her. While I was reading I just kept thinking, "Why is she THIS upset over her brother being kicked out of college?" and I know the answer. It made her see Byron for what he really is and what he is isn't perfect like she always thought. However, she should have taken this information and benefited from it instead of letting his faults bring her down. She always felt like she never belonged in her perfect little family but now she's able to see all of the real imperfections shine through. When her family never showed any real emotion about the incident or always referred to Byron date raping a girl as his "ordeal" she could also see that her mother and father, especially her mother, always scraped things like this under the rug so that they could APPEAR to be the perfect little family that they in fact are not.

Virginia's grades started to slip in school and she wasn't able to focus on her school work as much. She kept cutting school and going off and venturing on her own unbeknownst to anyone else. She totally cheated on her new diet because food was the only thing that she knew would keep her sane for the time being. Things for her felt like they were spiraling out of control. She just couldn't snap out of this funk. This was Virginia's breaking point. Her mother's constant comments about Virginia's weight just made her all the more stressed out than her family even knew that she was.

If I was Virginia, I would have handled this a lot differently than she did. She always kept quiet and never let herself speak her mind whenever her mother made an insulting comment about her body or when her mother would always say "How about we try Salon Z instead?" which is a plus sized clothing store for teenage girls instead of letting Virginia shop in the regular teen section. I would have stepped up to my mother and told her that I could handle my weight and my body on my own because it's truly none of her business especially since I'm already healthy. I think that Virginia would feel better if she realized her worth and realized that she deserves to be treated like a real human being and not an object that needs to be "fixed." Has someone in your family ever negatively commented on your body? If so, how did that make you feel and how did you respond? If not, how would you feel and how would you respond?

The Beginning: The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things

 For my first SSR book, I started reading The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things. I am currently on page 80 out of 246 pages of the entire book. This book is about a 15 year old girl named Virginia Shreves who is a little over weight for her age. No teenage girl wants to be considered overweight but what makes it harder for Virginia is that she comes from a "perfect" looking family. Her mother is a gym junkie and is constantly working out and eating healthy. Her older brother Byron is popular and very attractive and she also has a very attractive and slim older sister named Anais. She likes this boy named Froggy who comes over every Monday and all they do is make out in her room when no one is home. However, outside of her room, they do not communicate nor are they ever seen with each other in public. Virginia has learned to accept this because she thinks just as badly about herself as she thinks everyone else does as well. For the beginning part of this book, Virginia explains what it's like being an over weight 15 year old at a school full of perfect skinny girls who think they are better than everyone else. Virginia's best friend Shannon has recently moved away and now Virginia is left to bear the terrible days of high school all by herself. She eats by herself in the bathroom and one day while she was in there, she heard Brie, Briar, and Brinna, the three most popular and perfect girls in her school, talking. They started to talk about Virginia's older brother and how Brie was flirting with him on the train over the weekend. The thought of this made Virginia sick but what they said next made her feel like her stomach was gonna fall out. They mentioned her name and referred to her as the "chubby girl" but that's not even the worst part. After a moment Brie says "All I can say is, if I were that fat, I'd kill myself."

This made Virginia feel the lowest she has ever felt. On top of that, her parents start pressuring her about her weight and wanting her to go on a diet. Her mom takes her to a new doctor and even though she is heavier for her age, all of her tests come back that she is perfectly healthy. Even though she is healthy, the doctor still recommends that she go on a diet. This diet basically turns into Virginia starving herself and restraining from eating any type of real food.

Do you think that starving herself is the best way for Virginia to lose weight and be more happy with herself and her body? Do you think Virginia's mom should be more worried about her daughter's health rather than looking perfect like the rest of the family? Why or why not?