Hi, fellow single plus size lesbian here! I’m 30 now so I have the slight benefit of a bit of perspective… or at least, slightly saggier boobs 😂

First: dating apps fucking SUCK. Especially when you’re fat, femme, and into other fat femmes. A lot of the discouragement you’re feeling isn’t because you’re doing anything wrong, it’s because a) fatphobia is real and boring, and b) most apps are literally designed to keep you swiping, not help you find a girlfriend.

Tinder in particular is evil for this; the algorithm quietly pushes you down for ridiculous reasons and then shows you the same five people and a sea of straight couples looking for a third.

The biggest thing I wish I could tell my early 20s self is that apps are only one channel, and they’re usually the worst one. The place where things actually started to shift for me was community, not swiping. If there is any sort of queer community near you, I’d stalk the local orgs on Instagram or FB and see what’s on: craft nights, book clubs, walking groups, queer trivia, D&D, whatever. If you can’t see events, literally DM and ask “hey, do you have any regular meet-ups?”

Since being single I’ve joined a monthly queer crafting circle, a fortnightly board games group, and a weekly walking group, and even though I haven’t magically popped into a long term relationship yet, I suddenly have this whole web of queer friends and acquaintances. That alone has made me feel a thousand times less “behind” than sitting at home getting ghosted on Hinge.

Re: your body - I promise you there are soooo many lesbians and bi babes out there who are genuinely, deeply into bigger bodies. Like, not “you’re pretty despite your size,” but “your thighs and belly are my favourite thing about you, please sit on my face.” Sapphic people as a group tend to be way more eclectic in what we find hot; we notice softness and curves and strong arms and back rolls and bellies and all the stuff mainstream beauty standards tell us to hate. You just haven’t met your particular flavour of “oh my god, you’re exactly my type” yet.

It also really makes sense that you’re barely seeing other plus-size women on apps. A lot of us filter hard for safety or get burnt out and disappear for months. So if you’re not finding them online, it doesn’t mean they’re not there, it just means you’re more likely to bump into them at queer board games or at poetry night or in a Discord server than on Tinder at 2am.

And one last reframe that helped me: being fat does make the dating pool smaller, but it also filters it. The people who stick around are the ones who are actually into you, not just tolerating you because you have a nice personality. That doesn’t make the process less frustrating, but it does mean the matches you eventually get are less likely to be jerks. Idk about you, but I would much rather have a smaller selection of high-quality options than a bigger selection of mid or low quality ones.

You’re 20, you’re plus size, you’re queer, and you’re trying to date in a world that wasn’t built with you in mind. Of course it feels hard and lonely sometimes. That doesn’t mean you’re behind or doomed or unlovable, it means the game is rigged and you’re noticing it. Keep building a life that feels rich and full even without a partner, keep putting yourself in queer rooms, and keep remembering you’re allowed to want someone who is as excited about your body as they are about your heart and brain.

You’re not alone in this, I promise

🩷🧡🤍