The 5 Worst Things About Being Short

Yesterday I shared with you what i thought was the best stuff about being Short. It turns out, being short has some drawback, too. Here are my top 5 worst things about being 5'00 and under.

1. The Armpit

So you're standing in the bus. There's no place left to sit. Around you are many commuters, and everyone is packed together like sardines. They cling to the tops of the railings, you try and hold onto the post in front of you - and you catch a whiff of the most putrid, sweaty, uncleaned armpit you have ever smelled. An arm is extended right about you. You turn your head down. Riding the bus, you live in the pits.

2. The Friendly neighborhood Arm Rest

You're talking with friends, as you do. It's a nice day, all the birds are signing, the sun is out and nice and warm. Suddenly, a shadow blocks out the sun. A weight is applied to your head. You know immediately what has happened.
You have become an arm rest.
The person next to you leans casually on your shoulder or head, chatting amicably with your friends. Like a friend leaning on a friend, this not new: but as a giant using his short friend as a walking stick, you start to feel yourself shrinking away.

3. The Worst Angle

Have you ever told someone "You've got a cold coming on" before they even knew?
Everyday, you look up to your friends, chatting with them as casually as you can under the circumstances. You know their every booger. As the light hits their makeup, you see their every poorly blended seam. You see your male friends trying to grow a mustache. You see your female friends trying to hide theirs. It's tough, living life from below.

You know you're short when every evening you need to apply arnica gel to your neck from having looked up all day. Why does everyone have to be so much taller than me?

4. The BMI Inconsistency

I'm 5'00 tall. To be healthy, I need to be 120 pounds TOPS to be healthy. My taller friends? They get an extra 40 pounds wiggle room! My portions are smaller than theirs, and I need to be more careful what I eat, because it SHOWS!

5. The Three step

You've probably all experienced this at some point. Your friends are walking, chatting, and you exhaust yourself keeping up, taking three steps for every one of theirs. Soon, you're almost running to keep up. Shorter legs are  pretty inefficient.

There are many more. The feelings of inadequacy. The feelings of shrinking, or of being invisible. Every day I have to deal with jokes that hurt me more than I can say. People have told me it's my fault, that i never ate enough vegetables, or soup in some cases, while I was growing up. But it's nothing more then genetics, and I have no control over that.

And I can't do my dream job of being an astronaut, because I am too short for NASA's requirements.
I will never got to space, because I didn't grow an extra two inches.
I've stopped waiting for a second growth spurt. It's never going to come.

Being short had many drawbacks, but the benefits help to balance that out. So to all those short people out there: keep enjoying the leg room!

Love,
Sarah