Whitney Way Thore is in love and happy to tell the world all about it. But while living in the spotlight is a natural fit for the reality TV star, it doesn’t come so easily for her boyfriend.
So when the 37-year-old shares details about him or photos of him on television or with her fans and followers on social media, out of respect for him, his name remains private and his face is censored from the shots.
But that seemingly respectful solution has resulted in some deeply disrespectful comments being hurled Thore’s way.
(Be sure to click or swipe through to see all images in the set.)
“I wish I could put this relationship into words, but honestly, it’s all been a blur,” the star of TLC’s “My Big Fat Fabulous Life” joked alongside several photos of her and her beau, in which he’d been blurred out.
But jokes aside, Thore soon got serious as she moved on to the purpose of her latest Instagram post.
“(T)he amount of comments and DMs and tweets I’ve gotten from viewers assuring me that this man is embarrassed of me and does not care about me is confusing,” she explained.
To illustrate her point, in between the photos, she included grabs of the sort of messages she’s received since first sharing those shots in July.
“For Gods sake he’s embarrassed to be with you, lol,” one person wrote. “Get it through your thick skull.”
Another wrote, “He’s obviously not interested in you. You look so embarrassing it makes me laugh. ... When you flirt with him, it makes me uncomfortable.”
The relationship has seemed a bit one-sided at times to viewers of “My Big Fat Fabulous Life,” but on social media, she’s stressed how close they’ve become since taking their relationship out of the virtual world at into real the real world in Paris.
“I just spent 6 weeks with him in the planet’s most-visited country, and as you can see, we are clearly out in public at one of the world’s biggest tourist attractions…but because he doesn’t want his face shown on TV to millions of people around the world, he must be embarrassed of me?” she said of the French man who started out as her long-distance French tutor. “There’s a big difference between being in public with someone versus choosing to put your identity on display on the internet and TV for people to rip apart.”
She added that, “if he If he was ever doubting his decision to be anonymous,” that “comments like these only validate it.”
“Can’t y’all let someone be happy?” Thore continued. “I’ve had 8 serious relationships — the “public” has only seen 3 of them (I had 30 years of life before TV, imagine that!) and I’ve dated some sh---y dudes and had heartbreaks, but I also do not doubt that I have been loved deeply and fiercely and above all, I know that I deserve to be loved.”
She then used the opportunity to suggest that perhaps her haters actually have issues with self-loathing.
“If you feel that you can’t be loved because of your size or for any other reason, please don’t project that onto me,” she wrote. “Because I’m out here trying to enjoy myself and this person and what we have together.”