What It Really Means To Be The D.U.F.F. Of Your Squad

The Duff
The Duff

I never knew I was a D.U.F.F. until I saw the movie The Duff.

It was not much of an awakening. I knew I was a duff long before watching the movie. But I never knew my situation had a name.

Let me explain.

You see “D.U.F.F.” stands for “the designated ugly fat friend” kind of blunt right?

I’ve never really considered myself “ugly”. Sure I have my insecurities, I have tons of them actually… But I have my confident moments, sometimes… For the “fat” part, well let’s just say that I weigh as much as a toothpick. I’m not “fat”, if you didn’t get the metaphor.

Now you might wonder why I consider myself “the designated ugly fat friend” if I’m neither fat nor ugly. Well, first off, I don’t consider myself “the designated ugly fat friend”, it is just what I seem to be.

Let me explain.

You see I’ve had a couple of friends during my twenty-one years on this earth. And I have noticed that I get as much attention as a bat. I’m not sure how much attention a bat gets but what I meant is that I don’t get any attention. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not an attention-seeking person. Actually, I’m quite fine with staying out of the spotlight because I’m a tiny bit shy and awkward so if I get attention I feel quite embarrassed. Plus I’m not used to the attention so it’s something that I have to work on if it ever happens to me. Anyway, I’m rambling. What I meant is that with each and every one of my friends or group of friends, I have always been the D.U.F.F. I’ve always been the more approachable one or the one people would go to in order to get in touch with her friends or the one that is slightly less good looking.

Here are a few examples of things that happened to me that confirms my D.U.F.F. title:

1. Once I had a group of friends, I was about 14–15 and people would tend to forget that I was even there.

2. Once I had a friend that was really pretty. We went to a party when a guy asked “where do you guys live?” I answered and I was told “yeah but you, we don’t care”.

3. My most recent examples is probably the cherry on top of the cake: I had a guy friend and we were pretty close. And I had a best girl friend (actually she’s still my best friend as we speak). And loooooong story short my guy friend thought that he could have a shot at my best girl friend, so basically he used me to get closer to my friend.

I think those examples are good enough. Other examples are all the same, basically people would talk to me only to get closer to my friends or people would be more interested in talking to my friends rather than talking to me.

But this is not a complaint story. I am not here to complain. Truth be told, I don’t care if I’m a D.U.F.F. But I would be lying to myself if I didn’t acknowledge the situation.

Now, unlike the movie, I don’t dress like the main character. In fact, I quite like clothes. I don’t ever dress for others. I just like wearing nice clothes that I really love and that I can feel fabulous in. I do put on a little bit of make-up, but not much because make-up is such a hard art! I have no idea how other women do it…

Me when I try to do a good “professional” make-up. #CloseEnough

So unlike the movie, I am not a D.U.F.F. because I don’t even make any effort. I do make efforts, mostly for myself though… I do try to put myself out there. I do try to talk to others, sometimes, but you know with the shy thingy it’s pretty hard… I do go out with my friends to dance and have fun. Actually, dance is the one thing I love to do and I know I can do. People have complimented me on this. But even if I sometimes get “attention”, people are still more interested in my friends. But I don’t mind. Because I have the love of the people that really matter in my life. And I know that one day someone will be interested in getting to know me because they want to, not because they want to talk to my friends. So until then I will keep on having fun with my friends. If other people see me as my friend’s D.U.F.F., I don’t really care. They have the right to be interested in my friends. They have the right to not be interested in me. That’s ok. I’m ok with it. I just need to be careful not get used or walked all over though… Thought Catalog Logo Mark

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