Ever since Gayla Neufeld was a child, she’s always been heavy. In fact, her flab has been her biggest shame growing up. Today, however, she’s embracing her fats—all 96 inches of flabby tummy.
The 52-year-old has done more than just accept herself. In fact, she is now happily married to a man who loves every inch of her and has encouraged her to use her asset to launch an unlikely career as a model.
Scroll down for video
Gayla is now an international webcam model who entices men with her size. She shared, “Growing up, I used to be ashamed of my belly, but now I have a great following of men who really like it. There have been men from all over the world. I have had doctors, lawyers, and even bodybuilders, lots of bodybuilders, approach me, which really amazed me.”
She continued, “They tell me it’s the perfect belly. They say it’s not marred or scarred and that they love the shape of it because it is a single belly. Some larger women they have a double-layer or a two-tier belly, but mine is a single. That is really attractive to a lot of men.”
Despite her confidence, Gayla had to struggle to accept her body shape for years, especially considering her family’s genetic legacy. She shared, “Women in my family have always gained weight around the belly, especially after having children. My mum was fat and my favorite sister was fat, as were my grandparents, my grandmother, and my great-grandmother.”
Claiming to love homemade cookies and ice cream, the 52-year-old shared that she was bullied as a child because of her weight. She said, “Growing up, kids at school would point and laugh at me and say ‘Boom, boom, boom’ with every step I took. I was really ashamed to be fat.”
By the time she was eight, she started piling more weight, continuing up to her teens. Her curves made her popular with the boys in high school, but it still made her embarrassed. Still, she was married by the time she was 19 and started battling her weight.
Unfortunately for Gayla, she couldn’t maintain her weight loss and kept herself between 300 and 400 lbs. Her confidence diminished even further when her husband said he’s embarrassed by her and divorced her in 1999.
Down in the dumps, she found a community of obese women online who called themselves SBBWS (super-sized big beautiful women), and they were worshiped by men who called themselves fat admirers.
Curious, Gayla joined one of the forums and found herself with legions of lusty fans. “I realized I was desirable, I was sexy, I was beautiful, and I became confident in who I was. I had always thought the men who liked BBWs would be geeks in their mom’s basement, but I was totally wrong.”
This is also how she met her husband, Lance. After meeting at the Bulge Chat community, they enjoyed conversations and struck up rapport. They met the following week at a truck stop to have dinner, and the rest, as they say, is history.
The couple had to embark on a long-distance relationship as Gayla lived in Texas, and Lance in Manitoba, Canada. However, they finally married six years after they first met at the truck stop and both claimed to enjoy an “active and satisfying sex life” despite Gayla’s weight.
Still, there are some ordeals that they have to overcome. For instance, Gayla finds it hard to find clothes that will fit her, and when she goes on a plane, she has to book two seats. She also has a few health problems to deal with, including arthritis and thyroid problems, but she’s still positive about her future.
“As far as the health aspects go, I don’t really worry about them. My mother is still alive and she is 82,” Gayla explained. “I have had doctors tell me more then once that I needed to lose weight for health reasons, but I truly believe that when it is your time to go, it is your time to go.”
Lance, on the other hand, loves his wife, with or without fats. If in any case she decides to lose weight, he said he’ll be behind her all the way. “This woman is the love of my life. I would 100 per cent support her if she decided to lose weight. The first thing that attracted me to her was she had the most beautiful face I had ever seen. The belly was just the bonus on top of all her other beauty.”
He added, “It doesn’t matter to me whether it is bigger or smaller because it’s not really her belly I love—I love her.”
For now, Gayla is still going strong with her online modeling, and she’s planning on winning over more fans. This, she said, is a way to enjoy herself. She admitted, “I allowed the world to dictate to me what I was supposed to look like and who I was supposed to be. By taking a body-positive image, I have empowered myself to be who I am and to enjoy my life. I’m not going to tell you that I never have bad days and I am not going to tell you that I don’t wish I was thin from time to time, but mostly I just enjoy being me.”
She left with an inspirational note, “You’ve got to love who you are.”