Do fat people really smile more and happier?

Your mother seems to confuse smiling a lot with being happy or jolly, but there may be some logic at the root of your confusion. The jolly fat person is so much a stereotype that there has to be some truth to it. The trouble is, the jolliness, the smiling, and the joking of fat people are usually a defense, a way of saying “Like
me even though I’m fat and unattractive. I can still make you laugh.”

In a sense, they are trying to buy affection with a smile because they feel so uncertain of their own physical attractiveness. If this is where Sandra’s at, then you’re right in your feeling that she’s not all that jolly.

However, not all fat people smile, nor are they all jolly. Many are just as serious, just as unhappy, and just as unpleasant as their leaner cousins. There is nothing
in the physical makeup of a fat person to incline him to jolliness. The clue lies in his psychological makeup.

The body language message he sends out is usually one of desperation, a mask to cover up the hurt dealt with him by an unsympathetic world.

In some cases, such people stay fat for these very reasons, to create a mask to hide their inner selves. “If you never see the real me, you can’t hurt that me,” they seem to be saying, as they hide behind their layers of fat.

If Sandra is like that and you truly love her, your good feelings for her and your respect for her as a person behind the fat may help her control her mixed-up image.