I had heard about the upset airlines were causing by charging their larger passengers for an extra seat, but it hadn’t happened to anyone I knew. That is, until last Sunday morning.

My first Southwest flight was a 3.5 hour stretch from Oregon to Chicago. I arrived early as always, checked my bags, went through security, and got to my gate. I was sitting a stone’s throw from gate with about 45m to spare when one of the airline staff walked up and sat right next to me.

“Do you have a ticket for this flight?” he asked. I had no idea what was going on. My first thought was they might have oversold the flight and were going to offer me something above what they normally did for giving up my seat and didn’t want to make an announcement. I was excited because I didn’t need to be there as early as I’d planned and that meant Ivy would have a freebie trip somewhere.

“Yes sir, I do.” I said, ready to hear about my proposed reward.

“Well there’s a policy that if you don’t fit comfortably in a seat with the arms down that you’ll have to buy a second ticket. Do you think you can?” he asked.

I felt sick. There were 100 things I would have said had I not kicked into self-preservation mode. I just wanted the exchange to be over.

“Yes, I can sit in a seat with the arm down.” I said, hoping he would accept it on my word and go away. Of course it wouldn’t be comfortable, but I’d taken full flights before and sat squished into a seat with the arms down. I even made a game of it in my head—I’d pretend I was in a space craft designed for a smaller being. If I got too uncomfortable I could always stand for a bit at the back of the plane; no problem.

“It’s a 4 hour flight. You can sit comfortably with the arms down for the entire flight?” he asked, doubt in his voice. Still gripped with embarrassment I couldn’t even think straight.

“Yes, I can.” I reiterated.

“Okay, we’re going to take you down to the plane shortly to let you get settled and make sure.” he said, finally.

I felt mad, embarrassed, and scared all at once. I made my living traveling. There was no way I could ask my company (or the customer) to eat a second ticket because I was overweight. I worked out what a second last-minute ticket for this flight was going to run me and felt sick.

He came back and took me down to the plane. I stuffed my carry-ons into the overhead and slid into the middle seat, pulling down the arms and showing that I could indeed squish myself between them. At that point I got a bunch of “we’re sorry, but you understand I’m sure” from the attendant who brought me up and the ones working the flight.

So, now you know someone who has come close to getting charged for a second ticket.

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