"The annoying thing [about CFC] is the techs are either incredibly skinny or fat. Either way, it's triggering because you want to be like the skinny ones and you'd rather die than be a fat one."
I knew what category I was in.
"I was having a panic attack and [a care tech] came up to me and suddenly, instead of worrying about my problems, I was looking at her thighs and thinking, 'This isn't fair. You have a thigh gap. You get to tell me what to do and boost me for not eating.' Tell me what is fair about that."
Ha, at least she doesn't compare my thunder thighs to hers.
"I just think that I have to be perfect in order to be well liked. I have to have the perfect body to get noticed. No one notices personality in a crowded room. They notice the size zeros. They notice the pretty ones. And personality is linked to perfect body, right?"
So, with that logic, one notices my personality because I'm a big girl.
I went to the doctor today, for a new appointment for an old diagnosis (read this blog post here). When he discussed reasons for the visit, he said "macroprolatinoma....vitamin D deficieny....excess weight."
Awesome. So a medical professional just told me I have "excess weight."
Society sucks.
The patients I work with ask me: How do you have positive body image all the time?
The answer: NO ONE DOES.
And I can accept that answer. I understand that because of societal influences, ads about slimming down, trying to get that bikini body...no one is ever satisfied. I can understand that being underweight and overweight is unhealthy. I can understand that a tight shirt on me makes me uncomfortable and I'd rather wear a baggy sweatshirt because no one will see my rolls. I can see the humor in a post that talks about "all I want is pizza" or "I'm just in a girl in a taco world." I can understand a medical professional being concerned with weight, especially if it's a life threatening situation. But what I don't understand is:
***NEWS FLASH***
THIS WILL NEVER HAPPEN.
I just typed into Google "studies on body image and self esteem." About 818,000 results in .50 seconds. When I looked up Google scholar...about 708,000 results in .12 seconds. AKA about 700,000 results that have been cited in scholarly articles. Are you kidding me? So the research is there. Comments about weight, dieting, exercising--there are 700,000 articles that tell us that this affects body image NEGATIVELY.
I opened up the first one titled: "Obesity stigmatization and coping: Relation to mental health symptoms, body image, and self esteem." The researchers performed two studies. "Study 1...ask[ed] obese people to list stigmatizing situations they had encountered and their ways of coping. Study 2: Obese patients were surveyed about the frequency with which they encountered each form of stigmatization and employed each form of coping." The results are shocking..."Study 2 found that stigmatization is a common experience, and that obese subjects frequently engage in some effort to cope with stigma."
Surprise surprise. Why do you think I see 13 year old girls in treatment for an eating disorder?
Because society is obsessed with weight. A celeb puts on weight?? Tabloids talk. A celeb loses weight? Tabloids talk. We go grocery shopping and walk to check out with all these nasty "scandals" about who wore it best and who has a flat stomach. And it's affecting self esteem in just about everyone.
The voices in my head have been attacking more often lately. A comment like what my doctor said offhandedly, I should be able to brush off, especially from a doctor. But instead, I'm sitting on my bed thinking...even if I changed my eating habits, even if I went on a run, would anything really change?
I'm not writing this post to get sympathy. If anyone comments saying, you're awesome, we love you... I'm writing this post because We Need Change. We need mothers who love their bodies. We need to teach our daughters that it's OK to have ice cream. We need to teach girls to celebrate weight changes when puberty hits. We need to change society. We need to change this idea of "perfection" because guess what? NO ONE IS PERFECT.
Maybe I'm just having a bad day. BUT to be honest, this is something I've thought about for a long time. I think about it A LOT, especially when I see people close to me looking for ways to change their bodies, people close to me skipping meals, people close to me counting calories, obsessively talking about exercise and clean eating.
Some will read this post and say, "Megan's obsessed because she works at CFC." I write this post asking for some change. And yeah, it's a long shot. But I'm happy in my body because it's not worth the stress and time to worry about perfection. Life will pass you by and one day, you'll realize you've wasted a great life worrying about being perfect. Good luck to you.
And I can accept that answer. I understand that because of societal influences, ads about slimming down, trying to get that bikini body...no one is ever satisfied. I can understand that being underweight and overweight is unhealthy. I can understand that a tight shirt on me makes me uncomfortable and I'd rather wear a baggy sweatshirt because no one will see my rolls. I can see the humor in a post that talks about "all I want is pizza" or "I'm just in a girl in a taco world." I can understand a medical professional being concerned with weight, especially if it's a life threatening situation. But what I don't understand is:
why do we put so much time and energy into reaching this idea of being "perfect?"
THIS WILL NEVER HAPPEN.
I just typed into Google "studies on body image and self esteem." About 818,000 results in .50 seconds. When I looked up Google scholar...about 708,000 results in .12 seconds. AKA about 700,000 results that have been cited in scholarly articles. Are you kidding me? So the research is there. Comments about weight, dieting, exercising--there are 700,000 articles that tell us that this affects body image NEGATIVELY.
I opened up the first one titled: "Obesity stigmatization and coping: Relation to mental health symptoms, body image, and self esteem." The researchers performed two studies. "Study 1...ask[ed] obese people to list stigmatizing situations they had encountered and their ways of coping. Study 2: Obese patients were surveyed about the frequency with which they encountered each form of stigmatization and employed each form of coping." The results are shocking..."Study 2 found that stigmatization is a common experience, and that obese subjects frequently engage in some effort to cope with stigma."
Surprise surprise. Why do you think I see 13 year old girls in treatment for an eating disorder?
Because society is obsessed with weight. A celeb puts on weight?? Tabloids talk. A celeb loses weight? Tabloids talk. We go grocery shopping and walk to check out with all these nasty "scandals" about who wore it best and who has a flat stomach. And it's affecting self esteem in just about everyone.
The voices in my head have been attacking more often lately. A comment like what my doctor said offhandedly, I should be able to brush off, especially from a doctor. But instead, I'm sitting on my bed thinking...even if I changed my eating habits, even if I went on a run, would anything really change?
I'm not writing this post to get sympathy. If anyone comments saying, you're awesome, we love you... I'm writing this post because We Need Change. We need mothers who love their bodies. We need to teach our daughters that it's OK to have ice cream. We need to teach girls to celebrate weight changes when puberty hits. We need to change society. We need to change this idea of "perfection" because guess what? NO ONE IS PERFECT.
Maybe I'm just having a bad day. BUT to be honest, this is something I've thought about for a long time. I think about it A LOT, especially when I see people close to me looking for ways to change their bodies, people close to me skipping meals, people close to me counting calories, obsessively talking about exercise and clean eating.Some will read this post and say, "Megan's obsessed because she works at CFC." I write this post asking for some change. And yeah, it's a long shot. But I'm happy in my body because it's not worth the stress and time to worry about perfection. Life will pass you by and one day, you'll realize you've wasted a great life worrying about being perfect. Good luck to you.
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