Earlier today I stumbled across the blog of an old friend from University. Not someone I was ever really close too, but always really liked. It was a candid, and slightly heartbreaking look into her struggles with her weight. What really struck me was her admission that at the time when I knew her she was battling feelings of self loathing with respect to her weight. When I look back on that time I remember envying her slight frame, easy smile and popularity. Who knew that behind all the things I was busy envying we had more in common than I would have thought possible? Certainly not me.
It made me wonder a few things. When does all this start, this breaking down of our inner-selves, in favour of our outward shells? At what point do we start worrying more about our bellies and less about our hearts? When do we start thinking that a tiny ass is more important than a beautiful soul? Are there women out there who are happy with their bodies? Really truly happy, when no one else is looking? Whether they are 110 lbs, or 250, are they out there?
For me, I know I feel best about myself when I am taking good care of myself... but that never stopped me from looking at a photo of myself and thinking "holy, look at that belly!" I'm dangerously close to becoming one of those women who refuses to have her picture taken, because they are hazardous to my self esteem. Stupid, I know. And yet I look back at pictures of myself a few summers ago, traveling overseas, where I can distinctly remember feeling like the only girl in all of Thailand wearing a one piece bathing suit, and now I think I looked great! I think of my time in Japan, the skinniest I've been in the last 10 years. I still felt like the biggest girl in every room, and maybe I was... but how stupid is it for me to have been comparing myself to Japanese women? I would have needed a time machine to take me back to 1992 to have evened out the playing field. But instead of appreciating how great I looked, I just compared myself to the other women around me. In truth there is always going to be someone thinner and someone bigger than me. Here's the thing: How is that relevant to my self esteem in any way shape or form? It's not, and yet it's somehow become the only bar by which I know to measure myself.
And then there is the question posed by my friend, probably the most important question in all of this... how do we stop ourselves from passing all this on to the next generation of little girls? If we can't bring ourselves to love them women we see in the mirror, how on earth can we expect them to?
One thing seems clear, there's so much more to this than just the weight we carry on our frames.
