Okay, so last week I posted a distorted photo of myself and we laughed and joked about it but here's the deal. As Kristen said in her comment, this is a real thing and it isn't a joke and ummmm yeah. There's only one difference between how I really see myself and that photo. If I were to post what I really think I look like, the photo would be the same minus the bust. The bust would be flatish.
I posted the photo because this is something I fight everyday. I hate seeing myself in the mirror or in photos because that is what I see. Logically I tell myself that it is distorted but I can't make myself believe it!
My bathroom scale broke. I haven't bought a new one. I've always had a bathroom scale and have stepped on it religiously every morning and several times through out the day keeping an eye on my weight. Me not running out and buying a new scale and going without for several months makes it sound like I am taking a healthy step when in fact I've not bought one because I am terrified to step on the scale because I know that since my scale broke I'm sure I've gained ten pounds or more.
One can argue that that is not true but that is where my distorted thoughts are and I don't want to see it confirmed. The fact that my pants that I had bought which were fat pants are now tight tells me. I don't need a scale to confirm that which I can see and know.
Real fears. If I become obese will people still like me and want to be my friend? Shallow. I know. But real.
I've been working on my distorted image and thoughts about myself. Believe it or not......... It's a process though and like all processes, some days I'm better at it than others. I need to be healthy not just physically, but mentally also. As in how I view myself. And so it goes.........
Oh, Rachel, I am right there with you. It doesn't matter a bit to me what the scale says (-30lbs since January) or that I can fit in smaller clothes....every single time I see myself in a mirror I SEE the fatter me.
ReplyDeleteI try to just keep telling myself that I am healthy and I am taking care of my body, but boy would I like to feel like I look good.
And I wasn't kidding either when I said I was feeling anxious about meeting you and Kristen in person and being the chubba in the bunch....wondering if you will like me in person....
I felt this way exactly when I MET my little husband after having met him online and that worked out OK.
Dear Lord, what is wrong with us????? Victims of media and culture? I want Rubenesque to be fashionable. He's the guy who painted the voluptuous ladies, right?
Oh dear.
I love you for exactly who you are at any given moment, my friend. Because when someone is my friend, I'm friends with the whole package. I'm sure that my saying that you are beautiful and fashionable will not change your own opinion of yourself. But that is what I honestly think.
ReplyDeleteReally, I could go on about other misconceptions and fears that I have, some which match yours, but the comment section on your blog is not really the time or place for it.
You're a hottie-pashotie. Own it, girl.
Aargh! My self image is distorted, too. I've lost 40 pounds since February, and for several months I saw a slimmer, trimmer me in the mirror, then one weekend, all of a sudden, the fat girl image was back. I remember being confused that on Friday I felt beautiful, but on Saturday I felt frumpy. I'm slim enough that people are commenting. At my daughters' request, I put my wedding dress on last week for my anniversary . . . and it zipped up perfectly. But for some terrible reason, I still see a blubbery, shapeless person when I look in the mirror. It makes me sad. It makes me sad for you, too. Here's hoping we both find truth.
ReplyDeleteRachel, I just want to know that what I see is a beautiful person - inside AND out... :-)
ReplyDeleteYes, I think this particular thing can be traced right back to the media and the world we live in. They did studies in Pacific Islands where the culture valued an ample body - until American television came along. Within a generation young women were experiencing anxiety and depression because of their bodies, when that had never existed before. The thing is, if we were more invested in the happiness and welfare of people around us, we wouldn't have time for self-worry. I say that, but I know few people as truly kind and invested as you are. So I'm left not knowing quite how to respond. I know that I don't see people as they actually are physically. Extremes I notice. And I do see the outside when I don't know the inside. But I tend, I have learned, to see the whole package, sorta. I realized once that people like Roger, who I've known since about 1976 - when I look at him, I see him as I first knew him - I see the expressions on his face, and he's still young to me. I had to force myself, one day, to see differently - I said to myself, "If I were one of his kid's high school friends, coming over to hang at the house for the first time, what would I see when I look at this dad?" And when I looked at him then, that's when I realized that what I see is not the fact of what's physically there = because Roger just looked like a grown-up - I was actually able, for that second, to separate his personality and our history from what I was seeing, and I was kinda shocked at the diff.
ReplyDeleteBut that was only for that false second. I wasn't seeing the truth. The truth is the humor and the history and the shared experience and jokes - the truth is the heart of the person mixed with that LOOK you know they're going to get if you say this snarky thing - or if you tell them a sad story. The truth has little to do with BMA or wrinkles. It's the spirit.
Some people, I worry about their weight because I worry about their health. You, I worried about your thinness for the same reason. A little weight on the bones is not a bad thing. You almost look like a normal, responsible adult now instead of a skinny twelve year old. This is a good thing and explains why your "fat" pants (which I could not get into, much less zip up - and I'm not exactly plump, myself) are feeling like you fill them. I'd love you exactly the same if you were a blimp. I'm making myself giggle at the thought of it.
Mirrors make us short-sighted. We don't even see ourselves in them the way other people see us. I'll have to find the article I read about that. The thing you are going to have to come to terms with is that the people who know you, who look at you from the outside in, think you are beautiful. And maybe you just need to except that and not insult their taste by clinging to the distortion in your dang head. Maybe we think that humility means denying our virtues or something. Or that looking for the worst in ourselves is somehow honorable. But all it really is is navel-gazing, and maybe there's a reason why the Lord wants us to think about other people more than we think about ourselves, eh?
So why don't you just turn the job of looking at YOU over to me and the SM and the rest of us. We can handle it. You have enough on your plate. You're fired. You no longer have the job.
Yay I have internet again and look at the first post that pops up! I can totally relate to you and how you feel, I don't own scales as when I did I spent all my time jumping on and off them and then beating myself up over what I weighed because it didn't 'fit the mold' and I was never big. Now I go by my clothes and if I am feeling bigger I cut out the sugar for a bit until my jeans don't feel so tight. I hated photos of myself for ages and see a distorted view of myself in the mirror but I have to say since I have been doing Instagram and posting many photos a day of anything and everything including myself I seem to be getting over the precious image I have of myself and am starting to see the many different faces of myself and my body....get yourself a smart phone and get on IG and start to have some fun with your body, its the only one we have got and really its only the package that all the good stuff comes in. Hugs xx
ReplyDeletei live for kristen's comments.
ReplyDeletei want to print it and make it small enough to fit in my scripture case.
I don't have the answers. I know that everyone deals with this in one form or another. Logically and spiritually I know that we are all children of our Father in Heaven and that the 'one' who didn't get a body wants us all to hate ours. I know who is behind this self destruction.
ReplyDeleteSome days I am better at fighting it than others. It is a constant fight though......... and no, the media does't help any. Not that I am caught up in the media......... I get caught up in others getting caught up in the media and thinking they are judging me by those standards. If any of this makes sense.
I'm not talking about The SM. But you know how it goes........... no matter how many times our loved ones tell us we're beautiful, they like us the way we are, etc. I tend to think that of course they'd tell me that! They have to because they love me. :D More of that twisted thinking.......
I'll work on it if y'all work on it too yes? Deal!
Deal!
DeleteI was just reading about this, in the Life of Pi perhaps, about how as soon as we write something we distort it. Introduce an element of invention. Or something like that. Maybe a similar thing happens in gazing at our reflection.
You are beautiful. And brave and strong to write about this. And I say that clearly and as it is. No distortion.
sorry, but there's no way you can end up being obese while training for a marathon ;)
ReplyDeleteThat's what is buggering me! I'm running like crazy and still gaining like crazy! UGH!
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