As I write
this, I am having to deal with my own shame about my body, and I know it has
been destructive. There have been a couple of articles that have hit close to
home.
That one
was disturbing not just on its own but as part of a larger trend toward
fat-shaming infecting health care. Shame about your body is not helpful. If
there is any group that is not hampered by it, do not work against that, and
don't pretend it has anything to do with health and wellness.
The other
one was still worse:
It's not
even kids on the playground; it's the school nurse. BMI is not great science
anyway. It may not be completely useless, but I don't think it should be done
on pre-pubescent children. Their bodies are still growing and adjusting at
their individual paces, and this goes beyond ridiculous into evil territory. If
the child is does have weight issues that need addressing, you can know without
the BMI.
It hit
harder because six was the age when it happened to me. I was also an active,
healthy child, and I lost my ability to know that and hang onto it. The next
two posts are writing about how that happened.
Everything
that I had learned told me that fat was ugly, and I would use the word ugly to
describe myself, or not attractive if I needed to be less blunt, because
"fat" was so horrible that even saying the word was too emotional. The
first thing that I did was stop looking in mirrors.
I didn't
completely stop, because it was still necessary for brushing hair and some
basic things, but they started being really quick and cursory glances where I
was not really taking it in.
I did the
same thing with photos. We would get school pictures back, I would look and see
that they were ugly and quickly look away. Two years later, I would come across
them and think they weren't really that bad, but this year's photos were
horrible, and that cycle continued until I started hating pictures that were a
couple of years old too, because I was so fat.
It is easy
to believe that you are ugly, and easy to find reinforcement. In 4th grade
there was apparently a boy that liked my butt. That was a weird thing, that I
did not comprehend. In 6th grade there was a boy that called me Bubble Butt,
and that I understood. Even in the past few years, when guys have hit on me (which
has happened periodically) in my mind it indicated they had a fat fetish or
something gross like that. It couldn't be real.
The
thoughts that make it into your head are powerful. Being ashamed of them meant
that I didn't say my worst fears out loud. Someone might have contradicted them
then. I'm not sure if it would have helped, but I didn't really do anything to
fight it. To be worthy of love and acceptance I was going to have to lose
weight, and if you show an inclination toward that there is always someone willing
to support you and offer tips, reinforcing that clearly you were right all
along.
It is just
very unfortunate that weight loss is difficult, and dieting changes you
mentally. It's bad enough on its own, but when all of your future chances of
happiness depend upon it, that's a lot of pressure for someone who has already
learned to have a low opinion of herself.
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