CONTENT WARNING: Body image/disordered eating
Body stuff is fucking hard.
Societal pressures and beauty ideals lead us (womxn) to believe any struggles we have related to our weight are our fault. Too fat. Too thin. Too toned. Too flabby. You’re either too obsessed with how you look, and you’re overdoing it, or you’re too lazy to take care of yourself. Not only is it your fault, but most of your worth and confidence should and will be defined by it.
When I was 11 years old, I saw Titanic in the theaters (I just made half my readers feel incredibly old, and half my readers feel very young…I’m sorry and you’re welcome). One of the first “grown-up” movies I saw in a theater. I was electric with anticipation of seeing something so epic and romantic on the big screen. What I couldn’t have anticipated was my reaction to Kate Winslet.
At 11 years old, I was pushing 5’10”. Every middle school girl’s dream. To literally stand out. Most of my girlfriends were inches upon inches shorter and hadn’t started to fill out yet, and most of the boys hadn’t hit their growth spurts. Not only was I tall, but my body started to have shape. Not incredibly developed, but I had hips, a curve to my waist, and was out of the training bra phase of life. If you blurred out my baby face, I could easily pass for 16. A curse, not a blessing.
I was different; therefore, I wasn’t beautiful.
Enter Kate.
She was the most exquisite person I’d ever seen. I was completely taken by her; not just her beauty, but the confidence and ownership she had in being herself. And then there was the nude scene.
To this day, what I consider to be one of the most important and empowering nude scenes in a movie. I will die on this hill.
She looked like me. Well, okay, obviously Kate Winslet’s body at 22 looked very different from mine at 11. But remember, I was mostly surrounded by tiny girls my age, and coming of age in a society that thought “heroin chic” was a totally normal phrase to use when describing women’s bodies.
So no, I didn’t look like Kate. But I saw something of myself in her. And I thought she was stunning and strong. I was enamored and walked away feeling empowered, and that maybe I could be seen as beautiful too. (I also walked away with a crush on Bill Paxton…it’s like Leo wasn’t even there.)
Imagine my utter surprise when the media was offended by her nudity due to her size. How dare she show her body. How disgusting.
Now, no one should ever say those things about anyone’s naked body. But to tell an entire generation of young women and girls that KATE FUCKING WINSLET doesn’t meet your arbitrary & dehumanizing beauty standards…and then sit back and wonder why so many of us hate our bodies. Well, that’s just rich, isn’t it?
I’ve struggled with binge eating/overeating/food noise since I was a teenager. I can’t put this all on society’s bullshit issues with women; some of it stems from my ADHD and mental health issues. Regardless of the root, I thought about my body a lot in my teen years and into my twenties. My weight frequently yo-yoed.
Around my mid-twenties, I got more comfortable in my own skin. Part of this was due to gaining more confidence with acting and just feeling more established as a person. Right before I turned 30 (early 2016), I felt the most confident, attractive, and strong I ever felt in my body.
Then I experienced my sexual trauma and my body stopped being mine.
I walked around completely dissociated from my physical and sexual self. And as the C-PTSD settled in over the next few years – the combination of years of various forms of abuse piling up in my brain – my binge eating and overeating spiraled out of control. I completely stopped moving and kept on eating and eating.
In total, I gained about 100 pounds (May of 2020).
I hate to say this “out loud” because it is an awful, untrue, and harmful narrative, but it is how I felt, and I know I’m not alone in these kinds of thoughts…on some level I thought if I just kept growing it would make me unfuckable, and that would keep me safe.
The fast weight gain and lack of movement exacerbated my back injury, and my stamina went to shit. I’d get winded walking 3 blocks. I couldn’t stand in the shower for more than a few minutes because my back hurt so much. Me, the girl who had once walked the length of Manhattan with a friend. The girl who went on a hiking & camping trip in the Grand Canyon on a whim.
We are going to fast-forward 6 years now, because I know you’re all wondering when my life-partner, the treadmill, comes in.
Some quick highlights:
- I’ve lost about half the trauma weight but have struggled to lose the second half over the last few years. I frequently yo-yo in a 15-pound range.
- Ultimately, my blood pressure was affected by the number of unhealthy habits that spiraled out
- I also developed Type-2 Diabetes (which my genetics were just waiting for a reason to develop, so it wasn’t totally surprising, but it was a blow)
Between the issues above, as well as entering perimenopause, I have physically felt like crap the last couple of years. I entered this year, the year I turn 40, being fully committed to reclaiming my physical health.
I put together a new healthcare team to manage my general health, the diabetes, and the hormones. And got to work on trying new treatments.
It finally clicked in my head that these issues I have with my body aren’t personal failures of mine, or meant to be ascribed to any part of my worth as a person. I don’t need to dig myself out of my own hole all by myself. I can ask for and accept help and tools to get a handle on this. That’s not cheating or taking an easy way out.
None of this is fucking easy.
Most of this year I have been dealing with trying and adjusting different medications. It’s been a lot of trial and error. At one point I was in a great rhythm, rolling right along, and then I suffered a setback due to a delayed allergic reaction. And just like that, square one again.
I have not at any moment this year given up on committing to getting myself on the right path; but it has been exhausting and frustrating. Side effects, dashed hopes, so many appointments. What I am going through isn’t the worst thing a person could go through (or that I’ve gone through) – but it takes a lot to stay committed.
A clear piece to reclaiming oneself physically is moving more. And while for many months I was moving more consistently than I had in years, I wasn’t connecting to anything. Also, my energy levels have been all over the place as I get my treatment plan sorted. It was hard to stay engaged. And made even harder by the fact that I was very aware of how much my body has changed; how much I don’t feel like myself in this body. I feel more like myself in my mind and personality again – but my body, she’s still a stranger to me most of the time.
I couldn’t consistently meet my body where it was in workouts. I was constantly focused on how far I’d fallen from the young woman who went to the Grand Canyon on a whim, instead of how far I’d risen from the young woman whose brain and body went through hell and back again.
I was hitting a wall with my ability to keep hope alive on this health journey.
So, I called my mom to vent.
“Don’t get mad, but I have a suggestion…what if you got a treadmill? They make small ones for apartments, and you love walking.”
“I actually think that’s a great idea.”
After obsessively researching and measuring for a few days, I pulled the trigger (thanks for the support in the purchase, Mom & Dad).
For the last 11 days, I have spent 40-60 minutes per on my treadmill. I have not missed a day since setting it up. I have created a bunch of custom workouts at varying lengths and difficulties so I can meet myself where I am each day. I set the machine up where I have a wonderful and calming view. I blast my pop music and belt it out as I go. I look forward to getting on the machine every day – whether it’s to push myself, or clear my head, or a combo. I feel good on the machine. I recognize my body when I’m on it. I feel in control and free. I see my time on the treadmill as something I get to do, not something I have to do. After kissing a hundred workout frogs, I found my prince.
In the last 11 days, I’ve felt my happiest and most comfortable in my body in nearly 10 years. And it’s not because my body has magically lost the other 50 pounds, or all my health shit is now fully resolved. It’s because I found myself again in my body.
And if that isn’t something to celebrate loudly, endlessly, and obnoxiously, I don’t know what is.
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