Practical Magic
Big fat thanks to Jenfu and Weetabix for picking up the slack during my unexpected and extended hiatus. Regular posting will resume soon, I promise!
In the meantime, I’ve been dipping back into the Fatosphere feed and loved The Rotund’s post this morning about getting used to seeing your body from many different angles.
An anonymous commenter in my personal journal expressed, in an anonymous secrets meme, that they were cool with how their body looked in the mirror but they saw a photo of themselves sitting down, taken from the side, and they could not recognize themselves.
Oh, man, do I sympathize. You get used to seeing one vision of your body and when you’re presented with an alternate view, it can really blindside you.
That’s because we carry a certain image of ourselves in our heads. We have this “normalized†vision and anything that deviates from that? It’s a shock.
The key to combating this, though, is to normalize those other views. What do I mean? I mean, check out your other angles.
She goes on to give advice that is actually kind of brilliant. I love practical advice that can help us accept our bodies.
Posted by mo pie
Filed under: Fat Positive, Meta, Tidbit
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This is good advice. I wanted to say thank you to everyone at this website, and in the size-positive community. I broke up with Weight Watchers this week, after a 20 year relationship, and sites like this are helping me find my way. It feels crazy but good!
It’s difficult to feel good for yourself when you live in a society that demands a certain standard. I’m torn, myself, between size acceptance and the health I’d like to have to carry me onward to see my children grow up.
It’s rough.
Jenni, congratulations! Learning to live diet-free is a big step. It can be a bit scary, but it really is a happier, healthier place to be.
Simon, read a few articles at Junk Food Science or this article: http://kateharding.net/but-dont-you-realize-fat-is-unhealthy/ at Shapely Prose. The fat = death/thin = healthy dichotomy is largely mythological. You can be fat and still live to see your grandchildren grow up. You can be thin and die tomorrow…and vice versa. The assumption that one single body shape is the only way to be healthy and thus live forever is magical thinking.
Take care of yourself by eating a variety of foods with good nutritional value, get regular exercise that makes your body and soul feel good. Chances are, you’ll be fine, barring accidents or a genetic predisposition to a particular fatal disease or condition.
Even if your life doesn’t wind up being one of the long ones, easing up on the anxiety of maintaining body hate will leave your kids with happier, more valuable memories of you. Not only that, it will leave them with healthier relationships with their bodies and the foods they eat.
I totally relate to this. Luckily, I’ve been absolved of enough of the “thin is the only good way to be” myth that even when my first instinct was to cringe when I see myself from an “unflattering” angle…I then think about all my friends who love me and truly think I’m beautiful, and they see me from every angle all the time.
Plus, recently I went to a wedding with one of my best friends who is very very thin. We went through the photos from her camera together later that night, and we were both being super harsh on our photos in different ways, while at the same time each of us was trying to help the other know that she is beautiful from all those different angles, and to be nice to her body. It’s really not just a fat/thin thing. My friend kept saying her neck looked funny in this picture, or her chin looked too manly here, or whatever.
This post is good advice for the fat and thin and everyone in between. :)
Welcome back Madame Pie!
I have a ceiling to floor mirror in my house (it’s near where the door is, to look at ourselves before leaving the house I guess) and I used to hate looking into it back when I was battling bulimia. Right now in recovery, I use it as a healing tool. I make it a point to look at myself at different angles – lying down, bending down, in silly poses, artsy nudemodel poses, while dancing to music, etc. I sometimes don’t like what I see, but most of the time now, I do. It’s a process, and even though it took some time, I feel like it was worth every minute.
Twistie: That’s just the thing. I don’t hate who I am – my body and how I look. But I don’t get the exercise I need, and I don’t eat right. Or didn’t. I’m changing that, and the result has been some weight loss. Will I reach a preset goal? Will that goal make me thin?
The answer to the first is yes. I want to reach that goal, and I will work to do it. As for the other question, though, I honestly don’t care if I’m ever “thin”. When I was in high school, bench pressing 250 pound sets, I weighed about 230 and was a bit chunky. I’d be happy with that body again, because I had the energy to do what I needed. The current man I am – 500 pounds – is bloated and doesn’t do what he needs.
So yeah, I’m making a change, but I’ll likely always be a big guy.