Can I tell you a secret? Come closer. Closer. Here we go. I hate my body. Not all of it, just some of it, but that small 'some' has a profound effect on my Body Image. Growing up in the age of technology and photoshop I witnessed firsthand the false advertising of women's Skinny bodies throughout my adolescence. During high school I tried not to think about it, I had friends who were larger than my size 2 with AA breasts and a thigh gap, and I felt guilty for having even one slight against my body. It was when I came into the University life that my body image drastically plummeted.
Hidden hate
Every morning I'd find myself turning side to side measuring my belly bloat and love handles. Although I was steadily rising in weight at a healthy level with my late blooming curves, I was blaming cafeteria and fast food and an inability to eat better.
In my second year, I gained twenty pounds, reaching the average weight of 135 pounds. My thigh gap vanished, my waist looked more like an hourglass with some flaws, and my boobs stayed tiny. Raising pounds and lowering self-esteem slowly enveloped my brain and when I gained another ten pounds during a major depressive episode I quit soda and sugar hoping by some miracle I'd somehow skinny up.
It is now my junior year in college. I've dropped back down to 135 thanks to a slightly healthier diet and occasional trips to the gym.
However, my self-esteem issues didn't vanish with the ten lost pounds. Recently I've been grabbing at my belly fat and sucking in my stomach more than usual. When I wear longer belly button rings I wish and wish with all my heart they would just float straight down with no fat bump in the way. I gave up fast food, went two weeks without it, ate it four days in a row immediately after, and a week and a half clean again.
Anytime junk food enters my system, I imagine it all as fat sticking to my stomach and fattening me up, making it impossible for me to ever hope for having the photoshopped body I see on social media every day.
Flat stomachs, thin waists, fit thighs, and perfect general shape blast profiles on my Instagram and Facebook. And even though I recognize the truth that they are often several women puzzled into one or that lighting and blemish tools can alter any kind of flaw, it doesn't stop me from comparing myself to the false images.
Social media and skinny culture are shoved down my throat on purpose and accident and I try to fight the negative feelings every day, but I still tend to end up unhappy with what I look like.
A movie's helping hand
I watch a variety of TV shows and movies on my Netflix account. Most recently I've discovered the film called "To the Bone." It follows the story of a struggling woman named Eli who suffers from anorexia. The movie is comical, heartbreaking, and heartwarming all wrapped up in just under two hours.
What Eli (Lily Collins) did for me was open to my eyes to the pain and experience others go through in life. Sometimes when I go eight hours without eating I wonder if one more hour, could be good for me.
Maybe it'll cut back on my fat. But then I watch the performances given by the actors in "To the Bone" and it gives me empathetic comfort to my situation.
"There is no thin enough," says the therapist in the first session of the movie. The power of the gentle tone in that line stays with me and I hit my cheek in surprise when I first heard it. Someone had finally said the truth I had been dying to hear for years. I, as I am, am technically thin and I can use the help of others and the story of Eli to push me along. I know it will take time, but as the characters in the movie also need months and years to help get better, so will I.
The ending scene of Eli's vision of death struck a chord in me and I remind myself that I have a strong will to live.
I have an intense desire to be happy and fulfilled in life, and I can't let my body image get in my way. I can live with what I've been given, and I can enjoy it all at once. I know there are people there for me, much like Eli has a small group of trusted friends and family for her. I'm not broken, I'm not disgusting, and sometimes I watch "To the Bone" whenever I'm feeling very down on myself because of the way it helps me feel, well, human.
