8/4/23

I think it started with my childhood dog.

I would spend day after day and

nights stacked on nights 

crying at the thought of the day she’d die,

agonizing over each whisker gone gray.

I’d routinely hold her healthy body in my arms

and we’d commiserate over her impending death

on the kitchen floor weeping over her distant fate 

in the golden years of her life.

And then when The Day came

and the Bad Thing finally happened

I waved goodbye from a distance 

as her aching gray body was loaded into the trunk

and I looked away as her soft brown eyes searched for mine.

I stayed home when she went.

Afterwards, I stared at her threadbare bed with dry eyes.

Then I went on a walk and moved on within the mile.


I can recall it again from when I had my first love.

Too young, I’d sneak into the yard and sit in the soft rain

and fantasize about all the ways he could hurt me.

I would write pages of bad poetry 

about the miserable ache of betrayal not yet felt

and grieve love lost before it had begun to go,

and I’d channel the profound agony of Plath and Poe

in the tender age of teenagerdom.

And then when The Day came

and the Bad Thing finally happened,

I cut ties from a distance

and hence heeded polite tie-cutting scripts,

As my illusions of trust first began to unravel

and as my perception of self began to wobble.

Afterwards, I stared at the mirror’s new reflection with dry eyes.

Then I went to a friends’ and laughed at reality TV.

I think maybe pain was meant to be experienced 

like a film on the big screen or a rich song on vinyl.

Not muted or quelled, nor stomped out,

and please god no, not spoiled

by peeking ahead in the story and

trying it on for size prematurely.

And so I ask god, grant me well-timed tears

for when shit hits the fan,

wet eyes and ample angst when the Bad Thing comes,

but not a moment too soon as to ruin the ending -

grant me patience for pain.

Please, grant me patience for pain.

6/11/23

These days, so often, I miss her.

That funny little thing with round pink glasses and frilly bows

juxtaposed with a special affinity for coddling worms and snakes and toads.

She was so very confident, in herself and the goodness of the world.

Life was extraordinarily simple and delightfully sweet

with brother living just down the hall,

and spry grandparents who could still give underdogs on the swing

exhilarating enough to write home about.

Her body was just a vessel then,

for joy and mischief and wrestling and thumb wars

as she hadn’t yet looked in the mirror with revulsion

or pinched at her sides in loathing.

I miss her I miss her I miss her.


She didn’t worry about taking up space,

quite the opposite -

she was unapologetically loud and made herself so very big!

and sang and leapt and danced and chortled

with no sense of meekness to be found.

How lovely it was then, when people were inherently good -

she had not yet been stung by cruel words meant to cut

or yet felt the stomach churn along with an unwelcome touch.

Oh, I miss her I miss her I miss her.

In these recent years, I have played many parts.

I have been a drunk and a flirt

and a performer and a clown

and many versions of myself that pour confidence and charisma

from rather shallow cracks in my psyche.

I reach for her and yet I fall short of the raw nature of that her that child

The nonchalance of her humor and the earnestness of her nature.

In these moments increasingly so,

I miss her I miss her I miss her.

I miss how she played in and swung from the branches of the big oak tree by the red barn

and skinned knobby knees performing daredevil stunts of the razor scooter variety

and chattered with the cats back and forth all day with an ease of mutual understanding.

She knew exactly who she was

No inauthentic part to play but the occasional fantastical creature.

Unafraid of risk for its potential hurts

nor particularly concerned with whimsy-crushing notions such as logic or reason.

I miss her I miss her I miss her.

And as I yearn for her,

I feel her though with me in special moments here and there.

I feel her when I run barefoot through the grass on a cool summer evening

huffing and puffing, chest aching but laughing at the sheer joy of being alive.

Or when I dance around my kitchen with Toulouse the cat

honorable namesake of her favorite childhood character,

and him and I talk like old friends and, even sometimes exchanging favorite jokes.

I feel her when I lay flat on the ground and play with the strings of the carpet

while mom makes dinner in the next room over on short visits home,

or when I share big belly laughs with my dearest cousin

repeating the same jokes and howling louder each time,

cheeks aching from the sport of extreme grinning.

She is with me!

She is with me!

She is with me!

4/25/23

In this life,

I’ll sit in the sun with ice cold sweet tea sweating in my palms

and I’ll sit watching the same sun fade into dusk with warm wine to my lips.

I’ll laugh until my cheeks get sore

and I’ll laugh until tears fill my crinkled eyes

and I’ll laugh more still when I get high with an old friend

all palsy-walsy and dopey as we cackle too loud at bad jokes

not worrying about if our laughs are pretty.

I’ll dance around in a rainstorm

and scamper inside when it thunders too loud like an awestruck kid

and I’ll feel a bonfire’s warmth hot only cheeks in those moments of a pyro-induced trance

and I’ll listen to the grasshoppers sing just for me.

I’ll eat spaghetti made by mom and play poker with dad

and I’ll lay on the floor and watch TV.

I’ll fall in love again -

in little ways with people passing through

and their stories and big grins and idiosyncrasies and bad dance moves,

and in big ways

with grand plans for the future,

holding hands,

talking about a little house with a big backyard and cherry tomatoes and hens and god fine, a basketball hoop if there must be.

And with all of this, there will be pain.

Oh, there will be pain!

My heart will break again - and again and again and again and again -

in little ways as I watch my childhood dog’s muzzle gray

and as ugly anemic condos pop up in the field designated for freeze tag.

And it’ll break in big ways -

as I sit in church pews with stinging eyes,

fidgeting with a tissue as organ music drones,

and as I watch someone walk out the door for the last time

sucker-punched in the chest to begin an ache that will

linger months.

And then?

Joy will come back again, creeping in before I can even welcome her arrival and make room next to grief.

And before I know it,

I’ll sit in the sun again with ice cold sweet tea sweating in my palms.

It’s life, it’s the collective experience, it’s being human!

It’s being alive!

God, isn’t it wonderful!

2/3/23

I am grateful today!

In it’s funny way, life continues to be beautiful - and whimsical, and shitty, and strange, and serendipitous, and monotonous, and divine

Never settling for too long into one of these chapters,

Thank God!

It should be a crime to get too comfortable.

I am grateful today -

For the people whose paths have crossed mine,

In big ways or in small,

Paths intertwined or skating on parallel lines.

Experiencing reality together

Or tucked into rest in my memory.

For those whose hands I’ve held or shoulders I’ve cried on,

For those who have gently guided me through life’s seasons -

Watching me grow and falter, and grow and fuck up, and grow yet again.

For those who have handed me a coffee that warmed cold palms for $15 an hour,

For those I’ve exchanged drunken endearments and cigarettes with in the dive bar bathroom stall.

For those I’ve kissed, hugged, danced with, laughed with.

For those who have smiled at me in the street,

For those who lent me a pencil in grade school,

And for those who put a roof over my head.

How lucky am I, for these people to have slipped, for however long or fleeting,

Into this silly little life of mine!

f*ck diet culture

alternatively: my battle with disordered eating

TW: mention of eating disorder symptoms

Diet culture is everywhere. For so many of us, from the time we are children, we are made to equate our worth with our weight and to believe the deluded notion that “fat” is a bad word. Since I can remember being cognizant of food and bodies, I remember hearing about fad diets and the incessant categorization of foods into categories of “good” and “bad”. I was in elementary school when I first started the likes of demonizing carbs, turning away desserts to watch my figure, and ultimately beginning a journey of self loathing - because my 7 year old body wasn’t fitting the mold for what was society acceptable. Sad, disgusting… and did you know that most little girls in the US go on their first diet by the age of 8? 

And from this very formative age onwards, for almost 15 years , I convinced myself the worst thing in the world that I could be was fat.

And who could blame me? We live in a society that glorifies thinness and abhors fatness. We moralize these body types - with thin being good and fat being bad. Thin being smart, athletic, healthy - and fat being dumb, lazy, unhealthy. Terrible, isn’t it? But we’ve all been fed this messaging throughout our lives whether through the media or in our personal lives. Do these scripts sound familiar? 

• “I’m being soooo bad for having a second piece of cake right now.”

• “I look so big in this outfit; I’m changing.”

• “My diet starts tomorrow. I’ll be bad today.”

Unless your human experience has been particularly novel, of course they do. And here begins the convergence in our minds between our bodies, food, and shame. And so it began for me. 

Given diets are the top risk factor for developing an eating disorder, it is walking a dangerous line to get into the habit of dieting. Given I started down the slippery slope of dieting as a child, by the time I began high school, that dieting had become a full blown eating disorder. My absolute infatuation with thinness had begun and extreme restriction was soon to follow. I began obsessing over calories and checking my body in the mirror ~100 times a day. I weighed myself before and after meals and bowel movements. It was sick… and at first, it was very gratifying. My illness was encouraged and praised by those around me (to no fault of their own - none of us knew better) as I was asked for my diet regime and my workout routine. Family members told me, “You’ve gotten so thin!” - and they said it like a compliment. And that felt like a high. As I grew more and more sick, and my body looked more and more like what was societally ideal. And as so often happens with eating disorders, since I was never more than a little “medically underweight”, I was praised for looking strong and healthy. And so my disordered thoughts were fed.

A quick note debunking some of the justifications for fatphobia over the years:

- BMI as a measure of health is BS. It has long been disproven to be physiologically wrong, bad statistics, incredibly outdated, and an irrevocably inaccurate way to measure obesity levels. 

- The “obesity epidemic” in the US is also BS. It based on the bad science of BMI, tiny upswings in average weight (when this phrase implies that there is an epidemic of people putting on mass amounts of weight) and if there is any validity to this, the marginal rise in average weight in the US is directly correlated with the rise of diet culture. Because guess what - almost everyone who goes on a diet gains the weight back and more.   

- Fatness is not the indicator of health (or lack thereof) you may think it is. Health exists at every size. Being “overweight” does not affect one’s health nearly as much as we have been led to believe - and yes, you can live in a large body and be perfectly healthy. Groundbreaking.

By the time senior year of high school rolled around, I had stopped going to lunch entirely. I would spend that time taking pictures in the bathroom mirror of my body to document “progress”. I was fatigued and irritable constantly, perpetually dizzy and nauseous, and I became distanced from almost everyone in my life. And this all felt more than worth it in order to shrink myself. Meanwhile, I was a two sport athlete - who compulsively exercised on the side. And as I lived this shell of a life, I was commended for being healthy and even strong. Remember, because I was thin?

This age of severe restriction went on for multiple years, up until it was time for college. And despite the rhetoric on eating disorders being that only teenage girls can have them, I was not about to grow out of my ED anytime soon.

I will always remember being at physical with my PCP, a few weeks before I was to head off to my first year of college. Again, a deeply ill individual at this time. But nonetheless, a fresh start was coming my way and so perhaps a new chance to heal my relationship with food and body.  I will never forget stepping on the scale that day, after having quite literally been starving myself at more and more dangerous increments for years, and having my nurse say to me, “It’s a good thing you’ve lost some weight since last time I saw you. Keep it up so you don’t gain the freshman 15.” Keep it up, she had said. Of my malnourished body. I have never let a medical provider talk to me about my weight since. 

Looking back on this (terrible and unprofessional exchange), a few things come to mind.

1 - It’s important to remember that the majority of nurses and medical doctors do not have a depth of knowledge in eating disorders. I have the privilege now of working in an eating disorder treatment facility (more on that later) on a team of nurses, doctors, and dieticians who are trained in eating disorders. Unfortunately, though, a PhD or a nursing degree does not prevent ignorance and problematic ideologies. Fatphobia and diet culture are alive and well in the medical field. 

2 - On the freshman 15? My one wish is for this to be burned into everyone’s brains: gaining weight is not a bad thing. College means growing into an adult body, not to mention fun and meals with friends and drinks and memories. Who the hell cares about an arbitrary number when it comes to life experiences and memories?

3- And finally, looking back, this was the origin of a brand new chapter of disordered eating. 

Beginning in college, my disordered relationship with food and my body took a new form - equally insidious but veiled under the guise of “health and wellness”. Here entered into my life orthorexia and the dark side of fitness culture. 

Orthorexia is defined as an unhealthy obsession with eating “healthy”, and anorexia athletica characterized by excessive and compulsive exercising. And conveniently enough for the pervasive nature of eating disorders, these deeply damaging disorders have been completely normalized by “wellness culture”. The concepts of “no days off” and “no cheat day” gym culture are immediately ingrained into the minds of any curious minds looking into fitness. Herein lies another area we see that convergence in the mind of body and shame. 

Another quick note on “healthy eating”:

What does eating healthy mean to you? For many, eating “healthy” means cutting calories… AKA, restricting our source of energy. For many, eating “healthy” means only eating unprocessed or “all natural foods”. With this often comes the moralization of food groups - labeling foods as good or bad.

High energy foods are not bad, unprocessed foods are not the holy grail of health, and cutting out pleasurable foods for a smaller body is not inherently healthy in the slightest. The good food/bad food ideology is where toxic ideas come from such as “carbs are bad” (carbs are the body’s main source of energy and needed for cognitive functioning), or “gluten-free is best” (unless you are diagnosed with a gluten intolerance, this is irrevocably false). These are the traps I fell into as I convinced myself I had “healed” from my eating disorder and I was now on a path of wellness - meanwhile I was falling for all the diet culture gimmicks and “clean eating” (restricting myself from certain food groups, which is… disordered!).

Starting at a young age and through high school, I was an athlete. In retrospect, I could’ve seen my unhealthy relationship with exercise coming - as there came a point in high school where I absolutely, positively dreaded going to practice for my sports. Alas, I continued -  largely because sports were a way to “stay fit” (and yes, to me, this meant to stay thin). Coming into college, I no longer was committed to exercise through sports… and so I decided that in pursuit of wellness, I would start hitting the gym and eating healthier. This was at the peak of the “strong is the new skinny” movement, and so another type of body became the latest fad. Out with the heroin chic body ideal, in with the [still extremely thin but now also] muscular body ideal. Wow - a much more attainable body type! Tiny… but now, with an ass.

I began to workout obsessively at my campus gym… obsessively to the point where I would skip social events constantly to make it to the gym, break down crying if my schedule was too busy to go, and I would workout to the point of faintness and nausea most every time I went. Aah, the healthy nature of the “grind never stops” gym bro mentality. Meanwhile, I was “eating clean” - which means I was falling for the ridiculous gimmicks of juice cleanses and detox teas that diet culture capitalizes on. I was still demonizing food groups, assigning them labels of good or bad in my mind and following a strict diet that brought me absolutely no pleasure or joy. How fulfilling. Meanwhile, I would post photos of my body online, with captions about how ‘it’s cool for women to be strong!’ and boasting my new alleged sense of self love and healthy lifestyle. 

I hated myself more than ever, and I had a terribly unhealthy relationship with my body. 

Symptoms of anorexia and orthorexia, like I have described, are tragically often romanticized, and I have seldom felt shame when sharing my battle with restriction symptoms. The media, particularly social media (I’m looking at you Tumblr, TikTok… and Gwyneth Paltrow) has made restricting disorders seem desirable and sometimes sexy. Though this rhetoric is sick and twisted, it releases some of the stigma of restricting-type disorders. What I have refrained from sharing with almost everyone in my life is my battle with purging as an eating disorder symptom.

I began struggling with purging around sophomore year in college when another shift happened for me. This was when I decided I really did, deep down, want to restrict less and enjoy life more, as body positivity and neutrality movements gained traction. I wanted to recover. I started going out to eat with people more. I was going out to parties more. I was indulging in foods I hadn’t touched in years. How wonderful, theoretically… Until the guilt and shame, that which diet culture has ingrained in me deeply since birth, kicked in. Feelings of regret for enjoying pleasurable food. Thoughts of how much exercise or restricting I would have to do to “burn this off”. And from those feelings of body shame began multiple years of a battle with a purging eating disorder. 

There is a lot of stigma around bulimia, restricting and purging anorexia, and other purging disorders because it is simply not as glamorous. It doesn’t fit as well into what diet culture has presented as normal restricting and fatphobia. Starving oneself is beautiful, and vomiting is gross, right? And it is. It is an awful disorder. It has caused hormonal imbalances in my body, destroyed the enamel in my teeth, and caused daily bouts of extreme nausea after eating even after ceasing symptom use.

I also can’t begin to quantify all the time and energy and happiness that my eating disorder has stolen from me. And I would not wish an eating disorder on my worst enemy. 

… And so what? What’s the point of all of this? It’s all a bit of a downer.

But the point is that I am not alone in struggling with these symptoms and under the soul-sucking reign of diet culture. It’s thought that 10-15% of individuals in the US suffer with some sort of serious eating disorder at some point in their lives. And diet culture, which contributes to eating disorders more than anything else, is still alive and well. It’s about time we start dismantling that.

The latest chapter of my journey with body and food has taken place in the workplace, funny enough. I have been so incredibly lucky to have worked at The Emily Program as an Eating Disorder Technician since my graduation from college. By this I mean, I work at a residential treatment facility for adults with eating disorders on a clinical team, supporting clients through their recovery. This might seem like an interesting choice of employment for an individual who struggled/struggles with an eating disorder (recovery can be a lifelong process) - but this job has truly changed my life and my relationship with my body.

Working in this field has helped me dismantle ideologies that I didn’t even have words for. I have made many a realization, including -

• My internalized fatphobia, my fear of becoming “fat”, has stripped the joy from my life for more than half of my years on this earth

• Diet culture is a gimmick and plays upon insecurity - very intentionally, might I add, as it is a multi-billion dollar industry

• Living in a larger body is not a bad thing - it does not make you undesirable, and it does not make you unhealthy, and it does not make you any less of a person

• Calories are not the enemy, and cutting calories is nothing more than a way to say restricting energy to live life

• Food groups do not have moral virtue, and there is no “bad” food

I have come to the conclusion that my clients are the strongest people I have ever met. I have seen how eating disorders are in no way a choice. I have learned how you can’t tell someone has an eating disorder by looking at them. I have been shown how eating disorders don’t discriminate - they affect all ages, all genders, all races, all walks of life - and are in no way exclusive to white, cisgendered, teenage women. I have witnessed how the aftermath of a triggering post, a comment by a family member, or the subtle ideas promoted by diet and wellness culture can affect someone for years after. I have seen how eating disorders can take away lives entirely.

So I guess the point is - we are in a culture that makes it incredibly difficult to have a healthy relationship with our bodies and food; and everyone deserves to find peace here. And I am hoping that by beginning to destigmatize this illness, and to break down the harmful ideas perpetuated by diet culture, that we can all begin to separate our worth from the bodies we live in. We are so much more than the vessels we exist in, or what we ate today. I am so, so much more than this, and so are we all.

And: help is out there. You don’t need to fit into any box to seek treatment for an eating disorder, and it’s never too late or early to get help. It’s as good a time as any to start making peace with food. Life is too short, and you are worth it.

https://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/help-support/contact-helpline

https://www.emilyprogram.com/for-families/get-help/

the impact of our paths crossing

The value of people - too many people - is left unsaid.

How many times have I sung high praises for people who would never know I was anything but totally neutral about their presence or existence? Far, far, too many times. And what a sad thing it is for someone to be loved and never know it. It is so easy to assume people know how loved they are, or how intelligent their contributions in class are, or how their smile lights up a room. It’s a dangerous thing to assume people know they’re admired, because there lies the risk of no one ever validating how cared for they are.

Secret admirers are sooo out. Admiring others openly is a lot more fun (and meaningful).

For many, affirmation by others is unnecessary. For others with egos more fragile, affirmation is necessary (guilty). I guess you could chalk it up to different “love languages” or something equally as cheesy. But I think there’s something more to it than serving an ego. Making people feel good, and more specifically valued, is important and sometimes life-altering. Far too many of us struggle to feel accepted and valued and loved. And we can only hear “You are loved!” over and over again so many times before it feels like an empty cliche. It’s sadly universal to feel alone sometimes… So why aren’t we telling each other how we feel? Let us not assume we all know how we feel about each other. Living earnestly is underrated and underdone.

We are just about all scared of genuinity to a certain extent, because we are conditioned against it. It’s weird to show appreciation or admiration. And if it’s not for a birthday or celebration, or - !!! - not on social media, what’s the point? How radical and imposing to tell someone we care about them privately and randomly, right? Yeah, I don’t think so either.

The most memorable moments in my life, by far, have been moments of unexpected appreciation by people. Whether an appreciation for my person as a whole or for a small act of kindness I did, being recognized /getting some validation that I’m doing something right has felt pretty good. Never weird, never creepy, never unappreciated. Being told I have made someone’s day, made a difference in their lives or even just made them laugh has been so rewarding - and sometimes a saving grace. In the times that I’ve been struggling with my own mental health or self-image, these instances have given me such immense feelings of value and self-worth.

I remember a specific occasion, after a particularly difficult few months of rocky mental health and self- image, when I got a text from someone I didn’t know well and hadn’t spoken to in years. It essentially acknowledged I’d been a positive light in their life at some point in time, and that they appreciated our paths crossing. And I did not take that lightly. Not only did this mark a complete shift in my self-worth (and subsequently my mental state )- it gave me the inspiration to make time to thank others and express love to others. This person taking five minutes to thank me, for kindness I exhibited years previous, made me feel like everything I was doing was worth it. Like I was worthy. What an amazing feeling to have simply for having someone sent me a sweet message. Because of this lovely experience, I try not to let much time go between expressions of gratitude for my friends. I try to reach out to people I admire or enjoy, even if it makes me uncomfortable. I thank impactful professors and mentors. I call my grandparents more. I reach out to acquaintances I’ve drifted from. Etcetera.

It takes so little effort to spread some kindness when convenient - and it’s more often than not pretty convenient. Not only this, but it makes me feel good. We could get into the ethics of whether any kind act is truly selfless (a conversation that, if you know me, you know I love to entertain) - but a more important question is… does it matter? Putting love out into the world makes us, generally, feel good. If making someone smile helps you sleep better at night, it’s a win-win. Love creates love creates love. Kindness is contagious. Cliche, but you get the point.

Let’s take full advantage of human connection. Paths cross, and sometimes stay parallel - but so often, paths cross and continue on in separate directions. I’ve been particularly struck, recently, by the temporary nature of so many relationships. Circumstance plops people in and plucks people out of our lives, and will continue to do so throughout our lifetimes… However, the length of time spent close to certain people doesn’t always have the most bearing on how much they affect us, as I have come to realize. I have taken some time to reflect on which people have had the most effect on my self-esteem, happiness, worldviews, and behavior… and most of these people have actually been people come and gone from my life. Sad? A little. But perhaps more so… how beautiful! What a radiant and powerful presence must some people have to come into my life, change my world, and then continue on to wherever life takes them next. I am striving to have some sort of similar effect on the people in my life, as they deserve equal amounts of radical positivity. I want to make path crossings meaningful, as each interaction and meeting and relationship is a gift in its own way.

So…

Let’s thank the people who have molded us, inspired us, or just made us smile. Validation and appreciation are powerful tools; use ‘em! And then, let’s try to provide love and inspiration to those who deserve it and perhaps need it. This should go without saying, but kindness is a life-saver sometimes. Utilize how accessible it is to make someone’s day.

Spontaneous appreciation makes everyone feel good. You. Them. It’s a win-win. Tell someone you love them, or like them, or maybe just enjoy their presence… or even just liked their outfit the other day! Make your presence, long or momentary in the scheme of a lifetime, impactful. This is something that I think we can all strive for, and that we can all live more meaningful lives while implementing.

Let's Do Better Talking About Bodies

Let’s do better talking about bodies.

Or perhaps more radically, but more ideally, let’s stop talking about bodies.

Friends to their friends. Mothers to their daughters. Relatives to relatives. Etcetera.

It’s a nice notion to think that we have all at least learned not to make unsolicited comment on other’s bodies. But have we?

We’ve all been conditioned to refrain from the obvious comments as to not seem rude, right? We know not to say, “You’ve gained weight”. However, why is it deemed so acceptable to say “You’ve lost weight!” or “You look so much better now!” or the likes, when comments like this, though meant well, carry thinly-veiled implications of “There was something wrong with you before”.

Statements like, even when well-received, still carry the implication that should someone gain weight or revert to a previous appearance, that the compliment is revoked and a judgement takes its place. And if you find this viewpoint overly sensitive, you may be the target audience.

Perhaps not to everyone - but to a significant portion of the population, who have suffered with flawed body-image or disordered eating, it is so important to be gentle with the way we talk about bodies. I can’t speak for everyone, but I have enough beautiful people in my circles who have struggled with disorders of habit and thoughts (myself included) that I know how touchy the subject of bodies can be.

Anecdotally, I have had a long history of negative self-image and disordered eating. For context - I’m a tall girl (which I’ve always associated with “big”), I have seldom been the thinnest one in a group, and I grew up fluctuating on the border of “skinny” and not. These factors, combined with the overwhelming pressure of media and constant societal sexualization, have contributed to a long history of eating issues for me. I’ve gone through periods where I majorly abused my body and neglected my self-worth - with some stretches of time where “food” and “weight” were the only two things I thought about throughout a day. Thankfully, through many, many years of combatting inner demons such as these, I can say I’m at a relatively stable place with my habits and self-perception. I can now skip workouts. I can now go out to eat with people (with is, believe it or not, big!). I can now ignore the urge to step on every scale. These seem like small feats, and perhaps they are. But they’ve served as big milestones in my journey to health, both mental and physical.

This isn’t to say I love my body everyday or never slip back into problematic tendencies. And though it’s an oversimplified proposition that everyone else is accountable for my body image (as it’s my own responsibility to work on myself) … the truth is that a triggering comment can be the turning point into some weeks of body dysmorphia and unhealthy habits.

These triggers can come in the form of obvious comments that we all know to stay away from (“Have you gained weight?”), but far more often come in the form of subtleties such as “You look thinner!” or even “Have you lost weight?” This is not a compliment - it is an uninvited observation about my body that feels more like a violation.

Equating skinny to good, a generalization that carries the weight of fatphobia, ethnocentrism, etc., is problematic in itself - and to use that as a compliment seems in poor taste. As someone who has been societally taught that the less I weigh, the better, I can’t speak for those who have struggled to gain weight. However, it is important to acknowledge that “skinny” hurts many too, as not everyone is trying to lower the number on the scale.

While we’re at it: stop talking about your fad diets. Stop talking about your calorie counting. Stop imposing these thoughts onto those you care about. By all means, share your health journeys and body confidence and the likes… There’s a difference in delivery and intention there that I don’t feel necessary to spell out. Don’t plant a seed of disordered habits into the minds of loved ones, because we all learn our insecurities from somewhere - whether societally or relationally. Let’s be careful not to be the root of self-hate for others.

In the name of self-love! I love this picture because this was one of the first times in a while when it was taken that I didn’t feel guilty after eating whatever I wanted - which was a really empowering feeling going into my 20th year surrounded by loved ones. xoxo

Policing compliments isn’t what I’m intending. To so many, acknowledging hard-earned weight losses or fitness journeys is empowering and validating. However, I think we can get a little more creative with the way we validate the people we love than analyzing the changes in their physique.

We can compliment people better. We can acknowledge health better. We can empower people better.

We can do better. Let’s do better.

The "Problem" With Strong Women

Strong women are not inherently likable, and this is because weakness is intimidated by strength. 

As usual, I was prompted by someone else’s much more eloquently put thoughts to write on this topic - this time by comedian Iliza Schlesinger. The idea came while watching her new Netflix special, which I highly suggest (feel free to sponsor me Iliza!), "Elder Millennial". Not only is she hilarious, but her words on the perception of women were incredibly accurate. She so perfectly captured the phenomenon of strong women, with their lives put together and in powerful positions, being less desirable (in this context, to men), than the stereotypical sweet, soft, and unimposing woman. It's hard to sum up her narrative better than she does, so please give it a watch if you're so inclined.

Anyways, the modern archetype of women may seem far more advanced and empowered than years ago - and of course there’s been excellent progress on the front of law changes, specific rights, etc... However, culturally, women are still put into a box - whether we'd like to admit it or not. This can happen in malicious ways, or through much more subtle methods - specifically, the internalized biases against powerful women.

I can explain this phenomenon best from personal experience. From what I have learned, the more confident, clear and perhaps loud my personality has become, the fewer people find me endearing... and that’s okay, I wasn’t made to be endearing. I was made to make a difference and to be respected, and I have so much more respect from those in my life and for myself.  I've lived in two extremes - for a long portion of my life being “a pushover”, a punching bag, and incredibly self-deprecating. And I felt praise from all around at this time in my life. However, I had become more of a sad caricature of a woman than anything else. I had plenty of friends (how fulfilling!) and very little respect. In the last year or so, I’ve gained a voice. I have learned to love myself, my brain, my body, etc. - I am not afraid to say “I am intelligent” or “I am beautiful”. And there never should be a problem with that - because there is a world of difference between an all-for-one sense of arrogance and a beautiful sense of self-adoration (because we only live one life, so why not (try to) adore ourselves?)

The more confident and the more vocal about my self respect and self love I have become, I've realized, the more I’m able to offer others. As I said - weakness is intimidated by strength. Before coming into my own as a person and as a woman, I fell so often into the nasty habits of belittling other women and picking out their flaws. It’s gross to admit, but seeing an instagram photo of a beautiful girl could and did put me in a bad mood. When I saw a woman exclaiming publicly that she was beautiful or smart or otherwise worthy of love, I judged that as arrogance... because I didn’t have the quality of self-love, and that intimidated me. In hindsight, it’s so painfully obvious that this came from a place of insecurity and jealousy. The superior feeling of picking someone apart is fickle. Excuse me if this gets a bit cliché, but building others up brings you higher just as much as them. It is a win-win situation, every time. 

People will often confuse unapologetic nature with rudeness, or a lack of empathy (AKA a lack of orthodox femininity). How come if I state my beliefs loud and clear, I’m somehow a less kind individual? Why is a woman advocating for politics somehow bitchier than when she kept quiet? Why do we praise meekness in women and condemn speaking authoritatively? Kindness, in my opinion, should always be a goal. Being polite and maintaining the status quo... maybe shouldn’t necessarily always be first priority. There is nothing wrong with being a quiet, reserved individual - don’t get me wrong, there is beauty in those who speak few words (as I could afford to choose my words more carefully). But it’s hard to ignore the patterns of everyone yearning over a giggling girl of little opinion while mocking a woman who raises her voice. Caring intensely about something, whether it be yourself, a world issue, a political topic, or otherwise is not something to be ashamed of. Passion seems to become scarce when trying to fit in and acquire admiration.

It sometimes feels a little silly or naive to assert my version of life wisdom from my ancient, all-knowing age of 19 years old (especially since I’m changing my world-views on a day-by-day basis). However, I find that women’s voices being heard is a pretty universal need - because we have so much to say that needs to be heard. 

To end this post, here are just a few beautifully strong woman who have inspired me and/or continue to do so (some from afar and some through close friendships). I wish I could include everyone in my life, as I am blessed with an abundance of lovely (and powerful!) ladies.