WHAT WE'RE ABOUT
We are constantly redefining our own perspectives, and therefore tend to write a lot about our personal experiences. Many followers and contributors are living with anorexia, bulimia, body dysmorphic disorder, depression, and a variety of other body image disorders or mental illnesses, so please be respectful and remember that health applies differently to everyone. Any and all potentially triggering content will be prefaced with a trigger warning.
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Whenever anything or anyone ever asks me about my “fitness regimen”, I am quick to say it doesn’t exist.
But, in a way, it does.
This past week, I technically worked out a number of times; It consisted of dancing (by myself) in sporadic bursts of time. Hot, sweaty, and smiling.
I went on a couple of walks, too.
I spent most of my evenings stretching, painting my nails, doing light yoga and exercises while watching whatever, and smoking cigarettes if I felt like it. (For some reason, I haven’t been smoking much lately. Today I’ve had two.)
Somewhere in there I did some strength-training and pilates that I made up along the way, which escalated into testing myself to see how long I could keep my legs lifted, parallel to the ground, with my back to the floor.
The answer was: not long. But I kept lifting them up again anyway, and my muscles became warm and happy for it.
One week can not accurately encompass all of my life habits, but as an average: I’d say it’s about right.
The anxiety I live with every day is dense within my body. It saturates my muscles and nerve-endings so much that it seems I can feel it surge and recede like jolts of electricity.
Sometimes, my body is sore from anxiety’s effect. My muscles twitch, sting, and ache due to internal forces rather than outward physical exertion.
The burn of physical movement and the ache of anxious muscles, together, is bittersweet.
So I focus on that feeling, on myself, when I move my body to music. I feel how my fat sways and gives way as I bend, jump, and stretch - and it empowers me to move more. I test my flexibility and feel as the tension dissipates. I am aware.
I am so aware and in touch with myself in these moments of radical self worth and solitary movement that I actually forget what “fitness” is.
I don’t need a set of rules to tell me how I should or shouldn’t be moving my body in a healthful way.
I know that whatever I am doing is what is right for me because I have learned how to listen to my body’s cues - and we’ve decided to set our own goddamn rules.
Curvy Yogi Appreciation (Part V)
[because yogis come in all shapes and sizes]
I still can’t do half of these. Ugh. :/
fitness comes in all sizes! These people are so strong and flexible, omg.
YES! I love it, I need more photosets like this in my life.
Thin (and able bodied) privilege is not being mocked for using an assistive device in a fitness class. Fat discrimination is assuming the device is necessary because someone is just too fat to move a limb properly, as opposed to a chronic injury or disability.
bornandraisedwithsouthernways:
I almost didn’t go to the gym yesterday because it was cold and snowing. I did and when I saw this kid I wondered, “what was my lame excuse again?”
disabled people are not here to inspire you.
How creepy did you feel when you took this.
I have a lame excuse for why I don’t often go to gyms. It’s called weirdo walkie people fucking staring at cripples as if we never leave the house.
Yeah…. and then there’s the whole “someone will probably use me for inspiration porn and take my picture and use it without my consent because I’m just an object to them and not a real human being capable of not wanting them to do such a thing”
This is an incredibly shitty thing to do.
So just to clarify, this person went to the gym, saw a person using a wheelchair, took their photo without their permission, posted it online as inspiration porn without their permission and managed to use an ableist slur in that post?
Congrats bro, you’re a piece of shit
Another reminder that those “What’s Your Excuse?” memes are creepy as hell and unacceptable.
arecoverypath:
buttahlove:
A gallery of large bodies doing yoga. Quite impressive & motivating!
Yoga is for everyone!
My roommate has been here for me every step of my recovery. It’s been interesting- when I began recovery, she began her weight-loss journey. She is the reason that I’ve made it this far.
Anywho- we both get really annoyed at fitblrs and blogs that post really harsh things like “NO EXCUSES” or “DO THIS, DO THAT” sort of mentality.
Life is not about being the fittest. Life is not about going to the gym on a regular basis. Life is not being fashionable. Life is not about how many reps of something you do a day. No. If you don’t feel like going to the gym for 2 weeks, then who the fuck cares! Don’t go! Your life shouldn’t revolve around going to the gym and eating gold foods.
I completely respect people who carry out a healthy lifestyle by going to the gym and eating right. What I admire about those people is that they are also mentally in check. They don’t have a bad relationship with keeping up with their health.
I’m trying to understand where the line gets drawn between being fit, and being obsessive.
Moral of this scatterbrained post: Don’t feel forced or obligated to do anything.
The thing about being “mentally in check” is that, like, not everyone is mentally sound.
I mean, I am a fucking madwoman. I don’t always know what it means to be “mentally in check” and when I do, I appreciate it and everything, but it doesn’t make me a better person.
The line between fit and obsessive often depends on health.
But health is widely defined as one thing, when it should really be defined individually.
For me, good health means waking up without a migraine and feeling good enough to get out of bed. It means not letting my anxieties control me and doing the things I want to do in a day, like cooking myself food or getting some work done or spending time with my family. It may or may not include some kind of movement or physical activity, that is not always a priority.
Good mental health leads to good physical health, but good mental health isn’t always a given.
Just more thoughts to chew on.
..I long for the day in which we can enjoy runway shoes without being shown young Women forced into emaciation, when ladies don’t feel they need to starve themselves in to a 7 year old frame to be deemed beautiful enough; because until then I can’t appreciate the artwork of fashion whilst being heartbroken by having to watch someone waste away, paraded whilst she’s slowly dying. That is my fault with the fashion industry and I want to see a change.
The looks fat people get in gyms is enough to want to never go back
You say you care about peoples health
But you look at them like they are the scum of the earth for actually taking your advice
Most of the time it’s not even like fat people are taking anyone’s advice, they’re just LIVING THEIR LIVES and being active like anyone else. Like, god fucking forbid.
This is the kind of shit that makes me horrified to step into a gym. I have heard so many stories of fat people actually being talked down to, or condescendingly complimented, like “oh good for you you good little fatty, I’m so proud that you’re not on a couch stuffing your face with donuts right now”
Being visibly fat, in public, doing things (especially exercise or any other activity that could get twisted and shamed) is fucking hard sometimes. It really is. After a lifetime of being discriminated against, knowing the way other people my size are often treated, on top of having an anxiety disorder and inability to let shit roll off my back as easily as I wish I could…It just takes too much, and I don’t always have the energy to face it.
But there are good days when conditions are right and I can tell the world to properly fuck off so I may do as I please - and those days make all the difference, really and truly.
Rolls-Royce !
;-)
love it love it love it
@PRguitarman #Soccer
The majesty encapsulated in this image has slain me.
Yes, this is SUCH an important point. Fitspo tends to be ableist. It also tends to push a ideology — and it is an ideology — that the height of human achievement/perfection is a ‘fit’ body. Now, if some people want to pursue that, fine. But many of its members can’t seem to understand that theirs is a belief system not based on objective truths. There is no moral difference between someone who runs marathons, and a person who runs marathon coding sessions. Or someone who does neither. None.
-ArteToLife
rebloggable by request
This was why I had to stop using myfitnesspal—it was fucking me up mentally and I was on the fast track to EDNOS because the whole idea on that site (and other fitness sites) is that if you’re exercising and calorie-counting and not losing weight, it’s not because there’s something wrong with your body—it’s that you’re lying to yourself and not trying hard enough because you “don’t want it enough.”
I have hypothyroidism because I’m living with half a thyroid, and that half barely functions. Even when it’s being treated properly, I gain weight very easily. After years of struggling and beating myself up over not being able to lose weight, a doctor finally told me that the 20+ lbs. I gained when I was 21 was metabolic weight gain (brought on by steroids, which I had to take to treat a pretty severe bout of bronchitis) and would therefore be very difficult to lose for a totally healthy person, let alone someone with a disease that affects the metabolism.
Fuck ableism. Fuck fitspo.
It is ableist at heart in that it is based on the assumption of able bodiedness, as well as a lot of other privileges. It also trades in and lends itself to things like eugenics and other improvement of the (human) race type notions.
Yet it’s fair to say some PWD are more inclined and able to exercise than many able bodied people.
Friends we have made a film about fat activism, sisterhood and fat femme synchronized swimming . check the link ! x
PRACTICE MAKES
PERFECTBREATHING EASYSo my super dope homechick Ray sent me this amazing video. This fierce big boy is giving me EVERYTHING. Attitude, Confidence and Endurance.
These three things are SOOO important and often times as bigger dancers we are the ones who struggle with endurance. I’ll be the first one to tell you I struggle with faster dances. It’s hard for me to keep up and still dance with energy….which then often leads to lack of confidence. I used to get so frustrated with myself and often times get upset.
I’ve learned the best thing to do is practice, like full out, let it out, scream and shout practice.
As a big dancer you may have to practice more than others not because you don’t have the choreo down, rather to build your stamina. I cannot tell you how many times in college I almost felt like I was passing out after a dance because I was so out of breathe. I’ve learned that practicing FULL OUT a couple times a week really helps these days. My endurance is high and my endorphins are up, it’s a great feeling!! So keep pushing big dancers, we’ve already proved we can be hot, let’s show the world how we can move!!!!
You better werk!!!! <333!!
GET IT!!!
I can’t even walk in heels, much less dance. GET IT BABE
You better DO. IT.