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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(tw: fat shaming, disordered eating, self harm, suicide)
Let me tell you a story.
There is a girl who is 7. She wants a snack but it is late at night. Momma, a great grandmother promoted due to absent parents, says no. It’s too late she says. Bed time is soon. But the girl begs and begs and before long Momma has her at the table with chocolate milk and a slice of bread, the girl’s favorite. Her father comes in, not absent for a moment, to yell and curse. His daughter doesn’t need that. It’s too late. She’ll get fat. Momma tells him to leave. Tells him he doesn’t have the right. The girl is in tears. Momma consoles. The girl gets bread and chocolate milk every night after that.
The girl is 12. Soccer has filled her out. Muscle beneath the sturdy fat frame. She loves it. She feels athletic. She watches Mia Hamm and feels like her. But other girls don’t feel the same. They say “Look at snow white. Look how pale.” “More like a marshmallow other girls laugh. The girl feels ugly and for the first time, feels fat.
The girl is 13 and wants to wear this cute tankini that she found to summer day camp. Mother, biological mother, disagrees. She says “You’ll just be embarrassed ” The girl asks why. Mother pokes her stomach and says “Do you want people to see that?”. The girl doesn’t care. She wears it anyway and is ridiculed by her peers but she won’t cry in front of them. She’ll hit them with the ball while they’re playing kickball and make them think it’s an accident. She won’t cry until she is at home and hiding and digging her nails so far into her thighs that they draw blood.
The girl quits soccer at 14. They won’t let her play anymore because they don’t think she’s “right for it”. She’s good, she thought. Great a defense. Just couldn’t really run. Too fat, her teammates whisper. The girl changes in the bathroom during her last practice.
The girl is 16 and holding a bag of pills. A bag she had made a year earlier just in case. An emergency escape when the scratches on her arms and thighs are not enough. When her mother and father screaming that she is fat because she is lazy is too much. She takes the pills out one by one and sets them side by side arranging them in a perfect circle and thinks. Today might be the day, the girl decides. But there is a knock at the door and little sister is there. She’s five and scared because the girl had been crying again. The girl puts the pills back in the bag and comforts little sister.
The girl is 18 and going to college. She flushes the pills. She’ll get thin in college. She’ll show mother she can.
The girl is 19 and mother has her on a strict diet. She finds a bag of chips beneath the seat of the truck. A friend of the girl’s put it there. But mother screams and ignores her and says she’s lying. That she wants to be fat and ugly.
The girl is 19 and sobbing. Mother said she never did anything to deserve the love that she gave the girl. Your my mother, the girl thought. But then she thought of Momma and that woman was not her mother.
The girl is 20 and at a family function. She gets a second burger. Mother says angrily, “One day you’ll regret having no control.” Later mother cries and says she’s just afraid of the girl dying. Fat people die, you know. The girl cries. She feels fine. She’s just fat.
The girl is still 20 and Momma dies. The girl feels she lost the one true source of love in her life. She wishes she had the pills. She uses scissors on her thigh instead. She feels ugly in her dress next to her thin mother at the funeral.
The girl is 21 and falls in love. She cries the first time they make love and asks “Why? Why me? You could have anyone.” Her partner is confused. “What do you mean? Why would I want anyone else?”
At 22, the girl is still afraid to eat in front of her mother.
The girl is 23 and finds blogs on tumblr that are fat girls and they love it. She begins to love it.
The girl is 24 and she joins a blog about body image. Hoping to make a difference.
The girl is 24 and she takes a hiatus, not realizing how many bad memories she had locked away.
The girl is almost 25 and she thinks it’s time to live.
The girl sits in front of her webcam and takes pictures and doesn’t have to find one she likes. They are all beautiful. Her stomach, her petite breasts, she loves them. Self love.
“Momma, I found someone else that could love me unconditionally,” the girl says, “Me.”
Hello again everyone. I’m Sam, your absent moderator. I’ve been on an unannounced hiatus for some time now because when I first volunteered I had no idea how triggering this would be for me. I found myself crying daily looking at my tracked tags and the asks/submissions and realized I was doing no one a favor hiding. I had to take a break. Well. I’m back. I’m ready. Let’s do this thing. Let’s do this together.
1. Self Acceptance =/= Body Acceptance
Self Acceptance and Body Acceptance, while often related, are actually separate concepts.Accepting one’s self and having a core sense of self-worth does not necessarily equate to loving your body in its current state. Nor does a lack of self esteem necessarily equate to lack of body acceptance (although I would hazard a guess that if your self esteem is low, you are going to be more inclined to dislike your body). A sense of self worth can be built on who you are; your place in your community, family, work; what you like doing and do well; your hobbies and accomplishments. While appearance may be a factor in self worth, in most people I believe it would be only one of the components of their sense of self.
To put it another way, Self Acceptance relates to the inner whereas Body Acceptance relates to the outer
2. Fat Acceptance vs Size Acceptance – Allies with a difference
Philosophically, Size Acceptance and Fat Acceptance are very similar. SA and FA both advocate an end to size & weight related discrimination. Many FA and SA activists follow the principles of HAES (Health At Every Size). Many have learned to love their body at its set point, regardless of whether that is fat or thin or in between.The point of difference to my mind is that Fat Acceptance explicitly states that FAT is – and must be – part of that discussion; there can be no upper weight or size limit to our quest for rights and acceptance. There can be no point at which we nudge each other, compare bodies and say, “Well, I’m fat, but she is something else again. That really can’t be healthy, can it?”
3. Dieting and Body Acceptance are mutually exclusive
If you are dieting, then you believe your body as it currently stands is unacceptable. Full stop (or period, for the Yanks). It really doesn’t matter whether you are trying to lose weight for cosmetic or ‘health reasons’ – dieting, by definition, is a rejection of the current state of your body and an attempt to change that. The ultimate goal is a smaller or ‘healthier’ you, and regardless of whether you call your diet a ‘lifestyle change’ or ‘eating sensibly’, that is not body acceptance.4. Therefore Fat Acceptance and Dieting are mutually exclusive
If you believe your own body is so unacceptable that you must starve and shrink it, then by extension, you also must believe that bodies of people who are as large or larger than you are unacceptable. Do I really need to state why that is not Fat Positive?5. Diet all you like, just don’t talk about it in Fat Acceptance spaces
Some dieters appear to believe that the refusal of Fat Acceptance advocates to diet (or to discuss how to diet or the ‘benefits of weightloss’) somehow impinges on the right of the dieter to bodily autonomy. For my own part, I really don’t care if you diet. But – much as I refuse to listen to Jehovah’s Witnesses who knock on my door – I refuse to take part in endless discussions about calories and what ‘worked’ for you. I will not participate in the celebration of the loss of part of your body. I have made a conscious choice not to diet, despite there being endless cultural pressure to do. Fat Acceptance spaces are one place where that cultural pressure is eased (not removed, eased) for a while. I do not require your validation for my choice, nor do I require you to stop dieting. I just ask that you SHUT UP ABOUT IT already. Thank you.
an infographic always worth reblogging
1. Self Acceptance =/= Body Acceptance
Self Acceptance and Body Acceptance, while often related, are actually separate concepts.Accepting one’s self and having a core sense of self-worth does not necessarily equate to loving your body in its current state. Nor does a lack of self esteem necessarily equate to lack of body acceptance (although I would hazard a guess that if your self esteem is low, you are going to be more inclined to dislike your body). A sense of self worth can be built on who you are; your place in your community, family, work; what you like doing and do well; your hobbies and accomplishments. While appearance may be a factor in self worth, in most people I believe it would be only one of the components of their sense of self.
To put it another way, Self Acceptance relates to the inner whereas Body Acceptance relates to the outer
2. Fat Acceptance vs Size Acceptance – Allies with a difference
Philosophically, Size Acceptance and Fat Acceptance are very similar. SA and FA both advocate an end to size & weight related discrimination. Many FA and SA activists follow the principles of HAES (Health At Every Size). Many have learned to love their body at its set point, regardless of whether that is fat or thin or in between.The point of difference to my mind is that Fat Acceptance explicitly states that FAT is – and must be – part of that discussion; there can be no upper weight or size limit to our quest for rights and acceptance. There can be no point at which we nudge each other, compare bodies and say, “Well, I’m fat, but she is something else again. That really can’t be healthy, can it?”
3. Dieting and Body Acceptance are mutually exclusive
If you are dieting, then you believe your body as it currently stands is unacceptable. Full stop (or period, for the Yanks). It really doesn’t matter whether you are trying to lose weight for cosmetic or ‘health reasons’ – dieting, by definition, is a rejection of the current state of your body and an attempt to change that. The ultimate goal is a smaller or ‘healthier’ you, and regardless of whether you call your diet a ‘lifestyle change’ or ‘eating sensibly’, that is not body acceptance.4. Therefore Fat Acceptance and Dieting are mutually exclusive
If you believe your own body is so unacceptable that you must starve and shrink it, then by extension, you also must believe that bodies of people who are as large or larger than you are unacceptable. Do I really need to state why that is not Fat Positive?5. Diet all you like, just don’t talk about it in Fat Acceptance spaces
Some dieters appear to believe that the refusal of Fat Acceptance advocates to diet (or to discuss how to diet or the ‘benefits of weightloss’) somehow impinges on the right of the dieter to bodily autonomy. For my own part, I really don’t care if you diet. But – much as I refuse to listen to Jehovah’s Witnesses who knock on my door – I refuse to take part in endless discussions about calories and what ‘worked’ for you. I will not participate in the celebration of the loss of part of your body. I have made a conscious choice not to diet, despite there being endless cultural pressure to do. Fat Acceptance spaces are one place where that cultural pressure is eased (not removed, eased) for a while. I do not require your validation for my choice, nor do I require you to stop dieting. I just ask that you SHUT UP ABOUT IT already. Thank you.
Well, this is lovely and makes sense and things.
Please stop waiting for some magic moment (that may never happen) to come around. Some magic moment where you are tall, thin, have smooth skin, no cellulite, have a voice that doesn’t sound annoying when you hear yourself recorded.
Please stop waiting to go live your life, put on a swimsuit, dance at a club, give that hot guy your phone number, buy a pair of shorts, join a book club, show up for that exercise class, start practicing yoga, start lifting weights, start moving your body.
Just show up. Just go do what you love. Stop worrying about whether or not you look cool or nerdy or fat or stupid. You look fine. Your body is fine. You are the only one judging yourself as harshly as you are.
This weekend was by far one of my favorites. No I didn’t go on amazing adventures or change anyone else’s life. I stayed at home, watched a movie, took accidental naps and talked to an amazing guy. All without doing a damn thing to my hair or putting on make-up. It was glorious. I even walked passed my mirror naked today and was like… yeah okay. I like that. ;)
As I’ve said before… I’m new to body acceptance. I was never the type of person to show off my body or to even list anything besides ‘eyes’ or ‘hair’ to the “What do you like most about yourself?” questionnaire. My mother taught me at a young age to be a private person, to not flaunt something that was defective, to hide myself. Meghan was a good student. I never showed off my fat belly, my dimpled thighs, my stretch marks. I picked clothes that were baggy and didn’t fit too close to the body. I hid behind my books and my sadness and my self-destruction. Meghan was a great student.
It wasn’t until recently that I actually took a look at my body and found things I didn’t hate. I stared in mirrors that showed off below my bust. I took pictures and film of how my body truly looked in the light. I saw the same fat belly, dimpled thighs, countless stretch marks… but they weren’t as scary as they used to be. They weren’t horrific to look at. They were still flaws… but my flaws. To be human is to BE flawed and for the first time I was so happy to be human.
The moment of when you realize self-love… well, there’s nothing that can beat it. It’s a feeling that fills you up inside with such pride and acceptance and enjoyment. It makes you giddy to know that you love yourself, you’re happy with who you are and that you don’t need validation from someone else to make you feel worthy.
“Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.” Bullshit. Acceptance is a mighty fine cuisine. The sustenance that I take from loving myself is more than body-shaming can ever give me. The gratification of just being able to look at myself in the mirror and smile because my messy hair and puffy lips look ADORABLE is nourishment enough. You can take your ‘skinny’ and shove it. It’s just a meaningless term to me.
This weekend was all about loving myself and being appreciative of who I am as a person. I made a list of things that I liked about myself. I suggest you make one too. Celebrate what makes you YOU. <3
I know, I know TL:DR. To sum this all up? Love yourself.
x Meghan