i'm pretty wound up, so if i seem tense... i am!
last night i made a quick stop into trader joe's for some apples and nuts. standard occurance.
i always chat with my cashier to (hopefully!) brighten their day up a bit, and my lady yesterday was actually really friendly! she asked what i did last weekend, and i told her not a lot since i had the stomach flu.
she stopped and laughed, pointing out my first outing after the stomach flu was the grocery store, to which i very enthusiastically informed her i mean business when it comes to food!
then she said something that kinda offended me... she said she loves getting the stomach flu because she always loses 5 pounds. say what? since when is puking a good thing?
i thought about what she said the whole drive home (didn't the same thing happen in the devil wears prada, too?), and have continued to stew for the last 24 hours. i'm mad. and i've come to this conclusion:
we accept torture as a normal way to treat our bodies.
seriously, when did it become logical or healthy to get excited over starving/puking/dehydrating off 5 pounds? that's not normal: that's torture.
but we grow up accepting it takes drastic measures to be beautiful. anything goes to get to your goal weight. and everyone knows celebs starve to stay slim.
other ways we torture ourselves? living our whole lives feeling nowhere near thin enough. squeezing into too-small clothes because we we're fat and "deserve" the punishment. comparing our beautiful, real bodies to fake photoshopped ones. letting others fat-talk and influence us negatively. focusing more on our cellulite than other people.
how sad is it that i can relate to all of those!?! and i doubt i'm alone in that. since when did we start accepting this as a part of life? i think i heard the average girl starts dieting is age 8... WTF?!?
a noteworthy side of torture most people miss? the flip-side of acceptance.
anytime we don't respect our bodies, i'd call it torture. the main way we disrespect ourselves, i believe, is through our emotions.
but we can disrespect our bodies by neglecting them, too. sometimes we can get so caught up in rah-rah operation beautiful girl power that we forget to safeguard our health.
i'm a huge fan of self-acceptance and operation beautiful, obviously, but i am also incredibly passionate about living a healthy lifestyle. learning (and practicing!) nutrition and moving my body rocks my world! and it should rock yours, too.
and actually, i don't think you can say you are loving yourself if you don't take care of yourself. there. i said it! starving yourself to get to your goal weight clearly isn't self-love, but stuffing your face full of cake in celebration of your curves isn't either.
am i making any sense? where did our last shred of peace with ourselves go? where is our healthy balance? and why do we keep accepting this as the way life is?
i don't really don't have much to say other than this: please, please, please start training yourself to identify disordered thoughts like these: all of them.
no, you are NOT as big as a house. no, feminism does NOT give you a free pass to obesity. no, you do NOT need to work out for the 8th day in a row. no, you should NOT skip your own birthday party to aviod the cake. no, stuffing your face because you accept your size is NOT healthy. and NO NO NO you should NOT be excited about the stomach flu!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
gahh! any thoughts?
-r
that is so sad. that picture of that girl measuring herself is sad, too.
ReplyDeletemy daughter is 6 and of course she's a sponge and absorbs things all around her. i make sure to tell her that we eat a certain way and exercise to stay HEALTHY, not to be thin.
i remember in high school a girl i knew lost 15 lbs when she had the flu. i also remember being jealous. sick. sad.
I am so with you on all this..
ReplyDeleteI remember a girl in my highschool who got sick for a frickin MONTH and came back 20 llbs thinner! she was so proud! I remember wishing to get sick..how stupid is that? jezzzzzz
loved this post so much..no need to get upset though, just keep being the positive change in the world you want to see! you will inspire change :)
Dana xo
I can't believe the cashier said that. That is torture. I hate puking, yuck, haha. Great post and well said! We all need to start treating our bodies with love and respect, and love the food that nourishes our bodies! And put an end to negative thoughts.
ReplyDeleteThere have been times I wished I could get sick so I could lose a few pounds. There have also been times when I wished I would get pregnant so I could eat whatever I wanted. Neither thought is healthy. We're brainwashed so young and it takes so many years to reverse the side effects.
ReplyDeleteoh gosh, girl. it is really all so frustrating. It stopped being about health so long ago, and now it's all about a number.
ReplyDeleteThe biggest diet flop where I work is HCG Prenatal injections. You eat all the fatty foods you possibly can for 2 days, and the fat is stored in your mid-section. You then go on a 2-3 week diet of 500 calories a day, with 1-2 self-injecting sessions a day. The liquid you inject is literally pregnant woman's urine, and the hormones that go into your body eat the fat, and you lose weight. Fast. No exercise, starve myself, and lose 15 pounds in 2 weeks? "I'm so in" they all say. 20+ men/woman are doing it where I work. Worse part? I work inside a church.
I could care less if they say it's "safe" and "not that bad for you" and "studied by a really genius doctor" - it's TORTURE and it's NOT LIVING. It's not healthy, or fun, or enjoyable. It's a miserable way to drop a few pounds, only to gain them back once the injections are used up and the 500 calories turn into 5000.
Make it stop.
Just eat good food, people. Go for a daily walk, and enjoy life. Stop doing this, it's awful.
:(
Thank you for the comment on my post, it was really awesome to read "God is saying, 'hey, pay attention to me for a sec?!'" it's so true. No reason to question anything, it's all in His hands. He is in control. Thank you Jesus!
Hope your tummy is 100% better!
And I was JUST about to shut down my computer for the night. So glad I didn't because this was GREAT. Rant on, Girl. Rant on.
ReplyDeleteWow what a rant...I have to admit that I would have laughed at the cashier's comment and understood where she was coming from. You're right. That's not a healthy way to think. And you're right about all the excuses we make about our disordered thought patterns/actions.
ReplyDeleteI liked reading this. Hope your stomach is feeling better!
Great post. I think we need to find our own healthy balance and accept that it's going to be different from someone else.
ReplyDeleteSAdly, I used to think that way too. I remember my freshman year of college I had tonsilitis and I couldnt really eat and lost some weight...I loved it.
ReplyDeleteI would never think that way now though.
I was slightly jealous of my husband (then boyfriend) who got mono and lost about 30 pounds. He was so weak and his tonsils were so swollen he had to be on an IV because he couldn't eat anything. He ended up weighing less than me and looking so sickly but I thought, "damn, how come I can't get mono."
ReplyDeleteseriously.
Amen!!! "i don't think you can say you are loving yourself if you don't take care of yourself." There are lots of things I want to quote you on lol--they're worthy unlike Wayne from Wayne's world.. just kiddding he is ;) Anyhoo, I agree with you. My body is my temple and I want to THRIVE while I'm alive. Okay, unintentional cheesy rhyme lol. But really.. I can't believe the cash register said that. I hear that kind of talk from some of my peers. Maybe I'm sensitive to it because I don't believe in subjecting the body to disrespect like that. Do they realize why the body is able to throw up? TO GET RID OF ACTUAL TOXINS! Not to lose weight jeez. Or what happens when the body goes through starvation?? These things happen because our body wants us to survive.. not die by doing this on purpose to ourselves. You know what I mean?
ReplyDeleteBah!
Okay on that note, I hope you have a wonderful Tuesday and are feeling better, XO!
My thoughts: I LOVE your honesty. You are so right, and that last rant-y paragraph was kind of perfect! and i seriously can't believe that cashier said that... it makes me wonder what on earth our society is coming to. =/
ReplyDeleteI completely agree. When did this begin? Who said this was not only "ok" but encouraged? Since when did we want to sacrifice our well being to indulge in unhealthy habits...whether it be being too skinny or overweight. At one point in highschool i remember thinking, "well maybe if I had an eating disorder I would have a good body" and now I think "WHAT THE HECK, ABBY?!" (thankfully God spared me that, but I still had terrible body image).
ReplyDeleteIt is not ok and I hope that we can help change this mentality. And personally, I know that I needed to surround myself with people who knew that what is on the inside is more important than what is on the outside. It's so sad what other girls and supposed "friends" do to destroy healthy body image.
Excellent, excellent post.
you're awesome girl!this is a great post! keep 'em coming! :)
ReplyDeleteWhat that girl said is sad.. but I've been there and still have those thoughts. Everything you said is completely right though - we need to not just accept ourselves but take CARE of ourselves.
ReplyDeleteI'm trying to ban fat-talk in my house and I plan to speak up if I hear it from people I don't even know. Fat-talk does nothing but cause destruction even if it's said in a joking manner.
Yes you are so right! Way to be honest and put it out there girl. I admit that when I got food poisoning I lost about 8 pounds because I couldn't eat much for days and I was kinda excited about it. But then I thought, that was pure torture living through that sickness. And it made me realize that I was sick in the head for thinking that way. So good job on bringing this point out.
ReplyDeleteStomach flu is miserable and when I've had it the last thing I think about is, "Well, at least I'll lose 5 pounds because I can't eat anything and what I do eat I end up throwing up!" It's really sad that she's in that frame of mind.
ReplyDeleteI was put on a ritalin-like med (I can't remember the name of it) for the fibro a couple years ago and I had absolutely no appetite while I was on it. At first I was like, "Wow, I've lost weight" and then I reasoned with myself, "Because I'm unintentionally starving myself and most of it is probably muscle mass anyway." Losing weight because you can't eat isn't something to be overjoyous about. Honestly, I'd choose being fat over being underfed any day of the week.
Hope you're doing well, by the way. :) <3
Gosh, that's a shocker! I don't blame you for being mad! That's totally not ok. I hate throwing up. It makes me so sad and frustrated that women torturet themselves so much. Looking forward to reading about your vegan journey x
ReplyDelete