It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. My favoritest Xtyn came with me and pursuaded me that a grandma bathing suit was not a good selection. (You think I’m kidding, don’t you. No really, that is what I will buy if left to myself.) I have a very cute two piece. The bottom has fairly decent coverage of my ass and cuts in a not disgusting way on my belly. The top says, “Hello–these are my breasts.” And it is long enough to cover enough flesh that I don’t feel horrible in it. Well, I felt a whole lot better in it when I was in the dressing room and showing it just to Xtyn.
I came home and Puppy asked to see it. I made him beg a little, just cause that’s fun. When I put it on he said it was cute and he was appreciative of the breasts. I told him it was funny because as I was trying on suits Xtyn asked me what part of me does he like, so we can go for emphasizing what part of me he likes the best. He likes my breasts (mostly that they are now large) and… I can’t really speak to anything else about my body that he likes. He thinks I have a pretty face. Isn’t “You have such a pretty face” kind of the death knoll for someone being attracted to a fat girl? We are pretty up front about the fact that I am heavier than he is particularly into, but he is really into me as a person so it doesn’t seem to count for that much. This lead to a conversation in which he said, “Well, you have nice calves… and your shoulders are nice…” and he kind of stammered looking for something else to say. I covered his mouth and told him that he wasn’t making me feel any better. I went and put on a baggy shirt and somewhat baggy pants and proceeded to feel like shit. He tried to tell me that he loves me and he thinks I am beautiful, but yeah. Whatever.
I miss feeling sexy. I miss feeling like my body is something that someone is really into. I miss having people tell me how much they love my legs, or that they think the swell of my belly is sexy and very womanly. I feel fat again in a way I haven’t in a long time. I came home from the store hungry and because I feel fat and unattractive and so very undesireable, I haven’t eaten. I wonder if I will eat today.
It is funny that I am reading a book on the self-esteem of girls and how our society should work towards helping them to value themselves. What a timely read. How can I help increase the likelihood that anyone else will feel good about themself when I feel about as awful as I can possible feel?
AAAAAAARRRRGGGHHH. I like Puppy, but reading this just makes me want to scream. And also makes me want to write about 20 pages in response to this, but I’m going to collect myself a bit and try to be somewhat concise:
First of all, there’s something absurd and immoral the way we carve women up into body parts like beef, and then judge each of their parts separately as part of their character. We don’t do that to men. Ask anyone if, say, Puppy is attractive, and they’ll say, yep, I do believe so. But often the same person, asked if a girl was attractive, will go, hmmmmm….. tummy could be flatter, so no, the tummy is not attractive. Nice shoulder blades, so yeah, shoulder blades are attractive. Her nose is too big, but her teeth are perfect….
Does anyone else see how wrong this is? People should just be appreciated as their gestalt, not evaluated as individual body parts as if you could mix and match. As if I could say, “hmm, my tummy’s not flat enough, perhaps I should go buy a flatter model tomorrow”. And it’s particularly wrong that we understand that with respect to men, that we don’t say things like, you know, Puppy’s eyes are just a bit too wide-set, and his thighs are kinda chunky and disproportionate when we do that exact thing to women. We should do it to no one.
Aside from just being wrong, this division muddies up the waters when you’re talking about a person’s value, too. If you spend the first 30 line items in judging a person’s value picking over their thighs or their feet or their nose individually, you just never get to moves gracefully or mischievously sexy. This is totally out of step with how we actually judge and act on other people’s worth — you know perfectly well that people remember and adore someone who’s mischievously sexy, but won’t remember the name of a person who has a tight ass and not much else to recommend them.
So if you must judge bodies, I recommend keeping your considerations to the gestalt — just answering the question, hot, or not?. Let me assure you sweetie, the answer for you is oh yeah!
Moving on to my second point: it is not correct, and really not OK, for you to believe you are fat. I am fat, but I am clocking in at 200lbs at 5’3″ tall. You are not. I am fat and cute and pretty; you are of medium size and cute and pretty; there are other people out there who are skinny and cute and pretty. Reducing weight, health, and attractiveness to a binary system of fat and not fat is a practice that is both inaccurate and demoralizing and demeaning to everyone. Please do not participate in it.
Finally, the thing I tell everyone about body image: treat yourself as nicely as you would treat your female friends. (And, if you don’t treat them well enough, fix it!!!) Remember that any standards you cruelly buy into for yourself, you’re buying into for me, too. Am I unattractive? As my friend, would you let anyone tell me I’m unattractive? Is Xtyn? The way you increase the likelihood that anyone else will feel good about themselves is that you angrily defend yourself against any standard that you wouldn’t have applied to them, too.
Having spent a solid 20 minutes trying to start a response to this, and discovering that has, to no one’s surprise, said it better, allow me to say:
Ditto.
You’re so very sexy sweetie, and because of so many parts of you.
Finally, the thing I tell everyone about body image: treat yourself as nicely as you would treat your female friends. (And, if you don’t treat them well enough, fix it!!!) Remember that any standards you cruelly buy into for yourself, you’re buying into for me, too. Am I unattractive? As my friend, would you let anyone tell me I’m unattractive? Is Xtyn? The way you increase the likelihood that anyone else will feel good about themselves is that you angrily defend yourself against any standard that you wouldn’t have applied to them, too.
I would probably react in a very hostile manner to anyone who tried to tell me that you or Xtyn wasn’t attractive. I would go through the long and detailed list of all the reasons that you both are, why I am attracted to you, and why they are a pathetic schmuck if they devalue you. But I think I like both of you more than I like me.
But I think I like both of you more than I like me.
And that is why I am so very concerned when I read this sort of stuff that you posted today. To me it feels like Puppy’s preferences are undermining your fairly fragile self-esteem, and that is a BAD BAD THING. As said above–don’t get me wrong, I LIKE Puppy. But I’m very concerned with this trend that I see. Anything that causes you to think that you should not eat is a disastrous step in the wrong direction for someone with body image/weight issues. Not eating is counterproductive, and you know it–you will FUCK UP your metabolism that way. Head down this path far enough and you will be eating three tablespoons of food a day and STILL gaining weight (an exaggeration, of course, but not as great a one as might otherwise be thought).
Somehow, you need to get a sense of your own attractiveness as SEPARATE FROM those people you are seeking to attract. You are attractive to someone somewhere, no matter what size or shape your body is right now. You may not be attractive to a CERTAIN PERSON at any given size. But you will be attractive to someone. And most importantly, you need to learn to be attractive to yourself. (This is something that I am working on myself–it’s not easy). You need to like yourself, for who you are overall, not just physically, not in reference to some guy, nor to some ridiculous model standard.
You rock, and you’re sexy, no matter what Puppy might say or think. He has a right to his opinion and preference, of course, but he also needs to learn how to give you what you need when you make a direct request for it. You, OTOH, need to figure out how to bolster your self-esteem and not be as thrown by insensitive remarks You BOTH have things to learn here.
OK, I don’t feel like this is a particular coherent or complete response, but said most of it well, anyway. So yeah, what she said. And you ARE sexy. Would you like me to prove it sometime? ;^)
I would probably react in a very hostile manner to anyone who tried to tell me that you or Xtyn wasn’t attractive. I would go through the long and detailed list of all the reasons that you both are, why I am attracted to you, and why they are a pathetic schmuck if they devalue you. But I think I like both of you more than I like me.
Right. So, if you can’t bring yourself to be assertive with people (including yourself) who attempt to apply inappropriate and demeaning beauty standards on you for you, then do it for me. And Xtyn. And Sarah. And Dawn.
Because when they devalue you because you’re not one of the 300 women on earth who fit an exact and exacting standard, what will they do to me? If you are “fat and unattractive” at your weight, what does that say about what I am at my greater weight? If Puppy, or you, or anyone, judges you because your toes aren’t perfect and you’re medium sized instead of skinny, they’re judging us, too. They’re just not saying it in front of us and making us cry… yet.
I totally understand how you feel, sweetie. But I agree with your friends who have posted…they rock! I too, have been doing a lot of reading on the subject of body image and self esteem. Right now, I am reading, “The Beauty Myth” by Naomi Wolfe. I highly recommend it if you haven’t read it already. She talks about how getting women to focus on their physical appearance, trying to convince us that we are failures for not being able to meet up to an UNREALISTIC IDEAL, is a way to keep us down and achieving equal power. It will piss you off, I think, which is good because we need more pissed off, AWESOME, INTELLIGENT, BEAUTIFUL women to be pissed off so that we can change things. There is nothing WRONG with your body, honey. When I look at you, all I see is a gorgeous, HEALTHY young woman. Don’t let our fucked up culture tell you any different!
I think the most important thing for feeling sexy is believing you are – but, on the other hand, that doesn’t mean I’ll tell you that you just need to start believing it. I know exactly how much good trying that does me every time I’m retaining water and my belly gets all flabby (ok, the hormones causing that don’t help the mental state either.)
One thing I try to do is ask myself if I look like someone I’d find attractive. The usefulness of this may vary, but I like girls enough that examining myself from that perspective works for me (sometimes.)
Sometimes, unfortunately, the answer to whether a change needs to be made in the head or the body is the body. Mostly, for me, I try to add things, rather than take away things. I’ve seen my mother diet since I was a baby. I refuse to do that. I would much rather add a swim or a walk, or situps, or other random exercise, then diet. I would also rather concentrate on adding vegetables than taking away food, even though the effect of adding vegetables is that I eat less other things – saying “I’ll have this first” feels better than denying myself something.
Sometimes the change that needs to happen for me to be happy in my body isn’t weight loss at all, it’s just muscle gain. I would rather weigh 10-15 pounds more than I did four years ago, and be able to lift large objects, then lose the weight and not have muscle either. Having stomach muscles matters more to me than what’s on top of the muscles.
I’ve been thinking a whole lot about weight loss lately, though not so much from the feminism perspective – I have a very large boyfriend. Honestly, he needs to lose a lot of weight, if only for health/mobility/comfort. However, I’m having to spend a lot of time figuring out ways of losing weight that don’t involve the emotional feeling of “dieting”, because he’s spent so much time dieting since he was a kid that it makes him miserable and doesn’t work (because he’s convinced it won’t.) Right now – and we’ll see in a year if it’s working – I’m focusing on changing his habits in small ways, things like finding vegetables he likes that can be dipped in yummy but lo-cal sauces instead of eating chips or something. Looking for solutions for him is making me think a lot more about what I’m eating, which is probably good for me. Regardless of my weight, picking steamed veggies instead of french fries is just something I should do.
I’m really rambling. (We just got internet back and apparently I was so deprived that now I need to babble at people.)
Try not to not-eat. Eat something healthy instead, it’ll raise your blood sugar and make things easier to deal with. Apples or carrots or something, or drink a glass of milk. I know whenever I get self-image depressed and don’t eat, I go more and more insane as my blood sugar drops.
I miss not worrying about my weight, but all I can do now is try to be sane about it. (I didn’t have a problem until I started BC pills. I had lost weight from stress just before, so I didn’t weigh as much as I should have, but when I went on the pill I gained 20 pounds in 2 months. I went back to see the doctor, and he looked at me and said “you sure ballooned.” I switched doctors and pills, but I’ve never quite gotten over it.)
Oh, and one more thing – the “pretty face” comment doesn’t have to be bad, if said correctly. The face is important – hell, even when I’m being shallow and looking at girls in clubs, I look at the face first, or at least second (ever since mine grew I look at breasts a lot.)
I hope you feel better, and that things feel better to you soon.
edit: when I commented about deciding what change needs to be made, I meant in order to make you happy. Obviously you only need to change something if you aren’t happy.
I went back to see the doctor, and he looked at me and said “you sure ballooned.” I switched doctors and pills, but I’ve never quite gotten over it.)
Yow!! What a clod! Which doctor was that, so I can make sure to steer my daughters and friends away from him?? Good for you for figuring out what to do about the situation right away!
Dr. Oleander down near los gatos – my mom still sees him, and I have a really hard time not arguing with her about him. She doesn’t want to change because she’s seen him for many years; I think he’s a rude moron and she’d be better off with someone else. Every time he/his office calls for appointments with her, I’m tempted to give them a piece of my mind, but so far I resist.
That’s a big enough sin that, if it were me, I’d post a warning to, and to any local women’s communities and journals I could find. Have you considered/done that?
I would have a hard time resisting telling them/him off, too! Must. Resist. Snarking….. >:^D
whoops. That should be
At this point, it’s been 4 years. Making a fuss now seems a little silly, since he’ll probably end up retiring soon. (though, making it worse, did I mention that it’s an ob/gyn I’m talking about?)
*sigh* I see your point. And yet I shudder to think of any other young woman getting her self-esteem reamed that way in the intervening months or years. I’ve found that a surprising number of Ob/Gyns are tactless idiots. If only there were some way to identify these clods on sight (I mean, other than the usually helpful expedient of choosing someone who has the same plumbing you do ;^). It would save a lot of heartache!
Dude. Some guys are just clueless about what to say when a woman is dealing with body issues. And part of the reason why is, there really isn’t anything they can say that will work. When we’ve decided to be self-deprecating usually we are the only ones who can pull ourselves back out of it and be self-loving instead.
You have a perfectly luscious, yummy body and I’ve seen it so I know. So trust that and then start dealing with those totally icky nasty conversations in your head, because they definitely need to go.
unfortunatley this thing won’t let me reply annonymousely or I could give you a long list snippy responses that would make me even less popular than I already am…
GRIN
Like, I have to say that said most of what I was going to, and said it better 🙂
As far as the conversation and you covering his mouth – one problem is that, with you specifically, somebody can’t really approve of the parts of you that you don’t like. For instance, I think you have wonderful hips. And I suspect we both remember how it went the first time I expressed that 🙂
love you