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Stuck in my Body
beauty standards
The Body Neutrality Bubble
Is it possible to adopt a body neutral mindset in the face of external structural notions about what the body should be?
Image Description: The image depicts a graphic from bewitching.net that has a green background and colorful splotches with text. The middle pink splotch says Body Neutrality. It is surrounded in a circle by 5 other splotches that say be grateful for how your body functions; focus on how your body lets you be in this world; your body deserves respect; practice self compassion; your body isn’t an accessory. Each text has a different body next to it posing.
Body neutrality is a contemporary concept that describes the practice of adopting an objective, arguably more function-oriented mindset towards one’s physical self. Popularized in 2015 by Annie Poirier, body neutrality as a concept encourages individuals to view their bodies as physical vessels that allow them to experience and conduct through daily life. Some find it to be a stepping stone to body positivity, however in its fundamental ideology body neutrality is intended to promote a more peaceful relationship between the mind and body that does not focus on negative nor positive conceptualizations of the body, especially in those ways that can consume and strain the mind (i.e., significantly focusing on the size, shape, or color of the body). The concept of body neutrality is designed to operate in contrast to societal expectations that systemically operate to burden individuals to fit into physical and emotional molds in order to be legible as human beings and gain access to various spaces both physically and socially. It is critical to note that societal standards of physicality and being often disproportionately impact minority communities, who often may be denied access to other mechanisms of legibility such as personhood and femininity.
As the concept of body neutrality manifests as an individual effort—where one must rewire their thoughts to accept themselves in their current existence—it is critical to consider to what extent this mindset is sustainable. For sustainability seems unlikely in a world where one’s internal perspectives are competing with the perspectives ascribed to them by other social actors and the implications of structures more broadly (i.e., the spaces their physical and emotional selves may be accepted in or denied access to). It appears to be the case that the body neutral mindset can only exist in the individual bubble, as venturing out of those individual boundaries forces one to be confronted with realities of dominant thought about the superiority of thinness, smallness, whiteness, etc. that will inevitably, even momentarily, impact the way one views themselves and others. It can be said, then, that genuine bodily neutrality is an in-achievable pursuit in our current world where subjects are “locked in” their bodies unable to transcend to a space of being that allows them to shed their physical and spatial identities. While this perspective is less than optimistic, it does offer a more pragmatic contextualization of how societal influence is imperative in creating an environment where humans are categorized and then held to physical and emotional standards that are historically long-lasting and seemingly intrinsic, which hinder individual and population-specific liberation.
Upward Spiraling Out of My Body Dysmorphia
trigger warnings: body dysmorphia, suicide, mentions of disordered eating, illness
If you remember what your body looks like, I think you’re one of the lucky ones. If you don’t, then I’m not so glad this is what we have in common. Coming from an older West Indian family, my body was always a discussion. No matter how many soccer practices I showed up to, salads I ate, nor how well I did in P.E. class, whenever an aunt approached me it was always “You’ve gotten bigger!” Even throughout my adulthood my body has gotten bigger. I know I’m big, but I wish they knew that I didn’t need to be reminded every second of my life.
I think it’s important to note that I wasn’t always fat, but I still struggled with food and dieting at a young age. Having to deal with cholesterol issues during elementary school was the start of my long, relentless relationship with food. I remember sitting in the doctor’s office with my uncle, his eyes glazed over, listening to every word my pediatrician said. My relationship with food not only originates in this moment, but also with my family’s history of heart disease, diabetes, and many other debilitating diseases. By the time I reached high school, my uncle had a coronary angioplasty, stent insertion, triple bypass heart surgery, and several other surgeries for various kinds of cancer. He never wanted me to suffer like he did.
For as long as I can remember, my uncle micro-managed everything that graced my plate. There were even times we fought at the dinner table so he could see whatever takeout I’d brought home. The stress of bringing home any form of food that he would scrutinize started to transfer into other aspects of my life. In middle school I discovered how uncomfortable it made me feel to eat in public spaces. In high school I even went as far as to become the library aide so I could escape the daunting task of consuming food in the adolescent-filled cafeteria and tried my best to retreat back to the library every lunch break. The library was my safe haven, a place of structure for the moments where I felt the most vulnerable. This is still a habit I have today, I always look for security.
It wasn’t until my senior year of high school that I started my first romantic relationship. He was beautiful, smart, and even had a piercing on one ear that was the jackpot of my teenage girl fantasies. Being with him was the first time someone told me I was pretty. For someone that had only dreamed of having a boyfriend, that meant the world to me. I naively thought that feeling would last forever. As the pandemic raged on, and quarantine forced us into our isolated nests, there became an evident strain on our relationship. Still, we continued to stay with each other. I never noticed when his demeanor changed or that I couldn’t fit into half of my jeans anymore, or even that I was getting bigger than him. I made a huge mistake. You know that horrible mistake people make when they get lost in a relationship because they already have constant bodily validation? Yeah, that one. I gained the “happy weight”, I let myself go. People hate happy weight because being fat makes you feel empty and alone after a relationship. Nobody thinks that you’re attractive anymore and it feels like now there’s this huge responsibility that you have to get back to when you were skinnier. I fucked up.
Coming out of that relationship I became extremely depressed. I moved back in with my family, back to a space I never felt secure in. Endless nights spent scrolling through Tinder, a space where your body is always being perceived, felt completely invalidating. I was a completely different person. And I didn’t feel that way because I had loved and learned valuable lessons about navigating relationships, but it was because I was fat. Everytime I looked into the mirror, a devil appeared on my shoulder pointing out every flaw on my now monstrous body. It’s like my ego had turned against me.
I didn’t want to live in my body anymore. I thought I was nothing without the comfort of another person telling me I was good enough. I can’t say that I never feel that way today, but I’ve worked on it. I’m not about to go on a spiel about how much it matters to love yourself, nor about how self-love is a journey and not a destination… but would love really be worth it if it meant that I had to be skinny, athletic, or fit any of the aesthetic qualities guys on dating apps wanted? Probably not. But I want to be better, because I know that the moments in between these feelings of doubt and despair are much more important than these superficial views of my body. Though, how I never saw myself changing is still a phenomena to me.
In the end, I’m still trying to upward spiral out of this feeling called body dysmorphia.
Domestication of Food and the Body 🍚
Rice.
Rice is life.
Grains are the very foundation of human existence. It was only through farming and breeding these grains did civilization come about. These foods shaped us. Then we bred each other. Rice has domesticated us. As the saying goes, “you are what you eat.”
Continue readingIs This Mascara Really “Better Than Sex”? Some Thoughts on Makeup
I am prefacing this post by saying I barely wear makeup (is slapping glitter on your face “real makeup”?, the next presidential debate topic), I don’t know how to do makeup, but I really think we underestimate the power and psychological issues/potential trauma makeup can create. Granted, makeup can be and is gorgeous/fun because you can accent your favorite features or you can coordinate it with a cool look (i.e. special effects makeup or just a really bold neon green eyeliner), but at what point is it too much? Is it at the point where you have put on a full face for a beach trip? Is it when you have to put on a full face for a gym session? Is it when you’re incapable of seeing yourself/allowing yourself to be seen without makeup, so much so that it dictates how, when, and if you’re even going to be seen in public that day? Or when seeing your bare face strikes actual fear and depression into you? I do not think the idea of seeing your bare face exposed or exposing your bare face to the world, rendering you depressed, disturbed, or even disgusted is given enough space in talking about dismantling body dysmorphia. The alienation experienced at the disconnect of seeing your bare face and not registering it as your own because it has no makeup on it sounds like a trauma response to me. The gym comment is from a conversation I had with a friend. She legitimately could not go to the gym with me (or outside for that matter) without applying at least five different products and I remember pointing out, “dude you’re gonna sweat that off 5 minutes into rowing” and she told me she “wouldn’t allow” herself to go outside without it.
Continue readingIntergenerational Body Shaming
(Trigger warning: disordered eating/weight)
One of the first instances I remember being concerned about my weight was sixth grade, after the dreaded FitnessGram assessment in gym class. The FitnessGram consists of a series of different physical tests, ranging from the PACER, push-ups, sit-ups, and measuring body mass index (BMI). This was the first time I became aware of the weights of other girls my age, and naturally my adolescent brain had to compare mine to theirs. When I got home from school, I distinctly remember Googling “is it ok for a 12 year old girl to weigh 112 pounds?”
My relationship with my weight only got worse with age. My family would sometimes make comments about it, which of course made me upset; I would cry to my friends about it and they would insist I had nothing to worry about, that I was pretty, that I wasn’t fat (as if you can’t be both-but that’s another conversation). I didn’t know who to believe. I felt especially ostracized because I come from an extremely health-conscious family- my dad is a physical education teacher, my mom is a nurse, and my sister is personal trainer. Being surrounded by such fit people all the time definitely made me feel worse, and they didn’t hide their feelings about my weight, eating habits, physical activity, etc. I wanted nothing more than to shed a few pounds and be as skinny as my friends. My weight fluctuated some over the years, as I was using the LoseIt and My Fitness Pal apps on and off while being trapped in the binge-restrict cycle.
Despite all of this, I have never been medically classified as overweight. My BMI has always been in the normal range. But I was convinced I needed to lose weight, because my friends were still skinnier than me, women on TV and social media looked better than me, and my family still made comments. This past year, I lost 25 pounds and finally reached my “goal weight”. Honestly, my biggest motivation was to finally make my family shut up. Now, the comments have switched from “you look like you put on some weight” and “are you sure you should be eating that?” to “you’ve slimmed down” and “what are your weight-loss tips?” And yet, I still feel the same about my body. I still look in the mirror and see fat that needs to go.
My weight loss has made me realize that I may never be satisfied with how I look if I continue to view myself so negatively. I am slowly getting to a place of self-acceptance, and I am in a much better mental state than I have been in years. I have very supportive friends, a loving boyfriend, and a great therapist. I am actively trying to unlearn years of my family’s toxic dynamic with weight, but so much of it was directed towards me in my formative years that it has had a huge impact on my self-esteem and confidence. My grandmother has made similar comments to me that my mom has, so I can only assume that my mom was raised in a similar way, and that many of the things she had to say to me were just projections of how she felt about herself. In both my family and society, women are viewed more favorably the smaller they are. But this is a socially constructed, patriarchal standard of beauty that has taken up too much of my life. I know now that my weight has not, does not, and will never define me, no matter what anyone says. I know that I deserve to treat my body with kindness and love. I know that am more than my physical appearance. This intergenerational trend of body shaming ends with me.
“I Liked Your Hair Better Straight”
I’m getting tired of hearing that….
Alright, Let’s Be Honest America: Black Women’s Bodies Are “Inappropriate”
“…Corner of Plus Size Shame”
Recently there has been a lot of push back in the fashion industry when it comes to using the term “plus size”. Plus size fashion in the last decade has become a profitable portion of the industry. Something that I’m assuming came along with the realization that fat people are people too, and as such they need fashionable clothing, and at an affordable price. Continue reading
Body image and polyamory: an exploration
It’s endlessly intriguing to me how our view of certain things can be changed completely by new experiences. I have been thinking about this a lot lately, because after 11 years together, my husband and I have taken an unexpected (but very positive) step with our marriage — we are exploring polyamory. Something I took for granted over the course of more than a decade in a stable relationship was how many things I didn’t have to think about, especially when it came to my body. Continue reading
Unruly Bodies 