I'm an endangered species (Eating Disorder Awareness Week)

From all my life experiences, observations of those around me, taking in the messages from the media, talking to neighbors and loved ones, I have finally come to this conclusion:


I am a member of an endangered species.

What species you ask? "Fat woman who is not trying to become less fat." And I don't just mean that I'm "between diets" or just not trying to lose weight right NOW. I mean I honestly don't care about losing weight anymore, ever. I don't own a scale. I don't weigh myself. I eat what I like. I exercise and play cause I love it. If I don't like it or it makes me feel icky, I don't do it.

I've spent my time being on the other species, actually several other species. Let me paint a picture of the different species I have been a member of, in chronological order, although this is a VERY truncated version. Believe me, there are millions of women in each of these species. (Please note I'm using the phrase "fat girl" throughout, even though I am a woman, not a girl, but this started when I was a girl. And "fat" is not a value judgment, it is just a trait, like short or tall. I don't use this phrase as an insult, so please don't take it in that way.)


Thriving Species
Average girl who thinks she's fat.
Average girl who eats emotionally and becomes actually fat.
Fat girl who is actually, physically addicted to sugar and comfort eating.
Fat girl who knows that being fat is completely unacceptable.
Fat girl who decides she won't be a fat girl anymore
Fat girl dieting.
Fat girl losing weight.
Fat girl failing.
Fat girl binging.
Fat girl deciding (again) it's not okay to be a fat girl.
Fat girl dieting.
Fat girl losing weight
Fat girl falling off the wagon (again).
Fat girl binging and becoming even more fat than when she started (the "yo-yo-ing up the scale" phenomenon)
Fat girl eating ANYTHING sweet just to get a fix, without knowing if she even likes the food that much.
Fat girl deciding it's not okay to be a fat girl.
Fat girl tired of not being loved, of not being desired, of not being "ok" cause she's fat. Being fat is not okay.
Fat girl giving up sugar entirely.
Fat girl detoxing from sugar.
Fat girl losing a LOT of weight.
Fat girl is now average girl.
Average girl missing out on food with family and friends.
Average girl exhausted from undernourishment and overexercise.
Average girl still not happy
Average girl reaching out to friends and making treats for a party.
Average girl falling off the wagon BIG TIME and eating all the leftover treats from the party.
Average girl gaining weight and continuing a 3-year-long binge "last supper" while still off the wagon. (Cause she knows she'll have to get back on the wagon soon, so she has to eat the stuff she loves NOW while she still can.)
Fat girl sick and tired of this cycle that has been repeated more times than she can count.
Fat girl wishing she was still the "fat girl" of a couple decades ago, when she was actually just average, instead of approaching morbid obesity. Why couldn't she just have been happy with that? She'd kill to be that "fat girl" again now. 

By the way... all that ^^ is not just a "normal" cycle.  It's very disordered.  Dieting is disordered eating, and contributes to actual eating disorders.  I have had an eating disorder for most of my life.  Yes, with an actual diagnosis by actual professionals.  Dieting mentalities contribute to eating disorders.

Here's where we begin to get into an evolutionary tangent that does not have as many women in it, and I have become more and more endangered, as I know precious few people who join me where I'm at.

Endangered Species
Fat girl starting to think: do I really want to count calories for the rest of my life? Do I actually LIKE jogging and doing exercise videos? (The answer is no.) Do I actually want to lose weight so I can appeal to the men and other people who I currently feel are shallow for ignoring me the way I am now? Why would I want to be associated with people that are shallow? Why do I even care about their opinion? Whenever I go to the doctor and get lots of tests and stuff, they always find that I am perfectly healthy, to my surprise since I'm so big. Can someone actually be fat AND fit at the same time? Am I actually okay the way I am? Can I go ahead and accept myself as-is, and stop punishing myself physically and mentally? How much stuff could I get done if I didn't spend so much time obsessing about food, calories in, calories burned, exercise, weight, dating, my looks, etc.? How much more attractive and happy would I actually be, just by becoming confident and content with myself?

This kind of thinking has eventually landed me in my current species:  Fat girl NOT trying to become less fat.

This revolution has taken a couple years. It began with a dedication to STOP dieting, and STOP weighing myself. I've been successful with that and am committed to it. My brain and body are still adjusting. I have gained a little more weight and then come to a stopping point since then. I'm no longer yo-yo-ing my way up the scale, I'm just stable where I am. I still eat a lot of foods I love, cause no food is off-limits.  But I don't eat junk just to get some calories or some sweetness out of desparation, I actually eat things I like.  I no longer hoard and hide food and eat thousands of calories in one sitting, in secret, cause it's so shameful to eat foods you like.  I eat out in the open and no longer try to hide.  I no longer binge.  And I do physical things I actually like- biking, swimming, playing with my kids, hiking.  I even tried snowshoeing recently which was a blast.  I do NOT jog or do exercise videos.

My brain and body are learning to trust the fact that food will always be there. I won't make it forbidden ever again. So there are still cravings there, and I do still believe there is a bit of a physical dependence on sugar (that's a whole different topic for another day if anyone is interested).  But I also LOVE a variety of foods, and nothing is "good" or "bad", it's just food, some of which makes me feel great and some doesn't make me feel that great so I cut back on or avoid those that don't feel good to my body.

This revolution for me though, is really about self-acceptance and changing my paradigm about body image, society, etc.  It's okay to be any size, just like it's okay to be any color.  If you use things like race, gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic status in place of "fat", it really makes it clear what JERKS we are all being to ourselves and each other.

Fat girl decides it's not okay to be a fat girl.
Black woman decides it's not okay to be a black woman.
Gay man decides it's not okay to be a gay man.
Hispanic teenager decides it's not okay to be a hispanic teenager.


Do you see my point?

I see people all around me in various stages of that Thriving Species list.  Friends, colleagues, loved ones, going to extreme measures.  Exercising 10 times per week, tracking and counting every single bit of food they eat, having nothing but crackers for lunch, eating a total of 800 calories per day, making certain foods that they really love "forbidden", and so forth.  (For an explanation of why low-calorie diets are BAD for your body and your metabolism, you can see this post I did.)

I just wish these great people would realize how detrimental it is to be there, and instead join me here in my species.  Cause it's not just a species of NOT trying to lose weight.  It's the species of loving yourself, no matter what, and appreciating the GIFT that your body is, no matter what.  It's not about being unhealthy, or being fat, or "giving up" on something.  It's about loving yourself.  Respecting yourself.  Taking good care of yourself.

Change your evolutionary trajectory, it's not up to chance, it's your choice.  Choose to love yourself and see your body as a gift.  Use it as a tool to do all the AWESOME you have going on in your life.  Make your body your friend and ally.  To do that you have to stop treating it like the enemy.  Cause we're all friends here.






As my friend Lisa D'Alessio just beautifully said: 

Grieving the After

This summer I did something that was incredibly difficult and scary.  I gave away an entire wardrobe's worth of clothing in my "goal size".  These clothes were things I wore at about age 17-21.  I'm 34 now, and about 3 or 4 sizes above that collection of clothing.  I dutifully held on to these items because they were my favorite clothes- there was some really cute stuff in there!  And OF COURSE, I would get to that size again...some day.  I wouldn't want to have to go out and spend hundreds of dollars replacing all those clothes WHEN I got back to that size!

I've taken many "before" pictures in my life, sat down and planned out my "miraculous transformation to come", wrote down every workout, every calorie limit and possible "cheat" day to stick with the healthy goal of losing 2 pounds per week.  In fact, the box this clothing was stored in was labeled, "Julie's clothes Summer 2008".  That was the time period I had estimated I'd be able to fit in them again, after my careful planning out of the exact path to take to this glorious "after".

So when it was time to clean out and get rid of my storage unit this summer, I took a long hard look at this wardrobe I had been saving.  I took them out and looked longingly at my jeans and black pants that I fondly remember feeling so great wearing - I even got asked out on a date (something that almost never happened to me) by a complete stranger while wearing those clothes!  That means, this guy who knew NOTHING about me, asked me out based solely on looks...ME!  What a thrilling day that was. How nice it would be to have that experience again.  But for that to happen, I have to fit in those clothes again.

So then why did I give the clothes away?  Why would I waste money and give up my inspiration to be healthy?  I remember once even hanging those jeans up on my wall in an attempt to inspire myself daily to exercise and avoid eating the sweets I loved, so that I could once again be sexy, confident, and acceptable to males.

Why did I get rid of them?  I'll tell you why.  Because I decided to be kind to myself.  I decided I love myself.  I decided that I am awesome the way I am - NOT ONE POUND LIGHTER.  I will no longer subject myself to the self-inflicted abuse of putting life off until I get to my "after".  My life is here and now.  I got rid of those clothes because I gave myself permission to go ahead and live.

Believe me, letting it go was a hard thing to do.  I hesitated.  I regretted.  I bargained.  I cried.  And after they were gone, I breathed.  Then I smiled.  And then I went on with my awesome life.

(Thanks again to Militant Baker for doing this Smash the Scale thing at the beginning of this year.  I took another big step by grieving the "after".)

Smash the Scale- New Year's Confessions

Tomorrow is New Year's Day.  For a good portion of my 33 years, I wasted that day writing long lists of "resolutions" (aka unreasonable-and-unreachable-goals-disguising-themselves-as-healthy-lifestyle-changes), complete with calendars, benchmark goals, accountability measures, etc. only to have the goals eventually fail, usually by about February or March. Then, as an all-or-nothing perfectionist, I immediately labelled myself as a hopeless loser, and gave up on my "healthy lifestyle", crashing and burning with flair and Oreos.

But here's the weird thing.  The reality is, that's what I wanted.  I wanted the failure as much as I wanted the Oreos, in fact probably more.  Oreos are a nice calming, happy-inducing, non-judging friend.  But failure is even better.  You see, there is a certain safety in being a fat failure.  It took me a long time to realize it, but I have a suit of armor I carry around with me at all times.  It protects me from having to let people see the real me.  If anyone rejects me, I have an instant scapegoat- it's the armor they're rejecting instead of myself, those shallow jerks.  I get to look noble in comparison to their prejudice, and I also can wallow in self-pity.  It's a win-win.

Several years ago, I stopped making resolutions to magically transform my body and my life, mostly because it always turned out badly and emotionally devastating, and I decided to be kind to myself and no longer put myself through that abuse.  I occasionally still make goals of things I plan to accomplish that year anyway, like paying off my car, taking lots of hikes, or doing a summer internship.  This year is no different.  No body transformation goals.  Instead, this:

I'll get to the "because" in just a moment.  But first, smashing the scale (ie with a sledge hammer) is an interesting notion for me, because I have already weened myself off the scale.  I actually don't own a scale anymore, and I have only a rough idea of what I weigh.  It's nice living without a scale, and I highly recommend it.  (So if you haven't yet, go smash yours!)  No person actually NEEDS to know their exact weight every day or even every week.  The only time I ever have to know my weight is for filling out my driver's license application, and filling out medical forms.  I find out my weight a couple times a year when I happen to get sick enough to go to the doctor.  Being mostly in the dark about the number on the scale is just fine with me.  Instead of a number dictating how I'm going to feel about myself on any given day, how I FEEL dictates how I feel.  (Imagine that.)

Beautiful, even sans makeup

So since I have no scale to smash, I will have to smash other modes of hiding and protecting myself.  Giving my body fat status as protective armor ensures that I both love and hate it and subsequently love and hate myself.  I want to remove that status and give myself permission to love myself (including the fat), while also letting my true self shine through.  That won't be as instant as smashing a scale with a hammer.  And I have to be careful to avoid thinking my true self I've been hiding is a skinny hottie that has to be let out of the fat suit.  I already am the hottie, and the armor is actually in my head.  My physical appearance probably won't actually change all that much as I disrobe and let people see the real me.

A few things I have already started to do this past year, and plan to continue.

• Play more!  I have actually had times where I would exercise at home so I could get myself looking presentable enough to work out in public.  Now I don't care what people think when they see this fat girl hiking, backpacking, and river rafting.  I just do it, cause I enjoy it.
• Smile at myself in the mirror.  Instead of focusing in on little parts of my appearance to see if they look okay, just smile at beautiful me.
• STOP making shaming comments about myself.  Making negative comments about my appearance teaches the wrong things to my sons and anyone else who hears me.  Only positive comments, and try to avoid comments focused only on appearance.
• Avoid commenting on others' appearance.  Compliment their character, their hard work, their health, their joy.
• Lose the makeup.  I do this not because I think makeup is evil, but because my natural "me" is without makeup.  I only started wearing it when I was 19 when a guy indoctrinated me with the idea that I should wear makeup.  I eventually convinced myself I needed it in order to be acceptable or presentable.  That belief is not me, and I'm getting rid of it.
• Hug people more.  (This is a newer one.) I like to hug but I hold back in case it will make someone else feel weird or uncomfortable because they don't like me enough to hug me.  But in the process I end up making the situation feel really awkward and it's just dumb.
• Be myself.  I will only attract awesome friends if they can see my awesomeness. 

  
So, that is how I will "Smash the Scale".  Now for the "because".

Because I'm a human being.  Because I deserve to see my body as a means rather than an end.  Because I'm a complex person and my worth is not dependent on how I look or what others think of me.  What matters is what I think.  Because my body is a tool to do awesomeness.  Because my sons will learn much from me about the worth of women and how to treat them, and how they should treat themselves.  Because I am happier when I just live.  And I don't need anyone's permission to do so.

What about you?  Are you ready to smash the scale?  What's your "because"?  Please comment!

Smash the Scale is a body love movement put on by The Militant Baker and her Body Love Conference.  (Read about Smash the Scale at her blog, and visit the FB page for the conference.)  Thanks for the inspiration, Jes.