I’ve been reading The Body Project by Joan Jacobs Brumberg. I haven’t finished it yet, but it’s really fascinating to read about the different and changing attitudes about the adolescent girl’s body over the past century. Not just girls’ attitudes about their own bodies, but American society’s views of them as well. Joan also quotes a lot from different girls’ diaries throughout the 20th Century, and it’s making me want to dig up my old journals next time I go “back home” (many of my personal effects are currently in storage in my in-laws’ basement). However, I don’t think I’ll find much in the way of image and body observation in those old journals. I wrote much more extensively about my relationships with others, or my lack of relationships with some boys!
Usually around the summertimes of my teens I believe I thought briefly about getting “toned up” but apparently it was never important enough to me to have a good follow-through. A couple of times in my later high school years and college years, I would go through times of what I thought of as “vanity” where I set out to lose a few pounds, but I always ended up abandoning the project after a few days when it occurred to me that people should (and did!) like me just the way I was. Plus I just really liked sweet stuff. Mmm, cookies...
I held firmly to this belief for much of the time, especially once I began actively looking for my “knight in shining armor,” which started in my early twenties. Sometimes I’d think to myself: you would probably get more male attention if you lost a few pounds, but then I would just remind myself that I DID NOT want to marry a man who valued me because of a slim figure.
But I’ve gotten off-track! Back to The Body Project… I can definitely identify with some of society’s views on my adolescent body that I saw as standards to be held to. Case in point: modesty. When I was in junior high and high school, modesty was a big deal to me. Going against the grain and keeping my skin off-limits to the public was a priority. Keeping my shape a mystery was also important, except where absolutely necessary. Like at work. Where I worked AS A LIFEGUARD and SWIM INSTRUCTOR. I’m full of contradictions, I tell ya. But at least that modesty stuff explains why one will find very few photos of me, as a teen, where I’m not wearing big old baggy jeans and an oversize shirt. Okay, it was also the alt/grunge era… but seriously I never donned a strapless gown for a dance, mostly because I knew how uncomfortable I would be that everyone could see my whole décolletage. But it wasn’t really insecurity about my image; I just thought that it wasn’t modest to let guys see that much of me. I was to remain a shrouded mystery.
Let me tie up this post by saying that there will be more to come about this book, once I finish it, and then I have two more *gems* on my bookshelf to get into.
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Monday, July 21, 2008
the blah-blah-ology behind this blah-blah-blog
After searching for good blogs about positive body image, I’ve decided I just need to start my own. Don’t get me wrong, there are some great blogs out there, but there seems to be a dearth of bloggers and commenters who, um, actually like their bodies. Where are all the happy, beautiful, imperfect people who know that they’re not HOT HOT HOT by “society’s standards” but love their bodies just the same??? I can’t find them, so I’m going to create them. That’s right—I’m going to create YOU. All the beautiful people.
How will I do this? I don’t know yet. This will definitely be an experiment in body positivation. (By the way, I like to make up words sometimes. Deal.) I guess what I will do is start by telling you a little about myself and then if there is anything that I say that resonates with you, by golly, bounce it off in the comments and we’ll discuss, ok?
So, I’m a girl, now in my twenties, and up until about a year ago I was just kind of ambivalent about my body. For the previous 12-15 years --since puberty, I guess-- I’d had pretty much the same body: I didn’t think it was that great of a body, but I didn’t dislike it and I’d always been confident, laid back, healthy, and happy, and I wasn’t usually bothered by my excess weight. I can’t pinpoint when I knew, but eventually I realized I was on a slow but steady path towards obesity, and I decided something needed to change.
I started by learning to eat healthier, which actually took a lot of time to get into because I had a lot of learning to do about what’s healthy and balanced and what’s not! I also started exercising. I decided that this would be the time that I actually “got fit.” I’d been telling myself ever since I was 13 that I was going to “get fit,” but I’d never really cared enough to define my goals and develop a plan, so I’d never gotten much further than a salad and a couple of jogs around the block.
This time I was serious. As I began eating better food and exercising more regularly, I decided on a “goal weight” and was determined that nothing but the healthiest, most realistic plan was going to be good enough for me. Everything I had ever truly accomplished for myself I had done though hard work, and this was to be no different.
And it wasn’t, really. I worked hard day after day, and eventually the changes I’d made began to have an impact. I lost a few pounds and my clothes got loose. Some of my tight old favorites fit again. I kept fine-tuning and balancing my diet and I kept exercising, and kept losing weight little by little. And then an amazing thing happened. Gradually, I started to pay more attention to my body and I–gradually, of course—came to the realization that I had a really rockin’ bod!
Things got complicated once I started getting closer and closer to my “goal weight.” I wasn’t sure if my original goal weight was really where I wanted to be. Perhaps that would be too thin for me, and I’d want to gain a few pounds back. Or maybe it wouldn’t be thin enough for my height and frame and I’d want to consider losing a few more pounds. I started looking online for how other people decided what their most ideal weight and shape was, and that’s when I found them: the positive body image sites and blogs. Great! I thought. Other people who love their bodies, too! The only thing I could figure from most of them, however, was that most women, no matter what they do, cannot achieve a body they love: there will always be something to dislike about themselves. Also, a lot of people who frequent these sites have a long history of dieting, losing, eating, gaining, and doing it all over again.
And then there were the “fat acceptance” blogs, which claim that women should be happy and love their bodies at whatever size they are, because diets just don’t work. Period. But many people on those sites don’t really love their bodies, either. And they’re always trying to convince us all to be happy with our bodies the way they are, as long as we’re healthy. And what does that mean, healthy? And what about all of my hard work to “get fit”? Was that worth nothing now, since I was supposed to be satisfied with myself just the way I was?
So I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m just going to start my own blog to talk about this kind of stuff. That’s enough of my blah-blah-blah for today.
How will I do this? I don’t know yet. This will definitely be an experiment in body positivation. (By the way, I like to make up words sometimes. Deal.) I guess what I will do is start by telling you a little about myself and then if there is anything that I say that resonates with you, by golly, bounce it off in the comments and we’ll discuss, ok?
So, I’m a girl, now in my twenties, and up until about a year ago I was just kind of ambivalent about my body. For the previous 12-15 years --since puberty, I guess-- I’d had pretty much the same body: I didn’t think it was that great of a body, but I didn’t dislike it and I’d always been confident, laid back, healthy, and happy, and I wasn’t usually bothered by my excess weight. I can’t pinpoint when I knew, but eventually I realized I was on a slow but steady path towards obesity, and I decided something needed to change.
I started by learning to eat healthier, which actually took a lot of time to get into because I had a lot of learning to do about what’s healthy and balanced and what’s not! I also started exercising. I decided that this would be the time that I actually “got fit.” I’d been telling myself ever since I was 13 that I was going to “get fit,” but I’d never really cared enough to define my goals and develop a plan, so I’d never gotten much further than a salad and a couple of jogs around the block.
This time I was serious. As I began eating better food and exercising more regularly, I decided on a “goal weight” and was determined that nothing but the healthiest, most realistic plan was going to be good enough for me. Everything I had ever truly accomplished for myself I had done though hard work, and this was to be no different.
And it wasn’t, really. I worked hard day after day, and eventually the changes I’d made began to have an impact. I lost a few pounds and my clothes got loose. Some of my tight old favorites fit again. I kept fine-tuning and balancing my diet and I kept exercising, and kept losing weight little by little. And then an amazing thing happened. Gradually, I started to pay more attention to my body and I–gradually, of course—came to the realization that I had a really rockin’ bod!
Things got complicated once I started getting closer and closer to my “goal weight.” I wasn’t sure if my original goal weight was really where I wanted to be. Perhaps that would be too thin for me, and I’d want to gain a few pounds back. Or maybe it wouldn’t be thin enough for my height and frame and I’d want to consider losing a few more pounds. I started looking online for how other people decided what their most ideal weight and shape was, and that’s when I found them: the positive body image sites and blogs. Great! I thought. Other people who love their bodies, too! The only thing I could figure from most of them, however, was that most women, no matter what they do, cannot achieve a body they love: there will always be something to dislike about themselves. Also, a lot of people who frequent these sites have a long history of dieting, losing, eating, gaining, and doing it all over again.
And then there were the “fat acceptance” blogs, which claim that women should be happy and love their bodies at whatever size they are, because diets just don’t work. Period. But many people on those sites don’t really love their bodies, either. And they’re always trying to convince us all to be happy with our bodies the way they are, as long as we’re healthy. And what does that mean, healthy? And what about all of my hard work to “get fit”? Was that worth nothing now, since I was supposed to be satisfied with myself just the way I was?
So I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m just going to start my own blog to talk about this kind of stuff. That’s enough of my blah-blah-blah for today.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)