December 30th, 2022 - I opened my medical charts to see if my blood work results were in... and found this comment in my chart.
Appearance: She is obese.
Why do they put obese in bright red? It's as if they think I wasn't aware of this fact.
This stupid comment upset me because it was true but made me feel like I had failed.
When I was in school, anything in red writing on your tests or quizzes meant, you had made a mistake and were wrong. That same feeling rushed over me seeing this comment.
I felt like I had failed and I was so confused because my labs were totally fine and I was "healthy" (whatever, the f**k that means).
When I saw the Barbie Movie this weekend and America Ferrara said, "You have to be thin, but not too thin. And you can never say you want to be thin. You have to say you want to be healthy, but also you have to be thin," I immediately thought of my medical chart and how much of a failure I felt when I saw those big bold red letters.
After seeing my chart, I cried a bunch and realized I needed to change.
And no, I am NOT talking about my weight here!
I read countless books written by authors who identify as fat, listened to many podcasts about unlearning diet culture, and joined a therapy group for women in larger bodies, where we discussed the challenges that life tosses at you when you are in a larger body. On top of all of this, I worked with 2 therapists (one specialized in Eating Disorders), an ADHD dietitian, a Health At Every Size (HAES) primary care provider, and my coach to build skills and challenge all the beliefs I had.
This year has been a tough one but I am the largest & happiest I have ever been in my life, and that is proof that being skinny doesn't make you happier.
When I was at my skinniest (as an adult), I wasn't eating enough. I was on Weight Watchers stressing over the next weigh-in appointment. For those of you who have never been to WW, when you arrive at the meeting they first weigh you in. They write it down for you and let you know if you lost or gained weight (as if you weren't already aware). Then if you hit a milestone, like loosing 5, 10, or 20 pounds - you got a charm! You were given a prize and that prize went on your keys so every day you would have that reminder to hold you accountable. Then post weigh-in, you had the actual meeting where a "leader" would talk about their journey and how miserable their life was when they were fat, and how happy they are now. They went into FULL detail on how they shamed themselves into staying at this weight and I thought I'd share some of the lessons I will never forget...
- BLTs (not the kind you are thinking of....) Bites, Licks, and Tastes...because these little things will be what make you stay fat
- Watch skinny people - see what they eat and then copy them
- Once you lose the weight, keep an older picture of you at your largest weight in your wallet to look at when you are tempted to order an "unhealthy" option at a restaurant or buy a "guilty" snack at the store
- If you want a margarita, your day must be filled with zero-point foods or you will go over your daily limit
- Fat = unhappy, miserable, unworthy, failure, shameful, angry, not deserving of love
Now, your girl has done LOTS OF WORK on this to get where I am today. I have not 100% erased diet culture from my brain (I WISH I COULD) but I have learned & accepted that it will never go away 100%. I mean, my ED therapist even faces it from time to time and it was hearing her say that, that made me realize it's all about finding ways to counteract it vs giving into the diet culture BS!
I am sharing this post now because I am almost a week away from my wedding!!! Which is a BIG event that diet culture likes to get a say in. When I became engaged my inbox immediately started to fill with, "shedding for the wedding" and "how to lose weight before the big day" emails from so many corporations!
This sucked a lot because I didn't want to lose weight but they were selling the vision that IF I wanted to feel pretty and loved and happy on my big day - I NEEDED to lose weight.
SO MANY LIES and all said JUST to get your money! Because, weight loss = money loss. Every new diet/weight loss program and weight loss medication COSTS money! These corporations don't give 2 shits how you ACTUALLY feel on your wedding day. This was a big ah-ha moment for me in my journey.
These companies go out, make you feel like you are garbage for existing in a larger body, take your money, and then leave. It's a trap we all have been stuck in before. Once I became hyper-aware of this awful trap, I stopped buying into these horrible corporations and started to invest in myself.
I invested in my larger body therapy group, therapy, coaching sessions, an ADHD nutrition course, a HAES PCP, reiki, massages, beach yoga classes, and surf lessons. I invested in things that told my brain & body, that it was loved. And, by showing myself love, I started to emotionally feel self-accepted.
My last and final part of this rant is about clothes! As a 6 ft tall woman, it is hard to shop in stores, and being in a larger body makes that even harder. I used to wear all black - black swimsuits, black dresses, black tank tops because those were flattering - right?! If I wore black, I looked skinnier so I wore it all day every day.
I realized in all this self-work that personality wise, black just doesn't show people who I am and I am a strong believer that clothes should be used to self-express. I wanted to be seen as the bright and fun woman I felt I was inside! So for help with this one, I went directly to TikTok.
I love TikTok and have been on the app since 2018, so my for you page is extremely personalized to who I am as a person. I had some women on my FYP talking about the challenges of being in a larger body so, I started there. I began to look into who these women were following and that led me down a beautiful path. I saw women of my size and larger rocking outfits with crop tops and bikinis and I knew in my soul THAT'S THE ENERGY I WANT TO GIVE OFF!! So, that's what I did. I started to dress as the person I felt inside vs focusing on the body I had on the outside.
This summer, I have embraced this new sense of style. I have been living in these Target halter crop tops I found (thanks to TikTok). I wore a sparkly Barbie pink bikini to my bachelorette party and I wore a black crop top with pink feathers to Taylor Swift! I have been wearing a bra and biker shorts to beach yoga every weekend and not caring if my stomach shows. I also got a few pairs of fun-colored athletic shorts that I love wearing out to do errands. If I am wearing black, now, it's either a crop top or Girlfriend Collective Bra and that feels so good!
This year started with me being told I am obese and as much as I CANNOT even believe I am saying this, I am glad I was. *gasp*
It allowed me to work towards unlearning diet culture, invest more into myself as a way of showing love to my body and mind, become aware of the super toxic lies we have all been told by big corporations, and discover some cool size-inclusive brands out there.
This comment taught me that you can be fat and happy.
Now, l got to go rock my wedding dress, take all the wedding pictures, and celebrate my love with the man who has always loved me no matter what my body has looked like!
Cheers!
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