My Body Vow
I can't remember when it was, or who said it, but I remember how I felt afterward.
I felt stunned. It was like being slapped. I immediately knew that I was the wrong kind of different, not the right one. I remember hating myself every moment I saw myself in a mirror after that. I remember crying a lot. I remember a few years in my early teens where I worked out so hard that my body ached for days. I remember how horrible I felt going into Lane Bryant for the first time because I couldn't find jeans at Sears or JCPenny that fit me right. I remember starving myself, thinking it would make the words and the weight go away. It didn't. Even if I lost the weight, I was always going to remember how it felt.
About six months ago, my niece saw the stretch marks on my stomach for the first time and told me they were ugly and that she wasn't going to have them. I went in my room and cried. Not much longer after that, there was an incident where she called a girl in a magazine ugly because she was fat, and she and I had a very long tearful talk about how appearances don't mean a person is ugly. I honestly don't know how successful I was. She's seven, but to hear her say things like that kills me a little inside.
Honestly, I don't like hurting my body. I don't like the feeling of starving myself. I don't like the pain after working out. When I do those things, I feel so horribly bad... nothing in the world feels worth it enough to do those things. I want to get in better shape, but not for anyone else but me. So I live longer. I want to live, but I'm not going to deny myself the things that give me happiness, whatever they may be. Years of being told "no" have made me much more self-indulgent, and I'm not going to look at that as being a negative thing.
I vow that I will live my life with the bones, muscle, and yes... even fat... that I've been given. I vow that I won't associate with anyone who tells me that I'm less. I vow that I will take the bad with the good; that I will love the scars, the marks, the so-called imperfections that make me different in a good way. I vow that I will work on not comparing myself to others, and that I will stop calling myself ugly. I vow that I will retrain myself that other's opinions of me don't matter.
I am a work in progress, and I vow that I will love every minute of it from here on out.
(For ProjectLifesize)
I felt stunned. It was like being slapped. I immediately knew that I was the wrong kind of different, not the right one. I remember hating myself every moment I saw myself in a mirror after that. I remember crying a lot. I remember a few years in my early teens where I worked out so hard that my body ached for days. I remember how horrible I felt going into Lane Bryant for the first time because I couldn't find jeans at Sears or JCPenny that fit me right. I remember starving myself, thinking it would make the words and the weight go away. It didn't. Even if I lost the weight, I was always going to remember how it felt.
About six months ago, my niece saw the stretch marks on my stomach for the first time and told me they were ugly and that she wasn't going to have them. I went in my room and cried. Not much longer after that, there was an incident where she called a girl in a magazine ugly because she was fat, and she and I had a very long tearful talk about how appearances don't mean a person is ugly. I honestly don't know how successful I was. She's seven, but to hear her say things like that kills me a little inside.
Honestly, I don't like hurting my body. I don't like the feeling of starving myself. I don't like the pain after working out. When I do those things, I feel so horribly bad... nothing in the world feels worth it enough to do those things. I want to get in better shape, but not for anyone else but me. So I live longer. I want to live, but I'm not going to deny myself the things that give me happiness, whatever they may be. Years of being told "no" have made me much more self-indulgent, and I'm not going to look at that as being a negative thing.
I vow that I will live my life with the bones, muscle, and yes... even fat... that I've been given. I vow that I won't associate with anyone who tells me that I'm less. I vow that I will take the bad with the good; that I will love the scars, the marks, the so-called imperfections that make me different in a good way. I vow that I will work on not comparing myself to others, and that I will stop calling myself ugly. I vow that I will retrain myself that other's opinions of me don't matter.
I am a work in progress, and I vow that I will love every minute of it from here on out.
(For ProjectLifesize)
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