My disordered body image story
we all get body shamed.. might not be in obvious ways, like people in bigger bodies or smaller bodies
society tries to put all of us in a box
here is my story
Everyone seemed to have an opinion about my body, Chisom you are gaining weight they would say, or Chisom you are now too skinny...
you see I was a very skinny girl growing up, I grew up in a large family of siblings of different body sizes, in my eyes they were all beautiful but my only contradictions were that they would talk about their bodies and also about mine
teachers would talk about their bodies, and parents discussed the new slimming tool in town or how their exercise programs were working to keep them slim.
all these made me feel like something was wrong with my body
it continue until I went to university, it gets funny here
I gained some weight as my body changed, and I was named the girl with the figure 8
in Africa, it meant the girl with the sexy shape
I was in school, was not eating much, and was always so stressed out, and yet somehow I was named the Girl with the best shape the pressure to keep that shape got worse, in most of not having enough to eat I was still conscious of my body, I was still scared to eat so my tummy doesn’t get any bigger
I was still a child
as I got older, my body continued to change,
I remember talking about different kinds of diets with my friend Chisom,
she also loved to exercise, we would wake up in the mornings to jog and perform other fitness activities,
but I was doing all this with the fear of my body changing,
changing meant my body got bigger
after I graduated from the university,
I was at home for a while, and I had all the time to exercise and diet, this time around I could eat anything I wanted, but I decided not to because I was worried I would gain weight
and I succeeded in becoming skinny
I was proud of my skinniness, basked in in even
until oneday, I was walking down the street, and I met a friend, and after the hugs and exchange of pleasantries the next thing he told me was that I had gained so much weight
how did that happen
I was so skinny yesterday,
though I had managed to brush them off at that moment, their word kept ringing in my mind I had to lose more weight, I had to cut out more food,
I was barely eating at that time, I was overexercising and under-eating
I continued with this pattern of restricting and over-exercising until oneway I snapped,
I went on a binge, and I couldn’t hold myself back, for weeks I couldn’t stop eating; I had starved my body for a long time, and I gained all that weight back and more
guess what happened,
I was getting reminded that I was gaining weight, and this continued for a long time.
I would lose weight and gain it back.
it was a rinse-and-repeat cycle
I was an emotional wreck, my body gave me so much anxiety.
I finally understood that my body belongs to me I was born with it.
My body Is mine.
I stopped caring what society thought about my body, it took me a long time to accept it; for so many years it felt like my body was not right.
I have decided I can do whatever I want with my body; I stopped bingeing and over-exercising
I eat what I want and what makes my body feel good.
I listen to my body
and I move it in a way that empowers me
The more I treated my body right, the more confident I felt, and the more other people's opinions or view points didn’t matter.
