Body Acceptance
Yo gurls (and selected men FEEL PROUD)
It is starting to get on my wick that my body acceptance is so fucking poor. I feel fat and frumpy a lot, and this is not cool, as both fatness and frumpiness should be considered awesome and also non related to your worth as a person.
I'm not going to go on a massive feminist rant about how patriarchy makes women (me) feel like this, and we need to change society, and etc etc, because you all know that, you all know I know that, and change is always a long time coming. I'm looking for some personal solutions to feel better about MY body.
I've identified the fact that for me, my body is not the problem. The way I feel about my body is the problem. I recently looked at a bunch of pictures of when I was much younger and thinner. I remember feeling pretty miserable about my body then, too.
Diet is Not The Answer. It just focuses me on the shit feelings, and then I hate myself more, and think of the whole thing as a punishment for being so SHIT and flabby as to need to stop eating things I love. Also, I love food. I can't bear the thought of a life where I spend the rest of it restricting what I eat and punishing myself for it. I already eat pretty good in terms of vegetables, Real Food (tm) and vitamins, can cook, love lentils, etc.
Cardio exercise is Not The Answer. I hate it, it is boring, it does not make me thinner and feels again like punishment. It takes time I do not have, and I hate it (This cannot be emphasised enough).
Shit that I think might be The Answer includes:
Doing weightlifting, because then I feel strong and also my muscles ache in this good way that makes me think about them rather than my stomach. And I want more muscles and think I could rock this. I enjoy doing the exercise and it doesn't take long so I don't get bored and pissed off. So I'm doing this. Yay me!
Wearing better clothes:
This one's tricky. I spend my mornings working as a cook, and my afternoons looking after an 18 month old toddler. The clothes I need to wear for this are easy clean, comfortable and stretchy, not too hot or cold, etc. I also feel kind of awkward when I dress up, because I don't do it very much, am insecure and keep pulling at my clothes. The clothes that women my shape wear in awesome blogs and look good in, are very much those 50s style retro dresses, heels, very shaped, qute tight, pin up girl style. Like these: http://www.pinupgirlclothing.com/
http://www.collectif.co.uk/
They are awesome, but I never wear dresses, hate wearing heels, and cannot be bothered to wear a lot of stuff or make-up.
I am pretty sure there's a happy medium between dressing up rockabilly with heels for work, and turning up at work in an ill-fitting toothpaste stained strappy top and pyjama trousers, which is my general 'thing.' Some of it will involve making a fucking effort rather than waking up and putting on whatever is on the floor, I accept this. But I need some help because I feel exposed and kind of weird when I do make an effort. Thoughts? Any good ideas about what kind of clothes to wear, how I should wear my clothes, good blogs, etc? I am also poor POOR so nothing that costs loads of cash ;)
Learning to think a different way about my body:
I have literally no idea how to do this. Any good links, blogs, ideas from my peeps?
Also, I work with a load of women who are always on a diet, always very down about their bodies, and we talk about it a lot, because I am a cook and obviously we end up talking about food, and if they're going to eat lunch with the kids I cook for, etc. I find myself feeling like this is really normal, and something I should do as well. I don't want to 'shut down' conversations but I don't feel like this is a healthy way of having stuff in common with colleagues.
I dunno, anything helpful, guys?
It is starting to get on my wick that my body acceptance is so fucking poor. I feel fat and frumpy a lot, and this is not cool, as both fatness and frumpiness should be considered awesome and also non related to your worth as a person.
I'm not going to go on a massive feminist rant about how patriarchy makes women (me) feel like this, and we need to change society, and etc etc, because you all know that, you all know I know that, and change is always a long time coming. I'm looking for some personal solutions to feel better about MY body.
I've identified the fact that for me, my body is not the problem. The way I feel about my body is the problem. I recently looked at a bunch of pictures of when I was much younger and thinner. I remember feeling pretty miserable about my body then, too.
Diet is Not The Answer. It just focuses me on the shit feelings, and then I hate myself more, and think of the whole thing as a punishment for being so SHIT and flabby as to need to stop eating things I love. Also, I love food. I can't bear the thought of a life where I spend the rest of it restricting what I eat and punishing myself for it. I already eat pretty good in terms of vegetables, Real Food (tm) and vitamins, can cook, love lentils, etc.
Cardio exercise is Not The Answer. I hate it, it is boring, it does not make me thinner and feels again like punishment. It takes time I do not have, and I hate it (This cannot be emphasised enough).
Shit that I think might be The Answer includes:
Doing weightlifting, because then I feel strong and also my muscles ache in this good way that makes me think about them rather than my stomach. And I want more muscles and think I could rock this. I enjoy doing the exercise and it doesn't take long so I don't get bored and pissed off. So I'm doing this. Yay me!
Wearing better clothes:
This one's tricky. I spend my mornings working as a cook, and my afternoons looking after an 18 month old toddler. The clothes I need to wear for this are easy clean, comfortable and stretchy, not too hot or cold, etc. I also feel kind of awkward when I dress up, because I don't do it very much, am insecure and keep pulling at my clothes. The clothes that women my shape wear in awesome blogs and look good in, are very much those 50s style retro dresses, heels, very shaped, qute tight, pin up girl style. Like these: http://www.pinupgirlclothing.com/
http://www.collectif.co.uk/
They are awesome, but I never wear dresses, hate wearing heels, and cannot be bothered to wear a lot of stuff or make-up.
I am pretty sure there's a happy medium between dressing up rockabilly with heels for work, and turning up at work in an ill-fitting toothpaste stained strappy top and pyjama trousers, which is my general 'thing.' Some of it will involve making a fucking effort rather than waking up and putting on whatever is on the floor, I accept this. But I need some help because I feel exposed and kind of weird when I do make an effort. Thoughts? Any good ideas about what kind of clothes to wear, how I should wear my clothes, good blogs, etc? I am also poor POOR so nothing that costs loads of cash ;)
Learning to think a different way about my body:
I have literally no idea how to do this. Any good links, blogs, ideas from my peeps?
Also, I work with a load of women who are always on a diet, always very down about their bodies, and we talk about it a lot, because I am a cook and obviously we end up talking about food, and if they're going to eat lunch with the kids I cook for, etc. I find myself feeling like this is really normal, and something I should do as well. I don't want to 'shut down' conversations but I don't feel like this is a healthy way of having stuff in common with colleagues.
I dunno, anything helpful, guys?