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self-love

On (not) loving your body

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I have had several conversations about bodies and body love (or lack thereof) lately, which usually means it’s somewhere out there in the collective consciousness of the world, which means we have to talk about it and address it so people aren’t just dealing with it alone.

Many, many people struggle with body image. That’s a broad statement. It could include anything from body dislike, disordered eating, eating disorder, not loving what they see in the mirror, trying to attain a different body, etc.

Both personally (friends/family) and in the wide stream media (professionals, campaigns, etc), body love is preached. “Love your body!” “Bodies come in every shape and size!” “There’s no weight limit on beauty!”

And that’s super well-meaning. The idea being, you don’t have to be so hard on yourself! You can just love your body, however it looks, whatever size it is.

Except what I’ve been hearing from others is that sometimes it’s not that easy – and sometimes those well-meaning pieces of advice turn into (unintended) additional pressures. Because here is what some people then feel:

I don’t love my body.  I hate how much time I devote to thinking about it and obsessing over it. AND I’m supposed to be loving it. I can’t even do that. I suck. I’ve tried for years and I just can’t love it.

The pressure to love their body actually makes things worse. Because they don’t, and they can’t, and then they judge themselves for it and feel bad. So rather than them feeling self-love, now they feel even more self-hate.

And I get it.

There’s a large movement to embrace your postpartum body. “Love your body!” “Your body did amazing things for you!” “How lucky are you to have grown a child in your body!”

Again, all from a good place. The idea being, you shouldn’t be expected to have the same body you had before you grew a baby and gave birth. The idea being, be gentle with yourself. You don’t have to “fix” your body. You can love your body now.

Except what about when you don’t?

3 months after I had Maya, I fit into all my clothes again. My body went right back to where it was, and that’s just a fact. When pregnant with Maggie, I gained more weight. Due to some issues and complications, I didn’t exercise. I had an emergency c-section that healed weird and left me with thick, ropey scar tissue that’s itchy and uncomfortable every day. Diastasis recti left me with a bulging stomach. Nearly a year later, I still don’t fit into most of my pants because I have more fat and skin on my stomach, thighs, and butt, and that’s just a fact.

And I don’t hate it. But I DON’T love it. I know people who love their soft skin, love their new size, love their scars and stretch marks, and that’s wonderful. It really is. But it’s also okay that I don’t love it.

I love my daughters, and I am thankful every second of every day that I grew them and birthed them, and I wouldn’t change anything that happened for anything. And I’m not obsessing 24/7, constantly counting calories, spending 100% of my mental energy on it. But. I wish I had my body back.

The thing is, that’s okay! I shouldn’t feel pressured to get my pre-partum body back, but I also shouldn’t feel pressure to love my new body. Neither serves me.

I guess what I am saying  is: maybe the goal doesn’t have to be body love. If we get to that state, that’s wonderful. But if we don’t, that’s okay. It’s like a ladder and there are different rungs. Maybe the highest rung is body love, and the lowest one is body hate. But there are rungs in the middle. Like I said to a few people last week, maybe it’s okay to be on the “eh” rung or the “take it or leave it” one or the “it’s okay” one. Maybe if we just accept that’s where we’re at, we wouldn’t be putting as much pressure on ourselves one way or the other and we wouldn’t constantly feel like we’re failing one way or the other.

(I also just feel the need to say – if you are dealing with significant mental health issues because of your body image or eating disordered behaviors, etc., this is something different – please, please don’t accept where you are, and don’t accept that has to be your life. It gets better, I promise. I just mean, you don’t have to get to the “I love my body so much!!!” point to be considered “healthy” and “okay” and “better.”)

Loving our body is great. But be gentle with yourself. If you’re on a different rung, as long as it’s not the very very bottom, it’s okay to be there. It feels horrible to have an unattainable goal. Make it more realistic.

I feel “decent” about my body, AND I wish it looked and felt the way it used to, AND that’s okay.

Embracing my quirky self

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I really like myself.

I didn’t always like myself.

In fact, I think it’s only in the past two-three years that I really started liking myself.

It’s funny, in a sad way. I spent all of high school and college trying to act “normal” and “cool,” so that people wouldn’t think I was weird, or odd, or different. Consequently, anytime I did ANYTHING, I panicked over how I was perceived about it. So it became a lose-lose situation. And I firmly believe that positivity and confidence is attractive and magnetic, so the opposite was certainly repelling and unappealing. It’s not a coincidence to me that I met the love of my life (and the first and only guy I have ever truly dated) once my self-confidence skyrocketed and I started loving myself. Nor is it a coincidence that my generalized anxiety and panic attacks settled down once I started liking myself. It’s funny — all the work we do to “protect” ourselves just makes it worse in the end.

But now, I embrace my weirdness. I am quirky and I LOVE that. I love laughing at myself. I say what’s on my mind, I say weird things, I make people giggle. I let my students laugh at me when I sing during a therapy session or do something completely embarrassing. It helps them see that I’m human. And maybe it’ll help them feel more comfortable laughing at themselves, too.

I love my sensitivities, even when they make life tricky for me. I love my quirks, my ruminations, my intuition. I don’t pretend to enjoy going to clubs or bars anymore. I don’t pretend to enjoy things I don’t like. I tell it like it is. I’m honest with myself and others about my likes, dislikes, interests, fears. I’m real. I really just love myself. And that’s not to say I’m happy all of the time, because I’m not. But happiness and self-love can be separate things. I can love myself and also be sad sometimes. And that’s okay.