My assignment: If your body could talk, what would it tell you? Consider your body over the years, from early childhood to now. Take some time to consider what your body would say. Write it out. What is your reaction to what you have written?
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Okay, so before I begin, I’ve tried to write this many, many times. I’m not really sure how to write it or where to even begin. Here we go again.
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Right now, in the here and now, my body is telling me two very different things. First, it is telling me that it is strong, that it is becoming stronger, that it is powerful and capable of doing many things–from playing flute, to playing games with the little girl I mentor, to giving presentations, and to just relaxing with friends on a couch watching a movie. However, as I am sitting here–my body is also telling me many other things. How uncomfortable it is–how uncomfortable I am. How I feel like I can feel every fold and every extra flab or whatever on my skin. My body is also telling me it is hurt. It has physical and emotional scars and a foot that doesn’t seem to want to heal. My body has told me many times to stop running or stop working out, and I have not listening. In fact, my fingers are typing this now so that my entire being listens to my body. My body is anxious. My body would tell me to take a deep breath, but, again, there is another part of my body that just wants to give in to ED. My body is telling me that it is exhausted from fighting, but strong from the process.
At my yoga retreat, my body reminded me of how strong and powerful it is. My body amazed me. My body told me that it was okay to be of all shapes and sizes as I looked around. My body told me that all the crap I do to it isn’t really about the size of my body, and it is not. My body really just amazed me. I did things that I did not know that I could do. I became amazed at my body and I wish I was still listening to my body.
When I think back to early childhood, I’m not really sure what my body told me, but I know what it would tell the little me looking back now. I think, just like in yoga camp, my body would be amazed and tell me how amazing my body is with learning to move and walk and reach and run and all the other things I did. My body would tell me to go have fun! My parents always wanted one event or one thing that started all the crazy, but there isn’t. I remember being in my dance and swim classes as a small child (probably 5 or so) and just being so uncomfortable seeing my body in the mirrors and others seeing my body. I would tell that little body now, to just be a child and to enjoy everything. To dance across the room and twirl and make splashes and swim like a butterfly. I wouldn’t tell that little self to hid the body. I would tell the little self to embrace the body. There is nothing scary about it. It is okay to like yourself. It is okay to not always feel comfortable, but it is also okay to let yourself–and your body–have fun. I would also tell that little self that you are beautiful, inside and out, in your tutu or in your swim suit. Or, anything else you are wearing. My body would be telling my little self that I may not be good enough and that I had to be perfect.
As I aged, my body that was ashamed always told myself to hide. Hide behind clothes. Hide behind towels and other people at swim practice. I wish I would have told my body to just go out there and be comfortable. My body has never been comfortable. It always wanted to, but never was. I vividly remember walking into swim practice when I was about 12 and having just moved, I was joining another team. I remember seeing the other girls and wanting to run away crying. I felt fat, worthless, like no one liked me, that I could never be good enough. I felt I should swim more to lose weight. I wish my body would have reminded me that none of those things were true–if it did remind me, I wish that I would have known to listen to it. I dreaded going to practice, I loved the feel of the water, but I hated the swim suit and the locker room part in swimming and in gym. I rationally know that I was never a large child, ever. I was often on the lower end of average weight wise or just normal; I was always about a year younger than my peers, so behind that way with the “baby fat” not going away as fast or whatever, or bodies not changing when everyone else was. I think my body would have reminded me to just enjoy swimming. And, to remember that my abilities as a swimmer–or as a person–had nothing to do with my size or what I ate. Somehow, my body got this idea, even though it was fighting this idea.
Fast forward to high school and nothing has changed. If anything, my body is screaming that it needs to be loved and appreciated. I very vividly remember going pants shopping with my mom and getting a very normal size. I remember coming back and standing next to my dad–who was in bed struggling with bone cancer, none of us knowing if he would actually survive–and him telling me something to the effect of, “woah, you are getting too big” then pinching my belly. My body was still a swimmer but the bad side of my body was telling me to swim and to stay in marching band and exercise behind closed doors to lose weight, to make it okay to eat, to feel better, and to be a better person. My rationale body was screaming behind the doors that I had closed it in that none of these are true. My body was hurting inside and out, and I was causing that pain. My body wanted to communicate with me and everyone around me but did not know how. Today, I would tell that body to write, to talk, to cry, to scream. To do anything else. I would tell that body to tell the truth.
I remember going to therapy the first time. My body was dragging me in the door. I didn’t want to talk to the lady in the funny shaped office with the funny hair everything that was happening with my body and how I had lost the ability to listen to the rationale voice. I wanted to stay in my safe spot and be okay. Keep part of me listening to the rationale body, but feeling safe with the body that did the negative things. My body tried to pull me back from making negative choices (such as buying diet pills while under 18) and going towards positive choices. Eventually, my rationale body got tired of fighting with the stupid body and I quit swimming. I had too many scars on my body anyway. My body was crying. My stupid body was still telling me when to eat, what to eat, how to eat, how to move. My real body wanted me to talk. It wanted to remind me of all the good things that I was doing, but it was silent after years of being less and less heard.
In undergraduate, my body wanted to have fun. I did not let that happen. I was afraid to go anywhere, to have people see me eating, so I kept my body hidden and my voice that my body was trying to use silent. I joined the crew team as a reason to keep my weight low. My body was screaming that that was a bad idea, but I did not listen. However, something ironic happened, I gained a lot of muscle weight. At first, my body was proud. I was strong. But, then my coach told me that I weighed too much. I wanted to row again. In my head, my body took my new, strong body as a bad body. Over the summer between my freshman and sophomore year, I lost weight. More than I should. My rationale body was screaming to me to ask for help, to throw away the diet pills, to do anything else, anything at all. I came back to school and the stupid body was glad I was well under my weight limit for crew and that my spandex uniform was too lose. My rationale body started to kick in after various issues with passing out and being scared to return home. I quit rowing near the end of the season. While my body loved the feeling inside of the boat as I moved along the seat and moved the oar, my rationale body could not let me continue. At times, that body’s voice was a little bit louder. But, at the same time, the bad body voice reminded me I could continue to lose weight and stay at that “ideal” weight lifegaurding and teaching swim lessons again.
As undergraduate continued, I struggled to listen to what my body was telling me. I’m ashamed to admit this, but I took diet pills with me when I was an overnight counselor at a summer camp. I was a counselor for 8 year olds. I took the diet pills there because I was afraid of gaining weight at camp. I was a lifeguard, swim instructor, and mentor to these little girls. I read them stories at night and took diet pills before dinner. My rationale body again screamed for help, but the rest of me would not listen.
The rest of my undergrad continued largely like this. Body screaming, me not listening. Getting caught with diet pills, scales in my room at my sorority weighing myself at all hours of the night, working out far too much, avoiding eating with my sorority sisters and going out because of the fear of gaining weight from drinking or just not being good enough, judging my value as a person based on all the wrong things. I wish I could go back to me then and just tell myself to listen to my body.
Go onto graduate school, same old same old. I finally listening to my body and asked for help, but I ran as soon as they mentioned the words “eating disorder.” I thought it was okay to only eat “safe” foods, to work out all the time, to punish myself through not eating when I didn’t get something just right, to avoid anything that might involve food, to think I could control things, to think that my abilities as a teacher and researcher were somehow connected to what my body looked like and the food I ate. I guess recently (going back to the beginning), I have been listening to my body telling me it hurts–but I struggle to actually listen to it. So much of me is still caught up in those “bad” voices. My body tells me that none of this is actually about my body or my food, it is about how I don’t know how to love or accept myself, how I think I have to be perfect and fix everyone else, how I’m scared to lose control, and how I just need to accept who I am for how others see me. My body wants someone to pick me up and just let me cry and tell me that it will be okay–that it might not be okay tomorrow, but that it will be okay.
My reaction: I wish I didn’t turn down that “good” voice my body has. I wish I could help that voice come out. I’m so tired of not listening to it. I wonder if I ever can.
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Addition….I am so tired of all of this. So tired. It is exhausting. And, there is so much I am even scared to talk about still.
I just like watching it (and the ridiculousness of it–who goes to an amusement park in 3 to 4 inch heels?)! Haha, I do worry about all the germs with that many people kissing each other….but, that is just my special-ness….