"i hate my body"

I was standing in the kitchen last week, barefoot, up to my elbows in water just a bit too warm. And dirty dishes. Always, the dirty dishes.

There I stood, scrubbing and washing and rinsing and only half-thinking.

And I was aware that I felt a little bit of unease--sometimes I won't know what I'm feeling, I'll just know that it's uncomfortable or uneasy or at odds with normalcy.

So there I was, hands plunged into soapy water, with a pit in my stomach. What does this feel like, I asked myself? Have I felt this before? And within moments it was pretty clear that it was just a low-level anxiety about money.

Ah, finances, of course.

And so I let it be. But then came another thought, without me asking:

I hate my body. 

And that brought me round. Fully in the moment.

Wait, hang on. That's not right. I do not hate my body. 

The thought had come so quickly and so casually that I nearly missed it.

But it occurred to me, right then and there, that that thought--that single thought is the best tread path in my brain. It is so well worn and was once so oft-used that it'll find myself suddenly on it just out of habit.

People are forever in search of the why of an eating disorder. And it always comes down to control. That's what everyone says. That's what everyone's always told me. You're life lacked structure--you went in search of it. You found in in the rules and regulations and rigidity of calories and points and the whittling of your waist. But the thing is, never have I felt more out of control than when I was really sick. And I'm a pretty bright girl, if it had been as easy as balance and structure and a set of mandates I would have searched for those things elsewhere. Because it was very clear, very quickly, that whatever the hell i was doing, wasn't working.

Control--that notion never made sense to me. And maybe it's about semantics, but if it is then let me offer up some other words: to condense.

It was about being overwhelmed in a holy-shit kind of way. It was about being overwhelmed by things so large that i knew nothing more than that they were unnameable--that they were bigger than language allowed for. And so I attempted to harness them by emptying all of that looming and ambiguous and terrifying unknown into one thought: I hate my body. 

Which was sometimes true and sometimes not, but at least known. I am afraid, I am overwhelmed, I am lost or a little alone or totally unhappy in this place...I hate my body. Like laps in a pool I'd go away from the thought, only to return. It was my touchstone--the lip of the pool I clung to even as I was drowning.

It never occurred to me to swim to the side and climb out.

Or maybe it did. Or maybe I was more afraid of what getting out would feel like: cold and vulnerable.

And sometimes it was as simple as everything else might be terrible: I might be unhappy and I might be heartbroken and I might be out-of-my-depth, but at least I'll be thin. And then I'll get to feel superior and that'll be worth it--that'll be a good-enough-stand-in for all the things that I can't have.

But the thin never came. And that was both my particular blessing and my particular curse. Because I didn't get what i wanted I could only fool myself for so long, but because I didn't get what I wanted I couldn't disprove my false notions that thin would make for an easier, happier,  more manageable life (which sounds like control doesn't it?), but i thought the thin would bring the control--not the process of getting to thin--which is a big difference.

But in the end, in this life, all we really have is the process. Nothing is an end point. And so we have to invest in the-getting-from-here-to-there, as opposed to the goal.

When the thought came last week it unnerved me. And then it amused me. And then I got a good little laugh in. Because this is health in a new way.

And damn if it doesn't feel good.

thinking about fat-talk and fun-house-mirrors

I can't fit into a size large skirt at Zara.

I know because i tried one on on Wednesday.

I was out with my girlfriend Joy and we'd just had lunch and were discussing the date I had that evening and what I'd be wearing and she was saying I should show off my figure and maybe wear some heels. And i was lamenting the fact she didn't think converse appropriate and did I really need to wear my bangs down? And as all this was happening we were wandering in and out of stores, running errands, browsing in that way that's mostly a side-eye-sort-of-thing when we happened upon a mini skirt in Zara. It was feminine and structured--the right balance of sexy and sweet.

And so we both declared it totally date-night-appropriate.

But when I tried it on it was tight in that way that is unforgiving and unkind and totally unwearable. And it was a size large.

I ended up wearing jeans and wedges and white lace top with a blazer. And I felt totally great.

And so that was that.

But there's this nagging thought: I'm so very close to the body I've always wanted--a body that is healthy and very, very normal--and I can't find into a size large skirt at Zara. And so what. the. hell, you know?

I read an article in Cosmopolitan (the esteemed woman's journal) a few months back about how the three worst words a woman can say to a man are such: I feel fat. And i'm gonna level with you. I read that and though: Genius. That is genius. Spot on.

The reasoning being that (1) men like to feel like problem solvers. Men do not like to feel helpless. And those three words speak to a  problem that they just can't solve. (2) It plants this sort of thought in their head that you may in fact be fat or with less than perfect thighs or breasts or whatever it is you lambasted with your unkind words and (3) it gets the men feeling self-concious and insecure about their own bodies (and if there is anything I've learned after dating a good many men over a good few years now--men might just be more insecure than women, so it's best not to encourage that).

Number two is something I've spent quite a bit of time thinking about over the last few years. When we say I feel fat, that's fat talk. And fat talk is insidious and destructive. The one thing that I'd encourage anyone who wants to drastically and subversively change their life for the better is to eliminate fat talk. That's it. Don't engage in it, don't encourage it, and if you can, call others on it: Hey, that's fat talk, enough of that. Or Don't speak that way--this is me looking out for you. Fat talk is absolutely everywhere. And one of the things I began to notice is that when my best girlfriends would talk about having gained weight or their unhappiness with this-or-that-body-part--as soon as they called my attention to it, they planted an idea and I would then see what they were talking about. Oh yes, there's that extra weight.  Let me make this very clear: I did not see it, until they pointed it out to me. And even then, who knows if I actually saw it or I just thought i saw it. And these are women I love and adore.

Such is the power of suggestion. 

The most salient point of the article, I thought, was the suggestion that very often the bits and parts of our body we dislike the most, men absolutely adore. And if they've spent all night loving and caring for those bits and parts and we wake up and rip them to shreds--it makes men feel as if they're staring into a fun house mirror. makes them feel as if they can't trust their own eyes. Because that thing--the body--they think so beautiful we've just laid to waste with a few unkind words.

I am, for the most part, really proud of my body. But I am even more proud of how I got to this body. I never count calories. I eat full-fat everything. I mostly order the hamburger. And when I say I have as many lattes as I want over the course of a day, I actually mean that. I have them with full fat milk and a little bit of coconut oil. Yes! I add coconut oil! I can imagine diet experts/addicts the country over shaking their heads: extra fat, extra calories. But coconut oil is incredibly good for us--it helps with cholesterol levels and nutrient absorption, it aides in the reduction of belly fat, is an anti-inflammatory.

I was out with a guy a few months back and somehow the discussion turned to weight loss and we each described how we'd once been bigger and he said to me, But don't you miss those times when you just way overindulge--those times when there is absolutely no restraint? Nope, I said. Because if I feel the need to eat that way, I do. I refuse to live my life as if a sort of vigilance must be kept. Because how exhausting. How utterly exhausting. (And I'm having a hard enough time not crawling into bed at any given moment).

And so here I am with a body I quite like and I can't fit into a size large skirt at Zara. And a sort of fun house mirror erupts before me.

And I'm not sure what to do about it today other than walk away. And say, that's not today's worry. That uncertainty, that question, that distorted image will not govern me right now. I'll simply recognize that something's a bit askew and walk away.

round these parts

i feel like i finally got this brand-spankin'-new-site and a tremendous case of writer's block.

and so nothing to say.

which isn't quite true.

there are things to say but sometimes enough time has to pass. and sometimes i worry for the players in the story. and at other times the thoughts are only half-formed and getting them to whole sentences is a thing that happens in my body long before they reach the mind and so it's a game of patience.

and sometimes i find that when i'm in a place of great transition it's difficult to write. i have to get to the other side to gain some perspective.

but i do want to write about a post in defense of dressing up. and i want to write a post about things that don't age well (like tattoos and anger). i want to write a post about how i had a revolutionary thought on tuesday night while standing barefoot in the kitchen doing dishes. and so perhaps next week i'll get some of that written down. and if i don't, you all will remind me?

a letter to the man who'll one day make me an honest woman

i never refill the brita filter.

i put shallots in everything. and call them scallions because i can't remember their name.

i, on occasion, need to be told that i am beautiful. even if i know that you think i am, and you know that i know, tell me anyway. tell me once more than you think necessary or appropriate.

i feel better in flats than heels. and i'm a sucker for fresh flowers--mostly small, unwieldy ones straining skyward.

i've gotten so good at not-crying-on-the-subway that the tears come right out my nose, missing my eyes all-together. this is how i know i've been in new york too long. or just long enough.

i would choose to nap before almost any other afternoon activity.

promise me a lifetime of dinners without iphones or  ipads or whatever-i-thing-they'll-come-out-with-next. and if that means we'll only get ten minutes in, i'll take it. i'll take those ten minutes--those uninterrupted ten minutes. i'll make a life of those ten minute chunks. they'll be better than an interrupted thirty in which attention must be fought for and won.

and when i call you hysterical--when i collapse into you undone by something you think small and ridiculous, just the moment before your-man-driven-impulse-to-fix-everything-kicks-in i'm gonna need three words from you: i hear you. even if you think i'm being silly and foolish and absolutely-off-my-rocker, just give me those three words: i hear you. and then we can work on the fixing it bit.

i have a lot of flaws. some large and some small. some totally fixable--i mean, the brita filter thing? i think i'm just waiting for someone to have to refill it for. so that'll solve itself.

but what i can promise you, from my place of total imperfection, is ten minutes. again and again and again.

and again.

yours xx

...

 

Rejoicing in ordinary things is not sentimental or trite. It actually takes guts. Each time we drop our complaints and allow everyday good fortune to inspire us, we enter the warrior's world. | Pema Chödrön