Do You!
Ok, quick disclaimer, this post pertains mostly to ladies, but stick around, I’m hoping you guys will get something out of this as well. So lets go back a few years…decades to my youth, I am Portuguese, and us Portuguese folk love to eat. (Some of you who have witnessed me wolf down a burger can attest to this). As a kid, I ate all the time and I ate whatever I wanted! I loved food! People would make comments like “where do you put it all?” or “wow, that metabolism won’t last forever.” I started to become prideful in the fact that I could eat whatever I wanted and still be skinny. That all came to a halt my Junior year of High School. As I started gaining weight, I no longer felt comfortable in my body. I fell into so many of the aesthetic traps that are in place today and prey on women. I would look at the women on TV or in magazines and covet their bodies. Having not been educated on how to eat healthy growing up, I turned to whatever “fad” diet was in at the time. This struggle went on through college, I battled briefly with bulimia and anorexia, and still was unhappy with what I saw in the mirror. It wasn’t until I was diagnosed with melanoma at the age of 22 that I realized I was not being kind to my body and something needed to change. From there, I began exercising and educating myself on how to feed by body properly, but I found I was still comparing myself to other women.
Comparison. This is one of the biggest pitfalls women can fall into, which can breed rivalry. It wasn’t until I started doing CrossFit, and changed my aesthetic based goals to strength based goals, that I finally got rid of comparing myself to others. I knew the goals I wanted to hit and it didn’t matter what I looked like to get there. Without realizing, my body changed completely. Once my perspective changed to focus on numbers other than the scale, I was finally freed to love and appreciate by body for what it could do.
One thing I hope I can teach my daughter Camille is to love her body, and give her the tools to lead a healthy lifestyle. She turns two tomorrow, and she already loves helping me in the kitchen. I pray that she sees her strong mama and is inspired and empowered knowing she can do the same. At the end of the day, I choose to love my body and what it has walked me through. So do you! Don’t let comparison bring you down.
Very powerful words Rene! Self image and that number on the scale can be so darn damaging to folks! Enjoyed this article very much!
Growing up I was a part of a culture where to be cast in a performance how you looked and fit into a costume was just as important as ability and flexibility. We were constantly compared and evaluated against each other. I had parents who would shield me from the negativity as much as possible, but I watched my friends around me struggle with body image.
After ballet I turned to competitive and cheer (be small enough to be thrown around) and recreational running (gotta stay light, right?)- when I started at Sweatshop I had never touch a barbell and was 20 pounds lighter. I am constantly surprised by my own strength and it is incredibly freeing to not be concerned with my physical shape- the only person I am competing with is myself. There are amazing athletes in our gym- and so many women I get the privilege to work out with who inspire me to be stronger then I was yesterday.
I get to look in the mirror every day and remind myself that I have built what I see- screw the number on the scale, it fun as hell to be strong!
A worped influence of decades…..its real!