The Weight Issue

I felt the need to address the weight issue today after talking with one of my friends who is uncomfortable going to the beach. I have had my share of extra pounds, but I never felt too uncomfortable to participate in an activity. I do realize, however, that I did not make an effort to go out when I was younger and quite chubby.

I was a very thin little girl until around second or third grade, when I got considerably heavier. The boys in school would continuously ask me if I was pregnant. I was in third grade. Are you even kidding me? You can't defend them by saying that they were too young to know any better. Our culture teaches us that thin is beautiful and fat is not. But there is a very fine line between being "thin" and "fat."

I think it was third grade, maybe fourth, that I gave up pasta for Lent in an attempt to slim down. Haha, like that worked. Every morning I would come into the bathroom and pull up my shirt to look at my stomach. I felt that it was getting thinner. The scale wasn't an issue at this point, thank God.

In 5th grade I slimmed down a little bit, but once someone mentioned that to me I thought I could eat whatever I wanted. In seventh grade, things got really bad. Whenever my mom would say something to me about getting my weight down I would refuse to listen because I was too embarrassed to talk about it, but the summer going into eighth grade I finally gave in. That summer I lost 20 pounds. Between 8th Grade and Freshman Year I gained back 15. Then the summer going into Sophomore Year I lost about thirty pounds. I maintained that weight for almost a year, but at the end of sophomore year something happened emotionally that really stressed me out and disabled good diet and exercise routines. My biggest mistake was probably that I went Lacto-Ovo Pescatarian. I was very unhealthy and was ultimately a Carbotarian. After seven months I gave that up and tried to get my weight back to where it had been, but I am unable to run and running is the only thing I want to do. It's been difficult, and I'm losing the battle.

I'm not going to talk about what has caused the increase in obesity in the world, as I have neither great knowledge of it nor any desire to discuss it. I want to take a moment to point out that what many of us view as fat, is not in fact fat at all. Sometimes when I'm getting dressed, I'll look in the mirror and think "Wow, look at that hourglass. Those curves are awesome," but other times I'll look and think "Oh my God look at all that fat!" I'm not fat. It's fleshiness that has been miscontstrued into being called fat. In ancient Rome, flesh was beautiful. You will never see a sculpture of someone with a twig for a body in a Roman museum. Marilyn Monroe was a size 12. She was not fat at all. The difference between her and many people today is that she accentuated and used her curves to her advantage, while many people today try to disguise them. The beauty of the human body can be found anywhere. We define what is beautiful. And it's time to started expanding its definition.

xoxoGrace