On Body Image…
Totally weirded out. I walked into a bathroom with this sort of pretty brunette in humble clothing, loose jeans and a polo shirt, at a diner I went to earlier tonight. She was very thin. I held the door for her and she thanked me, smiled at me gently and walked into a stall next to the one I was going into. There were only two stalls. I heard her spitting into the toilet. Thought she maybe had a cold or allergies and was spitting out phlegm. She continued spitting and sounded like she was forcing coughs. They just didn’t sound natural. I found it very strange. After one wet throaty spitting noise and a prolonged cough, it sounded like urine streaming into the toilet from far above. I was out of my stall about to wash my hands by then and couldn’t help but look in her direction. Through the gaps between the partitions, I saw that she was standing over the toilet upright with her back to the door of the stall, just slightly hunched over. More coughing and spitting noises came from her stall followed by more pouring liquid sounds. I thought, either the person in there has a penis somehow, and a really awful cold, or that woman is getting sick in there, forcing it, it seemed. Totally freaking out having witnessed that, I washed my hands quickly and got the hell out of there.
Met William back at the table and described what I’d heard and seen. He said it sounded like a bulimic, if she was getting sick so casually like that and standing upright doing it. His mom was bulimic all through his childhood and adolescence, and he said she would just stand at the sink and try to spit and cough forcefully, and then use her finger, and do it right there in the sink as he watched, just standing casually, leaning over just a little, and that after, she would wipe her mouth and go on doing household chores as though nothing had happened. She did this after most of her meals, he said. Told him it was the only thing that could keep her thin. His mom’s a beanpole, like grossly thin, looks very unhealthy. It’s pretty sad. And she doesn’t think she has a problem or has ever had a problem. We waited for the woman to come out of the bathroom, and I motioned to William as she did. She definitely looked like a real woman to both of us, walked out totally cool, not looking like anything was bothering her, sat with a tattooed redneck-looking guy who was very hairy and appeared to be chatting casually with him. Seems strange that she would just do that when she knew someone was next to her. William said his mom would do it in public bathrooms with other people there too. William was absolutely convinced that this woman was bulimic, and that seemed highly likely to me too. Just felt so…gross…having been next to her while she was likely doing that to herself. And disturbing. Still makes me shiver just thinking about it. And it makes me sad.
There’s been this horrible trend for almost the last ten years among a lot of women I know for women who are not overweight at all to think they need to lose a ton of weight. They start out at a healthy thin with lovely bodies, size small or medium at most, and then go on some crazy diet or offer no explanation whatsoever, but suddenly begin to look haggard and dwindle down to a size Skeleton. Size Withered Corpse. And other women around them start complimenting their weight loss, acting envious of it, and saying encouraging things to attempt to keep the woman "on track" with her weight loss! I see it on facebook all the time too. Some ultra-thin woman will post about dieting and losing ten pounds in two weeks, and all of these other women will write "Congratulations!" and "I’m so proud of you!" on her post. I just shake my head. And females everywhere talk about wanting to get down to "a perfect size 0." I feel like I’m the only one left in the world, or this region, at least, who thinks that it’s wrong to encourage unhealthy weight loss and women being underweight. Society seems to turn a blind eye to anorexia these days, too. It’s almost encouraged.
When I was a teenager, in the 90s, I had a huge eating disorder. I ate almost nothing all day, every day, and weighed between 88 and 94 pounds for seven years. When girls who were already thin or looked healthy would start losing weight back then, adults and other teenagers alike would start to become concerned about them, counsel them about self-esteem and body image, try to encourage them to eat more and gain the weight back. Nowadays, when ultra-thin women lose weight, it’s complimented, envied. This is pretty fucked up.
But here’s an interesting phenomenon I’ve noticed: these compliments almost always come from other women. Almost every man I know complains about women who are too thin. They want ripe breasts and a round ass. They want flesh they can press their fingers into; they don’t want to feel a woman’s bones so easily. They want roundness and softness in a woman’s body– the very qualities determined attractive by nature itself.
Women are always blaming men for their body issues. Claiming that men have "unreasonable expectations" for what a woman should look like. Men are vastly demonized in modern society for being men, for having any sort of masculine sexual desire, and jesus christ, especially if a man expresses preference for femininity in women…But women are the ones encouraging other women to lose weight unnecessarily. Women are (mainly) the ones perpetuating these crazy diet trends, glorifying books like Skinny Bitch, idolizing zero as the perfect size. I’ve never known a man to think that any woman who is not medically overweight should try to lose weight at all. They are generally perplexed that a healthy woman would even think she needs to lose weight.
Anorexia is a tough mindset to shake; it hides in my brain in little dark corners and tries to trip me, even after all these years. I cannot allow myself to fall or become ensnared, so I’ve learned its patterns pretty well, and always have to remain hyper-vigilant of its tricks, so I can avoid them. It’s very difficult to accept myself at my natural healthy weight, as it involves a lot of curvature, but I use logic and reasoning to prevent myself from acting on self-destructive impulses.
Every man I’ve ever been with, whether serious or casual, has made me feel wonderful about the shape of my body. I’ve gotten a lot of compliments from men for not being just skin and bones. When I was anorexic, I had a few gentlemen admirers here and there, but when I finally allowed myself to stop harming myself like that, and gained weight that I was (and really, still am) hugely embarrassed by, I started turning heads left and right, which absolutely shocked me. It kind of scared and overwhelmed me, actually, at first, but I used it to aid in convincing myself to eat meals when I felt hungry. Not only that, of course. Mainly, I used how horrific my health had been for all those years while I was starving myself, how terrible my body
always felt during those clinically malnourished years, as impetus to eat. And I simply had to train healthy logic to put its foot down and my unresolved emotions to acquiesce to it.
Most women I know who have body issues, even women who are medically overweight, have men in their lives who love their bodies and their shapes so much. Outwardly, men in groups or in media may say they love big breasts, but if one observes men in real life long enough, one may notice a trend that if a woman has any breast material whatsoever, no matter what size, chances are there are men staring at it with appreciation, or, trying not to be caught staring at it in appreciation, among decentfolk. I think women need to stop blaming men for eating disorders. If a woman thinks that she needs to do those things to herself to land a man, it is all in her head. A little bit of healthy care into her appearance and a pleasant demeanor will usually land a woman a reasonable mate.
Notice, I’m not saying that women being so deathly thin in the media has nothing to do with the prevalence of eating disorders and unhealthy weight loss; but I do think women should use logic and reason and keep health in mind more when encouraging or discouraging weight loss in their friend pool, instead of just relying on stupid trends in the media.