Over the past few months I have noticed that a couple of my favorite bloggers have written about their body image in relation to weight gain/loss. On so many levels I can relate to their struggle with this love /hate relationship with weight as most women in America can. The hardest part is deciding to be healthy (have a healthy BMI) or being accepted by societies standards. This seems like an obvious choice, but it is? Not. Even. Close.
Prior to having my g-tube placed I was commented on all the time about how lucky I was to be thin. Many oggled over my ability to wear a size zero at the age of 25. Yet, at that time I still felt as thought I could slim up a bit, exercise to flatten my stomach a bit more, etc. Fast forward to nearly 5 years of having a g-tube and at a healthy BMI of 21-22, I look back at photos of myself and am dismayed that anyone including myself thought I looked healthy. My hip bones, shoulder bones, elbows, knees all protruded and you could easily count my ribs. Healthy? Nope. It took a huge dive in my health, like emergency intervention, to get me to agree to the g-tube.
Let me be very clear. There are just as many health issues that stem from starvation, malnutrition and being grossly underweight as there is with being overweight or obese.
I am now a size 4-6 and fluctuate between 124-128lbs. I am still in the process of accepting my new body. I have days that I feel fat. I have days that I feel perfect. I have days that I don't even think about it. The best thing I have done to help my perception of my body image is to exercise regularly. I feel happier about the weight gain. I understand on a different level that my body needs fuel and a healthy percentage of fat to muscle ratio to function the way God intended.
When I am at a healthy weight I have more energy which means I can engage in my own life more. I have longer lapses between IV's and hospitalizations. My lung function has increased and become more stable. I can run more than a mile because my body has the physical means to do so because of the proper nutrition. ALL is good!!
I do know one thing, I never want to go back to being a size zero. I never want to go back to feeling absolutely exhausted all the time. I never want to feel as though my body is largely depleted of everything.
Such a tricky topic. Finding the happy spot for each of us entails a different journey for each. For me, finding and focusing on things that bring me joy and are healthy have helped tremendously. Wanting to be active in my life as a new bride was a large piece for me. Then, I added running and started to experience all the ways running has helped me transform my perception about my body. Then, over time all the wonderful health benefits I started to reap; better lung function and better diabetes control to name a few.
I am now in a happy place. There are times when the jeans fit a bit snug and there are times when the jeans are a bit looser, for me this is normal as my body is not one size day after day. Just like the seasons change so does my body. I have found a happy place with this and am willing to work with it. I am sure as I age, I will come to forks in the road that force me through the process of reaccepting my bodies lot in life. I hope that I can do so with grace and dignity and shear appreciation for all the incredible changes my body has sustained over the years and still functions.
I hope we all can someday find our own happy place. Our own form of acceptance. We are all beautifully made and made for a purpose much more important than what the scale or society tells us.
~Doodlin'
Prior to having my g-tube placed I was commented on all the time about how lucky I was to be thin. Many oggled over my ability to wear a size zero at the age of 25. Yet, at that time I still felt as thought I could slim up a bit, exercise to flatten my stomach a bit more, etc. Fast forward to nearly 5 years of having a g-tube and at a healthy BMI of 21-22, I look back at photos of myself and am dismayed that anyone including myself thought I looked healthy. My hip bones, shoulder bones, elbows, knees all protruded and you could easily count my ribs. Healthy? Nope. It took a huge dive in my health, like emergency intervention, to get me to agree to the g-tube.
Let me be very clear. There are just as many health issues that stem from starvation, malnutrition and being grossly underweight as there is with being overweight or obese.
I am now a size 4-6 and fluctuate between 124-128lbs. I am still in the process of accepting my new body. I have days that I feel fat. I have days that I feel perfect. I have days that I don't even think about it. The best thing I have done to help my perception of my body image is to exercise regularly. I feel happier about the weight gain. I understand on a different level that my body needs fuel and a healthy percentage of fat to muscle ratio to function the way God intended.
When I am at a healthy weight I have more energy which means I can engage in my own life more. I have longer lapses between IV's and hospitalizations. My lung function has increased and become more stable. I can run more than a mile because my body has the physical means to do so because of the proper nutrition. ALL is good!!
I do know one thing, I never want to go back to being a size zero. I never want to go back to feeling absolutely exhausted all the time. I never want to feel as though my body is largely depleted of everything.
Such a tricky topic. Finding the happy spot for each of us entails a different journey for each. For me, finding and focusing on things that bring me joy and are healthy have helped tremendously. Wanting to be active in my life as a new bride was a large piece for me. Then, I added running and started to experience all the ways running has helped me transform my perception about my body. Then, over time all the wonderful health benefits I started to reap; better lung function and better diabetes control to name a few.
I am now in a happy place. There are times when the jeans fit a bit snug and there are times when the jeans are a bit looser, for me this is normal as my body is not one size day after day. Just like the seasons change so does my body. I have found a happy place with this and am willing to work with it. I am sure as I age, I will come to forks in the road that force me through the process of reaccepting my bodies lot in life. I hope that I can do so with grace and dignity and shear appreciation for all the incredible changes my body has sustained over the years and still functions.
I hope we all can someday find our own happy place. Our own form of acceptance. We are all beautifully made and made for a purpose much more important than what the scale or society tells us.
~Doodlin'
Kari, I LOVE this post! I have also achieved a BMI around 22 in the past few years, and my baseline now is 123-125 (at 5'2). It's more than I've ever weighed in my life, but I know it's a HEALTHIER weight than I've ever had in my life. There are definitely times where it can feel overwhelming to be so bombarded by media representations of what "pretty" is, but at the same time, I KNOW that my body works so much better at this weight. A few years ago I got a really nasty flu and dropped about 20 pounds in a week. It took me a year to regain the weight I'd lost. I weighed less than I ever had as an adult, with protruding hipbones and collarbones... I hated it, and it was a good reminder that bony is not pretty! But it was very disconcerting because so many people praised my "weight loss" and commented on how good I looked all the time - when really, I looked SICK!
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