I don’t love my body!
Despite being a ditsy and dreamy liberal arts major, I am actually an extremely practical and realistic thinker (Hello Capricorn Sun, Taurus Moon - sorry, I had to). Interestingly, I learned this after years of failed attempts at using positive cognitive restructuring - rather, body positivity - to ‘fix’ my eating disorder prone brain.
Many therapeutic modalities for eating disorders require you to change your negative thoughts, beliefs, and opinions about your body and your life - cue the phenomena “body positivity.”
Think of it this way: if you hate the taste of tea, forcing yourself to drink it while telling your mirrored reflection that you actually enjoy it, will that truly change your mind? Maybe for some, who can override their natural opinions and reactions. Personally, I just can’t get over the fact that I think it tastes like dirty sink water.
When it came to healing my relationship with my body - yes, I was safe in the confines of my room, repeating the cheeky positive mantras I wrote down on sticky notes and plastered onto my mirror. However, as my body began to grow and change away from the one that I was praised for when I was at my sickest, I became increasingly frustrated at the fact that I just didn’t believe the things that I was telling myself. I didn’t think my stomach was perfect or my thighs were beautiful or my acne didn’t matter. I didn’t love my body. I was actually really uncomfortable, I felt shame for not being able to radiate the positivity and self love that others in the wellness space seemed to emit so naturally, and I had no way to cope with that.
Most people won’t ever see a body like theirs being celebrated in the media, or praised as a beauty standard. It’s unrealistic to ask people to love their body while simultaneously throwing them products and routines and procedures aimed to fix the problem areas they didn’t know they had. It can be frustrating to notice that those preaching body positivity and self-love seem to already have a body that is widely accepted and celebrated in the world. It’s just not accurate to assume that the experience of a positive body image is as accessible to some as it is to all.
It’s easy to feel good, safe and accepted when we stay within our little bubbles of ourselves, maybe a therapist, and a partner (or pet) that don’t ask us to change. The struggle is how to stay with those feelings of comfort when we step outside of that bubble, into a world that seems to have been cast the role of derailing us from the path we’ve worked hard to pave for ourselves.
A recent collaboration held by YET Niagara and Bree Lowry, founder of Breethe Body & Biome Coaching, emphasized the importance of prioritizing your emotional and physical health as a woman, in whatever unique way that looks like for you. The workshop, Feminine Foundations, explored topics such as hormone health, proper nutrition and phases of the cycle, touching on their intersection with intuitive embodiment practices and traditional yogic philosophies. Bree discussed cultural trends that influence women to under consume and over exercise, and educated attendees on the lasting effects that increased cortisol levels (brought on by such trends) have on the female body.
The workshop left attendees feeling empowered, educated and excited - three feelings that women rarely associate with their own health.
Years into my own recovery journey, struggling to make forward progress and align with a healing modality that worked for me, I stumbled upon Dialectal Behavioural Therapy. DBT is a newer therapeutic treatment than the traditional Cognitive Behavioural Therapy I was practicing, and that is often recommended for folks with mental illness. Rather than focusing on changing negative, harmful thoughts, DBT “builds upon CBT by emphasizing acceptance and mindfulness, along with the development of interpersonal and emotional regulation skills.” (camh.ca). I find DBT to be a bit more accessible for folks at any stage in their journey, as it often utilizes a “yes, and” structure, implying that two things can be true at once. In eating disorder recovery, it looks something like this:
I can be unsatisfied with my body, and I can still treat it with decency and respect today. I can have the urge to restrict my food or overexercise as punishment for what I ate, and I can acknowledge that simply as an unhealthy urge and not act upon it. I can feel upset with my body not looking the way I want it to, and I can not let that change the way I show up in areas of my life.
My point is, you don’t have to be positive or gung-ho all the time as you navigate your own wellness journey. Just as leaves on the trees go through cycles of growth and death, of bounty and loss - your journey will not be linear. You can be uncomfortable, exhausted, unhappy, and still go through your day trying your very best, whatever that looks like that day. Take it from me - if you rely on motivation and positive feelings alone to heal, recover, or grow, you will never get to the place you want to be. I only started making strides in my recovery when I assigned more weight - subtle pun - to my deeper purpose on this Earth (a constant) than I did to my body (ever-changing). As we learned through the mass panic of the recent pandemic, humans love certainty. Our emotions are fleeting, the feelings of happiness and ease come and go, and we largely have no control over what happens to us in the upcoming five minutes. It sounds so cliche, I know - but if you are able to find a purpose, something to anchor to that won’t shift with your daily (hourly?) emotional state that you can rely on to be your reason to endure the next five minutes, you are well ahead of the game. You don’t need to feel good - about your body or your life - to continue living.
At this point in my journey, I don’t necessarily love my body, but I’m no longer trying to. I don’t think you need to love yours, or your current hardest struggles, or your skeletons in your closet either. Instead, can you just accept them for what they look and feel like right now? You might even find with that acceptance comes a slight release of the control they have over you.
In what area of your life can you release the need to change things, and rather work with them as they are right now?
Until next month, I’ll be trying with you,
Con amore,
Julia 🌞
P.S. I am excited to announce that I will be hosting a live workshop at Mind Body Spirit Fest, held at Ironwood Cider House in Niagara-on-the-Lake! 🧘🏻♀️✍️🎨🧠
Together we will explore three core pillars that I believe are essential to restoring ones sense of vitality: Creative Expression, Spiritual Exploration, and Recovery-Based Principles. This will be a guided, interactive session designed to inspire reflection, connection, and growth.
Details:
🗓️September 7
⏰11 AM
📍Ironwood Cider House, Niagara-on-the-Lake, ON
💰FREE!
I can’t wait to see you there! 😌🌞
Register here!