Body Thoughts
Jul. 15th, 2011 12:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
treefrogSometimes, the puzzle pieces in my brain click into place at the strangest of times.
Due to a financial screw-up and a lack of hot water at home for the past month or so (one more week to go on it, too), I’ve been showering at the pool when we go swimming. Because these showers are aimed at proper cleanliness instead of just rinsing off the chlorine, I’ve had to get naked. This has been surprisingly difficult, but has led me to some encouraging conclusions. I’ve never had a comfortable relationship with my body, and I’m pretty sure this started as soon as I was old enough to understand what a body was.
I left the Mormon church in my early twenties but the damage had been done. My body was a burden, an unfortunate, awkward part of existence.
Mormon girls are raised with a convoluted and contradictory set of ideas regarding their bodies. It boils down, more or less, to “So, uh, yeah. Bodies. Unfortunately, you have one. Try not to let it show.” Having nothing else to internalize, and being conditioned to fear non-Church teachings, I left adolescence wracked with shame, with a barren space in my mind, barbed-wired off by paranoia and guilt. That was the space my body occupied within my mind.
My body was ugly and troublesome, a source of Inappropriate Thoughts and Sinful Feelings, a thing to be hidden and ignored because nothing good could come of it (unless I used it to make babies, and I’m still not ready for that). So I hid it and I ignored it. I changed clothes in hiding, even when other girls changed out in the open. I never got involved in discussions about who was “hot” or “cute” because I couldn’t admit to feeling those things.
Mind you, not all of my body issues come from my religious upbringing. Biology doles out bodily inconveniences with a complete lack of personal prejudice. It saddled me with hormonal imbalances, clinical depression and anxiety, and mildly deformed foot bones that cause me all manner of pain if I don’t wear orthotics (and sometimes even if I do). Having a body, even when I’d managed to kick “sin” out of my thoughts, was usually annoying and often painful.
So I ignored the damn thing. I didn’t take care of it. I let it get overweight, weak and sloppy. This made me hate it more, so I avoided clothes shopping and often wore ragged, saggy clothes, and this cemented an image of myself in my mind that I no longer wish to be mine.
Taking off my bathing suit in a semi-public place meant admitting that I have a body, which felt weird because I hadn’t really realized I wasn’t admitting it, but it also meant seeing for absolute certain that there’s nothing horrendous about this body. It meant actually thinking about it enough to realize that while I don’t currently like my body, it’s nothing to be ashamed of, nor is it a threat to me.
Which means that next time Dave and I do a vegan cleanse, and I start to lose weight, I don’t have to feel freaked out and start overeating because my body is changing and therefore drawing attention to itself. It means that it’ll be okay to keep going to the pool and the gym even after we can shower at home, because it doesn’t mean that I’m treading on forbidden territory.
It means that this body is mine, which means that it's okay to lose weight, eat right, and get in shape. I hadn't realised before that any of these things weren't okay.
I’ve never really been comfortable with myself, body, mind or soul, but I think I’ve gotten a bit closer to being okay with who, and what, I am.
Due to a financial screw-up and a lack of hot water at home for the past month or so (one more week to go on it, too), I’ve been showering at the pool when we go swimming. Because these showers are aimed at proper cleanliness instead of just rinsing off the chlorine, I’ve had to get naked. This has been surprisingly difficult, but has led me to some encouraging conclusions. I’ve never had a comfortable relationship with my body, and I’m pretty sure this started as soon as I was old enough to understand what a body was.
I left the Mormon church in my early twenties but the damage had been done. My body was a burden, an unfortunate, awkward part of existence.
Mormon girls are raised with a convoluted and contradictory set of ideas regarding their bodies. It boils down, more or less, to “So, uh, yeah. Bodies. Unfortunately, you have one. Try not to let it show.” Having nothing else to internalize, and being conditioned to fear non-Church teachings, I left adolescence wracked with shame, with a barren space in my mind, barbed-wired off by paranoia and guilt. That was the space my body occupied within my mind.
My body was ugly and troublesome, a source of Inappropriate Thoughts and Sinful Feelings, a thing to be hidden and ignored because nothing good could come of it (unless I used it to make babies, and I’m still not ready for that). So I hid it and I ignored it. I changed clothes in hiding, even when other girls changed out in the open. I never got involved in discussions about who was “hot” or “cute” because I couldn’t admit to feeling those things.
Mind you, not all of my body issues come from my religious upbringing. Biology doles out bodily inconveniences with a complete lack of personal prejudice. It saddled me with hormonal imbalances, clinical depression and anxiety, and mildly deformed foot bones that cause me all manner of pain if I don’t wear orthotics (and sometimes even if I do). Having a body, even when I’d managed to kick “sin” out of my thoughts, was usually annoying and often painful.
So I ignored the damn thing. I didn’t take care of it. I let it get overweight, weak and sloppy. This made me hate it more, so I avoided clothes shopping and often wore ragged, saggy clothes, and this cemented an image of myself in my mind that I no longer wish to be mine.
Taking off my bathing suit in a semi-public place meant admitting that I have a body, which felt weird because I hadn’t really realized I wasn’t admitting it, but it also meant seeing for absolute certain that there’s nothing horrendous about this body. It meant actually thinking about it enough to realize that while I don’t currently like my body, it’s nothing to be ashamed of, nor is it a threat to me.
Which means that next time Dave and I do a vegan cleanse, and I start to lose weight, I don’t have to feel freaked out and start overeating because my body is changing and therefore drawing attention to itself. It means that it’ll be okay to keep going to the pool and the gym even after we can shower at home, because it doesn’t mean that I’m treading on forbidden territory.
It means that this body is mine, which means that it's okay to lose weight, eat right, and get in shape. I hadn't realised before that any of these things weren't okay.
I’ve never really been comfortable with myself, body, mind or soul, but I think I’ve gotten a bit closer to being okay with who, and what, I am.
