|
Love Yourself Just The Way You Are
Learn To Have An Obsession-Free Relationship With Your Body For Your Best Self Yet!
by Tam Thompson
Love is in the air this month and a deep longing to give and receive it seizes you. But before you can truly love and accept others for who they are, you have to love and accept yourself — including your body. If you’re the type that looks in the mirror and winces, you’ll probably have trouble accepting adoration from a significant other.
Former model Stacy Carto had that problem — a poor body image — when she was younger and she dealt with it in unhealthy ways. In an interview with Women Today, Carto reveals, “I got out of the [modeling] business after battling bulimia and coming to the conclusion that it wasn’t right for me to continue. Bulimia had a hold on my life and I constantly struggled to be thin enough. I felt so guilty.” Now she’s into self-acceptance and is back in New York, modeling plus-sized clothes. (Plus-sized clothes range from size 14 to 32 and beyond.)
Carto was struggling to fulfill an ideal of feminine beauty that is uniquely American — the notion that slenderness equals perfection. Other cultures have different templates for beauty. According to Becky Zuckweiler, M.S., R.N., C.N.S., and author of “Living in the Postmastectomy Body: Learning to Live In and Love Your Body Again,” “If you were about to be married in an African village, you would be sent to the fat farm where you would be plumped. In Africa, robust women are viewed as strong, and healthy enough to produce thriving children.
“Being comfortable with the body we live in seems to be such a struggle for many women,” Zuckweiler laments. “Our culture prepares us to have set ideas about what our bodies should look like and teaches us that if we do not meet those standards, we have failed at being a woman.”
This sort of thinking is particularly hard on women who have had mastectomies. Zuckweiler had a double mastectomy at age 30, and when her implants ruptured 13 years later, she made the decision to live life without breasts. “Through my grieving process I shed many tears over the loss of my breasts. I felt like my body had betrayed me. But now, I can honestly say that I really like my body and that my acceptance came about by changing my thoughts, not my body.”
She delineates the link between self-esteem and body image, and notes, “Self-esteem is how we think and feel about our self as a whole person. Body image has to do with how we relate to our body. The lower our self-esteem, the more likely we are to generalize that low self-esteem to our body image. When I was trying to accept my changed body, I found the way I think about myself as a whole person made all the difference in the world. I realized, ‘I am not my body, just like I am not my car.’”
Zuckweiler advocates having compassion for your body instead of criticism. “When I think of my body as a gift, I am no longer angry at it or ashamed of it. Instead, I feel grateful to have it. In fact, I feel a lot of compassion for what my poor body has been through. This has made me want to take better care of my body, to be kind to it, so I can get the most out of it. I try to eat well, exercise, rest, comfort and nurture it.”
Humor is one of her coping mechanisms. “My husband and I … joke that it would be hilarious for me to walk into a strip joint and apply for a job as a topless dancer. The thought of the reaction of the interviewer when I whip off my shirt and he sees that I am truly topless makes us laugh.”
To others, she offers encouragement. “It takes time to work past the superficial American body ideal we have all grown up with and come to appreciate and enjoy all that our bodies still have to offer. This is a difficult process and you will cry many tears, but you will get there. You are not your body.”
Body image isn’t strictly a women’s issue. The National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA) devotes an entire Web page to “Enhancing Male Body Image.” Men are urged to focus “on the qualities in yourself that you like that are not related to appearance,” and to “Look critically at advertisements that push the ‘body-building’ message and emphasize the V-shaped muscular body shape as the ideal for men.”
NEDA also recommends that men “remember that your body size, shape or weight does not determine your identity as a man,” and “confront others who tease men about their bodies or who attack their masculinity by calling them names such as ‘sissy’ or ‘wimp.’”
Another tip, which could apply to both genders, is to “Aim for lifestyle mastery rather than mastery over your body, weight or appearance. Lifestyle mastery has to do with developing your unique gifts and potential, expressing yourself, developing meaningful relationships, learning how to solve problems, establishing goals and contributing to life. View exercise and balanced eating as aspects of your overall approach to a life that emphasizes self-care.
Some positive steps you can take to improve your own body image:
1. Change your expectations. Reinvent your ideas about perfection. This is a tough one to pull off, but it can be done.
2. Teach yourself to love and nurture your body in healthy ways. Think of your body as your child — abusive thoughts, words and actions are off-limits.
3. Accept and celebrate your body’s unique strengths and weaknesses.
4. Work with your body toward greater health.
Body acceptance is a healthy thing, and part of acceptance involves working through issues. If you’re struggling with an obesity problem, you shouldn’t hate your body, but you shouldn’t let yourself become complacent. Address the roots of why you are obese.
If your child has issues with body acceptance, there are some things you can do. Here are a few suggestions from NEDA:
1. Examine, explore and, if necessary, modify the appearance expectations you have about your child or unborn child (such as will she grow up to be pretty, etc.).
2. Encourage balanced eating of a variety of foods in moderation.
3. Allow all foods in your house.
4. Encourage eating in response to body hunger.
5. Become a critical consumer of the media — pay attention to and openly challenge media messages. Talk with your children about the pressures they see, hear and feel to diet and to “look good.”
6. Convey to children that weight and appearance are not the most critical aspects of their identity and self-worth.
7. Help children accept and enjoy their bodies and encourage physical activity.
8. Don’t use food as a reward or punishment. It sets food up as a potential weapon for control.
Alexa Sparkman is a registered and licensed medical nutrition therapist who holds a master’s degree in nutrition. She helps clients overcome what she calls “mind hunger.”
“We all have genetics that determine what is normal and natural for us, what shape we’re going to be. If people try to achieve external acceptance and their shape doesn’t fit with society’s expectations, they’re setting themselves up for disappointment.”
Eating disorders aren't limited to anorexia and bulimia. “A wide variety of behaviors manifest themselves,” Sparkman says. “Compulsive eating is also a disorder; people are dealing with their emotions by mismanaging food. Their relationship with food is not based in reality. What I do is help people learn to eat in response to hunger and to manage their feelings without medicating themselves with food.”
But how does the burgeoning obesity epidemic in America jibe with body acceptance? Can’t people take acceptance too far? Sparkman agrees. “Some people use ‘size acceptance’ as a cop-out and an excuse to let themselves go. But for most of the people I see, it’s more like, ‘I’m gonna be OK with where I am as I try to be healthier.’”
She cites actress Jamie Lee Curtis, who did a widely publicized photo shoot last year in which she appeared au natural, with her hair unstyled and no make-up. “My group found it comforting that she felt comfortable enough in her own skin to let people see her the way she is. They thought it was very empowering.”
Sparkman uses self-acceptance as a tool for positive changes. “Negative self-talk makes you dig your heels in. Accepting leads to positive changes.” One of Sparkman’s clients lost 45 pounds by losing her obsession with food. “She came to me with a history of having gained and lost the same weight several times, and she had the ‘good foods/bad foods’ thing in her head. Now, she’s keeping the weight off by honoring her body’s need for food — she eats when she’s hungry, and doesn’t when she’s not.”
Trainer Julie Amon, owner of Activa Women’s Wellness believes in working with the whole person.
“I used to work at one of those big, corporate-owned gyms. Their goal was to get as many people as possible to buy a membership, but then there was no follow-up and a month later most of those people weren’t there.” The inspiration for Amon’s holistic approach came from a client.
“She came to the gym where I was working. She had all kinds of issues: self-esteem, a history of anorexia, and her weight had rebounded after she got the anorexia under control. I tried to get her to work out more at the gym, but the place just didn’t have the resources she needed.”
Driven by a desire to help the woman and others like her, Amon started Activa. She partners with several massage therapists, an acupuncturist, a pre and postnatal specialist, a nutritional counselor, a dietician, a personal chef and a chiropractor.
“I believe in working on the whole person, and sometimes I have to refer clients to other professionals to get their needs met.”
How does Amon feel about body acceptance in light of the obesity epidemic? “There’s a fine line to loving your body. We try to do a more holistic approach so as to take the focus away from weight-loss. Thinking about weight-loss depresses most women. But there are some people who use ‘size acceptance’ as an excuse to not have to lose weight and feel healthier.”
One of Amon’s biggest success stories was a female client who trained with her for a while, then took three months off to deal with personal issues. When she came back, she trained to run a 5K. In her first race, her time was29 minutes. A year later, she’d lost 65 pounds and her negative body image and ran the same 5K in 19 minutes. Amon beams, “Now she’s able to do stuff she couldn’t before, like taking active vacations with her family —hiking and cycling.”
If you’re feeling down on yourself because of how you think your body should or shouldn’t be, Amon suggests, “Come in and talk to us; we’re not all about the waistline. Or join a gym or a training program but make sure you do it with a buddy or a trainer who will hold you accountable.”
So, reverse the golden rule and do unto yourself as you would do unto others: embrace yourself and your body for who you are and where you’re at right now. If you do, you’ll be in a better frame of mind to make positive changes in your life and your health.a
Useful Resources
Alexa Sparkman —
257-0898 — www.mindhunger.com
Julie Amon, Activa Women’s Wellness —
563-9088
National Eating Disorders Association — www.nationaleatingdisorders.org
Befriending Your Body — A Look into Body Image — www.thebreastcaresite.com
Body Positive — Boosting Body Image at Any Weight — www.bodypositive.com
Self-Acceptance — www.selfcreation.com/acceptance
|
