I step onto the scale. The digits flash and twitch as the number gets higher. They stop, and I gape. Is that what I should weigh? I feel like it should be less. They say muscle weighs more than fat, is that true? Is this discrepancy between my ideal weight and the reality in front of me because of muscle? Why am I so bothered?
Why am I so bothered? I know I am not alone in this experience. I also know that for me, weight has not been the cause of unhealthiness. Therefore I hope to address this topic as graciously as I can, out of the experiences I have. I am bothered that for as long as I can remember (I'm thinking like, elementary school) I have compared my body to other girls. I am bothered that I tried to do 200 sit-ups every night in junior high in an attempt to make my stomach smoother. I am bothered that I judge other people by the way they look. I am bothered that I still compare my body, not only to those around me, but on screens as well. I am bothered that plastic surgery was advertised and promoted while I was watching the Superbowl. I am bothered that I have heard too many stories of people with eating disorders caused by outside influences. I am bothered that as a mother I feel my one and only beauty goal is "to get my old body back." I am bothered I have a beauty goal. I'm even more bothered by moms much further along in their experience of motherhood, who are still afflicted by their postpartum weight. I am most bothered that society, media and whatever other implicit (and explicit) outside influences have stolen the scales of beauty from us and provided such a narrow margin for success in beauty. I am bothered that I don't even know what has been stolen from me; I have succumbed to these other definitions of beauty. I am bothered because when I look at the numbers on a scale I don't see an empirical fact, I see an identity marker. I see a clothing size. I see something outside of the realm of what "they" call perfection. I am bothered that a scale defines who I am; for that is not the truth. My identity is in Christ. The God who looks at the heart. Who knows every hair on my head, but doesn't care if those hairs have split ends or not.
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Jordan is...A mother, artist, designer and loyal friend. May this blog bring you hope and a normalization of both emotion and logic. Archives
March 2021
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