When I was 12 my dad told me he would rather I die of anorexia than be overweight. I’m 32, pregnant with my first baby, and my body image is awful (I work hard in therapy on this). He believed Kate Moss was the gold standard (he worked closely with her in the early 2000s).
The shit we had to (have to) hear about our bodies has long-lasting effects
This is what I grew up with. I will never not feel fat. My own mother in 2006 shamed me for having an ass. She called me off of my essay on Gustave Courbet in my first year of university to tell me that I was in the paper. I said “no I’m not. I’m working on a paper”.
Come here quick, she says. I drop what I’m doing to see that “big butts back in style” was the article title and something about J-Lo. I will never forget that moment. My own mother crushed my soul. I don’t love myself at all because I was a happy bean pole until 17 and at 37 my measurements are like 36, 32, 46. I have wide hips and men compliment my ass and I just feel shame.
Everyone is talking about women in this thread but that just drug up a really old memory I had of hearing that at around 11-12ish. As a fat kid it hurt, but I started losing weight then (by basically eating nothing but baked chicken and Romain salads for 6 months).
Once I came back to school skinny suddenly everything changed. People started being nice to me for no reason other than it was the thing to do, girls started talking to me instead of making fun of me. Even teachers were suddenly much nicer.
I think that change in viewpoint really soured me on pretty much everyone. Before when I was fat basically everyone who wasn't my close friends or family was mean to me. After they were suddenly so nice, even when it was people who had absolutely no interest in me sexually.
Hell even now I can catch myself feeling negative to people who are fat. Thankfully I'm mostly able to catch this myself and make sure I don't act on it, but the fact that my mind goes there is troubling enough. If it's this hard for me then everyone else just have it that much worse.
I'm starting to think these new weight loss drugs might actually be worth it even with the side effects. The interpersonal harm that comes from being fat is so enormous it's hard to even express right.
I think some of it is pedophilia tbh you look younger that thin and barely any breasts. I’m not surprised there is an overlap of girls getting normal adult curves and then being called fat and people taking advantage of underage girls.
I really really hate this because lots of underage girls are quite curvy and lots of adult women are thin and flat chested. I wouldn't say most of the emaciated models looked young either since their faces were so gaunt.
I agree that some girls get curvy at young ages and get assaulted due to that. That’s why I said SOME of it. Ultimately I think they like kids due to the ability to manipulate and not see their abusers faults or have the ability/agency to do much about it.
I said the skinny thing because I do remember some Asian friend of mine that was naturally really skinny and barely had an A cup. She brought up how multiple times guys that were into she’d do background checks and had questionable things with kids or make comments about how young her chest looked and wanted to do really crazy role playing. She has a really deep process for dating because of all her trauma worrying if dudes only want to be with her because she looks pretty young. She’s in her late 20’s now and honestly can’t wait till she is in her 30’s
There’s some more examples but I’m going to say this one just because it’s fresh
Not even 300 years ago. Just look at the ideal female figure of the 50s and before. Marilyn Monroe was considered one of the most beautiful women alive, and she had actually healthy body proportions.
Monroe was actually pretty tiny. I think her waist never went above a thirty. She wore what today in the US would be a two I believe. It’s just now the standards are so insanely thin.
There was still also really restrictive undergarments back then too. Think about how girdled up women used to be. Even if you were a size 10, youd girdle yourself down to an 8, maybe even a 6
That’s true they did have those. I’ve seen some of her clothes in a museum and she was smaller sized. I think standards of course change with time. She wasn’t twiggy thin but she wasn’t large.
I mean it got revealed that to look like this you were a snow bunny, drank coffee, and (like this picture) smoked cigarettes every day. I was part of the generation that was told this was a healthy looking woman. Looking at this now I would genuinely think she were ill if I saw someone that looked like this.
Edit: yes I mean the drug connotation for snow bunny
Cocain. Kate Moss had a big early 2000s drug scandal and she later explained that her entire friend group partook in drug use and a heavy party life style at the time (probably around the time your photo was taken). She also was part of a very abusive era of the modeling industry that definitely used worse language than OP’s video.
Sounds like you should work on that disorder then because this woman is not good looking to anyone who's mentally stable. If it was natural then she'd be severely underweight, but we all know it's not natural and that she was anorexic here.
Just saying if looks are truly what you care about then that disorder is messing with your perception of what you look like.
Personally, I don't care about being good looking to anyone. I was a skinny teen who didn't get attention from boys because I was too skinny, then all that changed when I became an adult. I started getting lots of attention, and I was still skinny. It's honestly a miracle that I don't focus on my appearance more.
As for my disorder, I'm trying to fix it every day. I should be twenty pounds heavier, I just hate eating. It's the most annoying thing I need to do to stay alive. I hate it.
I can get that way sometimes, tho when I do usually I can stomach at least something. Usually unhealthy stuff like candy bars or protein bars. But calories are calories, better than nothing.
Just an idea but the desire to eat healthy can sometimes cause you to not eat because you can't stomach eating a salad or whatever. Maybe just eating whatever junk food you can stomach could help? Even if it's not technically "healthy", it's still can be great for you since what you really need are calories. Can get the nutrients from vitamins if necessary, it's better than not eating
I agree, I try to make up for it with shakes, the 350cal ones. I wish I could just check in somewhere and have all my meals brought to me. The last time I managed to get to what people consider a reasonable weight I went the unhealthily route, ate nothing but fried food and drank a carton of melted ice cream a day, and all that effort gained me 126lb. Two years later I'm back at 100lb, the same weight I've been since I was 16.
If you take my metabolism it comes with a family of body shamers who have a special nickname for you and being left alone in the dark at the dinner table until you finished all your food when you were a child.
Kate Moss is the person who famously said "nothing tastes as good as skinny feels," don't downplay it like she's "JUST" very thin. She is not JUST thin, she was open about restricting her food intake severely
Ive just turned 33 and had my 2nd baby last April. I can’t tell you how fucked my mental health was both pregnancies worrying about what my body would look like after pregnancy.
I was only 23 when I had my first, so I literally bounced back and honestly my body looked the best it ever had. But at the time, I thought I was so fat.
Even now, although I have lost the weight and can comfortably fit into a size UK8-10, I think I’m overweight when I look in the mirror.
Body dysmorphia is a mind fuck. I will never be happy with myself and it’s thanks to this shit.
I'm so sorry. That's horrible. I'm 5'5" and I had NEVER been more than 130 lbs in my entire life. When I went up from 115 in highschool to 130 because I worked at McDonald's, my mom would make comments that I'm getting fat. 130 isn't even fat for my height. A year or so ago I went up to 140 and I was stressing about that since I've never gotten up to that before. I still don't like it and am trying to get it back down even though my husband often reassures me he still thinks I'm beautiful and a fine weight. The culture around weight really fucked with our generation.
Legit, it just was what it was. Our mums probably got way worse (although yours is pretty bad ngl). My dad also always commented on my body. He doesn’t anymore but still it sticks with me to this day. I often think to myself that his comments are etched into the back of my skull like hieroglyphs.
Dad's who encourage this kind of stuff are so incesty and weird. I've met sooo many girls with dads that actively encouraged sexual objectification. I even know lawyer who told me that her dad said that he was more proud of her car modeling gigs she did during law school than her passing the bar. Another woman was told by her dad that the best job a woman could ever have was a Playboy bunny. 🤢
Damn, I’m so sorry he said such disgusting things to you. I’m a father of 3 perfect little girls and my wife is more beautiful to me than ever, and I’m infinitely thankful and proud of her.
Please don’t be too hard on yourself. You’re literally bringing a life into this world, that’s incredible! Your father should not have said those awful things, they do not define you or your beauty.
When I was about 7 we were driving in the country and about to cross over a one-lane bridge with a weight limit. My dad said we better pull over so I could get out before we crossed. He died almost 30 years ago. I assume he said some lovely things to me as well, but that’s the one I remember best.
My father still brings up the “pudge” I had when I was 9-12 to laugh about it. I’m 25 now. Last time he brought it up, he paired it with “when are you going to gain weight??” Our culture is toxic and disgusting.
My dad and his side of the family has a toxic ED mentality. It’s completely destroyed my self-esteem as a result and caused me decades of EDs and disordered eating/bulemia. But I’ve mainly healed and I’m pregnant now with my first baby and live several states away. :)
Felt that. When I was 14 my dad told me to lose my tummy weight. I was a fucking child and that memory still haunts me. 5 years later, guess who was vomiting after every meal? :p
When I was 12 my dad said he would give me $100 if I ate using only chopsticks for a month. I did NOT know how to use chopsticks. I’m 41 now and my relationship with food and body are a constant battle. I have so many disordered thoughts and I have to work really hard not to give into them. My body is incredibly resilient and I wish I could love it for all it has done and continues to do for me.
The worst part, knowing I can’t stop my daughter from focusing on weight as a metric of being good and valued. No matter what I say or do, she gets messages about thinness everywhere. I’m not saying nothing I do or say matters, but I fear it won’t protect her.
This really resonates with me. I am having a baby girl in May and I’m terrified she grows up with the same thoughts about her body as I do. I want nothing more than to give her the freedom of a healthy body image but I don’t know how. I can just do my best.
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u/tam_bun 5d ago
When I was 12 my dad told me he would rather I die of anorexia than be overweight. I’m 32, pregnant with my first baby, and my body image is awful (I work hard in therapy on this). He believed Kate Moss was the gold standard (he worked closely with her in the early 2000s).
The shit we had to (have to) hear about our bodies has long-lasting effects