http://todaynews.today.com/_news/2013/01/31/16789696-ravens-cheerleader-i-got-benched-from-super-bowl-for-weight-gain?lite
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Does this girl look fat? Ravens think so.
Food for thought as we enter Super Bowl 2013 weekend. Another unfortunate example of what needs to stop.
http://todaynews.today.com/_news/2013/01/31/16789696-ravens-cheerleader-i-got-benched-from-super-bowl-for-weight-gain?lite
http://todaynews.today.com/_news/2013/01/31/16789696-ravens-cheerleader-i-got-benched-from-super-bowl-for-weight-gain?lite
Sunday, January 27, 2013
Why Do the Media Constantly Push An Unhealthy Body?
I took to the Internet this evening in search of the answer to this question, and found that these articles tackled the subject nicely:
http://www.eating-disorders.org.uk/media-and-eating-disorders.html
http://savageminds.org/2010/10/29/why-thin-is-still-in/
http://www.adiosbarbie.com/2012/10/skinny-curvy-and-still-not-fitting-the-mold/
http://www.eating-disorders.org.uk/media-and-eating-disorders.html
http://savageminds.org/2010/10/29/why-thin-is-still-in/
http://www.adiosbarbie.com/2012/10/skinny-curvy-and-still-not-fitting-the-mold/
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Psychological component? Or beginning..?
From an article found on the site "The Center for Change":
"People with Anorexia Nervosa are usually persistent, conscientious, competitive and driven to succeed. They have a strong need for control. These same individuals have a poor sense of self and look for validation through their external achievements. They want to be the best athlete, the best student, and often feel terrible about perceived mistakes they believe they have made (socially, academically, etc…). They also tend to have a difficult time with change. People with Anorexia Nervosa tend to be obsessive, and self-critical. They often have much higher expectations of themselves than they do of others.
People with Anorexia are usually very conscientious and very good students."
My senior year in high school, I had what I think must have been a nervous breakdown due to stress; being involved in too many things, being a terrible perfectionist, and worrying about which college I would ultimately get into. I was on the Southettes flag team, a sports writer and copy editor for the school newspaper, had Principal's Honor Roll grades, was in National Honor Society, Quill and Scroll, and was on the Categories quiz bowl team as well as sundry other things. One day during the fall of my senior year, I suddenly had the sensation of a great lump in my throat, and almost immediately lost the ability to eat solid food. It was embarrassing, and was VERY hard to conceal socially. After it had been medically determined there was nothing physically wrong (no cancer, polyp, etc.), I went under a counselor's care. It wouldn't be until the following summer that I could consume a single slice of pizza without feeling like I was choking. I lost a horrific amount of weight, and was under 100 pounds. However, when I got better and began to gain weight back, I began to panic. I quit eating red meat, pizza, any cheese that wasn't the rubbery, fat-free kind, and ate exclusively salads, V8 juice, and low-fat crackers. I weighed myself many times a day, often calling my mother in tears from my dorm room, because I couldn't understand how I could start the day at 110, but be 123 by evening. I began to buy calorie books and fat gram books, eventually calculating the entirety of each bite I consumed. Thus, it began, in the worst form.
"People with Anorexia Nervosa are usually persistent, conscientious, competitive and driven to succeed. They have a strong need for control. These same individuals have a poor sense of self and look for validation through their external achievements. They want to be the best athlete, the best student, and often feel terrible about perceived mistakes they believe they have made (socially, academically, etc…). They also tend to have a difficult time with change. People with Anorexia Nervosa tend to be obsessive, and self-critical. They often have much higher expectations of themselves than they do of others.
People with Anorexia are usually very conscientious and very good students."
My senior year in high school, I had what I think must have been a nervous breakdown due to stress; being involved in too many things, being a terrible perfectionist, and worrying about which college I would ultimately get into. I was on the Southettes flag team, a sports writer and copy editor for the school newspaper, had Principal's Honor Roll grades, was in National Honor Society, Quill and Scroll, and was on the Categories quiz bowl team as well as sundry other things. One day during the fall of my senior year, I suddenly had the sensation of a great lump in my throat, and almost immediately lost the ability to eat solid food. It was embarrassing, and was VERY hard to conceal socially. After it had been medically determined there was nothing physically wrong (no cancer, polyp, etc.), I went under a counselor's care. It wouldn't be until the following summer that I could consume a single slice of pizza without feeling like I was choking. I lost a horrific amount of weight, and was under 100 pounds. However, when I got better and began to gain weight back, I began to panic. I quit eating red meat, pizza, any cheese that wasn't the rubbery, fat-free kind, and ate exclusively salads, V8 juice, and low-fat crackers. I weighed myself many times a day, often calling my mother in tears from my dorm room, because I couldn't understand how I could start the day at 110, but be 123 by evening. I began to buy calorie books and fat gram books, eventually calculating the entirety of each bite I consumed. Thus, it began, in the worst form.
Sunday, January 6, 2013
Anyone Ever Wondered About 'The Biggest Loser'?
More specifically, is it healthy for severely obese people to be put through not only unnaturally grueling workouts, but bitchy comments from a jerk like Jillian Michaels? Experts say 'probably not.'
http://www.livescience.com/9820-biggest-loser-big-problems-health-experts.html
http://www.livescience.com/9820-biggest-loser-big-problems-health-experts.html
A Life of Body Hatred in Photos.
This is me at age 10, before I knew what 'ideal' beauty was. At that age, it was all about facial attractiveness; I loved Marilyn Monroe, Mitzi Gaynor, and Barbara Stanwyck, thanks to all the old movies I used to watch on The Disney Channel. They were gorgeous women with perfect faces and perfect hair, and even more perfect clothing. I never noticed their bodies.
This next photos are of me at the apex of my eating disorder. At the time of this photo, I was about 104 pounds, and yet I still worked out two hours a day, six days a week, even when I was ill or had a fever. In the most ridiculous episode, i broke down in angry tears in the car during an ice storm when the university was closed and so was its rec center. I immediately drove back and, in my sorority house's chapter room, set up a crude step stool for step aerobics and worked out for an hour. I was rewarded for my crazy by winning 'The Queen of Bell' (named for the Bell Center, the rec center) at our sorority's fall formal. At that moment, I had a food journal and tried to stay under 900 calories a day. Don't ask me how I came about that number; it just sounded 'right'. The sorority's cook was exasperated with me, pushing me out of the kitchen because she couldn't take my anxiety over the amount of oil and/or butter she would utilize in a recipe. This would spill over into my summers at home, and the rows my mom and I would have over my 'hovering'. My lunches would consist of a salad or steamed vegetables with plain rice and soy sauce. Sometimes they'd be just soup and a bagel. Dinner was even more so, with my anger at our cook for making us such shite for us to eat. I felt trapped under people trying to get me to eat fat, and I would just hoard 'healthy' snacks in my room, most of it totally unhealthy---synthetic 'fat', sodium-laden 'healthy' instant soup. Nothing mattered unless it was low in calories. Chef Boyardee tiny microwaveable cups were a staple. Sure, high in sugar, but low in calories and fat. I just wanted to be FULL. But I was still hungry. I ate so much synthetic food---PowerBars, Slim-Fast shakes, fat free dressing/soup/butter analogs/chips/crackers/cheese, and all those hideous Snackwells products. I didn't even notice that they tasted like shit/wouldn't melt/tasted rubbery. I just wanted to lose the weight and be full at the same time.
This declines to mention the bingeing on food after my parents went to bed when I'd be over there: tortilla chips and salsa, popcorn, huge salads with shitloads of ranch dressing, eating nothing but loads of grape jelly rolled up in bread, pounds of cookies that my grandmother made, loads of Laughing Cow cheese rolled up in bread. I probably would have binged on flour if that was all they had, I was so fucking hungry. But then, I'd inevitably feel disgusting and disgustED, and would then 'punish' my avarice with awful, painful, and interminably long workouts the next day. I fucking hated my "piggish" self. I felt like a fucking fat, bloated pig with no ounce of discipline. I only felt absolution in my weak body and grey, pallid face after killing myself on the Stairmaster and then an added aerobics class after that. I felt penance and that everything had been 'reset'--erased. I could try again to eat normally. After I graduated college, my mother set me up with a personal trainer and a nutritionist at a local hospital to try to help me retrain my thinking. It worked for a time, but ultimately came back to square one after I moved back home in 1998 to change careers and go back to school. I didn't have time to exercise much, and I was upset and panicked terribly about this fact. The nervousness and anxiety over missed workouts would turn into irritable rage.
This is me today. Last week, as a matter-of-fact. And I'm still struggling.
This next photos are of me at the apex of my eating disorder. At the time of this photo, I was about 104 pounds, and yet I still worked out two hours a day, six days a week, even when I was ill or had a fever. In the most ridiculous episode, i broke down in angry tears in the car during an ice storm when the university was closed and so was its rec center. I immediately drove back and, in my sorority house's chapter room, set up a crude step stool for step aerobics and worked out for an hour. I was rewarded for my crazy by winning 'The Queen of Bell' (named for the Bell Center, the rec center) at our sorority's fall formal. At that moment, I had a food journal and tried to stay under 900 calories a day. Don't ask me how I came about that number; it just sounded 'right'. The sorority's cook was exasperated with me, pushing me out of the kitchen because she couldn't take my anxiety over the amount of oil and/or butter she would utilize in a recipe. This would spill over into my summers at home, and the rows my mom and I would have over my 'hovering'. My lunches would consist of a salad or steamed vegetables with plain rice and soy sauce. Sometimes they'd be just soup and a bagel. Dinner was even more so, with my anger at our cook for making us such shite for us to eat. I felt trapped under people trying to get me to eat fat, and I would just hoard 'healthy' snacks in my room, most of it totally unhealthy---synthetic 'fat', sodium-laden 'healthy' instant soup. Nothing mattered unless it was low in calories. Chef Boyardee tiny microwaveable cups were a staple. Sure, high in sugar, but low in calories and fat. I just wanted to be FULL. But I was still hungry. I ate so much synthetic food---PowerBars, Slim-Fast shakes, fat free dressing/soup/butter analogs/chips/crackers/cheese, and all those hideous Snackwells products. I didn't even notice that they tasted like shit/wouldn't melt/tasted rubbery. I just wanted to lose the weight and be full at the same time.
This declines to mention the bingeing on food after my parents went to bed when I'd be over there: tortilla chips and salsa, popcorn, huge salads with shitloads of ranch dressing, eating nothing but loads of grape jelly rolled up in bread, pounds of cookies that my grandmother made, loads of Laughing Cow cheese rolled up in bread. I probably would have binged on flour if that was all they had, I was so fucking hungry. But then, I'd inevitably feel disgusting and disgustED, and would then 'punish' my avarice with awful, painful, and interminably long workouts the next day. I fucking hated my "piggish" self. I felt like a fucking fat, bloated pig with no ounce of discipline. I only felt absolution in my weak body and grey, pallid face after killing myself on the Stairmaster and then an added aerobics class after that. I felt penance and that everything had been 'reset'--erased. I could try again to eat normally. After I graduated college, my mother set me up with a personal trainer and a nutritionist at a local hospital to try to help me retrain my thinking. It worked for a time, but ultimately came back to square one after I moved back home in 1998 to change careers and go back to school. I didn't have time to exercise much, and I was upset and panicked terribly about this fact. The nervousness and anxiety over missed workouts would turn into irritable rage.
This is me today. Last week, as a matter-of-fact. And I'm still struggling.
Saturday, January 5, 2013
Let's pause for a moment.
I'm going to fast-forward to the present for this post and pause my story so I can illustrate a point.
I'm 5'5", about 127-130 pounds (give or take, it depends on a gazillion factors.), and my size varies widely depending on the make or brand of clothing. Generally, I'm like most women in my family: small on top and larger on bottom. When I buy a pair of jeans, I know it's a good pair when it makes my thighs look slimmer and, most of all, when I can't shove two forearms down the back. While I'm on the subject? Yo, denim companies: DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS. It's bullshit how I have to buy a pair of jeans two sizes larger because of my hips and you mistakenly believe that women's waists and hips are congruent.
News flash: the average American woman is 5'4" and 145 pounds. STOP MARKETING TO US AS IF WE'RE 5'10" AND 120 POUNDS. There is no reason on God's green earth why inseams on designer jeans need to begin at 33". I'm dead serious. Well, unless you subsidize Nordstrom's tailoring department.
But, I digress.
I have a little "pillow" of flesh around my belly button, and a perfectly-shaped roll of fat that resembles an inner tube around the top of each thigh, making them resemble something like a chicken drumstick. My thighs rub together when I walk. And every time I have tried to rid myself of them, I look emaciated everywhere else, but the roll remains. Society tells me it doesn't belong there, so, what can I do? And, stack that up against now-aging, thin body skin that has begun to slacken a bit, giving the front and back of my legs a puffier, uneven appearance? I couldn't win. Fighting biology became a hobby.
It was only tonight that I tried to think about my best physical attributes. It's funny to think that I've never once considered it. However, I came up with a few things:
1) I work very hard on my skin. As an aesthetician, it was/is practically my job. I had terrible skin growing up, and I've taken painstaking care to protect it.
2) My teeth are, thanks to braces and retainers, straight, bright, and white---which has always bode well for my cheesy grin.
3) I've taken great care of my feet, as well. They may be small, but I've respected them. As a result, I may not be able to wear sexy stilettos or squeeze them into pointy kitten heels: however, they aren't mangled by bunions, corns, or hammertoes. They look smooth and young, unlike the rest of my family.
This begs the question, though: at any time, during the last 20 years, did I care about these things?
A RESOUNDING 'NO'.
Amazingly enough, I have taken each and every one of these things for granted. Case in point: I had horrible acne from approximately 7th grade through age 21. I had both dermatologists and endocrinologists helping me. I did everything short of Accutane to help my situation, and the only reason why I declined was because my mom was too afraid of it; it was too new, and its effects on the body weren't well-known yet. I was on every tetracycline, topical antibiotic gels, and incredibly strong benzoyl peroxide lotions that would soon bleach my skin. I remember in the 8th grade trying to bargain with the Lord---not asking for another thing, ever, if I could have skin like those girls in school who never had to worry about it. I finally attained it--(nearly!) spotless skin, but after Fat mattered, every other thing ceased to.
Such was my point.
I'm 5'5", about 127-130 pounds (give or take, it depends on a gazillion factors.), and my size varies widely depending on the make or brand of clothing. Generally, I'm like most women in my family: small on top and larger on bottom. When I buy a pair of jeans, I know it's a good pair when it makes my thighs look slimmer and, most of all, when I can't shove two forearms down the back. While I'm on the subject? Yo, denim companies: DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS. It's bullshit how I have to buy a pair of jeans two sizes larger because of my hips and you mistakenly believe that women's waists and hips are congruent.
News flash: the average American woman is 5'4" and 145 pounds. STOP MARKETING TO US AS IF WE'RE 5'10" AND 120 POUNDS. There is no reason on God's green earth why inseams on designer jeans need to begin at 33". I'm dead serious. Well, unless you subsidize Nordstrom's tailoring department.
But, I digress.
I have a little "pillow" of flesh around my belly button, and a perfectly-shaped roll of fat that resembles an inner tube around the top of each thigh, making them resemble something like a chicken drumstick. My thighs rub together when I walk. And every time I have tried to rid myself of them, I look emaciated everywhere else, but the roll remains. Society tells me it doesn't belong there, so, what can I do? And, stack that up against now-aging, thin body skin that has begun to slacken a bit, giving the front and back of my legs a puffier, uneven appearance? I couldn't win. Fighting biology became a hobby.
It was only tonight that I tried to think about my best physical attributes. It's funny to think that I've never once considered it. However, I came up with a few things:
1) I work very hard on my skin. As an aesthetician, it was/is practically my job. I had terrible skin growing up, and I've taken painstaking care to protect it.
2) My teeth are, thanks to braces and retainers, straight, bright, and white---which has always bode well for my cheesy grin.
3) I've taken great care of my feet, as well. They may be small, but I've respected them. As a result, I may not be able to wear sexy stilettos or squeeze them into pointy kitten heels: however, they aren't mangled by bunions, corns, or hammertoes. They look smooth and young, unlike the rest of my family.
This begs the question, though: at any time, during the last 20 years, did I care about these things?
A RESOUNDING 'NO'.
Amazingly enough, I have taken each and every one of these things for granted. Case in point: I had horrible acne from approximately 7th grade through age 21. I had both dermatologists and endocrinologists helping me. I did everything short of Accutane to help my situation, and the only reason why I declined was because my mom was too afraid of it; it was too new, and its effects on the body weren't well-known yet. I was on every tetracycline, topical antibiotic gels, and incredibly strong benzoyl peroxide lotions that would soon bleach my skin. I remember in the 8th grade trying to bargain with the Lord---not asking for another thing, ever, if I could have skin like those girls in school who never had to worry about it. I finally attained it--(nearly!) spotless skin, but after Fat mattered, every other thing ceased to.
Such was my point.
Friday, January 4, 2013
The Beginning.
Hello. And welcome.
The title of my blog is, obviously, a riff on the über-liberal blog of (almost) the same name. However, unlike that blog, there won't be any über-liberal political claptrap. In fact, this blog is meant not to uplift the media, but to skewer it for its injustices.
This won't be a very pretty blog; the more uncomfortable and/or angry it makes you, all the better. In my opinion, it is only through pushing through this that real change can ever be affected. Hopefully, in time, you'll want to unplug from the torture machine as I have.
What, specifically, is it that the media does in this case? you might wonder.
THE MEDIA AND ITS ADJUNCTS HAVE BEEN DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE UNATTAINABLE IDEAL OF FEMININE BEAUTY THAT IS SHOVED DOWN THE THROATS OF FIRST-WORLD SOCIETY ON A DAILY BASIS. And, sadly enough, it has begun to afflict Second- and Third-World civilizations, as well.
Many books have taken this idea and expanded upon it. I'm not here to do that. Rather, I'm here to document my personal struggle against their backdrops. Before, only those who knew me very well were privy to how I felt inside; even fewer knew the awful details. However, it's 2013 and shit needs to shift away from the current, unsustainable model. Hence, here I am.
1988.
My story begins in the fall of 1988. I had just started my freshman year of high school, and my absentee grandmother had returned home for a brief period before jetting off again for more exotic locales. Up until that point, I had not really understood the word 'fat'; well, at least, not in a ridiculous sense. I ate loads like every other teenaged girl without care as to what might land on my thighs. Exercise wasn't a chore back then; I skateboarded, ran around the block, rode my bike with my friends, and took jazz dance three times a week. It was FUN---a concept that is now alien to me and indescribably remote. Up until the day my grandmother arrived back in town, I never considered myself even 'curvy'. However, biology was soon catching up to my boyish physique. It seemed like overnight, I developed breasts, a butt, and thighs which seemed to not behave. Clothes didn't fit right; in fact, my jeans felt suspiciously like sausage casings. I was uncomfortable with my new figure---I didn't like it at all. Upon seeing my grandmother for the first time in nearly a year, she exclaimed: "Wow!! Jennifer, you've really filled out!" It was all I could do to stop myself from either socking her in the face or running away. She knew her comment had gone over like a lead balloon. Quickly, she changed the subject, and nothing more was said. Suddenly, however, I became fixated on those sausage casings and the two bulbous objects underneath my shirt which threatened to make themselves known. Even the monthly, innocuous trips to the all-you-can-eat breakfast bar at Shoney's with the crew following my dad's Astronomical Society meetings became suspect: had it been the ice cream? Should I have ordered the sherbet instead? Naturally a high-strung, perfectionist personality type, I began to wonder how I could get back to my old, rangy, prepubescent size---the size depicted by the teenaged models in 'Teen' magazine, 'Seventeen' magazine, and even 'YM' magazine.
Now, before that time, of course, I had seen loads of magazine covers advertising weight loss and exercise; even my own mother had complained about her "big bunda", working out to Jane Fonda's exercise tapes and books and practicing Jazzercise moves on the floor of our family room, though she was a slender size 8. It wasn't a foreign concept to me, but it wasn't one which I applied to myself until my body began 'betraying' me. It was only then that the pieces came together and I bought into the myth.
The title of my blog is, obviously, a riff on the über-liberal blog of (almost) the same name. However, unlike that blog, there won't be any über-liberal political claptrap. In fact, this blog is meant not to uplift the media, but to skewer it for its injustices.
This won't be a very pretty blog; the more uncomfortable and/or angry it makes you, all the better. In my opinion, it is only through pushing through this that real change can ever be affected. Hopefully, in time, you'll want to unplug from the torture machine as I have.
What, specifically, is it that the media does in this case? you might wonder.
THE MEDIA AND ITS ADJUNCTS HAVE BEEN DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE UNATTAINABLE IDEAL OF FEMININE BEAUTY THAT IS SHOVED DOWN THE THROATS OF FIRST-WORLD SOCIETY ON A DAILY BASIS. And, sadly enough, it has begun to afflict Second- and Third-World civilizations, as well.
Many books have taken this idea and expanded upon it. I'm not here to do that. Rather, I'm here to document my personal struggle against their backdrops. Before, only those who knew me very well were privy to how I felt inside; even fewer knew the awful details. However, it's 2013 and shit needs to shift away from the current, unsustainable model. Hence, here I am.
1988.
My story begins in the fall of 1988. I had just started my freshman year of high school, and my absentee grandmother had returned home for a brief period before jetting off again for more exotic locales. Up until that point, I had not really understood the word 'fat'; well, at least, not in a ridiculous sense. I ate loads like every other teenaged girl without care as to what might land on my thighs. Exercise wasn't a chore back then; I skateboarded, ran around the block, rode my bike with my friends, and took jazz dance three times a week. It was FUN---a concept that is now alien to me and indescribably remote. Up until the day my grandmother arrived back in town, I never considered myself even 'curvy'. However, biology was soon catching up to my boyish physique. It seemed like overnight, I developed breasts, a butt, and thighs which seemed to not behave. Clothes didn't fit right; in fact, my jeans felt suspiciously like sausage casings. I was uncomfortable with my new figure---I didn't like it at all. Upon seeing my grandmother for the first time in nearly a year, she exclaimed: "Wow!! Jennifer, you've really filled out!" It was all I could do to stop myself from either socking her in the face or running away. She knew her comment had gone over like a lead balloon. Quickly, she changed the subject, and nothing more was said. Suddenly, however, I became fixated on those sausage casings and the two bulbous objects underneath my shirt which threatened to make themselves known. Even the monthly, innocuous trips to the all-you-can-eat breakfast bar at Shoney's with the crew following my dad's Astronomical Society meetings became suspect: had it been the ice cream? Should I have ordered the sherbet instead? Naturally a high-strung, perfectionist personality type, I began to wonder how I could get back to my old, rangy, prepubescent size---the size depicted by the teenaged models in 'Teen' magazine, 'Seventeen' magazine, and even 'YM' magazine.
Now, before that time, of course, I had seen loads of magazine covers advertising weight loss and exercise; even my own mother had complained about her "big bunda", working out to Jane Fonda's exercise tapes and books and practicing Jazzercise moves on the floor of our family room, though she was a slender size 8. It wasn't a foreign concept to me, but it wasn't one which I applied to myself until my body began 'betraying' me. It was only then that the pieces came together and I bought into the myth.
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