Regardless of size, putting your life on hold until you reach that perfect weight, does no one any good.
This will be my collection of poems reflecting on societies obsession with weight and size and the effect this has on us and how we can change...
The reason I have chosen this subject, on which to create a collection of poems, is because I have experienced first hand the damaging effects of constantly feeling you are not worthy of a good life, until you change your body shape and size.
If only I had been stronger, back when there was absolutely nothing wrong with my body shape. No, I wasn't a size 8 when all my friends were. I was a perfectly healthy size 10/12, however due to the constant pressures at the time, towards the super skinny physique, I believed I was fat, by societies standards. And so my diet journey began. As did my ascent up the clothing scale.
I have descended and ascended many times over the last 20 years and it is only recently that I fully accepted, that the diet industry claiming to want to help me achieve my ultimate goal of weight loss success, was actually a huge factor in the issues I was working to resolve.
Until I learned to love myself for how I am now, I would never find peace and love for my body. Why should I delay happiness and self worth, until a scale says a certain number or I eventually fit into a certain clothing size. As long as I feel strong and healthy, that should be all that matters.
My body is strong and loves the feeling after working out and that is my goal. Not to focus on whether it is keeping me in the calorie deficit I was so desperate to achieve.
I'm not undermining those who are on a weight loss journey, I wish them all the luck and success in the world. We are all individuals and what is a healthy goal for one person, is not necessarily the same for another.
Also to all those who have been successful in their weight loss journey and managed to get off of the diet train. I salute you.
However for those like me, for whom the merry-go-round never seemed to end. Don't be afraid to get off. Walking away from that mind set and often toxic way of life, may be well be the best decision you will ever make.
Instead surround yourself with positive inspirations. Find blogs of women who celebrate their body shape and give advice on being healthy and strong, on nurturing the body you have now, not telling you how to change it to something society deems "better".
Learn how to love yourself now, because you sure as hell deserve it. Not at a late date when you think you'll be more deserving. You're here, alive, thanks to the body you have, give it thanks by loving it for all that it is.
In doing this, you may even find that you have way more success in your weight journey than you ever did aboard the Diet Express.
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