Re: Body check

[Guest guest]

You know, another insight that I had at some point in terms of body image which

people's responses to this thread makes me think of is that not only do I feel

both attractive and unattractive at certain times and that it is often unrelated

to how I actually look, BUT I think at some point I realized that many/most

women (in our culture, at least) feel unattractive, no matter what they look

like.

My best college friend was very good looking but she often complained about how

fat she looked or whatever she didn't like about her appearance. A lot of the

time I would kind of roll my eyes at this; after all I was very overweight, so

didn't I have much more of a right than her to complain about my looks? But

eventually I realized that it wasn't just me who had these feelings, which

suggested that it might be something outside of myself or unrelated to reality

that was making me have them. Instead of feeling isolated because I am so

" different " from every other person because of my weight or whatever, I think

I've reached a place where I feel like we're all in it together. That

realization is a lot more powerful, I think.

So it's good to hear responses from other people saying they've had some similar

experiences.

> >

> > My experience, I don't know about others here, is that I have times when I

feel unattractive and I have times when I feel attractive, and I do think that

this is kind of separate from reality. I think I could look exactly the same on

two different days and feel totally ugly on one and feel pretty on the other,

and I think that has been true no matter what weight I've been at. So judging

myself and berating myself over my looks probably has limited utility. It's

probably more useful to gently question why I am thinking this way than to get

caught up in the action.

> >

> > I don't know if that helps, but I felt like it was relevant.

> >

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