I was looking back through my post history, wondering if I could re-post an article I previously wrote on body image. But, when I looked back through my archive, I realised that I had written so much about body image and the relationship I had with mine. Every post I read triggered me to remember something different.
Some of the posts were written quickly when I was having a good day and had found that chanting a mantra was the best way forward. Another was after I had read a positive book. Another was after I thought my body demons had gone for sure.
The most accurate I found was this: My Biggest Breakthrough – an aptly named post where I claimed to have solved the problem of my body issues.
Reading through that last one filled me with a smile. I was happy to see that 1 year ago I had realised how much I had changed my relationship with my body and I’m proud to say that I’ve, more or less, been able to keep that mentality.
The theme of this year’s Mental Health Week is: BODY IMAGE. And this is a topic I could write about endlessly – and have in the past.
Rather than spew about how my relationship with my body has changed – there are plenty of articles in this blog archive for that – I would rather tell you about some of the ways I have managed to move past my issues, some of the best people to follow, best books to read, podcasts to listen to and what I do when problems arise again.
But, I will give you a little bit of context…
I stopped swimming at the age of 16 – going from county squad training 3/4 times a week, to nothing. This was at a time when my body was changing through puberty but I didn’t really notice. (I could still eat a whole pack of doughnuts and stay slim). I took these unhealthy habits to uni, where my metabolism caught up with me and I gained a stone in 3 months. I lost the stone over summer and came back to uni and put on 2.
My whole university education was a cycle of diet fads, starvation, punishing exercises, comparisons, tears and veganism when it came to my body and losing weight. That didn’t change until I started working in London, aged 22. And, in the past 2 years, I have finally managed to sort myself out.
But I couldn’t have done it alone and for me, it was important to realise that things that worked for other people did NOT work for me.
Here are some of the things that got me through:
Number 1…Books
I just love reading and one of the first things that really impacted my mental shift was reading articles and self-help books that helped me relate to other people. I didn’t choose the kind of non-fiction books that put you out there as a medical case but rather chose the memoirs and autobiographies written about people’s struggles. One of the most poignant was Mad Girl by Bryony Gordon which recounted her mental health throughout her life. I found the book so excitingly honest and it was the first book that I had properly read which signalled to me that mental health should not be kept behind closed doors. It was given to me as a gift by my aunt and I treasured it before releasing it, as she had to me, to go and help someone else.
After I read that book, I was in a frenzy and picked up various other feminist and body positive books. One of the books I read was by Megan Crabbe, or @bodyposipanda.
Number 2…Instagram
Though there is often a lot of stick for social media presenting negative attitudes and feelings, if used correctly, it can be a wonderful tool for healing. I removed all the negative, food focused and body/exercise obsessed accounts from my instagram and honed in on the good stuff. One such account was @bodyposipanda and her weekly dances in her underwear. At the same time, I also followed @kate_speer, who documents her struggle with mental illness and branched out into finding a community for people suffering with their mental health.
Number 3…Podcasts
In the search for alternative material to tune my brain into, I headed to Spotify and followed podcasts like Yoga Girl, which helped me to focus my spirit on something else. I enjoyed all the engaging topics and found it refreshing to muddle through real-life problems rather than just what you looked like.
Number 4…Intuitive eating
With the niggling voice of dieting still kicking around in my brain, I tried a way of eating that wasn’t said to be a diet but still felt as though I had control. When I started intuitive eating, it wasn’t for long but something seemed to click in my brain without me even thinking. Whereas before I had been petrified of the feeling of being hungry (since I associated that feeling with the pain of IBS that would always follow as I was growing up), I learned to allow myself to feel a little bit of hunger before I ate again. I banished meal times and snack times and really listened to my body. In a short time, I naturally realised when I needed to eat, what I wanted to eat and when I wanted to stop. This is a practice that I still continue today and find it super super easy to follow.
Though these are the steps that have helped me regain confidence in my body and helped to heal my relationship with food, like I said, they won’t work for every body. But hopefully this story is encouraging enough to demonstrate that even though the road looks hard at the moment, the pain doesn’t have to last forever and there will be that breakthrough moment for you.
Plane Ride Stitches 