Beyond the Pursuit of Thinness
The pursuit of thinness isn’t about being “super skinny”… It’s much deeper than that.
It’s the desire to feel seen, to feel worthy, and with the society we live in—to feel accepted.
For years—10 to be exact—I chased after this thin ideal that society convinced me I needed to obtain in order to be loved. In order to be attractive to the male gaze. And for 10 years, I believed it. I believed every word that diet culture fed me. Heck, I went for seconds, and thirds!
I would stop at anything to just. be. thin.
I convinced myself that all of my problems would dissipate if I could just be skinny. I would finally be beautiful. I would finally have a significant other. I would finally be enough!
And in those months where I could maintain a low calorie intake for prolonged periods of time, and felt my thinnest, I was never happy. I still didn’t feel beautiful. I still didn’t feel like enough.
Sure… I had men “paying more attention to me,” but for what? My body? My “confidence” that in fact was deeply rooted insecurity? No thanks. I’ll pass.
Sometimes, when I reflect on my past, and how horribly I treated my body, I get sad. I feel sympathy for the old Gabi. For the years I spent trying to mold myself into something I wasn’t.
All those years I spent skipping meals, or having a bar for lunch… I did that because I was afraid of facing the truth… I was afraid of processing trauma I had buried so deep. So deep, that I had convinced myself that I somehow wasn’t “good enough” just the way I was.
Trauma like, never fully processing how much my parent’s divorce affected me. Trauma like, getting bullied in middle school and being called “roly poly.” And even worse, not knowing what a “roly poly” was, and having to secretly look up the definition, only to find it meant “having a round, plump appearance—chubby.” And let me tell ya, at just 12 years-old, that stings… Trauma like, constantly feeling pressure from family members to be on a diet because if I “just lost 10 pounds,” I would be “much prettier.” Trauma like, being in the middle of my parents custody battle and feeling like I had to choose who the “better parent” was…
And the list goes on and on… Some smaller than others, but trauma nonetheless. I learned to diminish my trauma and amount it to “just what every teenager girl goes through.”
But boy was I wrong! That trauma wasn’t “simple.” It was complex, deeply rooted, and unprocessed. It’s like getting a really deep cut, never properly treating it, and then having to re-open the wound just to sow it back up again.
So yeah, many—if not all—who pursue thinness, aren’t pursuing it because all they want in this world is to be skinny. Maybe on the surface, yeah. We live in a toxic diet-centric society… Who doesn’t want to be skinny? Don’t blame anyone for wanting to be skinny! In fact, I empathize. But, what it really comes down to, is this sense of not feeling like “enough.” Feeling so unworthy that you forcibly eat less, workout more, and berate your body day in and day out, to attain an unrealistic and dangerous standard.
That’s what it’s really about.
So, if you’re struggling or know of someone who’s struggling, remember, the pursuit of thinness goes much deeper than just wanting to be “skinny.”
I invite you to reflect. To face the hard stuff. To process. To surround yourself by loved ones. To remind yourself that you’re SO much more than a body.
And most importantly of all, to remind yourself that you deserve to live a life with food freedom, body respect, and self-love.
