Stop the Fat Talk and Love Yourself

I’ve thought about this post for a while. I knew that I wanted to do a post for Caitlin’s change the way you see, not the way you look campaign. I knew that I could take this post several directions, but I finally found the direction I was looking for.

While I was out and about grocery shopping (one of my favorite sports), I popped into Barnes ‘n Nobel to pick up the Operation Beautiful book. I couldn’t believe I was actually holding it in my hands. After I rushed home (& put the groceries in the fridge so they wouldn’t spoil, sigh) I jumped on my bed and started devouring the book.

After reading for a mere 30 minutes the idea jumped into my head and I started to scribble down ideas, recollecting thoughts from years ago about my relationship with food and my relationships with other people.

The Fat Talk

In middle school and high school, I didn’t feel pretty on most days. Most days I would sigh when I looked in the mirror, put my hair up in a pony tail and hope the guy I liked would notice me. I had “friends” who would point out my cellulite and tell me to work on my stomach. I was picked on…wait for this… because I was good at sports. I had quite the tough exterior but I would come home crying on so many days with my head filled with negative self-talk, mostly fat talk.

The Turning Point

In my senior year of high school my diving coach highly recommended that all of her divers attend a workshop on positive thinking. It was geared towards positive self talk to enhance your performance in sports, but I also applied it to my fat talking side of the brain and called it quits on the fat-talking.

I was happy. I may have still been getting teased but I was on cloud nine. My brain was telling my body positive things and I felt like sunshine was radiating out of me. Okay. Totally crazy thought, kind of like the little puff ball in Horton Hear a Who saying that in her world people “eat rainbows and poop butterflies,” but hey! I felt like I was pooping butterflies I felt so good.

Fat Talk Again

After I graduated, and moved to college the fat talk slowly started creeping in. I was training for a half marathon and while my body was in great shape, my roommate kept comparing herself to me and would fat talk about herself in front of me. At the time I didn’t realize how much this affected me. What sent me over the edge was during Winter Break of this year (my sophomore year) I couldn’t fit into any of my jeans because of some weight gain. I was blaming myself for eating crappy foods, eating too much dessert, not working outing enough and being a lazy butt. In other words, fat talk. It was back. And in full force.

When I transitioned to a healthier diet based in vegetables and whole grains, my body started to lose the weight, but the fat talk stayed. I was very afraid to eat desserts or “junk” food for the fear of gaining weight and getting sick. I remember when Tina, from Carrots ‘n Cake showed one of her breakfasts that had a doughnut. I commented that I was surprised that she showed that she ate a doughnut, to which she responded: “Why?”

Why was I so afraid to show people that I ate a doughnut. Why was I so scared of treating myself to a doughnut?

I also never listened to my body. My body craves whole grains. I crave millet cereal as a midnight snack. I used to give my body carrots for these cravings. Sure, the carrots were less calories, but it didn’t settle what my body wanted. All it wanted was some grains.

Stoppin’ the Talk

Caitlin’s book made me recognize this fat talk which was shown through my actions. The thought process of not showing a doughnut because I wanted people to think I had the perfect diet and didn’t put any junk food into my body and eating carrots instead of cereal because I don’t want to get fat off of cereal because my tummy is looking a bit too pudgy these days was horrible. It needs to stop. And it needs to stop today.

And because I’m such a Type A person I made a list of how I am going to make changes in my life to make the fat talk stop.

• Compliment myself on my body every day. My body is strong and lets me do the things I want to in life, it deserves to be complimented.
• Keep posting Operation Beautiful notes. I have posted them twice. Here and again here. I felt AMAZING after posting these and I kept hearing chatter about them from the girls in the architecture department. Everyone was sad when the janitorial staff took them down. Letting other people know how great they are, even anonymously, really raised my thought of myself and my body. Moving into the sorority house may just be the best opportunity to do this.

This last point is more about my relationships with people, but I feel that my actions are deeply rooted in my own insecurities.

• Be less blunt to girls struggling with dieting. I get very annoyed when people just want a quick fix to their weight. I gave an example here of how I almost blew up on a sorority sister for her lack of knowledge on a healthy lifestyle. It’s not fair to them for not being as health conscious and they can truly learn a lot from my example.

Oh, and give into my cereal cravings! Lots of whole grains, meet my stomach. Stomach, meet lots of whole grains.

I hope to hear your comments about Operation Beautiful and Stopping the Fat Talk.