Personal Post: Comparison

I was feeling amazing today. I felt strong, confident, beautiful, then she walked into  the bathroom in her skimpy gym shorts (which she looked totally amazing in) and I suddenly felt the fattest girl in the room. She is maybe 5'2 very petite, skinny, tan, beautiful. I am 5'7 big boned, broad shouldered, white, suddenly feeling not so beautiful.

It's not just her either, I come across women every day that have smaller frames, smaller bones, slender arms. Al the things I am not, and will never be. I cannot be any smaller, I cannot shrink my shoulders, or my bones. No matter how much I work out I will not wake up petite.

It is disappointing on so many levels. This phrase was actually the first thing that popped into my mind today when my confidence fell flat. I am killing my joy, killing my confidence by comparing myself to people that I have physically nothing in common with.

It is so hard not to do. It is so hard to put things back into perspective. Sometimes it is totally subconcious. I don't even catch myself doing it. I have made it such a habit I don't even notice. Other time I do catch it and I try to remember "I am not her" and that is ok.

I wish society made it more ok. I wish the standard for beauty was not 5'5 100lbs, small, fragile. Because I can't ever be that. And sometimes that makes me think I can never be beautiful. Th sickest part is that I have allowed myself o be convinced through years of brainwashing that this is what I am supposed to look like. And it's not just me, it's all women. That's why we have plastic surgery, and fast diet programs, and lipo, and camera filters, and Photo shop.  We are accosted with images every single day that tell us we are not good enough. That we are not "perfect."

I could let this comparison eat at me. I could let it ruin my progress and I could give up. Or I could take my diet to an extreme and starve until i think I fit that ideal. That is what I did years ago when I was anorexic. Even then I hated me. I hated my frame, I thought I was huge. Ask my husband and he will tell you I often refer to myself as Fiona (From Shrek). I feel like an ogre. People try to convince me I am a beautiful Amazon, but that term also upsets me. I don't want to be an Amazon.

I am only sharing this because I want to be honest. I want to share what I think many of us feel often. Even if you look at someone and think they are fabulous and must be so happy with their appearance, they probably aren't. I think it is rare to find a woman who is totally confident with her body.

I am just like you. Some days I feel ugly, some days I feel fat. This is a journey not just in changing habits, or losing wieght. It is a journey is changing your mind. Changing the way you see yoruself. Most of us with weight issues have a very established mental image of who we are and what we see in the mirror is quite different than what others see. I don't know if it ever goes away, if we ever stop comparing. The goal for me is to change my thoughts. To remind myself that I am me, not her. I am in this body and this body can be beautiful. I will never be her and so I have to stop trying.

It's a journey.