Instagram has been consuming a lot of my time recently. More than it should but I see so much on there to read or look at. I find people who need support, I find people who have tons of support, I find girls who need support of a different kind and there are too many of the wrong people supporting them. I find inspiration for myself. It’s amazing what one app can do to change your life. It sounds a bit far fetched, but it’s true. It hasn’t changed my life, but you know some of those people need their followers to keep it going.
There are a few things I want to talk about tonight. What is true inspiration? What has society done to girls? What about the naysayers or people who can’t support you? Can you be judged for eating right?
When people used to tell me I was an inspiration I pretty much blew them off. I know I’ve said this before, but I’m going to say it again. People of all shapes and sizes told me I was an inspiration to them. I didn’t see it. I still have a difficult time with it but now I feel it more than ever. There are pictures on my new favorite virtual playground (Instagram) of people like me, who have lost 50+ pounds. There are A LOT of us. Then I see people who are like a size 4 who lose five pounds and others comment on their pictures that they’re “so inspirational.” This REALLY helped it click for me. I actually feel insulted by that. I don’t mean to take away someone else’s success, but for someone to say that five pounds is inspirational blows me away. Five pounds is one big dump to some people out there… How about almost 100 pounds? Or how about MORE than 100 pounds? Or what about those that finally got the strength to begin their journey and have more than 100 pounds to lose? These people are inspirations. Anyone can lose five pounds. Not everyone can lose half of their original body weight… Inspiration is all about what pushes you to make a change for yourself or feel a certain way. I’m blessed and grateful for the people who have reached out to me to express their gratitude for helping motivate them.
There is the other extreme on there though, which actually makes me incredibly sad for the future of our young women (and even men) in the world. They’re so brain washed to think that having your hip bones stick out is the way to be. Or to be able to wrap your hands around your thighs. Or to have a “thigh gap” or boney shoulders or a visible spine or ribcage… These girls post under #weightloss but also under #bulimic and #anorexic. They post grotesque pictures of sickly thin girls who are malnourished, that have dingy hair and gray skin and think it’s attractive and they strive for that “perfection.” One girl posted words that said something like “food is bad for me.” I posted that bad food is bad for you. Apparently she had binged and was feeling fat and guilty. When I read her profile she had that she was 130 pounds and her goal weight was 97 pounds. She was really thin. She twisted her body to show her hips in the pictures. I thought back to a girl I went to high school with and she told me she was bulimic and I told her how thin she was and she said that was like calling a fat person fat. I never thought of it this way. Their brains are wired differently. They need love, support and guidance. They need to know what healthy really is and how to get to that point in their lives. We see models in magazines and TV personalities, and we’re made to feel like we’re huge when they’re tiny. I’m a size 16 now. I plan on being at least a 12. I am now the size of an “average” American woman and I still feel huge. Why do I feel like this? Why do 15 year old girls who aren’t physically mature feel like they’re not pretty or skinny enough?
I have encountered people in my life that don’t have it in them to be supportive of the decisions I’m making. I don’t expect everyone to be “on my side.” I don’t care. I know who my true friends are. I know the people that really matter. I am much stronger than the naysayers. I have the ability to say no to a patty melt or doughnut. When I am ready, I will decide what I eat. Those people think, “What’s one doughnut going to hurt? What’s one piece of candy?” Okay, well take something you REALLY like and say no to it when someone puts it in front of you. A glass of wine, a piece of cake, pretzels, popcorn, beer… try it sometime. Then the person offering will tell you to take it, that it’s okay, and you know you can’t for your own good. If you don’t have a medical reason to back you up, it’s even harder. No one is really going to force a diabetic to eat cubes of sugar, but if you’re not a diabetic, what’s your excuse? Your own health? Your own determination? Your own promise to yourself? That’s not good enough to some people. Yes, this can be discouraging, but to know you have the strength to be true to yourself is your power. Someone I work/worked with one time made a comment about why my back may have been hurting (even though I wasn’t complaining of any pain), implying it was because of my weight. I will never in my life forget this. At that time I was my heaviest and I was gobsmacked that someone would actually say that to me, in front of someone else, no less. I felt extremely hurt by this and I know that person has no idea they did it. To make a negative comment about someone’s weight is, I think, one of the worst things you can actually say to a person, especially if the person making the comment has never had a weight problem. Now that I’m losing weight, the naysayers can EAT their words and kiss my ass because it doesn’t matter what you think. You’re meaningless in my big picture and will only be a blip in my memory some day. Don’t judge me for wanting to make myself a better person and then actually following through.
These pants fit me at one point (in 2009-2010). They’re a size 22. Do you think they make my butt look big?
Blaire's Journey 