Glorifying unhealthy behaviors and lying about it! #overit

The title says it all. Also I love the pic ( check out Lindley Ashline and her site https://bodyliberationphotos.com/links/ for more and) P.S I NEED THIS PLATE IN MY LIFE lol

I want to really use my voice to really start some truly controversial but needed conversation. I'm truly sick of the way the world will promote diet culture in the name of "health" when in reality it's doing everything to harm our physical well being, harm our mental well being, and take our financial well being away from us just to leave us depressed, sad, and sick physically and mentally and broke!

So I've had Christy Harrison's book for quite some time, along with being a part of her course to get away from diet culture and essentially away from my disordered behaviors/eating disorder ( however you want to look at it) for quite some time, but I've felt so much guilt because I'll have an amazing breakthrough just to end up back in the throws of diet culture, and I feel like I don't even deserve to read the information because I can't act on it in the way that I want to. If you follow me, you know that I model, and although I love the ability to be a character and have a form of self expression related to photography and art, I will be the first to say that modeling is probably not the best choice of expression for somebody that has struggled with an eating disorder or image related insecurities that have taken a toll on your mental health and well being. I catch myself wondering why do I pursue it trying to make a difference just to find myself engaging with diet culture and being sucked into an "acceptable" rather "glorified" eating disorder? So let's get into it and what I mean by the glorification of truly unhealthy behaviors just to label them as.... let's call them "good deeds" very sarcastically and very angrily.

Let's start with Instagram and social media. I hope I'm not the only one who's SICK of seeing all of the fitness models and people with bodies that are in an unsustainable, unobtainable, and overall just unrealistic aesthetic selling lies and selling that it's a better way of life and that that is how you are supposed to take control of your life... I would know, I am in this type of shape at times, but I refuse to sell the lie that America has decided to impose on all of it's inhabitants, and even the others of the world, as America has A LOT of power. I am here to tell you that it is not a happy life. When I see someone with abs and myself with abs, I don’t become proud of them or admire them, I honestly feel bad for their suffering and the control that diet culture has taken over their life. I don’t believe that they are taking control of their life, and honestly there’s a ton of evidence that they are being taken control of. It requires depravation, starvation, dehydration, lack of mental focus and energy for the things we TRULY love and the people we love, and so many other toxic things wrapped in the bow that is known as diet culture but disguised as health and wellness as Christy Harrison has mentioned. Also I will be the first to tell you that a lot of times on the path of pursuing a career in entertainment (although it shows up in every career because we're such a superficial breed) that engaging in a disorder that most don't call a disorder is pitched to you as necessary to succeed and unfortunately more people that have control over your career are more receptive to this than aren't, and I'm sorry if you're going through this While being told you’re doing the right thing.

I remember waking up in a body that was not acceptable at the young age of 12 just to be called out by adults and peers about how it was unacceptable. What did that look like? Constant comments about how my body was becoming larger than it should've, comments about how I was cuter when I was smaller, comments showing that others were policing my choices in food and how I should sacrifice things to overall shrink my body and become aesthetically pleasing for the satisfaction of others just to one day have it truly affect me and make me believe it was necessary for my health and for my life.

Now I am ranting lol, but hey I have a LOT on my mind. Back to the topic.

Unhealthy behaviors: sacrificing time for things necessary i.e. sleep, taking care of others, truly nourishing your body, having a social life and so much more.

What we call "healthy" behaviors: sacrificing food that we enjoy, depriving our body of enough energy with all kinds of food to think at a higher capacity and have more cognitive focus, dehydrating ourselves for the sake of having abs, over exercising and calling it dedication and focus, glorifying things like fasting and cutting out food groups and telling people it's their fault if they realize it was an unsustainable way of life and a true detriment to their mental health.

Now I by no means am an expert on how to live in a truly healthy way and I am by no means out of the red when it comes to interacting with the toxicity that is diet culture, but I am very aware of how awful, or as Christy Harrison has said INSIDEOUS this awful thing is and I just don't want you to mistake the shape I'm in at times whether past present or future when I have things like abs as me being the epitome of health or what should be what we decide to call beautiful. I want everyone to know that the people that are typically called "unhealthy" in my personal opinion are much healthier than the rest of us that are held captive by diet culture and don't even realize it And that people in larger bodies are the people I admire the most and truly think are the most beautiful and fulfilled.

I wish I hadn't been lied to by a website about how I had to micromanage my food, police my body, and attain abs to be successful and happy just to find myself in an eating disorder/constantly engaging with disordered eating and disordered thoughts that are never ending when it comes to my body and how it is supposed to look for almost over half my life at this point not knowing when it will end. If you are thinking about starting a diet, changing your body, or sacrificing the way you live to have a "better" life, just take a second, read my words and really hear me when I say, the people telling you that their life is "better" probably aren't aware that it's quite the opposite, and will not be strong enough when their body goes back to a more sustainable size and look due to time restraints, injuries from over exercising and actual malnourishment (trust me I've had SOOOOO many in the past few years while pursuing my modeling career) to stop you from engaging in this terrible and life sucking way of living.

Thank you for reading and I hope this helps you <3

I also want to thank people like Rachel Millner and Leah Frazee for all of the work they do in the world with stopping diet culture and helping people with the recovery process when it comes to eating disorders.

https://theweightofitall.blog/f/glorifying-unhealthy-behaviors-and-lying-about-it-overit