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Body Talk
Your body, your choice? A place to debate and discuss the complexities and controversies surrounding women's' health issues, reproductive rights, and bodily autonomy.
Being Body Positive Is Hard
Loving my body has been incredibly difficult for me over the years. I’ve suffered with eating disorders. I’ve been too fat and too thin. I’ve wanted to gain weight then I’ve wanted to lose it. I’ve wanted curves In “the right places.” I even considered cosmetic surgery.
By Emily Tarff6 years ago in Viva
Curvy Girl Gives the Perfect Response to a Body-Shamer About How There's No Way She Could Be With Mr. 6-Pack
I mean, look at her. That's paradise. Call me crazy. However, I'd be one to say that any woman, regardless of body type is indeed paradise, but you have to admit: the more of that paradise, the better.
By Pierre Roustan, Author of THE CAIN LETTERS and SCARY HORROR STUFF!6 years ago in Viva
How My Body Shamers Got Me to Shame Myself
So where do I begin? Where do I even begin to start when I have endured over ten years of cruel and mean insults? Insulted, "joked" toward and beaten up emotionally about my body. How do I even begin to address these people? Well here goes nothing, let me tell you how I felt.
By Alexis Quintana6 years ago in Viva
To the Girl Struggling With Body Image
To the girl struggling with body image, One of the most important things I have learned in my short 19 years on this earth, is that loving yourself is 100 percent unnegotiable and necessary if you ever want to be happy. Truly happy. If you were to ask 12-year-old me to name anything about herself that she unconditionally loved, her list would consist of absolutely nothing. Granted, 12 is a hard age for just about anyone, but the idea that the entirety of your worth came solely from your physical appearance was so engrained into 12-year-old Grace’s head, that it stuck, and unfortunately followed her everywhere for a long time. For everything and anything that went wrong in my life throughout my middle/high school years, I somehow found a way to blame it on the way I looked. I would avoid meeting new people for the fear that they would think I was ugly. I would avoid standing up for myself for the fear that someone might use the word fat as a comeback, and slowly but surely, my obsession with being as beautiful as I thought I should have been completely overrode the outgoing, smart person that was underneath. This mindset later developed into an eating disorder known as bulimia nervosa. For a long time, my relationship with food, my body, and self-control was not only unhealthy, but it hindered me completely from seeing everything in my life that I should have been thankful for. After being in recovery from my eating disorder for almost two years now, I like to keep a journal to be able to look back on the lessons that stood out to me the most when it came to really changing the way I viewed the world. These are a few of the most important ones:
By Grace D'Aprile6 years ago in Viva
Burlesque: Body-Positive Therapy
I do not feel comfortable in my body. I never will. It’s very hard to deal with the loss of control of something I’m inside of. I became disabled when I was 20, but I still had mobility. The two major things that affected that were:
By Anomie Fatale6 years ago in Viva
Body Image and What It Has You Believing...
Here it is... I can't speak for everyone but I know a lot of women and men feel like I do. I have friends and loved ones in the same position. So, I am speaking from my experiences but, of course, this may touch all of you.
By Wynter Snowe-Gem6 years ago in Viva
Debunked Myths About Your Vagina
We live in a society that seems to be obsessed with both female sexuality and female anatomy. Though we constantly gab and debate about the female body, as a society, we're really ignorant about how the equipment works down there. Hell, even gynecologists don't really seem to know as much as they should have the time.
By Ossiana Tepfenhart6 years ago in Viva
Fat Girl Fabulous
Ink and Blood and Soul I've grown up writing. Putting thoughts and ideas and feelings down on paper. Now I go to school full time and I write even more. I'm about to go to grad school and when I get there, I'll have to write my dissertation. Writing is a part of my soul. Like breathing or sleeping or drinking. Maybe it's more a part of me than any of those things. Breathing and sleeping and eating are facts of life. I enjoy them. I need them. They don't really touch my soul, though. Writing does that. It offers expression to the inexpressible, like art or dance. Arranging words on the page is like writing a symphony. Taking note of every syllable and sound. The soft whoosh of sh followed by the sharp, clipped p in ship. When I write I try to take these sounds and arrange them in a way that makes my heart hurt. It is as though my heart is speaking. When I open my mouth to speak the words come out jumbled and out of order but when I write, it is the purest form of expression. I'm writing this article because I believe I have something to say but I'm really not sure how to say it. The thoughts are fractured and messy and beautiful as they are. This is my attempt to show you the beautiful, crazy mess inside my head, spoken through my heart.
By Kristen Lee6 years ago in Viva