Amie
01-30-2010, 10:09 AM
I guess that everyone struggles with this every now and then? Some more than others.
I just realized something about my own struggles and am interested in firstly, what y'all go through (if anything) and your stories, realizations, etc.
Secondly, I am sharing because I find the openness to be cathartic. For me, it is a struggle that shame attaches to and opening up helps to sort of wash that off.
Just for a bit of back story (and some of you already know), I was abused for a lot of years of my childhood. Sexual abuse was part of it.
It is hard to describe how I felt. I was supposed to hide it from my mom, so I knew that it was wrong. The odd thing is that hiding things from one another was part of our family make-up. The drug abuse by the adults was a big reason for that, but in general looking back, it seems like there were no personal boundaries at all. Keeping secrets meant getting favors, but never having the ability to really celebrate those joys.
Like, being the excuse for a trip to the store meant getting candy and YooHoos, but it also meant not telling mom that we were riding in circles for an hour while he drank a twelve pack of beer. Most of the time if I talked about what I got to have to my mom, she would respond in rage. It was put on me to be responsible for her calmness and mental stability, as well as his - his alcohol meant his "stability" (he didn't act out like he did when he wanted it and didn't get it).
My reward was not being hit and not being mentally tormented, with candy, doughnuts, or whatever to boot. It's weird (again, thinking back) because when he got drunk, he would still demean me calling me a "mental midget" and making fun of my body. I was thin back then, but he still said that I had "cottage cheese legs" (no way was that true, but I believed it then) and eventually made fun of me when my body began going through changes. He had a really low view of women in general, yet he needed us (look at me including me as a child as a "woman" - good grief) to feed his ego.
Mostly the things that were supposed to be secret would happen at night after everyone was asleep. There were times though, that things would be happening in the same room as the rest of the family - under covers etc. My mom says that she never knew, but I remember her catching him (back then I thought "catching us") and shooting me angry looks. She caught him doing something inappropriate to me one time and I thought it would end it all, but the next morning nothing was different.
When I told her, I was 15 years old. She blamed me. She said "You were a horny little girl, weren't you?" (Gosh some of this stuff is hard to share!) She is still married to him.
When I was high school aged, I moved in with my dad and step mom who still have no idea what hit them. I was pretty messed up and should have been. I 'tried' bulimia when I was 16 or so. My friends and I joked about "scarfing and barfing". My body stopped letting me. Somehow, my gag reflex just stopped working for me. I would try and get my friends to get diet pills for me, and sometimes they could.
They would smuggle alcohol in perfume bottles and I would drink it even though it tasted like the perfume that used to be in the bottle. I was desperate to feel good.
I remember feeling oppressed because my dad didn't allow me to go anywhere, not even walk around the block or in the front yard. It really was extreme, yet at the same time I probably would have developed into a full fledged addict given opportunity.
There was a movie about bulimia with Meredith Baxter Burney in it. It showed that throwing up that much can eat a hole in your neck, so I stopped attempting that. I started working out a lot and started a cycle of the work outs helping me feel good, to quitting because the feel good didn't last, to starting and getting that initial feel good to etc. That really hasn't stopped for a life time to be open.
Today, I saw a music video from forever ago ("Roseanna") and saw a woman dancing around on the video. I remembered how I wanted to look like the woman on the video.
Here in my late thirties I read someone bring up the point that a person cannot "feel fat". "Fat" is not a feeling. Just looking in the mirror and then coming to terms with what I was actually feeling was eye opening, and hard. I felt ashamed, I felt powerless, I felt self loathing.. for me that is what "fat" feels like.
I've seen women interviewed that are close to death's door because they are so thin, yet they still "feel fat". Behavioral treatment will never work until what they actually feel is explored imo.
I saw on a program where they did an excercise on perception. A woman with anorexia was supposed to draw an outline of how she saw herself on this big piece of paper hung on the wall. Then, she stood against the paper and the therapist actually traced around her. She was much smaller than what she believed.
As someone who can relate, that perception is shaped by feelings. What we see with our own eyes is "corrected" by our brains that have intertwined feelings with body.
It's easy to blame the body. "I wasn't accepted, I was sexualized and wanted to be touched, I was rejected, I was teased, I was demeaned, etc etc etc and I BLAME MY BODY!" "My body betrayed me". "BUT, if I can fix my body I then can have all that I desire". That is one mentality.
The woman on the video and the women in the media were/are (in my mind) powerful. I am sure that I am not the only person seeing it that way. Songs like "My Humps" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBZD_mmzfVM)are often blamed for feeding that type of thinking with no thought about the reality that the author/lyricist is writing the story that they are believing themselves.
The reality can't be ignored either imo of sexual power. Kids like me felt powerless when we were being taken advantage of and seek to self medicate through sexual power. (By "sexual power" I do not mean actually having sex as in the verb. I am talking about the power seemingly gained through sexuality basically.) Is that real power though? It seems to me to be just a fix that never works JUST LIKE chasing a high. Even the most sexually powerful women (ie Marilyn Monroe, Anna Nicole Smith) were horribly depressed and ended up pretty much killing themselves.
When a child who has felt powerless looks at a "media image" and longs for that life and that body, they are really longing for power. They are longing for not feeling ashamed any more and for a reason to love themselves at all.
It isn't as simple as just realizing it and it moving automatically from head to heart. It isn't a simple "well God loves you without condition" and "bam!" - there's the cure. I WISH it were.
For me the next question that I will look for an answer for is where to find genuine personal power - not just chasing the high. I'm growing more and more into love which helps SO VERY MUCH. Shoot, it enables me to open up with y'all here.
I know that the examples and stuff that I have given are female, but body image is not just a female issue. I do wonder if it is the same for guys or different somehow (because I know that society puts different pressures and standards on each sex).
(continued on next post)
I just realized something about my own struggles and am interested in firstly, what y'all go through (if anything) and your stories, realizations, etc.
Secondly, I am sharing because I find the openness to be cathartic. For me, it is a struggle that shame attaches to and opening up helps to sort of wash that off.
Just for a bit of back story (and some of you already know), I was abused for a lot of years of my childhood. Sexual abuse was part of it.
It is hard to describe how I felt. I was supposed to hide it from my mom, so I knew that it was wrong. The odd thing is that hiding things from one another was part of our family make-up. The drug abuse by the adults was a big reason for that, but in general looking back, it seems like there were no personal boundaries at all. Keeping secrets meant getting favors, but never having the ability to really celebrate those joys.
Like, being the excuse for a trip to the store meant getting candy and YooHoos, but it also meant not telling mom that we were riding in circles for an hour while he drank a twelve pack of beer. Most of the time if I talked about what I got to have to my mom, she would respond in rage. It was put on me to be responsible for her calmness and mental stability, as well as his - his alcohol meant his "stability" (he didn't act out like he did when he wanted it and didn't get it).
My reward was not being hit and not being mentally tormented, with candy, doughnuts, or whatever to boot. It's weird (again, thinking back) because when he got drunk, he would still demean me calling me a "mental midget" and making fun of my body. I was thin back then, but he still said that I had "cottage cheese legs" (no way was that true, but I believed it then) and eventually made fun of me when my body began going through changes. He had a really low view of women in general, yet he needed us (look at me including me as a child as a "woman" - good grief) to feed his ego.
Mostly the things that were supposed to be secret would happen at night after everyone was asleep. There were times though, that things would be happening in the same room as the rest of the family - under covers etc. My mom says that she never knew, but I remember her catching him (back then I thought "catching us") and shooting me angry looks. She caught him doing something inappropriate to me one time and I thought it would end it all, but the next morning nothing was different.
When I told her, I was 15 years old. She blamed me. She said "You were a horny little girl, weren't you?" (Gosh some of this stuff is hard to share!) She is still married to him.
When I was high school aged, I moved in with my dad and step mom who still have no idea what hit them. I was pretty messed up and should have been. I 'tried' bulimia when I was 16 or so. My friends and I joked about "scarfing and barfing". My body stopped letting me. Somehow, my gag reflex just stopped working for me. I would try and get my friends to get diet pills for me, and sometimes they could.
They would smuggle alcohol in perfume bottles and I would drink it even though it tasted like the perfume that used to be in the bottle. I was desperate to feel good.
I remember feeling oppressed because my dad didn't allow me to go anywhere, not even walk around the block or in the front yard. It really was extreme, yet at the same time I probably would have developed into a full fledged addict given opportunity.
There was a movie about bulimia with Meredith Baxter Burney in it. It showed that throwing up that much can eat a hole in your neck, so I stopped attempting that. I started working out a lot and started a cycle of the work outs helping me feel good, to quitting because the feel good didn't last, to starting and getting that initial feel good to etc. That really hasn't stopped for a life time to be open.
Today, I saw a music video from forever ago ("Roseanna") and saw a woman dancing around on the video. I remembered how I wanted to look like the woman on the video.
Here in my late thirties I read someone bring up the point that a person cannot "feel fat". "Fat" is not a feeling. Just looking in the mirror and then coming to terms with what I was actually feeling was eye opening, and hard. I felt ashamed, I felt powerless, I felt self loathing.. for me that is what "fat" feels like.
I've seen women interviewed that are close to death's door because they are so thin, yet they still "feel fat". Behavioral treatment will never work until what they actually feel is explored imo.
I saw on a program where they did an excercise on perception. A woman with anorexia was supposed to draw an outline of how she saw herself on this big piece of paper hung on the wall. Then, she stood against the paper and the therapist actually traced around her. She was much smaller than what she believed.
As someone who can relate, that perception is shaped by feelings. What we see with our own eyes is "corrected" by our brains that have intertwined feelings with body.
It's easy to blame the body. "I wasn't accepted, I was sexualized and wanted to be touched, I was rejected, I was teased, I was demeaned, etc etc etc and I BLAME MY BODY!" "My body betrayed me". "BUT, if I can fix my body I then can have all that I desire". That is one mentality.
The woman on the video and the women in the media were/are (in my mind) powerful. I am sure that I am not the only person seeing it that way. Songs like "My Humps" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBZD_mmzfVM)are often blamed for feeding that type of thinking with no thought about the reality that the author/lyricist is writing the story that they are believing themselves.
The reality can't be ignored either imo of sexual power. Kids like me felt powerless when we were being taken advantage of and seek to self medicate through sexual power. (By "sexual power" I do not mean actually having sex as in the verb. I am talking about the power seemingly gained through sexuality basically.) Is that real power though? It seems to me to be just a fix that never works JUST LIKE chasing a high. Even the most sexually powerful women (ie Marilyn Monroe, Anna Nicole Smith) were horribly depressed and ended up pretty much killing themselves.
When a child who has felt powerless looks at a "media image" and longs for that life and that body, they are really longing for power. They are longing for not feeling ashamed any more and for a reason to love themselves at all.
It isn't as simple as just realizing it and it moving automatically from head to heart. It isn't a simple "well God loves you without condition" and "bam!" - there's the cure. I WISH it were.
For me the next question that I will look for an answer for is where to find genuine personal power - not just chasing the high. I'm growing more and more into love which helps SO VERY MUCH. Shoot, it enables me to open up with y'all here.
I know that the examples and stuff that I have given are female, but body image is not just a female issue. I do wonder if it is the same for guys or different somehow (because I know that society puts different pressures and standards on each sex).
(continued on next post)