Anonymous: I’m 17 years old, 5’2 and I weigh around 80 to 90 pounds. But for some reason, I consider myself fat. I know I’m not fat but a lot of the time the thought crosses my mind. I want to lose weight but I’m not sure I should. Any advice?
First off, it sounds as if you have a really negative view of your body. I say really negative because you are already very small but for some reason you believe becoming smaller will do what for you? Make you happier?
From my experience losing weight isn’t really about losing weight. It’s about self-care and loving yourself enough to be in the best shape for yourself. And happiness is a state of mind, you need to get to a place to where you are happy whether you are at 90 pounds or 190 pounds. You have to love yourself no matter how you look or what you weigh.
I have a question for you. You say you think you are fat at 80-90 pounds? Do you believe that other people who are bigger than you are fat? I’m broaching that question because sometimes we are too hard on ourselves and we imagine impossible goals for ourselves that we would never image or want for others.
And I get it, I do, you want to be your best self, but are you being your best self at a weight that is underweight for your height? Instead of focusing on losing weight you should be focusing on gaining it! Someone your height should be around about 100-135 pounds.
And I’ve known people that have lost weight, met their goal weight, and still weren’t happy with themselves. Losing weight is all about the journey. The journey of learning to care for yourself by caring for the mind, body and spirit.
And you are very small to begin with so instead of losing weight, why don’t you go on the journey of self-acceptance and self-love? You have to come to a place of loving who you are and knowing that you are not defined by your weight.
And the most important thing is to be healthy mentally, emotionally and physically and to love yourself. I guarantee you, losing weight would make you unhealthy physically, because you are already very small, but also mentally and emotionally.
You have to work on loving yourself, you really do. I think everything is stemming from your lack of self-love and you can fix that but losing weight will not change how you view yourself or the level of self-love you have for yourself.
And please, stop using the word fat! Take it out of your vocabulary! Fat has such a negative, judgmental connotation whenever we use it towards ourselves or think of it in terms of others. There’s nothing wrong with being bigger.
It’s all about self-care, eating healthy, drinking lots of water, working out multiple times a week and being mentally and emotionally healthy and stable. You can be bigger than a size that is comfortable for society and still be healthy.
In fact, some studies show that people who are bigger sometimes are healthier than their smaller counterparts because they know that health is their life. They recognize that although they are bigger, they don’t have to be bigger and unhealthy.
They eat healthy, workout several times a week but the only difference is that they eat more. The only difference between a healthy smaller person and a healthy bigger person is the number of calories they intake.
So, once again, remove the word fat and its connotations from your mind. And you should acknowledge that fat is a social construct that uses fear of how others perceive us in order to get us to align with how society wants us to be, which strips us of our self-esteem and authenticity.
The word ‘fat’ is used to shame and demean others for stepping outside of society’s norms. Norms that I and others never agreed to be placed upon us. Just love yourself, treat yourself with care by caring for your mind, body and spirit and focus on you loving yourself, not society.
DearSpence 