On the Couch with Gail Saltz, M.D. | A Mental Health Blog at iVillage.com
- Love
- On the Couch with Dr. Gail Saltz
Loving the Body You're In
With the warmer weather, women want to dress in less. For some, this is enjoyable. For others, it’s a nightmare because they dislike their bodies. A recent study showed that 83% of college women diet, regardless of whether they are at all overweight.
Very, very few women have a naturally “model like” body, and magazines and television shows often make women feel they should. They measure themselves against the pictures of women wearing the new spring fashions and feel disappointed or even embarrassed about their own bodies. This robs many women of the ability to enjoy dressing as the wish they could, being active, and feeling good about themselves through out the day.
Battling back those feelings requires a combination of acting in ways that are constructive, accepting the person you are with the body you have and appreciating the truly unique and wonderful parts of you.
In terms of action:
- Rather than starving and exercising like mad, I advocate eating sensibly and in a healthy way (It's all about moderation) and learning new skills that are physical and yet suit your personality. (i.e. Swing dancing, yoga, belly dancing, golf, etc.) Picking something that you enjoy and is a reflection of you will enhance your feelings about yourself and make it far more likely you will stick with it.
In terms of acceptance:
- Spend a day adding up how many minutes you spend criticizing yourself and then ask yourself if there is some other way you would rather be spending that time?
- Tell people in your life who criticize your body to pipe down. Often we let someone (a mother, a sister, a husband, a friend) go on about our thighs, our hips, our size, and it is not constructive but rather destructive. Let them know if they have a constructive suggestion you are open, but to please refrain from just pure destruction.
- Review the past. Sometimes we keep reacting to a criticism from the past (as a kid someone said you have chunky thighs) and you never update your image. Try to see if the areas that bother you may be steeped in old news.
In terms of appreciating:
- Appreciate others. Find nice things to say to those around you…you’ll how it makes them feel and it will come back to you.
- Look in the mirror. Sometimes we walk around with our negative self image and its inaccurate. Look in the mirror and list your three favorite things.
0 TrackBacks
Listed below are links to blogs that reference this entry: Loving the Body You're In.
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://gailsaltz.ivillage.com/system/mt-tb.cgi/4969
Please tell us just WHERE we can go - to love that body we're in?
This summer I tried going swimming with a heavy friend(I'm underweight). It would be fine, I told her. "We can go to the lake. No one goes there but families."
About 15 minutes after we arrived, so did a large family who began to heckle us. They were between us and the car. Where were we supposed to go? They already had baseball bats, and indicated that they would use them if we didn't stop "uglifying" the beach. I have never been so scared. I finally was frightened enough to go over to a tree, and get a stick to defend us, only if necessary.
So "they" called the police.
Apparently the officers were well acquainted with this "family", and agreed with us - but WE were asked to leave - and not them!?
The sad part is, this is typical. At the city pool, the unattractive victim is always ejected for "starting it". (Check on this if you don't believe me!)
Please don't say, go with a group. Ugly people, don't even like to be seen with ugly people.
Eat sensibly and in a healthy way. AGREE.
Tell people in your life who criticize you to pipe down. AGREE.
Review the past. AGREE.
Appreciate others. AGREE.
Look in the mirror (to see if your negative self image is inaccurate). DO NOT AGREE.
In order to determine that a negative self image is inaccurate, isn't one still judging one's body by society's standards?
How does society set those unrealistic standards?
How does a girl get the idea that she should be able to spend from $400. to $1200. on a pair of shoes?
The Today Show helped to set that expectation this morning when they did a segment on shoes with those price tags.
Add to that their segments on Botox, Skinny Jeans, designer dresses and what do you have......viewers who feel inadequate for not being thin enough, young enough or rich enough. That's a negative self image waiting to happen.
It's difficult to appreciate the person you are with the body you have when daily programs continue to promote a template you don't fit.
Hi there! Your site is cool!
I have decided that I am perfect - in mind, body and spirit. Aquaaerobics at the Y has helped me reach this conclusion!
I completely agree that women - and men! - should work to accept and appreciated the body they inhabit. That is not to say that each of us should not make every effort to eat and live healthy, but I am saying that no body is perfect and critiquing imperfections serves no good purpose. Many women admire and want large breasts - the bigger the better is often seems! Yet an ample rear is usually frowned upon in American culture.Appreciate the wisdom of your body to be what it was intended to be. In a few words - like yourself!
Still,
WHAT - should you do? WHERE - do you go?
(...to love "that body you're in", when the culture you are stuck in, is given profit motivated, sanctioned permission to ATTACK you, for something you can do nothing to change! [And, I am getting more than just slightly tired of hearing that smug, worn out "eat and live healthy solution" repeatedly given to people who ALREADY DO, as if ignorance, apathy, or bad habits are the cause of their problem.])
When I was a child, someone once told me, "You can't change the world, so you had better change yourself."
I have come to the conclusion that this defective philosophy (one SO conveniently useful to Big Business) is the very root cause of the terminal danger we are all now facing as a culture. This is actually a leftover SLAVE philosophy. Black, brown, or white, it doesn't really matter, we are all still thinking like the slaves that Big Business wants us to be.
STOP THE HATE! Before the Hate stops us all!
(continued from August 20 at 02:18pm)
And, by the way, the obese children that I teach (secondary) always seen to have healthier, and better eating habits than their peers. But then, why shouldn't they? They have been forced to stay on those so-called "sensible diets" (that, while healthy, never have cured their weight problem), and to exercise daily. The "normal" children could learn a lot from them.
And also, I too was once physically attacked for a "visual attribute". If it had been for my skin color, the outcome would have no doubt been violent - if they would have dared to attack in the first place. So, the Haters did not attack me for my race, they attacked me for my height. This was perfectly acceptable to the onlookers.
Lets all pray that there is some better solution to these attacks, than violent activism.
Otherwise, we are doomed as a nation.
Tell people in your life who criticize your body to pipe down. ???
Dr. Gail you are a very nice civilized lady. Unfortunately the world has changed. I should know. I am a school bus driver. Most of the violence incedents start about a child on the bus who is fat. No one taunts anymore. They hit kick beatdown and stab. Parents of kids who do this want the fat kid off the bus and back their kids in what ever they do. There is nothing i can do about it. If i stop it on the bus they do it before or after. Try to imagin the fat kid telling these other kids to Pipe Down while being hit kicked beatdown and stabbed.
Good site! Good resources here, All the best!
Good site,good job.My problem is not really on weight loss;but my upper arm which is big and muscular.How do i go about it?
To Carol, August 28 at 08:46am, who asked, "... my upper arm which is big and muscular. How do i go about it?"
Move to a less hopeless culture, Sis'. One that judges people on the content of their character, and not just on the size of their disposable income - plus - their willingness to gullibly, and obediently blow it on sanctioned QUACKERY. ;)
Either that - or stand up, and FIGHT FOR A CHANGE in this culture!!!
Ask any anthropologist, those beautiful arms of yours are the mark of a QUEEN in most "intact cultures". They are there, because this world needed you. Yes -YOU!
Everyone, the next time you encounter LOOKSISM (the only real ugliness, and the progenitor of all the other "isms" that have caused all the suffering in this world):
step in - politely,
speak out - clearly and calmly,
and
never - never - look away.
America is LOST! And only YOU, can find it.
Just a little information. Those models who are extremely thin; they are usually too proud to ask their parents for help when all they have left is a small amount of rice to eat, plus there is a constant scrutiny over being dependent on parents anyway within a business that does not accept the wisdom of age. The parents are usually kept away from their "model" children by people who are "trading" the look they provide. This is a revelation to parents of thin models.
Bruce
It's true: the fat and overweight are blame for many of our modern society's ills. This blame manifests itself in many ways: being denied promotions at work, being ostracized by peers, and for our children who suffer with this condition they get humiliated, degraded and physically abused by their peers while adults look the other way. Knowing what they will face horrible things if they become overweight drives people to do drastic things in order to stay thin. If people accepted fat people as normal human beings it would go a long way towards stopping this epidemic of poor self image. Unfortunately, the media perpetuates the negative stereotypes of overweight people and so people are inundated with negative images of fat people every day. If we get more positive images of overweight people out there it would be a good start.
Great tips!! It is very nice post!!
the fats are lying that they get this way by accident
fats are force feeding themselves because they LIKE 2 get beatdown
they are 2 fat 2 have sex so it takes the place of sex 4 fats
in school we stick fats with tacks and they pretend 2 get hurt but they dont feel it because they are so covered with blubber
then teachers grab fats and put them in detention for jumping around & yelling like lame idiots when we stick them & then they pretend 2 cry and act all depresed so they can get out 4 some more *rotfl*
this is so funny because fats dont really have feelings like people do & teachers are 2 old & 2 stupid 2 know it
scientest who try 2 say it is some disease & it can get cured are the same dumb stupid hozeheads who dont want us 2 enjoy ANYTHING
they cant have fun because they got OLD LIKE THE CRYPT KEEPER
they cant even have sex no more
so they are trying 2 spoil any fun 4 the rest of us
>:-( !!!!!