Why I Don't Want to be Skinny

"Here's the new diet trend to shed that holiday season weight! Eating clean is the only way to be healthy! You have to work out every single day! No days off! Burn fat by doing cardio every day! Carbs make you fat! Fat makes you fat! Everything except plant-based foods makes you fat!" ... So. Much. NOISE. Why are we so obsessed with being skinny or small? Why is it that having cellulite or belly rolls is seen has a bad thing? Why are so many women starving themselves just to sustain this unrealistic form of "beauty" that diet culture wants to force upon us through various forms of media? Why are we comparing ourselves to these unrealistic bodies we see online? Because it's glorified. 

Now don't get it twisted. Before I start, I just want to clarify that I understand some people are just naturally skinny with fast metabolisms or what have you. I'm not trying to come at you. I think every woman is beautiful in their own way. Skinny, thick, curvy, big, small, whatever! Own your body girl! But, this blog post is simply for people like myself who struggle to lose body fat, even when in a caloric deficit, and have at some point in their lives attempted or is currently attempting to go out of their way to make themselves smaller when it isn't necessary. My intentions are not to offend anyone of any size. 

As someone who has struggled for years with anorexia, bulimia, binge-eating and body dysmorphia, I know how it feels to constantly want to change every aspect of your appearance. It f*cking sucks. It's taken me years of recovery, relapses, and recovery again to realize I don't need to change myself to look or feel beautiful. Recovery is a life-long process, so I still struggle with minor battles every day when it comes to food or body image, but it's very rare compared to when I used to strive to have abs, weigh under 100 lbs, or fit a size 0 or xs in everything I wore. I was a prisoner to the diet industry.

If you don't know my story already, you can watch it on YouTube here, but if you're like "Nah come on Maddie I'm not trying to watch a video right now" then alright, I'll explain: My weight loss journey began in 2013. I was at a point where I wasn't overweight, but I did have a high amount of body fat, I was out of shape, and I ate like shit... I'm talking two packs of Ramen Noodles and a sleeve of Oreos for dinner shit. I wanted to make a lifestyle change and I saw all of these Instagram "fitspos" and created my own fitness account to track my progress (how @maddiejfitness was born!! Except my first @ name was "@stayinfit_" because I didn't want anyone from my high school to find me at the time lol). Anyway, so it began. The only form of exercise I was familiar with, besides volleyball practice, was running. So every day after practice, I would run. It started out 10-15 minutes, 30 minutes, 45 minutes, up to an hour. I also started eating less and increased my protein intake. Then I saw these IG fitspos post about weight lifting. So I added weightlifting at the end of my hour-long runs AND would sometimes go for a swim after. I reduced my calories to 800 a day while doing all of this. Just to be skinny. Like anyone who goes on a outrageous crash-diet, I started to see results pretty quickly for the first few months. I weighed myself daily (like 3 times a day... smh) and if I was over my goal weight even by .5 lbs I would restrict myself of MORE calories the following day. This was my life now. Miserable. Then I noticed that these fitspo's I followed had "cheat days" and I gave a sigh of relief. I thought I'd never be able to eat my favorite foods again. So my Sundays turned into my cheat days... and by cheat days I mean BINGE days. My body was starving so it makes sense why I would eat so much, but it got to a point where I would eat beyond being full and my stomach would be in so much pain. So what would I do? Purge... AKA make myself throw up. This began a vicious cycle that went on for a little over a year. The worst part is that I had no idea I had an eating disorder. I thought this is just what women "had" to do in order to be thin, and I was okay with it (again... smh). It wasn't until my family caught on and called me out that I realized this was a problem and it sure as hell wasn't a healthy lifestyle at all. Sure I had abs and I lost over 20 pounds, but I was so cold all the time, I blacked out almost every time I stood up too fast (I actually fainted in one of my classes from this), I was weak as hell, food-obsessed, body-image obsessed, and I didn't want to do anything besides sleep or work out. All to be one thing... skinny. 

As a woman, I know I'm not alone in feeling pressure to look a certain way. It's taken me years of recovery, self-acceptance, healing, and rediscovering myself to come to terms that a certain body type doesn't equal beauty. True beauty comes from within. Cliche, but true. It's good to have fitness or physique goals, but don't associate them with beauty or your happiness. I always chased this "dream body" of being skinny and assumed I would finally be happy when I got there, but I was more miserable than ever. What I hadn't realized is that I was struggling with self-esteem issues that rooted deeper than just my body, but I was using the gym and my eating disorder as a source of distraction. I had to revisit my insecurities and inner demons and had to finally face them to overcome them once and for all. Learn to accept yourself as you are and encourage yourself throughout your *entire* journey - even on the bad days. 

Now, skinny isn't the goal for me. In fact, I've changed my thought process so most of my goals aren't even physical and I no longer weigh myself. I aim to be STRONG, not skinny. I aim to be HAPPY, not look a certain way. I aim to INSPIRE, MOTIVATE and ENCOURAGE other women instead of envying them or wishing I could look like or "be" them. Because in all honesty, I wouldn't want to be anyone else but me. I'm grateful for who I am and who I'm constantly evolving into. You deserve to feel the same way about yourself.