Not so sure.

So this blog has been inactive for a while, because my life has been incredibly busy recently. I was rehearsing for a community theatre production of The Mikado, then I jetted off to my homeland (leaving the husband and kids behind) to visit family for two weeks. After struggling to recover from jet lag and a bout of illness, I had to perform in the musical every night for an entire week. Frankly, I’m exhausted.

But I’ve been thinking. I’ve been paying attention to the world around me and the things people say. My observations are disjointed, but I feel like I just need to write for now. Maybe I’ll be coherent in future posts. Maybe.

1. I live in the UK. Because we would have to pay for a TV licence in order to watch television, we eschew it. We watch DVD’s, and download certain TV shows we want to watch, but otherwise I don’t get much exposure to a lot of advertising. When I was in the states, I watched a bit more TV, and I was shocked at the amount of weight-loss related advertising I saw. Maybe it’s like that over here; I don’t know for sure. But it depressed me to realise that this battle we’re fighting against body hatred and fat hatred seems so insurmountable. Bah.

2. My new sister-in-law, who has given herself severe digestion problems and possibly IBS through the misuse of laxatives and the like, still thinks of herself as fat (she wears a size 10 or something) and drinks slimfast by the box. She’s freaking beautiful, my brother adores the very ground she walks on, and she’s so caught up with hating herself that she’s turning into a very clingy wife. I feel so sad for her, and I don’t know how to help her. She lives halfway across the world, I barely know her, and I don’t think my unasked-for input would help or even be heard.

3. When I was performing in the musical, the changing rooms backstage were communal. Both men and women had to strip off in front of one another. When I first heard about this arrangement, I felt slightly concerned and embarrassed. I didn’t want people to look at me as I was changing my clothes! But when the time came, I realised that noone else wanted people to look at them, either. And also? The most insecure woman there, who constantly belittled her looks and appearance, was very thin and attractive by the world’s standards. She also battles her fears of aging (she’s in her mid to late 50s) but I was rather shocked by the things she was saying. I usually counteracted her words with mild statements like “We will never be perfect enough — too fat, too thin, too old, too whatever. We can’t win, so I choose not to participate in the battle.” or when the talk inevitably came to sizes of clothing, “I refuse to worry about what size I am. You can walk into three different shops and come out with clothes in three different sizes. It makes no sense, and I can’t be bothered with it.” In every case, I would hear murmured assent, as if these women wanted to believe me, but just couldn’t. I know what I’m saying makes sense. No one else seems to get it.

4. I refuse to hate my body. Absolutely refuse. This doesn’t mean that I don’t have ‘bad days’ or that when I see a glimpse of my reflection in a passing car window, I don’t shudder a bit because my face looks distorted and I wasn’t prepared to see that particular expression, and do I really look like that? No, I’m not there yet. But I chuck those thoughts out of my head as quick as I can. I’m improving.

So that’s it for now. I’m writing again. I may be back soon, maybe not. I’m feeling really overwhelmed by all the fat phobia and fat hatred out there. I just realised recently that I’ve been living in a bubble of mother&toddler groups and church friends. My exposure to the media is limited and, somehow, I never really noticed how pervasive and insidious this attitude can be.