You only get one home. One shell. One Earth suit. Mine has climbed mountains, traveled on planes, worked 18 hours straight, been immersed in the ocean too many times to count, turned purple in the snow, red in the sun, and green on the Interislander. Everything I have done in this life. Everything I have seen, felt and experienced has been made possible by my physical existence in this body.
On the night that I began writing this blog, I was driving home from my parents house, after another discussion about diets, weight, health and our goals. And I just felt the urge to write. To get it all out. You see I’ve been trying to start again, eat healthily, hopefully lose some weight, and better my habits and my overall health. I’m not sure where this tunnel of thoughts began but it was something along the lines of “imagine if I actually succeed this time”.
This blog came about as a way of sharing my journey to loving myself and I would be lying to myself and to every person that reads it if I denied my physical self and only talked about my mental and emotional well-being. Not to mention the fact that my mental and emotional well-being is undeniably attached to my physical well-being, as much as I try to ignore it. You should know, I never ever in my wildest dreams thought I would say the words I’m about to write, let alone pen them and publish them.
When I say, “Will I succeed this time?” I mean the ten thousandth time. Tomorrow morning. Monday. The start of a new month. That’s when I will start my new “diet”. I started to think about all the times I had tried (or not really tried at all) and I wondered why I hadn’t succeeded sooner. Before I could ponder that for too long the answer had already popped into my head. “Because you see it as your identity, you see it as who you are”. And I was right. But I had never said those words to anyone before, or allowed myself to really hear them either. I have let myself believe for as long as I can remember (and I’m talking primary school until now) that I am a “big girl”, “fat girl”, “overweight” and all the other words that describe my body composition. Not only did I think that about myself, I believed that was all anyone else thought about me too. I genuinely let it become who I was, rather than just a description of my physical features. It followed me through school where I didn’t push myself at sport because I was embarrassed. And where I didn’t feel like I belonged with my friends who were all much skinnier than me. I flushed red with embarrassment whenever one of my friends would grab the tiniest little roll on their tummy and says they needed to lose weight. It followed me into my romantic relationships, where I didn’t believe any person could ever be interested in me because of the number on a set of scales, and when I found someone who was, I still let it follow me and plague my thoughts about myself and therefore what he thought of me. It follows me in to every new room, when I meet every new person, and I wonder if they dislike me or think less of me for my weight. It threatens to taint my relationships with others, nothing makes me grumpier than a diet discussion with my parents, or hearing my thin friends talk about how they need to lose weight. It followed me into my career, cringing every time someone talked about overweight patients, and thinking they must be judging me too. Wondering if anyone would want someone in healthcare who so blatantly can’t even look after their own health. So much of what I have talked about already in these blogs is actually deeply rooted in insecurities surrounding my body image, I could provide endless examples.
The reason why seeing it as ‘who you are’ hinders any changes is because you don’t believe you can be anything different. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy. I believe I can’t do it, and so I just don’t even try. I believe I will fail, and so I just give up. Right now, I’m going through a time of change. Of undoing. And overcoming. I want to shift my identity. I look back at so many times in my life that I have either not taken an opportunity, or I have enjoyed something less or felt as if I couldn’t do something, because of the way I looked and felt in my skin, and I don’t want to continue my life letting my body image be in charge of my decisions. I want to go tramping, without fear that I won’t be fit enough to keep up or to reach the top. I want to go kayaking, paddle boarding and rock climbing, and know that I am strong enough to do those things comfortably and have fun. I want to be able to jump into the ocean in my bra and undies because I don’t feel the need to cover my belly. I want to be healthy, physically, emotionally and mentally. I want to not hesitate to do whatever it is I want to do. I have thought many times about the day I will get married, but always followed by “I want to lose weight first”. I have thought about going on a big OE, but not wanted to go until I am thinner so I will look better in the photos. I’ve wanted to reach out and make new friends and try new things, but only after I finally succeed at reaching a goal weight, no one will like me otherwise. I even thought about not posting this blog until I had lost some weight, because who would listen to someone who hasn’t actually “succeeded”.
Last year, I signed up to train for a half iron man. Which writing that now feels like a joke. But honestly, my main driving factor behind that was that I wanted to lose weight. I wanted to be fit and strong and I wanted to be thin. At that point in my life, I was incredibly unhappy, truthfully I had been for about two years. But I knew if I went to a doctor, the first thing they would say is that depression is linked to obesity and I needed to lose some weight. I hoped that the iron man would solve that, and it would then in turn also improve my mental health. Life (God, fate, a guardian angel-whoever you believe in) however had different plans for my year. With all of the emotion and stress that came with a major break-up and the death of a friend, I couldn’t hack the training day in, day out. And so I gave away the opportunity to train for the half iron man. However in that month, I dropped 10kgs. I’ve never had so many compliments on weight loss in all my life. And the worst part was, I knew compliments were far from appropriate. I wasn’t eating. I wasn’t sleeping. I could barely stomach water most days. I was absolutely devastated. And people were complimenting me on how good I looked? It felt so backwards. One day at work someone asked me what my weight loss secret was and I turned around and said (very sarcastically) “first you have to fall in love, dedicate seven years of your life to someone, and then on the day you bury a close friend, get them to break up with you and start dating someone else, that should do it”. Upon reflection, I realise this was probably a really unfair and somewhat cruel response, but I was a hurting human, right in the midst of a tonne of pain. And I can guarantee you I would have gained the 10kg back in a heartbeat if I could undo the hurt that I had suffered. It made me realise people really were paying attention to my body, but no one knew what was happening in my heart. I still wanted to lose weight, but I knew I had to pay some real attention to what was going on inside first. I committed to working on the internal stuff, hoping the rest would follow.
As part of my journey to self-love, I spent a few weeks going through a program with Courtney Durr through what was then called Body Love, now called Worthwild. We talked about limiting beliefs and self-worth and met regularly to discuss different topics and as the name of her business would indicate, body image is a big part of her message and what she deals with. But even at that point, I couldn’t bring myself to talk openly about it. I talked about every other insecurity, personality defect, heartbreak and hang up that I had, but the second body image entered the conversation I’m a stone-cold-walls-up-good-luck-getting-in kinda girl. And that’s the way I realise I’ve always been when it comes to my body, my weight, my appearance. You couldn’t find a more open book than me when it comes to feelings, but bring up weight, dieting, appearance and I shut down faster than a pool with an unwanted floater. These meetings with Courts helped in lots of areas in my life (would 10/10 recommend working with her for any female looking to better themselves) but it would be months later until I would start to open the floodgates of body image and try and change my thought processes around my physical body.
I’ve been trying to unpack where it all began. Where my first thoughts of loathing my own body started. But when I genuinely think about it, it’s the only thoughts I’ve ever known about my body. It’s the only way I’ve ever been taught to think and feel about my body. To put it down. To say it’s not good enough. It’s the way the female role models in my life talked and continue to talk about their bodies, it’s the way my friends have talked about theirs too, and it’s the portrayal of one “perfect” body type in the media. Outfits have been picked out for me my whole life based on what is “flattering”. I’ve been told what to eat and what not to eat. I’ve been compared to my fit and athletic brothers. I’ve looked back on photos of times where I thought I was big and wished I could go back to the size I was then. I’ve had people much smaller than me complain about their size to my face. The list goes on of all the ways the world brings our physical appearance to the forefront of our mind, and paints us a picture and a belief that skinny equals success.
My struggle with my weight caused a massive disconnect in my desire to be a good nurse. I felt like a fraud, as if I was on the wrong side of the stethoscope so to speak. Just as the saying goes “never trust a skinny baker”, I felt as if no one should ever trust a fat medical professional. It wasn’t until the end of last year that I realised how this was really affecting my level of job enjoyment and satisfaction. I had counted myself out, decided I would never make a good nurse, and so similarly to all attempts to lose weight, I just didn’t really try my best. This is a slight detour, but I can’t explain how immensely my level of confidence, enjoyment and contentment in my work has gone up in the last 6-8 months as I have been journeying to love and support myself more. As a nurse, day in, day out, I see the cruel reality of how quickly our bodies can fail us. And I am reminded of how much I value my health. How much I should value my health. And how much effort I should put into preserving it. This includes finding a healthy weight.
So here I bounce between a strong “you are perfect at any size, love yourself!” vibe, to a practical “you need to lose some weight to be healthy” train of thought. The key here is, both are right. For me, I am currently overweight. Scientifically speaking, if you looked at my BMI I would fall into the overweight-obese category. However, this in no way makes me less worthy of love, from myself or from anyone else. It doesn’t make me less likeable, less fun, less kind. This is where I was trapped for a very long time. I put my whole self-worth into my weight and my appearance. I decided people didn’t like me, and wouldn’t like me until I lost some weight, until I reached a goal weight or size. I decided I therefore shouldn’t like me until I reached that goal either. And then I became really stuck. I didn’t lose the weight, but I didn’t want to live in that body either. I pushed people away, telling myself that I would let people in when I was thinner.
I have thought for a while about the message I wanted this blog to send. I didn’t want it to be about just losing weight. But I also didn’t want it to be reckless, eat what you want and just let loose, disregarding the importance of a healthy weight. It is two things, hand in hand.
It is finding out what you value. For me, I know that it is health. And how I show what I value is by investing in it. Investing my time in moving my body, through sport and physical activity that I enjoy and that I know is good for me. Investing my money in nourishing my body, through delicious, healthy food and learning to be a better cook. And also investing in learning more, about how I can best take care of myself by reading and absorbing information. I also value fun (a lot). I want to live a life doing all the things I love with all the people I love and having a good time! That means throwing away the fear of what I will look like, getting fit enough to do the fun things, and just getting out there and doing it.
Secondly it is the old self-love. You are loveable and you are loved, regardless of your size. It sounds cliche but I totally understand now what people say about needing to love yourself and your body first in order to lose weight and get healthy. I never understood that. I know I had almost zero love for myself, and I loathed my body. I thought that I needed to lose weight so that I could finally love myself. But over the last six months, I’ve grown so much in love and admiration for myself. And now, just like what I want for the other people I love, I want the girl I love most to be comfortable in her body, healthy and strong, fit enough to do anything she wants to do, and able to live the life she dreams of. The life where she walks, climbs, swims whenever and wherever she wants. Wears the clothes she loves, eats delicious food and takes photos of her beautiful smile without her body holding her back. I want to live a long life, be able to be a positive role model for others and hopefully one day, for my own children. I want to have the knowledge and experience to teach them about nourishing their bodies and enjoying movement but also about loving everything about themselves along the way.
I also want my identity to be so much more than what I look like. When I look at each person that I love, their physical appearance is never the first thing that comes to mind. Their kindness. Their generosity. Their support. Their laughter. The happy memories we have shared. Their thoughtfulness. Their intelligence. That’s what I think of. And I need to keep that in perspective when I think about myself too. I’ve found so much joy in falling in love with who I am, all of it, and seeing myself blossom, that suddenly it seems to matter less and less what I look like and I just want to enjoy being who I am, trusting that the healthiest version of myself will follow. I want the people who love me to know me and remember me as thoughtful, kind, and fun, not as someone who was obsessed with the way they looked or the food they were eating.
This isn’t just for people who are overweight. It’s for everyone. You are more than your body. Your body is your vehicle to live and breathe and experience this life. If you have legs that walk and eyes that can see then yes, you should use them. You should be grateful for them. And you should look after them. But if there is a few extra kilos on your body, it doesn’t make you a bad person. You are so much more.
It is still a journey, likely a life-long one in all honesty. I’m rebuilding an identity that is based more around love and care and less around judgement and assumptions. I’m choosing to see myself as what’s on the inside rather than the body it is all packaged in. I’m making every effort to be grateful to my body for all the incredible experiences it allows me to have, like I said at the beginning, it’s the only body I’ve got. And I’m choosing to value and protect my health: physical, mental and emotional. I hope something in this writing encourages you to do the same.
All of my love,
Bernie ❤️
The Self Timer 