I named my tummy Doris to personalize her. It’s harder to dislike someone with a name and a personality. Now, when I wake up in the morning, I say, “Hello, Doris” and it helps me to treat her gently and with more respect.
I’m utterly fed up and discouraged by our culture’s obsession with thin, perfect bodies for women. Men are not under the same pressure to look sleek, elegant, stylish and fit. Sure, many men would prefer six-pack abs, but I’ve never heard a man referred to as “plus-sized”, yet women have to endure this label all the damn time.
No societal change happens quickly. It’s a twenty year process, at minimum, but we can choose not to play our role in it anymore. No outside pressure can make us feel bad about ourselves. We have to opt in for that to work. As Amy Schumer famously said, “I say if I’m beautiful. I say if I’m strong. You will not determine my story – I will.”
I’m exhausted worrying about how Doris will look in a swimsuit or a new pair of jeans. There are much bigger things to be concerned about in this life. I’m longing to opt out of tying my weight and appearance to my sense of self-worth. But there’s no point in yearning for this. Now is the time to decide to let this nonsense go and carry on by saying if I’m beautiful and if I’m strong.
Doris is still sore from my appendix surgery this summer. The three laparoscopy sites are mildly tender to the touch, five months later, and I feel like the work I did before surgery with weights and sit-ups has been undone. I want now to simply accept my body as it is. To stop wishing it was like someone else’s. To thank it for carrying me around in this world and to look after it and love it with kindness instead of shame.
As women, we have impossible beauty standards all around. I rebel against the idea that I’m supposed to be made up and pretty when I’m out and about. I’ve been leaving my face free of makeup and going into stores in a ponytail and yoga pants and trying to make it a radical act. But this only works if I truly believe I’m allowed to do this. Some days I feel strong and sure on this, and other days I look around at the women who are made up and look stunning and then I feel insecure and silly.
Perhaps this type of growth is a slow process. I loved it when Alicia Keys talked about not wanting to cover up anymore. Something in me rose up and shouted, “Yes! Me too!” It’s brave to show up as we really are instead of hiding. Occasionally it feels too radical, too unsafe, so I retreat behind my desire to conform and work harder at being pretty and acceptable.
Is it okay to want to be pretty just for ourselves? And is it okay not to want to be pretty? To just go into the world as a man would do, without applying makeup and blow-drying hair and dressing up to go buy fruit and milk?
For now, I’m working on talking myself off the ledge with a series of affirmations. I greet Doris each day and tell her I love her, just as she is, round and soft and ample. I say, “You are okay. You are worthy of care and affection. You don’t have to look like a starving model to be beautiful.”
I wish I didn’t have to try so hard to offer myself permission to look the way I look. I’d rather not aspire to a concept of beauty that is unattainable to most. I enjoy food too much and the gym too little to make that level of sacrifice so I’ll have a flat stomach and shapely limbs. At the age of 44, it’s not likely to happen, especially since I’ve had this same basic body type since I was a teenager.
Now the key is to accept myself and to opt out of the madness that is the beauty and fashion industry. I don’t have to believe I’m less-than. It’s counter-culture enough to love myself (and Doris) with a radical sense of care and kindness, no matter what size I am. Who’s with me?