Guts

“When we decide that people’s bodies are wrong because we don’t understand them, we are trying to avoid the discomfort of divesting from an entire body-shame system.”

-Sonya Renee Taylor, The Body Is Not an Apology: The Power of Radical Self-Love

Oh hi again,

I am compelled to sit down and write another blog piece because this time two years ago I finally decided to quit lying to myself about a nasty little problem I was running from for years. I have officially been two years eating disorder free.

I did not think I would ever stop so I guess this is a good mile stone. I know I have a lot to say about this shit cause healing is an upward battle and I am back on here again to follow up.

Maybe someone out there is like me two years ago. Maybe that someone else is coming to the end of many years of secretly fasting for days, throwing up good food they paid for, diets, diet pills, working out even when sick. I am sure a lot of you have read every book there is about self help and dieting and health in general. You did it all and now you may be having some side effects from all this and thinking, “but I did everything right! I am so good! Why!?” If this is you just know you’re not alone. And if you’re here for a solidarity read, thanks!

I don’t want to say I have a remedy for what society has influenced us into doing to ourselves. But I do have some feedback on how it feels to leave it all behind. It isn’t all as tantalizing as these diets that got all of our asses over and over but it may be something to look into. I have found it is helpful the more people talk about this as well.

First of all, I am definitely fatter than I have ever been and that is what happens to a lot of bodies that yo-yo diet for years since they were minors and quit dieting. As I have shared previously in my blog about my departure from diet culture, there is a ton of science that backs this up and all my references can be found in that blog 😉

But to recap, your body goes into starvation mode when you start relaxing your diet habits and wants to get you back to your previous weight it was feeling normal at. That is why most fat people gain it all back and sometimes more.

I couldn’t tell you my weight cause I haven’t been looking since maybe a year ago and I do feel a lot better. My bloodwork has been normalizing, and I feel a lot happier/less anxious throughout the days. My lichen planus flare ups are getting more controlled, my thyroid levels are leveled with medication. I exercise to feel good and I think this is the most peaceful I have felt in a long time regarding my body.

I do however feel a lot of jade. Not to worry, I am learning to channel it into art, comedy and whatever else. It is just wild the shit doctors and people of all sizes will say about anyone that is a person of size to their face or even people around them. Body shame is so engrained in all of us. It is enraging when you are just trying to heal.

I have found myself more open than ever about my struggles with all of this because once you read the truth and how a system once again is designed to destroy you, you realize you could never go back to pretending like this dieting and eating disorder life is a good way to live.

It is hard to bite my tongue when someone gets lit up on the subject about obesity and is not in favor of having a compassionate stance. It is a really hard chat to have as well. Like do I need to go over why I am the way I am cause I can feel judgement that is out if ignorance every day? It is all the same conversation. Everyone has a fat uncle that can’t do this or that cause they are what? Too fat. I am always wondering like how close these people really are to this uncle and what the poor person is going through that is the fat uncle.

There is honestly so much to learn and to be said about fatness that I have found I don’t have time to wait for a skinny person to try and gaslight me so they can quote some crazy fat shamey diet book I also probably already read and then still not get it.

The one thing that really annoys me is that it is so obvious that a person of size has read and done every diet culture fix/fad in the book. And not one of these assholes will just go read one of these books challenging the concept that diet culture is good.

The only reason that I can think of is because people want to feel superior? Or maybe they don’t want to believe some of the shit they are doing is not necessary. It’s like people can’t just be okay with the fact that traits are genetically passed down. Sure, you have a kick ass lean body but you may also just be that size naturally. Which is fine!

I wish people could see that by feeding into a culture of shame, they are also feeding into a world that lacks autonomy. It’s truly wild how hard it is to get people to worry about their own problems when it comes to appearance, identity and sexuality! Like mind your own business. If you feel like you’re going into a conversation with the mindset of dunking on someone, I don’t know… Maybe you’re not listening lol.

I feel crazy that I have to remind myself this shit still every day. That it is not always worth it to go down the rabbit hole with people. That is also why I try to make art and write about it.

I still feel like what if I did go back to living that way. And I get all this doubt sometimes. I think about diets lol like ohhh, what if I just did it for a little bit but then I remember I’d just gain it all back and more. I’m too exhausted to care like I did before I started healing. It is grim but also gives me solidarity with my own body and helps me not think about my diet and body 90% of the day which to me is a win.

I get way more work done not worrying like that. I also spend a way more reasonable amount of time working out and my body isn’t exhausted all the time. I feel way more funny and relaxed on stage and in my art. these are all wins. I also did actually seem to level out at the weight I am at currently. There is this irrational fear of overeating but once I let myself have at it all for months, I now can keep ice cream and stuff in my fridge and I don’t just binge it in one sitting along with everything else. Food is food for the first time and that is awesome.

I do get sad and triggered by old photos or when people share before and after photos but then I just remind myself that I am healing, I feel good, and my health is doing a lot better. I also remind myself that others are in whatever state they are in with their bodies and they probably haven’t done the research I have.

I think the old photo whether in a before and after or just my own old photo is this weird reminder of where I was at that time. How much I didn’t feel pretty or confident and it is a damn shame cause I look great in the photos too. Even if I am ugly to anyone why do people even care? Why did I believe that so deeply? I think that is also why the before photo upsets me, a lot of the time it is referring to your past self as not worthy. And I am here to tell you these don’t look that much different a lot of the time and you’re beautiful in both. And on that note, I have learned to love me for me wherever I am on the scale. Even though, I am not weighing in.

I have been having lots of digestive struggles since I used to have bulimia and did a bunch of other terrible things that I thought were weight loss remedies. I had to give up coffee cause it was giving me acid reflex, actually, I had to tone down how spicy and acidic my diet was a bunch. It is funny how your trauma will always find a way to catch up and a lot of the time in a physical way.

When I was still fasting, pushing keto too hard and having bulimia off and on my hair started to fall out, I had ulcers in my mouth from what I now know is an auto immune condition called lichen planus. My back and muscles were knotted the heck up. All of this was happening and I still was like, “can we be skinnier?”

it wasn’t until the Lichen planus diagnosis that I finally was like oh what? My body is mad at me for losing too much weight too fast? Not to mention the fact that I carry a lot of my anxiety in my gut. I never saw it until I started lightly writing jokes about it but I totally get diarrhea when I am about to perform in a certain stressful situation, or just having stress in general and if I have too much caffeine or acidic food I will totally throw up also when anxious. I have been working really hard to get better and I can say it is the best it has been in a while.

I did have the best dental appointment in the last three years this past month. Lol, truly I don’t know if it is because I am on medicaid but they were very positive and didn’t try to sell me shit. It made me realize how much of my stress also played into my doctor’s visits. What a good feeling it is to go to a practitioner that actually cares about your health and isn’t blaming something random on being fat. Or just not having a doctor try to sell me shit is another huge breakthrough.

Lastly, I think having clothes made for my body size is a huge game changer. Imagine if plus size clothing existed for kids back in my day. Lol instead we had the awful 90s and that is why Britney Spears is fat shaming Christina Aguilera. She was without culture for so long she was essentially stuck in the 90s mindset of being the best, the only female and the skinniest female. That poor gal has a lot to catch up on and we all kind of do.

So yeah? I am still learning every day and I think that is okay. It is hard to let go of being perfect. I think working on staying present is helpful to prevent a meltdown.

So I painted this portrait of the digestive system because it is important and I feel like I am finally actually listening to mine. I am staying present by listening to a craving, when I am actually hungry also just listening to fatigue.

The digestive system is this beautiful self healing structure that I distanced myself from for so long in order to fit into what society was telling me to be. I neglected it and put lots of garbage in it. Starved it. Made it regurgitate when it didn’t want to.

I put my guts through a lot and it takes guts to say this (lol) but I am finally feeling more myself than I have in a long time and I just want to keep on spilling my guts to everyone all the time. I don’t want to be all closed off and giving myself diarrhea unless it was a worthy plate of Asian or Mexican food.

Again, not perfect but better than spiraling into bad habits. I hope this was a digestible read for you and that you can also find some peace with yourselves. I gotta stop, I am full of puns. I hope we all can lean in to a new way of leaving behind the shame and actually living in a supportive community where appearance is just a factor that exists. If anyone ever wants a resource, I got them and like I said, there are some great ones in my past blogs and if you hate reading, check out the podcast Maintenance Phase, they do a great job at deconstructing diet culture.

So much love,

Bowman.