Hullo!
Since I only seem to be able to talk about mental health awareness, I wanted to switch things up today (to prove you wrong of course!).
This morning I stood in front of the mirror and I thought: I look quite okay today.
And I was really amazed by myself for thinking this! How absurd is this even?
So, this moment made me jump to my desk, open my laptop and tadam, here I am!
Today I want to discuss physical awareness and self love towards our bodies.
This isn't an easy topic to talk about because of all those influences and social awareness out there that force us to look so or so.
But I want to try, with a positive light shining on this topic, trying to prove that our looks are more than 'just okay' by telling my story about my body.
For me, my physical awareness and my relationship with my body has been quite the journey.
During my childhood I never was aware of how I looked like or how small, big, slim ... I was. I was just a happy kiddo playing with dolls and living in a fairytale imaginative world.
The real awareness, and I suppose this can be applied to most of us, was when I entered secondary school.
I always have been small (I still am, just 1m60 but proud!) compared to my peers, but this never occurred to me until I noticed my body developing differently from my friends' bodies.
You can say I was kind of a late bloomer. My growth didn't change like others changed and it was only in my 3th (age 14-15) year that my mum started worrying.
I still was, at the age of 14, a teenager in a child's body. No breast development, no monthly periods, no hips and thin. I was a petite and slender person. Some even thought I had Anorexia (which is an ultimate lie, I could eat for two and loved eating!).
So, worried mum took me to the doctors and they analyzed me, took some tests and indeed, I was a bit below the average grow curve. But nothing to worry about, they said, I would definitely get to the point where everyone already was, just a bit later.
But of course, like all teenagers are, I panicked! And I even started to become jealous of my friends's periods (how ridiculous is that, right?).
However and hallelujah for that, my seventeenth birthday gave me the present I was waiting for: periods. It really sounds absurd, but I was relieved and happy. And since that moment, just like the doctors had predicted, my body started to develop its female bits and pieces. Thank you, hormones!
Never been blessed with the height unfortunately, but I can't complain haha.
And although I still don't look my age, I embraced it after years of struggling being a late bloomer and always looking younger than I am. Now I see this as a positive advantage, something that is unique and that makes me me. And later in life, this only will come in handy, won't it haha!
One thing I left out of this story is my weight. Weight is something most women can't or refuse to talk about. And I get it, I struggled with that as well. Always being thin and slender looks like having won the big price in life, but believe me: that's not always the case. As a child and teenager I really was really thin and I desperately wished for some extra kilos which never came, even though I ate so much.
But eventually I learned this all has to do with hormones and luckily these hormones gave me some extras the moment I started taking the pill.
For some, this maybe sounds horrifying: getting extra fat, but for me it was a blessing: I looked 'more normal' and felt 'more normal' for my age.
Now that I have developed female curves (it would be weird if I still looked like a child at 24), I still am slim and slender, but for me it's somehow different. The hips, the breasts the thighs make it different since I didn't have those for a very long time.
Like everyone I don't always love my body. I often hate my thighs because they look out of proportion comparing to the rest of my body, I often dislike the size of my breasts, I wish I could have natural curls or that I could remove the natural brown blemishes underneath my eyes who force me to always wear concealer to not look tired. This is how EVERYONE thinks.
But, getting older (and wiser) I also begin to appreciate my body more and my self love towards it is only growing. No matter how horrifying it can sound, looking at yourself in the mirror is the best exercise there is. Just taking a moment to look at yourself, carefully, at every detail and starting to see that it's just right. It's just a body, just flesh. You are looking okay, you really are.
Not all days will be self loving of course, but on the days you do love your body, embrace those moments.
I learned to accept what you have given and it's the only body youwill ever have. Slender, thin, big, brown, white, whatever: it's all normal and you are beautiful.
The confidence with which you can show that body to the world is what really matters and what brings the glow to make yourself beautiful.
So, go on, embrace those flaws, we all have it. Don't listen to the rubbish of fashion and media, even models have stretch marks and cellulite. This only proves that your body is alive, nothing else.
I hope my story can bring you some relief about yourself. Not only for women, but also the men out there, because I know you feel insecure too!
Give your body a hug today, because he/she well-deserves it!
Lots of love and love yourself,
MJ
AND MATE, YOU LOOOOOOK AAMAAAZING!