6/25/2017 0 Comments What Size Are You?One of the questions I dreaded answering the most in school had absolutely nothing to do with academics: “What size t-shirt do you wear?” I was a very involved student, and inevitably, every single club and activity required a t-shirt. I hated it. Why? Because it was also inevitable that the method of ordering said t-shirt was a teeny-tiny, bubbly girl walking around with a clipboard and sign up sheet, asking people for their sizes and recording them in front of everyone else. When that girl came up to me, I always faced a soul crushing internal struggle regarding how to handle the situation. Option 1: I could save face and order a smaller size than I actually needed, but never wear the shirt. The problem: It was pretty clear that I didn’t fit into a small or medium, so my peers would know I was ordering the wrong size, and if I ordered a large (still too small), they would judge me for having to wear such a big size. Option 2: I could mumble my size quietly to the girl taking orders. The problem: She’d probably ask me to speak up, in which case everyone would be MORE focused on my answer than they initially had been. It would also be incredibly clear to those around me that I was ordering a size with which I was uncomfortable. No one mumbles that they need a size small t-shirt. Option 3: I could tell her I was not ordering a t-shirt at all. The problem: “Gasp! You don’t want to show your affiliation with our club?!” or “If you don’t order a t-shirt, you can’t participate in _______ event” or “But everyone else is ordering one…” Option 4: Just tell her that I need a size XXL and own it. The problem: No one in high school has developed the confidence to “own” the things about which they are insecure. I usually went with some sort of combination of the above. Usually, I mumbled that I needed a size XL, which was a little too small, but with some stretching before I donned it and some not-so-subtle tugging throughout the day, I could make it work. Even today, when I am a thinner and much more confident version of myself, I feel an initial panic when I am asked to order a t-shirt. But why? Why does revealing one’s clothing size produce so many negative emotions? As a society, we often use this to make an assessment regarding body image. The smaller the size, the prouder we are of our bodies. Conversely, the larger the size, the more embarrassed we are. Working in a high school, I cannot tell you how many girls I see parading around in their size 0 jeans and bragging about the size on the tag. But do I ever hear a young lady who wears a size 10 announcing it? No. That would never happen. Attaching any value at all to a clothing size is absolutely obnoxious in today’s society. Clothing companies have skewed what sizes mean so much that there is no way to pinpoint a person’s “size.” When I go to Old Navy, for example, I can easily fit into a size small t-shirt, and sometimes even x-small. However, I generally need to look for a size 10 or 12 pair of jeans. If I hop over to WalMart, I’m probably going to find jeans in a size 6 or 8 that fit me. When ordering from LulaRoe, I can buy an x-small maxi dress, but I have to wear tall & curvy leggings. The pant sizes in my closet range from anywhere between a size 4 and a size 14. My top sizes range from x-small to x-large. So what size do I wear? Well, I guess I wear a size x-smarge OR a 468101214 (shout out to my friend Chris for helping me figure out what to call it!). I know I am not the only one, and I have accepted that clothing sizing is about as consistent as gas prices across the United States. Yet, there are still days when I leave a dressing room feeling a sense of failure or discouragement because I couldn’t squeeze my healthy-sized badonkadonk into a size 6 pair of jeans, or because my biceps and shoulders make me hulk out of that size small. It took me a very long time to accept that the size on the label of my clothing is not what matters. What matters is how I feel in that clothing. In all of the following examples, I feel beautiful, yet the sizes of the clothing I am wearing vary a good bit. Why should we assess the beauty of our figures based on how a particular company cuts their clothing? The size on a clothing label issued by a company distributing product to a nameless, faceless audience does not determine your level of fitness, health, or beauty. Human beings are incredible because of our diversity, and part of that diversity is rooted in our physical appearances. When a clothing company produces a product, they choose a single measurement from which each item is cut and then distribute millions of replicas based on that number in the hopes that some part of our incredibly varied population of shapes and sizes might deem them an acceptable fit. They don’t care about individual characteristics that make a person unique, so why should individuals care if their measurements are not right for them? They shouldn’t. You shouldn’t. There should be no embarrassment attached to having to wear a size 10 jeans because you are curvy. Instead, there should be some pride in the fact that you don’t fit a mold that some money-grubbing business indiscriminately attached to a size.
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I go out to eat with friends or family pretty regularly. I am usually the last to order, so once the waitress gets to me, she has already noted a variety of unmodified meals from the menu. I always begin my order by saying, “Please don’t hate me for this…” I can feel her thinking about how hard she would like to roll her eyes the moment that I say this. I look at the others at the table, and they nonchalantly avoid eye contact with me. They know that I will have a “complicated” order, and they are secretly praying that the waitress does not add “extra ingredients” to their meals just because they are at the same table as me. I feel like I am under the gun, and hastily spit out my order: the 6 oz steak, a double side of broccoli instead of fries, with absolutely no butter, and a side salad with no cheese, croutons, or dressing. After the waitress leaves, I generally hear, “What’s the point of wasting your money on that?” Yes, I am embarrassed. I can feel my face flushing from the heat of the imaginary limelight under which I have been placed for making a the atypical decision against ordering the restaurant's signature meals. I look at my husband and whisper, “I wish I could eat like a normal person.” Immediately, I regret my choice of words. The statement is untrue. In reality, there is no reason that I would have changed my order if I did not feel as though I was being judged negatively by those around me. I would have made myself the same meal at home and felt no qualms about it, whatsoever. Furthermore, the statement is absolutely illogical. How, exactly, does a normal person eat? In Japan, a “normal” person might snack on wasp crackers, much like a child would eat a chocolate chip cookie. In Africa, some people like the crisp, crunchy, apple-like flavor of stink bugs. In South America, your adorable pet guinea pig, Wilbur, might be served to you whole and roasted on a bed of vegetables. (Read more here: http://www.hostelworld.com/blog/the-50-weirdest-foods-from-around-the-world) Before I add any further stress on your gag reflex, I will stop there. You get the point. There is no normal way to eat. So why do we, as Americans, assume that if we are not partaking in the greasy, fat-filled, carbohydrate-rich treats featured in every restaurant’s menu, that we are not eating normally? If you research typical meals from around the world, most of them consist of deliciously fresh veggies, lean, grilled meats, and “good” carbs. Meanwhile, the average meal in the United States is cited as consisting of a cheeseburger and fries. Is this stereotyping? Maybe. However, in most stereotypes, there is some truth. (Read more here: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/what-people-eat-for-dinner-around-the-world-a6732036.html) Americans eat poorly, and furthermore, we have eaten poorly for so many generations, that it is actually considered abnormal to make healthy meal choices. People are also intrinsically motivated to be accepted by their peers, and will make choices for the sake of fitting in, sometimes even at the risk of their own health. This is a lethal combination in a society in which superficiality rules most of our decisions, and it has led us to earn the title of the “fattest country on Earth.” The good news is that a paradigm shift seems to be happening in our country. More and more, we see restaurants listing calorie content right on the menu and offering “lighter” fare. This is a tiptoe in the right direction, but by no means a leap. Often, these meal choices are segregated to their own section of the menu, or forced to carry some symbolic indication that they are healthy choices (you know, right next to the indicators that tell you that you will probably die if you are allergic to peanuts and eat it, or that you’ll get e coli if you order it under cooked). This still attaches abnormality to the meal itself. The fact is that we need to eliminate this concept of what “normal” eating looks like. To do so means to stop judging people for what they choose to consume. If you are with someone at a restaurant, and they choose to order the grilled chicken salad with only chicken and lettuce, please refrain from diverting your eyes away from the waitress in silent disapproval. Believe me, it is not silent in the least, and your single, reproachful glance could be the difference between that person continuing to eat healthily or giving up on good nutrition altogether. 6/11/2017 0 Comments Let Me Take a SelfieMy phone is filled with selfies. These selfies are taken with self-love and self loathing, all wrapped up into thousands of pixelated components that cannot even begin to convey the differences between what I see in them and what you see in them. I take pictures of myself, not out of vanity, but because after 3+ years of trying to convince myself that she is me, and I am she, there’s still this weird part of my brain that cannot comprehend the fact, nor am I sure it ever will. I spent 26 years of my life staring at myself in the mirror, noting, begrudgingly, each unaesthetic fold or lump or sag in my body that did not match the images that I saw on tv or in the magazines. I memorized that image much like I memorized Hamlet’s “To Be or Not to Be” speech in eleventh grade. I can rattle off those lines in the play just as easily as I can tell you how large in diameter my thighs were at my heaviest weight. The headline of this blog is “A Realistic Look at Losing Weight.” Here is the reality: you aren’t going to break a habit that you’ve held for the vast majority of your life in a single moment. After snapping that selfie, you are going to experience a barrage of thoughts and feelings, both positive and negative, that you will struggle to appropriately analyze. If you are like me, and have a type A personality, that can be very difficult. The only way I know how to describe this to a person who has not actually experienced it, is by walking you through my thoughts after viewing a photo of myself. When I look at this photo, here is a running commentary of what I see... (Fun fact: my husband took this picture at least seven times before I found one that was acceptable.) “The lines around my face make me look soooo much older than I actually am...I wish my boobs didn’t sit so low... All I can see is my gut jutting out in front of me.... Do I have cankles or is that just weird lighting? How can a person have cankles and ALSO such veiny feet?...That black strap falls in a weird place on my shoulder and makes me look like a football player...I wish my biceps looked more defined to explain why my arms are so beefy...Elbow fat...knee fat...back fat...So much booty! As I was analyzing this photo at 9:16 p.m. on a Sunday night, while my lovely husband was laying in bed, patiently waiting to see if he needed to snap yet another shot, I realized something. I had to diligently search for each of the things that I identified as “unattractive” in this picture. I had to look over it multiple times, zoom in, then out, then in again, question whether the problem was actually present or due to weird lighting, etc. If it took that much effort for me to find those problems in this photograph, who the hell else is going to find them? No one! This is applicable to every moment that I have spent staring in the mirror, no less than 2 inches from the glass, fussing over the stray hair in my eyebrows, or that tiny zit that showed up on my cheek overnight. All the time and energy that all of us spend stressing over things that no one will ever notice is time that is absolutely wasted. An image is not meant to be picked apart pixel by pixel, just as a Monet is not meant to be viewed by individual brush strokes. Look at the picture as a whole. Does it reflect the goals that you've set for yourself more appropriately than those you have taken in the past? That is the only question that you need to worry about when it comes to working on making yourself a better, healthier you. Does this mean that I won't take my next selfie 7 times? No. Old habits die hard, but the next time I catch myself zooming in on my picture to see if my gut is visible, at least I'll have the perspective of this realization to stop me in my tracks. Maybe one day I'll reach a point at which I won't even bother analyzing any longer. My fingers are crossed... 6/4/2017 1 Comment In Praise of DiscomfortI feel my heart beating through the veins in my temples. I taste my barely digested lunch in the back of my throat. I am convinced that I cannot even so much as blink because, if I do, my eyes will not reopen. Each inhalation of air is more taxing than the last and if I were able to see my lungs, I imagine they would appear collapsed and charred, submitting to my inability to quell the anxieties that restrict my breathing. My vision is slightly blurred, and even though I look up at the clock, the numbers appear to be as familiar to me as quantum physics. The barbell that sits at my feet felt so light only 3 minutes ago, yet mustering up the energy to bend over and pick it up even once more seems as though it would be a feat of strength superior to any I’ve accomplished before...I will have to do this 19 more times, and then run 400 meters before I can say I am done. My brain shouts an internal tirade, telling me that I can’t do it, every muscle in my body rebelling against any movement that does not include collapsing to the floor… I bend over, trembling, sweat dripping from my brow to the floor despite the fact that it is just barely above 50 degrees beyond the bay door that stands wide open on the other side of the gym, a finish line taunting me from afar… “Pick up the bar, Crysta!” A voice that I cannot identify yells at me from across the room. Taking my best shot at a deep breath, I set my back, and lift the 95 pounds from the ground to my shoulders: once..twice...19 more times. My lead-filled legs stumble toward the door and I somehow complete the final 400m, although I could not tell you any details about the time in between. With my hands on my chest, I collapse to the floor, feeling the shallow rise and fall of my lungs, and note the time on the clock. A few people offer fist bumps and accolades as they walk by me, already recovered. And I am absolutely spent, but feel absolutely accomplished. I’m not very good at numbers, but I would venture to say that about 82% of my life has been spent avoiding situations similar to the aforementioned. Consequently, that is also why I’ve spent 82% of my life overweight and wondering why no exercise seemed to be effective in helping me change that. I remember my favorite gift for Christmas in sixth grade: a pair of flared jeans in a junior’s size 13. I was super stoked! With absolutely zero grace, I ran to the bathroom and clamored my way into one leg of the jeans, and then halfway into the other...Halfway. There was a soft knock on the door and my mom entered the bathroom to find me crying in the corner. “They don’t fit. You can take them back.” This was the first moment in my life that I realized that I was overweight. Not long afterward, my mom and I signed up for memberships at our local YMCA. My mom loved the Spinning classes, and I decided that riding a bike couldn't be all that bad, so I joined her every Monday and Wednesday evening. However, at any given moment during class, I could be caught goofing around: nodding my head to the beat of the music, making jokes about my mom’s facial expressions, singing instead of listening to the instructor. It was no surprise that I never heard her yell at me to turn the resistance up on the bike, nor that I left the class having barely broken a sweat, yet I was shocked when, a month later, I had lost no weight. Fast forward to my senior year of high school. This was one of my more serious attempts at working out. For the first time in my life I had a boyfriend, and as the end of the year approached, excitement for prom filtered into almost every conversation at school. With the realization that I might have the opportunity to go, my motivation to lose weight was sparked yet again. About three years prior to this, my mom had purchased an elliptical machine that, for the most part, sat idly in our living room, dust accumulating in the facets of the footholds. After a very squeaky yelp from the unused joints of the machine, I began a routine of spending 20 minutes on it every other afternoon. Although the dust had been brushed off of the pedals, the resistance knob and screen indicating pace and progress remained blanketed. Prom night had come and gone, but I decided to remain with this workout routine in the exact same manner: plodding along on the elliptical at a pace that allowed me to comfortably laugh at whichever midday sitcom was on television at the moment. Suddenly, I stopped shedding pounds. Then, I stopped trying. As I reminisce on these moments in my life, I can identify one stark difference between them and the scenario with which I opened this blog: discomfort. When I attempted a workout regimen in the past, I was merely going through the motions. I was moving, but staying entirely within my comfort zone. For a person who has been inactive for much of his/her life, any movement inevitably leads to progres...until it doesn’t. What I did not understand about fitness when I was younger is that progress cannot occur without discomfort. At least in terms of fitness, I generally gauge effort based on my level of exertion. At some point during my workout, I must encounter a moment that makes me question my physical capacity to complete the workout, a moment that requires me to have an inner monologue with myself to keep on going (within reason, of course). Do I feel like I could throw up? Sure. But am I going to? No. Keep on going. Does the weight feel heavy? Absolutely. But do I have the strength to pick it up again? Yes. Keep on going. Let me pause for a second here so that I’m not misunderstood. I do not advocate for pushing yourself to the point of passing out, vomiting, getting injured, etc in a workout. That is unsafe and, quite frankly, stupid. However, I AM advocating for reaching a level of smart and manageable discomfort. CrossFit Founder and CEO Greg Glassman is noted as saying, “We fail at the margins of our experience.” If I continue to take Spinning classes, but never turn up the resistance knob, I have failed. If I step on the elliptical and don’t try to go faster than what I’ve gone in the past, I have failed. The failure is not based on whether I could or could not manage higher resistance or a faster pace, but in the fact that I did not allow myself to reach a certain level of discomfort to strive for them. The margins of our experience encapsulate all of the things that we’ve already accomplished. There is merit in repeating the things we’ve already accomplished, but only with the objective to eventually expand those margins. Striving for anything less results in standing atop the dreaded “plateau” of fitness where many of us become frustrated and give up altogether. The cogent resolution to this is reaching beyond those margins of experience: moving faster, lifting heavier, jumping higher, adding resistance, and, in general, pushing harder. That can get uncomfortable, as it should if you expect to see progress. However, once you face that discomfort head on, something really quite interesting happens: you begin to embrace it, welcome it, even. Mentally, you are creating the facilities necessary to understand that discomfort and acquiesce to it. I chase that discomfort. I long for it. It is an indication that I am pushing on my margins of experience, and even if I am the very last person to complete a workout, I know that I have not failed because I’ve done everything in my power, in that moment, to make myself better. |
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