Every woman knows what it's like to feel insecure about their bodies. Even the top models of the world get bullied and made fun of for their looks.
It doesn't matter if you're a size 2 or a size 22, mean people will always find something about your appearance that they can pick on.
Sofie Hagen has known this for most of her life. Ever since she was 8 years old, Sofie has been on diet after diet, trying to be skinnier.
But now, as a young woman, Sofie has decided to embrace her body as it is right now, not what it could be with six months of starvation or a year of insane exercise.
She posted her story on Facebook, along with a photo, where it quickly went viral. People loved her message that "no bodies are wrong."
Within only four days, Sofie's post had over 10,000 reactions and over 3,300 shares. Read what Sofie had to say below.
We have to talk about my body right now, right here. As it exists. My stomach is big. Not Dove Real Beauty Campaign-“big” meaning “not at all big, actually kind of flat and overall pretty acceptable”-big. But big. “Oh no, do I fit into this booth in the restaurant?”-big. “Get me a mirror because I haven’t seen my vagina since 2004”-big. My round, soft stomach that now hangs over my thighs.
This is uncomfortable for most people. We are eager to jump back in time; analyse how I ended up here. Who hurt you, Big Stomach’ed Girl, who made you hide behind an excessive body?
I am so often probed for answers — people want to know what kind of fat victim I am. Was it an eating disorder or abuse or was it coming from a poor background?
A lot of times, people will offer their valuable help. Let me know that actually, if I just consume fewer calories than I burn, then actually, I will just simply start to lose weight. And I will look at them as if I could not tell them the exact amount of calories in anything from an apple to an ounce of haggis and how many steps it takes to burn half a banana.
But we have to talk about my body as it is right now. In the moment. We have to collectively meditate and practice mindfulness but instead of feeling our bodies, we have to feel my body.
Oh, but the future. The future is so tempting. In just six months I could lose all of this weight. If only I starved myself and pushed my body way beyond its comfort zone on a daily basis.
Or I could switch out food with powdery shakes that taste like hospital floors, not for long, just until forever. I could join Weight Watchers and turn all food into points — not nutrition, not social lubricant, not something that fills me with joy and energy, just points.
As if my body is a competition I have to win. I could completely ignore my body’s signals and my friends’ eager pleas to go out for a drink with me, because no — the future is bright and I shall be skinny.
When the people who shout at me in the street or on the internet do not tell me to kill myself, they tell me to lose weight. I am too fat for a lot of things — I point out that a plane seat is so physically painful that it is cutting off the blood supply to me legs, I get asked to lose weight.
When I go to the doctor and ask for the contraceptive pill because I just got a boyfriend, I am asked to lose weight. When I am unable to go to any clothes store and buy a T-shirt that I can fit, I am told to lose weight.
As if I am not currently sat on the plane, wearing a T-shirt as a choker necklace with an impending pregnancy scare. I am currently, in this moment, not considered deserving of autonomy.
You are not allowed to live in the present when you are fat. You have to be constantly preparing for the future, in which you are hopefully thin. We say things like, “I don’t eat carbs right now” to make everyone aware that we know there is a problem and we are fixing it.
I have been on a diet since I was eight years old. A little chubby girl-child. A little, beautiful chubby girl-child who loved Jumanji, playdough and sandboxes. That was when the first school nurse told me that I was wrong. That my body was wrong. Public service announcement: No bodies are wrong, especially little children’s bodies.
I have been on every single diet imaginable. Did you know that American talk show host Dr. Phil has a son called Jay? I do. Because he wrote a book about weight loss. Jay McGraw.
I have survived primarily on cucumbers for weeks. I have fainted. I have asked friends if I could have a parcel sent to their house because my mum couldn’t know that I was trying to find illegal dieting pills from South America on the internet.
Pills that did not even try to hide that yes, there was a massive risk of absolute death if you took them. Because Nothing Tastes As Good As Skinny Feels. Not Even Being Alive.
If you are fat, you are constantly asked to not be fat. And if you cannot do that, then you have to at least be in the process of not being fat anymore. Meaning that today is not ours. Today is a waiting room. We do not get to breathe or laugh or fuck. Because it will all get better in Just Six Months.
The very concept of dieting signals that you are not good enough yet. You are not thin enough yet, you do not get to be happy yet. Dieting is violence. Yet we treat it as if it is normal.
We need to understand the mechanics of dieting. It is a tool meant to control.
We need to understand that we have bought into the notion that the smaller women are, the more they are worth. And that dieting is created by an industry that needs repeat customers — it is not in their interest that we become small enough. They want us to be in the waiting room forever, buying their stuff, never reaching the goal that does not exist.
Understand that by dieting, we are supporting our oppressors.
Please, take up space. Right now. Right here. Today. In your body as it is, right now.
If you're inspired by Sofie's message, please SHARE this article with your girlfriends!
