My body… is no body’s business
Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦 on Unsplash
When I was 12 years old, someone - a boy from a few grades above me - called me “fat”.
It happened at a mixed judo class, and the girl I practised with burst out laughing. Several decades have passed since then, but I clearly remember the embarrassment and shame I felt in that moment.
Little did I know that it would severely affect my body image and confidence for many years to come and make me try to shrink my body to the extent of engaging in disordered eating patterns.
The irony is, my 12-year-old self was not overweight. On the contrary - I was strong and athletic as I was doing lots of sports. I had just matured earlier and was curvier than other girls in my grade, and - as I learned later - that comment had been the boy’s inept attempt at attracting my attention.
Now I wish I could tell my younger self to stand up for herself and tell the bully to keep his opinion to himself, but I was vulnerable and - as many young people going through puberty - very conscious of my changing body.
“I retrieved that incident from the archives of my mind because I am now a mother of three soon-to-be teenage girls. I wish to protect them from having the same negative experience…we have made it a rule in our house to not comment on other people’s bodies.”
- Diana Azzopardi
There is a silver lining to this story though - my disordered eating was one of the main reasons that many years later I decided to go back to university and obtained a degree in nutrition. It provided me with the necessary tools to heal my relationship with food, and has become the focus of my work - helping people who are going through the same struggles.
I retrieved that incident from the archives of my mind because I am now a mother of three soon-to-be teenage girls. I wish to protect them from having the same negative experience which, in my case, took a long time to work through.
I know that doing my best at raising confident girls who know their worth and are able to fend off bullies, could increase their chances of going through puberty relatively unscathed. But it is not and should not be just about them (or anyone subject to bullying or on the receiving end of unsolicited appearance-related comments), toughening up and growing a thicker skin.
“The sad reality is that expressing judgmental comments on people’s appearance - their weight, height, skin, age, facial features (the list goes on) - is very much present in everyday adult conversations and in the social media.”
While the incident I referred to involved a boy who could have been 15 at the time and his bluntness and outright rudeness to disguise a failed attempt at gaining my attention could have probably been attributed to his lack of maturity, the sad reality is that expressing judgmental comments on people’s appearance - their weight, height, skin, age, facial features (the list goes on) - is very much present in everyday adult conversations and in the social media.
Research shows that negative appearance-related comments may have a detrimental effect on one’s (especially a younger person’s) body image, potentially resulting in a constant attempt at attaining unrealistic beauty standards or body ideals (so often portrayed in the media, especially the social media) and in some cases - disordered eating practices.
But it’s not only the negative commentary. Research also shows that positive comments may affect eating habits as a result of “social comparison and thin-ideal internalisation”.
We just never know what the person is going through. Take, for example, comments about people’s weight. It is important to be aware that weight gain may occur due to pregnancy, use of certain medications, or an eating disorder. Likewise, weight loss could be a result of grief, mental health struggles, or illness.
I don’t claim to be entirely non-judgmental. But we have made it a rule in our house to not comment on other people’s bodies. And I hope that sharing my story would increase awareness of the profound effect that appearance-related comments (even the well-intentioned ones) may have on other people’s lives.
About Diana…
Diana Azzopardi is a nutritionist, registered with the Association for Nutrition (UK). She runs an online nutrition clinic D Nutra Clinic where she helps people to make peace with food and reach their nutrition goals in a gentle and sustainable way.
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