Body Image

 I’ve wasted a lot of time being less than happy with my body. Ever since I hit puberty, I’ve struggled with unwanted fat.

When I was a teenager, I was part of a professional Polynesian Dance troupe. The owner/director told my mom to tell me that I would never be able to advance from the volunteer shows to the paid shows unless I lost weight.

The boys in my choir classes had a nickname for me. They called me “Bodie” all year long, but when I asked them what it meant, the lewd grins would appear. No one would tell me where the nickname came from. Finally, at the end of the school year, one of them told me it was from a movie where someone referred to a woman who had “bodacious tatas”. I had already felt like the size of my breasts made me look fat, and now it was a nickname that embarrassed me.

All through junior high and high school, when I worried I was putting on weight, I was told, “you’re not fat!!!” But when I would eat more than one slice of banana bread, I was told, “if you keep eating like that, you’re going to be big as a house.” On the other hand, when I tried to refuse a helping of mashed potatoes and filled my plate with salad, I was told, “you’re anorexic!”

In college, I was so excited to be able to take a ballet class. As I leapt across the room, I felt like I was flying. It was the most joyful feeling I’d experienced – until I saw my teacher laughing behind her hand as my curvy bosom bounced with every leap.

My first husband was very vocal about wanting me to get skinnier, especially before our wedding. During the 13 years we were married, I had surgery for endometriosis, and gave birth to three babies. He thought he was being encouraging when he told me to buy lingerie that would hide my fat, or when he told me what to eat and what not to eat (while he indulged endlessly in ice cream and popcorn and chocolate and peanut butter in front of me).

Some people feel shame around their sexuality. I felt shame around my desire for food. I felt sexy only as long as I could dress in a way that would camouflage my tummy and flatter my breasts (which became almost impossible the heavier I got). I wanted to be wanted, and I did not feel guilty about desiring to be sexy. I did not feel guilty about getting aroused easily. But I did feel tons of guilt about wanting more cheesecake, more chocolate, more cinnamon rolls, more cookies, more grapes, more ravioli, more cheese, more ice cream, more breadsticks.

During all these years, I’ve struggled with chronic constipation. I remember missing my carpool ride home in 9th grade because I was stuck on the toilet in the girls’ locker room. When I expressed my concerns to my parents, they told me I just needed to take more Vitamin C. It didn’t work. There was one Sunday where I told my dad that I was so stopped up that it hurt to sit. I could feel stool in my rectum, but it wouldn’t come out. He told me I just needed a large dose of Vitamin C powder, and it would come out “like quicksilver”. I did as he instructed, and then sat uncomfortably at church, leaning on one butt cheek and then the other all through the meeting. All the home remedies, all the laxatives, all the prune juice in the world didn’t help.

Because I was so stopped up, I constantly had embarrassing problems with flatulence. In college, I drank Pepto Bismol straight from the bottle before every date, hoping it would keep me from being gassy and smelly.

My tummy noises were loud. When I was a junior in high school, I was selected to participate in an Honors Orchestra. It was far enough away from home that we stayed two nights in host families’ houses. My roommate and I shared a hide-a-bed. As I was falling asleep, she suddenly sat up and said,

“WHAT WAS THAT?”
“What was what?” I asked. She sat quietly, listening.
“THERE IT WAS AGAIN!”
“Oh. That’s just my stomach.” She couldn’t believe it was my stomach making those noises. I thought it was just normal.

When my daughters were growing up, one of their favorite pastimes was to lie on my bed with me, taking turns putting their heads on my tummy, listening to my abdomen. They would be in fits of laughter over the monstrous sounds coming from my insides.

For nearly thirty years, every doctor I spoke with about this problem dismissed or minimized it. They’d listen to my abdomen with their stethoscopes and say, “you have great bowel sounds. Everything is normal.” After a colonoscopy, I even had one gastroenterologist ask me if I’d ever “considered taking a laxative.” I wanted to strangle him.

Three years before my divorce, I discovered “Body for Life”. For the first time ever, I was successful at losing weight. Over the course of a few months, I progressed from walking to running, from 5 lb. weights to 20 lb. weights. I dropped 50 pounds and I felt amazing. I felt empowered, energetic, and beautiful. I also realized that I could no longer remain in my unhealthy marriage. After several months of therapy, and many long and painful conversations, I knew it was over. His response was, “I can’t believe this. I stayed with you, and pretended to be attracted to you even when you were fat. Now you’re all skinny and hot, and you don’t want to be with me anymore.”

After the divorce, my weight fluctuated a bit with the stresses of two more abdominal surgeries for endometriosis. But I continued to try to eat healthy and exercise. I lifted weights and I took ballet classes. I ran and I jumped rope. I still struggled terribly with constipation, but it became a household joke. I always had laxatives on hand, of several varieties.

Then I discovered Crossfit and Paleo. For the first time, I became both very strong and very lean (115 pounds!), and it seemed my constipation woes were over. All that lovely vegetable fiber was doing my body good. I remarried, and my wonderful strong Superman husband and I moved to California where we lifted weights in our driveway together year-round.

But the constipation came back. And then the weight started creeping back on. I thought maybe it was stress. I was a new stepmom to sons aged 12 and 6. I was hired as a music teacher for a prestigious private school. My husband went back to school and we were juggling so many things. I sobbed in the shower and I cried on my husband’s shoulder in bed at night. What was happening with my body??? I doubled down my efforts to keep my diet clean and healthy. We went to the gym every morning at 5 am. I packed my own lunches and snacks for school, and cooked our dinners at home every night. I averaged 5 heads of romaine every week. We were both so exhausted, but we were trying so hard to follow our dreams and also be healthy.

But the pounds continued to slowly accumulate, and the constipation wouldn’t resolve. Still, no doctors would take my problems seriously. They would say “it’s normal”, or “you’re not overweight”, or “take Miralax”, or my least favorite: “this just happens to women your age.”

I took drastic measures. I reduced my caloric intake to 1355 calories per day. I weighed and measured and tracked every morsel of food I put in my mouth. I took progress photos every week. I worked out harder/heavier at the gym. I was ALWAYS HUNGRY. Painfully, devastatingly hungry. After a few months of this, I was beside myself. I had been so diligent, and absolutely nothing had changed. I was still the same weight, the same measurements, the same size – the size that was too big to fit in to my clothes, the size that didn’t reflect how hard I worked in the gym (and in the kitchen). It was too much. So I said “screw it.” After years of tracking macros, I just quit.

We moved again, and I celebrated living close to my daughters and my granddaughter. I was doing so many things I loved – painting walls, refinishing furniture, hiking in the mountains. I was also eating a lot of my “renovating food”: peanut M&Ms. We regularly picked up dinner at our favorite TexMex restaurant. I worried that I would get really fat, the way I had been when my daughters were little. The truth is, I did gain a little weight, but not more than five pounds. After Christmas, I decided it would just be healthier to clean up my nutrition again. I stopped buying M&Ms, and I started eating more vegetables. I just didn’t want to give up the idea that my body could be lean and strong again. Maybe this time it would work.

I was disciplined. I doubled or tripled my vegetable intake. I started taking psyllium husk. I eliminated all dairy, sugar, artificial sweeteners, gluten, and soy. I drank lots of water. I only ate whole, real food -- nothing processed, not even protein powders. I continued my regular daily Crossfit workouts and enjoyed long hikes about once a week.

Nothing changed.

At this time, I had been donating plasma for about four months. I’d been notified of elevated ALT test results a couple times, but I was told it was really normal for that to happen once in a while. However, after so many elevated tests that I was “permanently deferred” from donating, I was scared. I made an appointment with a doctor to get more information.

I was so anxious about seeing the doctor. I was ready to stand up for myself, to insist on appropriate tests. I had done a lot of homework about nutrition, gut health, hormones, and what those elevated ALT results might mean. But I was so worried that this would be yet another dismissive, minimizing experience. I hardly slept the night before my appointment.
But this time, fate smiled on me. I had stumbled upon a doctor who listened to every one of my concerns, and took them seriously. He was able to access the post-colonoscopy report from nine years earlier, and read the results to me – something the gastroenterologist never did. Instead of the “no abnormalities” I had been told, there were some concerning findings from the procedure. He ordered tests, and promised to do whatever was necessary to get answers. He affirmed that what I was experiencing was not normal, especially considering how diligent I was about my health. We explored possibilities: maybe I have liver disease; maybe I’m insulin resistant; maybe I’m diabetic; maybe I have slow peristalsis; maybe I have an intestinal blockage; maybe my hormones are out of balance; etc.

Now that I’ve finally found someone who will partner with me in my pursuit of health, I’m feeling more encouraged. And I’m finding more compassion for my body. I haven’t given up hope that I can be lean again, but I hold my body in higher regard – it’s been trying so hard to respond to all my efforts, but something is impaired. I’m amazed with and grateful for this body of mine, attempting to build muscle and effectively eliminate waste, while battling something unseen and unrecognized.