Is it vain to be afraid of losing or gaining weight?
I meet many women who start off by apologizing to me for their body image issues. "I know this sounds so bad but..." or "I must sound so vain..."
What other template do we have for thinking of ourselves? We are taught that we must be attractive to have value, but no one markets that for what it is: earning a sense of safety or belonging in a world that turn its back on you if you don't measure up.
If you have grown up with people complimenting your appearance, you learn to run with it.
It's the ultimate goal, isn't it? That’s what we’re taught. What need to we have to develop identities outside of appearance, if this is the primary value system in the world? Not to mention - it takes most of our mental, physical, and emotional bandwidth to maintain it, so there isn’t much time or energy left to cultivate hobbies or other ways of expressing ourselves.
So you built your identity on appearance-based compliments. With every word of admiration, the dependence on them grows. You cling tighter. You do more to maintain it. The validation grows, as does your belief that this is Who You Are.
It makes perfect sense why letting go of that security blanket would feel threatening and life-altering.
You're not wrong. This is hard.
Body image healing is the scariest path to figuring out who you are underneath the surface. There is more to who you are than what you look like. The validation and applause may not feel as loud, but it's far more real.
I also want to note that I have worked with several women in larger bodies who fear being in smaller bodies because they associate their size to feeling safe in their "niceness." As one client said to me: "what if I get smaller and people stop seeing me as nice and non-threatening?"
Notice the ways in which your body feels like a part of your identity. Expose them so you can work with them. What comes up?
