By It’s a funny thing. With social distancing abound, I’m seeing an intense influx of accounts where young women have been bullied and abused by their near and “dear” over their weight. Truly, the volume has been overwhelming. I’m not here to offer any solutions. God knows, I’m not qualified to do so. But I do want to offer one thing. I want to help you remember just one thing. I can’t say this any of you in person, but I do want to take the time to say that I’m so sorry for what you’re going through.
I’m so sorry that your existence on this planet is being linked to the size of your jeans. I’m sorry that the immense value of what you have to offer our world has somehow become interwoven with the number of marriage proposals at your door.
Reading your words broke my heart. It’s just so upsetting. As someone who has had her self-esteem chipped away at because of her weight, please know that we are more than our weight. To any one of my sisters who needs help remembering, our worth is NOT measured by our weight or our marriage prospects, and it NEVER WILL BE, no matter how much people try to convince us otherwise. I want everyone going through something like this to remember that they have so much to offer themselves and the world beyond physicality.
Your body pushes you through the toughest moments of your life, and it has a 100 percent victory rate so far, because guess what? You’re still here.
Perhaps you are kind. Perhaps you are compassionate. Perhaps you are eloquent. Perhaps you are insanely talented! Perhaps you carry yourself with a strength that others draw inspiration from. And perhaps you are all of these things rolled up in one wonderful being! For all that about you which can’t always be seen on the surface, you are worthy of love in abundance.
This body of yours carries you through your life. It carries you through what you know and what you don’t recognize. It fights back, in your honor, through your illnesses. It fights through your heartbreak. It pushes you through the toughest moments of your life, and it has a 100 percent victory rate so far, because guess what? You’re still here.
Either way, you are more than your weight.
My sisters. You are so much more than a number on a scale or the validation of others. It took me years to figure that out. And sometimes, I still slip into the belief that maybe I’d be happier, maybe everything would sort itself out if I just lost the excess weight. But I’m here to remind you, as your sister-through-life, that you are allowed to acknowledge the pain you feel, honor it, and then move past it at your own pace. The quality of your life, your love, your existence, and your experiences do not depend on some excess weight, or how those around us feel about us.
So much love to all my sisters being put through such a toxic experience over something so frivolous. It’s so upsetting, but I hope you all come out stronger.
