On Health

On Health.

Over the course of my adult life I have thought a fair bit about my body and my health. Probably a lot less than is common, since I think I’ve had a better than average body self-image and confidence level throughout my life. This occurred to me one day a few years back when I realized that I think of myself as thinner than I am. When I lok in a mirror or look down at my own body what I see is different than what I see in a picture of myself.

As I typed that I realized that actually, it’s probably not that I think I’m thinner than I am, it’s that I’m unused to seeing other angles of my body. I rarely if ever see myself sitting, from the side, or from behind other than in pictures. So the cognitive dissonance of seeing my body from a new angle, or at all (since I don’t often look at myself other than to see if my outfit looks okay, as in I don’t look at my body specifically). So my mental image of myself is made up of a very limited data set; limited to my own observations of myself in whatever piecemeal fashion of checking my mouth for toothpaste residue or my shirt for stains. I bet if I took the time to look at myself from a variety of angles I would not think I’m thinner (or fatter) than I am. I would be aware of my true size and there would be no issue or concern, since everything is as expected. As with many things, practice helps.

It’s the same cognitive dissonance we all feel with things, like the way tattoos used to be shocking and worth of a double take, but now it’s been mass consumed and it’s not really that shocking anymore. Things that get lots of exposure get normalized into our culture. If I was used to seeing myself, I wouldn't notice myself.

And this makes me think about health. My own health, which I have been gauging to some degree with my weight which is, as I am learning, not accurate or, get this: healthy. I was surprised to learn this about myself, since I would say I have a great body image and sense of self-worth. I’m a feminist and I have a strong body that has never done me wrong. And yet, very recently I found myself counting calories and looking up restrictive diet and exercise routines to change my weight. I like eating healthy and I love food, so in part learning about the nutritional value of certian foods has been really interesting. But, not entirely purely motivated.

I’m not fat. I weigh more than I did when I was at my peak physical level, which happened to be when I was 17 and in high school…when I hadn’t finished growing into my body and was doing roughly 3-5 hours of athletics a day on average. Possibly I weigh more than I could if I really changed my life to make that happen, and that’s when I start to wonder about health. Am I unhealthy if I weigh 165ish pounds at 5’7”? Even if, generally I rarely become ill, have never had a major disease or sickness? Or am I just a bit fat? And if I’m a bit fat, is that really a problem for me? Or is it more of aproblem for the people who look at me, in which case, why the hell would I care about that?

I’m thinking more about this, because I’m interested in deconstructing the things I take for granted in my life, my attitudes and reactions. Usually I don’t know it is happening until it’s pointed out to me. So now I’m thinking about my attitudes towards fat people and fat in general. In my recent foray into healthful eating and exercise regiments I’m discovering that fat doesn’t automatically equal unhealthy any more than “thin” automatically equals healthy. This is interesting to me because I had already accepted that thin people aren’t always healthy, but I hadn’t made the connection that fat people aren’t automatically unhealthy.

I have been this weight (and height) for over 5 years now. In those five years, my eating habits have not been consistent, nor have my exercising, but I have been the same weight. Could it be that this is the weight my body wants to be at? And why should I try and change that? Wouldn’t forcing my body away from a size that it chose by restricting food and pushing exercise be less healthy than allowing it to be what it is?

Similarly, when it comes to exercising, I notice that I have developed what I consider to be an unhealthy association. I have connected any athletic activity with fitness (and therefore weight loss). I love riding my bike, and I especially love cycle commuting. I love that we aren’t paying for gas for the car and that I get to enjoy the scenery of my awesome town. But, when I do that ride I ALWAYS think about how much exercise this is and how it’s contributing to weight loss, which takes away from the joy of the activity itself, because all of a sudden I’m not doing it because I love it, I’m doing it to change something about myself. It feels like a change for me to think about activity as amusement in itself and not as a tool for thinness. It's a tool for fun.

I love feeling fit and strong, but you know, I’ve done those stairs on the way home a bunch of times and it‘s way easier now than it was when I first started. Guess what? I’m the same weight as always. So, by my traditional thinking my cycling is a failure, as it has not resulted in the desired effect of weight loss. Except it HAS! I still love the feeling of winning at those steps and seeing the mountains and the town laid out below me. I have sincerely not thought about any physical activity from walking to kite flying without considering whether it’s “exercise” or not. Now what in the hell is “healthy” about that?

I’m going to continue thinking about my body and how I think about my body. I want to say that I’ve read quite a bit of a blog of a fellow Marianne at www.therotund.com. Other than having an awesome name, she’s a well spoken blogger championing fat acceptance, and I encourage you to go and read her stuff. What I wrote today is only part of what has made an impact on what I’m thinking about these days, and she’s got plenty of great thoughts and very good points.

Some of the points I gleaned form her blog that I really appreciate are things like couching lifestyle judgements as concern for health, and suggesting that being fat means you are either lying about your food and exercise habits (because you wouldn’t be fat if only you etc etc) or you deserve it (i.e. improperly applying morals to food with “good” food and “bad” food). Consider how a naturally thin person who “can eat anything and not gain a pound” compares to the belief that calories consumed – calories burned = weight gain or loss. Like, the inability for a naturally thin person with an equally complex body system as a fat person may relate to a fat person’s inability to lose weight, and that really, why is it anyone’s business since as a feminist I don’t believe that public and cultural judgement of ANYONE’S body is acceptable anyways?

I continue to think on it, but it’s been very interesting.

Food for thought! Hah!