I Wish Someone Had Taught Me:

• The difference between high brow and low brow.

When I was in the sixth grade I had full-on 80’s Madonna brows, the kind that have at least four regions to each brow, they’re so big. What no one told me was if you paid a professional to wax or expertly tweeze that bottom chunk, you could still be left with 2 fairly thick, yet fantastic eyebrows. Or, that pretty much anything is better than giving a sixth grader free-tweezing reign over her forehead hair because she is gonna pluck the fuck outta those suckers and then become a 31-year-old person who can list “growing brows” as a hobby on Facebook.

Ok, to be fair, I knew that waxing made the brows look amazing. My friends all shared stories about how their mom took them to Elizabeth Arden, or even a hair cutting place I had actually heard of. However, I felt I would not be afforded such a luxury — how could my dad understand that he’d be helping me shape the brows that would define my life?! I just wish future me could go back and give my lovely Madonna brows a pep talk, maybe with a Whoopie Goldberg Ghost-style speech to really get the point across, “Little self, put those tweezers down — you’re in danger, girl!”

• That straighteners exist and that naturally pretty hair is a lie.

Okay, maybe not all pretty hair is a lie but at least that “pretty” is suspicious. For about 25 years of my life I’ve assumed that popular girl hair was a magically bouncy, shiny and fantastic boon bequeathed upon only the richest and fanciest look-at-me-I-eat-at-Red-Lobster-and-it’s-not-even-a-special- occasion divas. In my younger days, I assumed that the Barbie girls just woke up with perfectly scrunchied barrel curls, bangs elegantly reaching skyward with a mere spritz of spray. If they needed a little help perhaps a ritual blood-letting or a simple kitten sacrifice to Aphrodite, and voila! Perfection. (Because popular girls read their Edith Hamilton, right?) I was sure I was destined to my thick, coarse, bell-shaped helmet because all I had was a round brush, blow dryer, and my stupid Catholic saints to help me.

Alas, there is no Saint Perpetua de la Coiffure and I didn’t really have internet access until college, so you can imagine my shock when I discovered hair straightening technology. Science! After a quick 40-minute blow dry I can now straighten 500 or so tressy chunks of my head and thusly trick everyone into the belief that my mammalian strands are not just normal, but nice, even. Until it rains.

• That perms don’t belong on third graders.

This should be self explanatory. Why did we DO this? Why did adults let us do this? How was looking like Eraserhead — not to mention pouring pungent chemicals all over a child’s noggin — a cute trend in the way of slap bracelets and hypercolor t-shirts?! Forget the face on Mars, this is a UNIVERSAL MYSTERY.

• That, “Hey, don’t shave all your parts.”

When I got the green light from my dad to go ahead and shave my legs if I felt like it, I had a bit of a lightbulb moment. As I watched my gams shed their thick and lustrous Sasquatch fur, I felt a strange sensation of feminine empowerment. . . or was that the stinging pain of bleeding? Oh, how soft and silky and attractive my stems/stumps had become!

What if…what if…What if I shaved the entirety of my body to be free of hairs (A.K.A. The Follicled Menace)?!!

Oh, and I did it. Knuckles, elbows, face. Peach fuzz be damned, I’m a LADY! What I wish I had the forethought to have seen at this turning point was that, much like the hair on my head, all those little hairs were gonna grow back — and thickly and thoroughly with a pokey vengeance and much itching. And it’s stupid to shave your toe knuckles, Stupid. And hey, remember your dad’s face? How he shaves it and gets a 5 o’clock shadow at noon? Well, shit. So, “hey, don’t shave all your parts” would have been a nice heads up. That’s all I’m saying.

• That dyeing your mustache will just give you a creepy blonde mustache.

Again, help a sister out. I have a pretty sizable overbite and never got braces because, “meh, they look fine.” There’s no way my family was shelling out cash to deal with my Magnum P.I. situation. I took matters into my own hands on a tip from Young and Modern (YM) magazine and I sported a blonde ‘stache that perfectly matched my jet black hair for an embarrassing portion of my existence on this planet.

• That conditioner is a thing and so is social conditioning.

When I was a little kid, my hair was pretty fun. My dad would squish a lot of shampoo into it and give me a very impressive Ed Grimley hairdo. Less fun was the brushing and the styling of the hair, as you see, my dad didn’t know that conditioner existed. Once the old chap figured that one out, the tangles were less tangly and the brushing was more manageable. The ponytails, well, they still were a little tight, pulling my eyes sideways on more than a few occasions, but as Dad would say, “Pain is beauty, beauty pain.”

Even though he was trying to collect my hair into a quirky side-pigtail just like his favorite female college basketball player, even though he was wearing a pro-woman t-shirt from a feminist rally on the day I was born, even though he was breaking all kinds of gender norms by being my mom AND my dad, there’s still that pesky conditioner that can get in our eyes and in my experience, it’s not the tearless kind.

—

Ana Holguin writes PopHeart for The Idler.

“I shouldn’t have these cookies. But fuck it, I’m on vacation!”

“I don’t even want these chips. But I’m eating them anyway.”

“I should go running after this. But instead I’ll just be fat!”

We were transgressors. Inwardly I patted myself on the back like some kind of smug asshole for having the light beer or for drinking water instead of pop. You don’t want to get fat, I tell myself. As if getting fat is a disease you can catch; as if it’s the worst thing that could happen. I don’t own a scale and never really set much store by the numbers anyway — I’m a tallish and a little muscular, so striving for any number is never something I cared about.

Instead, I found other ways to care. I measure with my fingers how much fat does or does not spill over the front of my pants or how much my jeans fold around my thighs. I pinch the undersides of my arms to see how soft they are. I feel for my collarbone. I didn’t even realize I was doing it or that it’s a problem behavior until I heard it named online: “body-checking.” I was physically measuring my imperfections, checking to see if the disease had spread.

What was I afraid of? Why was I so afraid? I was a twiggy little kid. I grew up with a mother who ate healthily and exercised, but who was always loving and never shaming, never said anything negative about my body or appearance. I was occasionally teased for my crooked teeth or ridiculous hair, but only in the way that kids are sometimes mean, never to the extent of cruelty or bullying.

I watched and learned from the way other girls were treated that fat was bad. Fat was ugly. Fat was something I never wanted to be. With my frizzy hair and braces, I already had two things that the pretty girls did not have.  I was average-looking. If I got fat, I knew I’d be officially ugly. (I know this sort of thing inspires a chorus of people saying nice and reassuring things, which is so kind, but I am really not fishing for compliments. That was how I saw the world. I observed and paid attention and learned who was considered pretty and who wasn’t, and knew I was somewhere muddled in between.)

I figured that, if I could only stay thin, I could have a chance at being pretty. I’m grateful I have never crossed into eating disorder or excessive exercise territory. I never needed to be stick thin and I wanted to be strong. But I still spent plenty of time hating myself for the paunch on my stomach or the way my inner thighs always touched no matter how many squats I did. When I said, “I’m fat” or “I feel fat,” what I really meant was that I felt ugly. Fat was a bad word. (AN F-WORD IF YOU WILL.)

And then one of my friends said the following: “PSA: Using the word ‘fat’ to describe yourself when you are not actually fat (a yardstick is being able to shop in non-specialty mall stores) is kind of rude. As someone who has actually faced real, tangible, public discrimination for being fat, I would really appreciate it if we could put a hold on that word.” And then I started doing some thinking and doing some research. I watched this video. (HI IF YOU DON’T READ ANY OF THIS, YOU SHOULD DEFINITELY JUST WATCH THIS VIDEO.) And I realized I was being a huge asshole (if unintentionally) to others and to myself. It never occurred to me that when I’m lost in my own neuroses, I could be hurting other people. All my fat-hate had been focused on myself and never on others, but it didn’t matter. I’d been using the word fat as a scapegoat, which is really just as awful and discriminatory as using the word gay to mean that something is bad or stupid.

So I’m trying to retrain myself. I’m trying to teach myself that fat is not a bad word. Fat is not an insult and shouldn’t be used as one, whether toward myself or toward others. Fat does not mean ugly or lazy or stupid or mean. Fat is fat. Some people are fat. I have some fat on my body. You can be fat and be still healthy. Being fat does not mean you’re ugly — my lovely friend who helped me to start thinking about these things is gorgeous as hell.

It’s difficult. It’s really difficult. But especially as a writer, I want to be conscious of what words mean and how I use them and try to not use them to harm myself or others. And fuck apologizing for that extra slice of pizza.

—

Jill Kolongowski is a writer and editor living in San Francisco. When she’s not cooking, running, or reading, she sometimes blogs at jillkolongowski.com. Follow her on Twitter at @jillkolongowski.

I go to a studio and I stretch and pull and shape my muscles.  Direct my hips, angle my feet.  I have to work, really work, to relax my face. Ups and downs, planks and pigeons, tables and chairs.

I praise myself for touching my toes — I couldn’t do that years ago.  On the blacktop of my elementary school I sat with my legs stretched in front of me.  I willed my fingers toward my feet, but they would not go.  The Presidential Fitness Test showed me that I was inadequate.  Taught me that I could not do a pull-up or a push-up or even bend my body in half.  It planted a bitter seed in my gut.  “Maybe it’s not right to weigh this much. . . ”

In college when all the girls wore pleather pants and delicate bandanas strung together into tops, and everyone I knew was tan and gorgeous and limber, I still could not touch my toes, didn’t know when I should speak, didn’t know why boys only kissed me at night, never acknowledged me by day.  Didn’t know, but I surmised it was me — only my soft body and soft mind could be so wrong.

Now, I touch my toes and feel empowered when I wriggle my hands under my arches, drawing myself deeper into the bend.

Fuck those boys and fuck the president and fuck not talking.

And a bandana is not a shirt, at least not one I’d like to wear.

And I breathe out and laugh a little because it hurts and feels good at the same time.

In hot power yoga class I wanted to cry.  Everything was going too fast and everything was uncomfortable and the lady in front of me was popping into handstands and I was sweating and I thought I might scream and an invisible scalpel cut into the place where I thought my lungs would be but instead of flesh a huge swathe of space filled with tears poured out and I was scared.

I haven’t been back there yet. But I think about it.  I think I’ll go back there.

In ashtanga and vinyasa the teacher cooed gentle things, things that I wanted to snark and snort about but ended up being too nice to erase.  Words like “sink” “melt” “drop” all became poetic as they soothed me into place.

“Ask your body for a millimeter–maybe in a year or two you’ll gain an inch”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself.”

“If it hurts, you’re doing it wrong.”

What are these people talking about?  But, yes, yes, and thank you.

I’ve been a hole that ate everything up and found solace in nothing.

I’ve been a machine that saw food as fuel, every calorie accounted for in repetitive shows of athletic “power.”

I’ve starved and lost all sense of things, lost the numbers and names of the days.  Belly collapsing into a fist, I could not lick my fingers for fear that their natural oils would tip the scale.  A sack of bones heavy with paranoia.

In plough pose, my body rolls over my head and my feet touch the ground behind me.  Here, I’m forced to feel and see my abs cascade in little lumps before me.  Really feel and really see.  I love and hate the rolls.

Yoga hasn’t fixed me and it’s not magical and perfect and it hasn’t made me skinny or wonderfully acceptant of my fatty deposits.  In yoga I move through discomfort and I hold on and then let go.  I remember all the the stories stuck in me and on me and then I find some surprising(?) new ones.  It feels real and I feel real there and this is why I keep going.

—

Ana Holguin writes PopHeart for The Idler.

Not too long ago, Kate Moss took a public slamming for revealing that one of her personal mottos was “Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.” But Ms. Moss’s comment came after she had already lost a number of modeling contracts for being caught on video doing lines of cocaine. People reacted more violently to what was an opinion—a personal motto, than her documented drug use. To me it seemed like a completely valid motto, especially coming from a woman whose career is based on her appearance. Public denial that what we put into our bodies, and the amount of it, affects how we look, seems to be at an all-time high despite the continuing popularity of fad diets and quick fixes. And if you dare point this out in a way that lauds your own thinness in the faces of others, you had best be prepared for the backlash.

Over the past year and a half, I have lost just over 30 lbs. And more than 16 inches from my figure if you add up all of the various places I measure: waist, hips, bust, arms, thighs. It has been a long process, but one that is more difficult now that I am at a point where the results are undeniable and easy to notice. There is a new component to battle at this stage: peer pressure and public scrutiny. I’m not done with my journey. And suddenly it’s become everyone else’s journey, too. One they feel like they should have a say in directing or mediating.

In the break room a coworker told me that my legs looked a mile long. Then she told me that I was practically melting. At Easter a distant relative asked me if I had lost weight, and when I said “Yes, thank you!” she replied, “You were already beautiful. We don’t want you to waste away!” The negative connotations here do not express concern so much as they express criticism. This reaction is stronger when you refuse to apologize for the fact that you look and feel better about yourself, and happily accept a compliment rather than offering the standard self-deprecating joke or sheepish justification. It makes people visibly uncomfortable, and sometimes you can see them stammering to hold back the reassuring follow-up they already had prepared to coyly counter your readily volunteered self-criticism.

Making me uncomfortable about my new shape and size—pointing it out and commenting on it freely and publicly seems to fall into the realm of perfectly acceptable. Telling me that I already have a long face and that I run the risk of looking gaunt if I lose another pound is also fine. Telling someone that their face has morphed into their neck in one fantastic moon shape of excess fat is something you could not, however, get away with. Saying that you are worried about their heart or their cholesterol or the risk they run for diabetes by being overweight is also unacceptable. It is OK to shame someone for making healthy lifestyle changes, but when unhealthy habits are reflected by a person’s physique, mum’s the word in a culture hypersensitive to accepting everyone and not hurting anyone’s feeling. We are supposed to believe for the sake of social interactions that our weight is not something that we can control. If a woman is overweight, she is cursed with unfortunate genetics. Yet if a woman is thin, more often it is assumed that she has inflicted upon herself the joyless torment of a Nazi-esque diet and deprivation regiment than that she is blessed with impeccable genes. With the over-abundance of food and easy access to junk that we have, it may be true that resisting temptation has become a full-time job for those interested in being thing. Yet clearly none of these stereotypes are absolutes. It is equally as ignorant to assume that an overweight person who may have a medical condition is lazy as it is to mistake a thin person’s hard-earned svelteness for luck. Either way, Kate Moss got it a little wrong: nothing tastes as good as healthy feels. I never felt unattractive, or even fat. I’ve been blessed with a frame that carries weight evenly and dispenses it as curves. But I did feel uncomfortable in my own skin because I was completely out of shape, and because the behaviors that had led me to be carrying extra weight in the first place had negatively impacted my health.

Health isn’t about a quick-fix. It’s about sustainability. Health is part of your lifestyle if you’re serious about it. Few people want to address an all-encompassing lifestyle overhaul. And that is exactly what experience has shown me that it takes. Lifestyle isn’t just a personal change, either. It plays a huge part in your social choices and the people you choose to be around, as well as how they interact with you. It usually means you have to reconfigure your home environment, too.

I’ve been a serious athlete, a social binge drinker, a vegetarian, and an on-again, off-again chain smoker. I struggle terribly with emotional and stress-related bingeing and have since adolescence. Consequently, I have been a size 12 to a size 2 and everything in between, all since high school; well past the age of developing your lady bits. These inconsistencies not only showed in my waistline, they took a toll on my overall well-being. And none of these phases were sustainable. Realizing the latter is what finally broke the vicious cycle of indulgence and shameful repentance I had entered.

My biggest lifestyle change came when I decided to view food as fuel and sustenance. Losing weight might boost your confidence initially, but it is never a solution to any sort of personal issue. If you are an emotional or stress eater, you still have to find ways to deal with the feelings at the root of these impulses. Your body might change but you are still the same person. No dietary discipline is going to alter that—they are separate issues entirely. And I have a host of said “separate issues,” but I finally made a decision to leave my health and my body out of those battles.

It was a huge and liberating decision. Surprisingly easy and obvious to make mentally, and surprisingly difficult to enact physically. My kitchen cupboards had to be ransacked. I had to actually start doing dishes so that I wasn’t deterred from cooking. There was a tremendous amount of planning involved. Regular trips to the grocery store to make sure produce and meat were fresh and appetizing. Getting ingredients that could actually be combined into recipes and turned into meals, looking up new recipes to ensure variety and satisfaction. Along with it, I did an incredible amount of research to make sure that I was getting the proper nutrients and nourishing my body, not depriving myself. Quite frankly, it was a lot of work. And it took a lot of time for it to become a habit. But this was just the dietary component. The exercise and fitness half of the battle required a lot of scheduling accommodations to make it a priority, and an enjoyable one, too.

My faith in not only figuring this part of the balanced lifestyle out, but sustaining it, lies in the success of others that I know. One of those people, Angela Vasquez-Giroux, is a mother and wife—a woman with much more personal responsibility than I, the petless, childless, date-avoiding young professional. She has been a sounding board to me throughout this lifestyle improvement process, and I thought sharing some of her insights here would be a great way to wrap up the article. She is, after all, a role model, and as you will see, a much more difficult one to brush off than Ms. Kate Moss.

—

TAS: You’ve expressed that after making significant lifestyle changes for the sake of your health and general well-being, you have found yourself having to defend them to close friends and acquaintances alike. Can you describe such a situation and give me your thoughts on why this happens?

AVG: I know we’ve talked a lot about people insinuating that there’s something wrong with losing weight – or that my size is shrinking because there’s something wrong with me, not because I am eating better and exercising, so I’ll let you cover that. Eating and exercise weren’t the only big changes I made.

In November, I stopped drinking. It was partly motivated by necessity – I take a daily medication that doesn’t interact well with booze. But the further away I’ve gotten from alcohol, and the entire associated culture – bars, binge drinking, hangovers, embarrassing behavior, hazy feelings of regret – the less I’ve missed it.

Now, when I am out and about with friends and alcohol is part of the evening, I have to decline – politely, of course. After reminding them that no, I am not pregnant, I’m just unable to drink, the standard response it, “That sucks.”

Perhaps I can avoid that by owning it a little more – because the truth is, I really don’t want to drink. I don’t miss it, and I especially don’t miss the way even one drink can derail healthy living – by blowing your calorie count on drinks (and then drunk food), by interfering with your workout routine, etc.

My life is less complicated and happier without booze, because I’m able to focus on eating and living clean. And my body shows it.

TAS: Describe an average day for you: what would your food journal look like and what kind of exercise might you get?

AVG: My goal every day is to eat a net 1250 calories—so, if I burn 300 calories running, my goal is then 1550, etc.

It cracks me up when people ask me if I am starving myself – because I am constantly eating! For dinner I will have a Larabar because I’m working late, and then I’ll have another snack when I get home after hitting the Y and my softball lesson. I always leave room for dessert, too, like pudding or ice cream.

I try to work out 5 or 6 days a week – either running 3 miles or hitting the cardio machines at the Y. I’m pretty busy, so I like shorter, intense sessions. I run on the elliptical for around 30 minutes – but I work hard, keeping my pace above 180 strides/min. Ditto with running. I want to be efficient with my workouts, because I don’t always have an hour to spend.

TAS: As a mother, what is the example you want to set for your daughter in terms of both health and fitness? How much do you think your example will impact choices she makes as an adolescent, and later in life?

AVG: I want to show my daughter that you can enjoy food, but that food is not meant to replace love—and for many people, it does, hence our obese nation. My husband and I try to set a positive example with our daughter by encouraging her to be active, and by being active ourselves. She knows that exercise is a priority for me, and she’ll accompany me on runs on her bike. She is also an athlete – in season, she swims a few nights a week, takes gymnastics, and is now playing soccer.

My hope is that she learns to take care of her body because she values what she can do with it, whether it’s a relaxing run to clear her mind or winning a swim meet. I try to emphasize health first: I measure my food and count calories to maintain my health, not to reach a goal dress size, and it’s my hope that she constructs her own relationship to food and exercise the same way.

TAS: Did the attitude and behavior of your own mother toward food and exercise impact your views toward either?

AVG: My mom has struggled with her weight her entire life, and she came from a family where food was synonymous with love. What I mean is that her family is very loving, but when every celebration or occasion is marked by a ritual of consuming mass quantities of unhealthy food, it teaches you to do the same in your own life, and I think that has made it harder for her. She and my dad are now losing weight and exercising, and it’s wonderful to see them take charge of their health.

TAS: What do you think are some of the most common/biggest misconceptions about losing weight harbored by people? Why do you think they hold onto these beliefs when research is often readily accessible to dispel these myths?

AVG: I often hear people say, “That’s not so bad for you.” As in, I’m ordering this dinner, and I am going to call it healthy even though it isn’t. Once you start tracking what is IN your food, and HOW MUCH of it you should be having, it’s appalling. I think so many people are in overt denial about what they’re eating, and how much, and why they’re getting heavier. What you eat makes you fat more than genetics. You do need to exercise. And you do need to be diligent about what, and how much, you’re eating. If you don’t want to do those things, then you don’t want to be healthy. Plain and simple.

There’s also a lot of denial about what it takes to lose weight. It doesn’t take the Atkins diet, or home-delivered food. It takes discipline and a lifestyle change. I will eat this way for the rest of my life to maintain my weight loss—as opposed to these other diets, where the assumption is that after you drop 10 pounds you can go back to doing what you did before and you’ll be fine.

You won’t. You have to change your life, and you have to commit to doing it forever. It’s the ONLY way.

TAS: What motivates you on a daily basis to sustain your chosen lifestyle changes?

AVG: I’m in the best shape of my life, and it shows. I don’t feel self-conscious about the way I look, or the way clothing fits. I can run and push myself and do things I never thought I was capable of. And it keeps me sane: the time when I am alone on the machines or running the trails, no one can bother me. For a mother, that’s golden time. For a human, you need it.

TAS: What are the biggest benefits?

AVG: I just feel great. I’m happier. I’m more motivated. I just feel great.

TAS: What have been the biggest challenges? Initially? Ongoing?

AVG: Initially, it was difficult to adjust—just getting used to the whole system of counting calories and logging them, and exercising even if I was tired, etc. It’s a whole new world, but you learn quickly, and you learn more each day. The continuing challenge is the way people react—”oh, you’re wasting away!”—and being made to feel guilty. As in, it sucks you don’t drink, or why don’t you want to get pizza with us, etc. So I’ve adjusted by making my social life not revolve around food, and reminding people that I am making healthy choices and I am healthy. I’m not thin because I am ill, thank God. I am thin because, like Gweynth Paltrow said, I work my ass off. And I’m not going to let other people’s food or body issues derail my health.

TAS: For anyone looking to initiate similar healthy lifestyle changes, what advice do you have to offer?

AVG: Just do it. For the first month, lay low. Believe it or not, people will sabotage—consciously or otherwise—your efforts. Humans suck that way. So establish your changes and your routine, and give them time to stick before you introduce elements of your old life again.

Be patient. It can be hard, frustrating, and sometimes you might not want to say no to ice cream or go to the gym. But if you WANT to be healthy, and you WANT to feel better, you will do it.

Forgive yourself. If you have a bad day and eat a whole pie, just get back on track the next day. Don’t go off the rails after one bad episode.

Stay on track. You’re the one who is in control, so put yourself first. Trust me, the kids and the dogs and the spouse will gladly have you done at the gym for an hour if it means you don’t hate yourself. Do it. Do it because you want to, and don’t let anyone make you feel guilty or otherwise. You only get one life, and you might as well live it to enjoy it.

While I think Americans like talking about food almost as much as they like eating it, I think that food can also become a bad word, especially for women. Indulgence is a sin, one always committed with excuses (A bad day at work. A bad boyfriend. I’ve been doing a juice cleanse for a month). Food can be a bad thing. Do you notice how you don’t want to be one who orders dessert first? “I’ll get one if you get one.” “We’ll be fatasses together.” It’s shameful to be the one who wants it. Unless, of course, you have someone else to balance your want for the dessert with feelings of regret afterward. I’d say it’s almost in fashion to think that you are fat. Or to say that you think you’re fat. No one wants to hear a woman say that she thinks she looks beautiful and thin today. Any compliments should be countered with something negative.

Woman 1: “Ugh, I ate so much at dinner today. I must have gained twelve pounds.”
Woman 2: “Shut up. You’re so skinny.”
Woman 1: “Well, my stomach is pretty flat, but I’ve pretty much resigned myself to big thighs.”
Woman 2: “No way. I am so much fatter than you.”
Woman 1: “Are you kidding? You have hips. I look like an eleven-year-old boy. And you have the best smile. My teeth are so hideous.”
[Note: This is an actual conversation I’ve had. More than once. I’m no less guilty.]

On an on, a contest of who can out-ugly whom. Instead of focusing on what we like about ourselves, we’re looking for the flaws.

Lately, I’ve noticed an upsetting trend where I don’t feel like I can say anything when I feel happy about the progress I have made. I’ve never been very overweight, but I definitely gained the freshman 15, and have worked about four years to get to a point where I have incorporated exercise and (mostly) healthy eating into a part of my daily routine. I make sure I balance cardio with weight training and with relaxation, like yoga. I went clothes shopping a month ago and fit into a size two pants for the first time. The only person I felt comfortable sharing my excitement with were my mom and my friend Anna, who has made a similar effort to be healthy and now can run half marathons in her sleep. And still beat everyone.

As I was typing that paragraph, I can feel a sense of ire from invisible readers. I felt afraid typing it. Even worse, I have a problem now where many of my pants don’t fit, so I worry about looking unprofessional at work, but don’t have the money to replace all of my pants. I realize this is very much a first-world problem. And, it’s barely even a “problem.” But I know that I can’t voice thoughts like this without someone saying “SHUT UP. YOU ARE SO SKINNY. YOU GO TO THE GYM ALL THE TIME. I HAD TO BUY A SIZE BIGGER PANTS YESTERDAY.” It’s not like I haven’t been there too. It’s not like I feel great about myself at all times. However, I’m really tired of the culture of self-hate. I’m tired of having to lie and say I’m so fat when I know I’m not. What’s wrong with our conceptions of food and our bodies if we don’t feel comfortable telling the truth about them?

That’s why I admire Lady Gaga. I’d agree that her body is far from the average woman’s body, but she’s not afraid to be as much of a freak as she wants. She feels free to appear in public in ridiculous hats or showing enough skin to incur some really unfortunate sunburns. She doesn’t give a shit about what you think. It’s not a shock that I saw lots of Gagas out for Halloween—what an opportunity for women to be as much of a freak as they want, and go to out without covering up, pulling down, checking and rechecking the mirror for telltale fat rolls.

On Halloween, I went to see The Rocky Horror Picture Show at midnight, where people were dressed as half boys, half girls, in lingerie, as Aeon Flux, men dressed as women, women dressed as men, women dressed as men dressed like women, and lots of skin all around. While it was definitely not something you’d want grandma to see, it was so refreshing to see a large crowd of people enjoying being themselves, comfortable in their bodies.

Obviously, there are health concerns to being overweight that should not be ignored. But, for the love of Gaga, can we please try to look for things that we like about our bodies, rather than picking on everything that we hate? As Gaga would say, “I want your love.” Or, alternatively, “Rah rah ah ah ah, ro ma, ro ma ma, ga ga ooh la la.”