Could I be way off the mark here?

I woke up this morning feeling extremely pissed off with myself. Something just wasn’t right. I could feel that feisty part of me getting more and more worked up. One look in the mirror and it started to get even louder. So, I let it take over. I’ve realised that, sometimes, it’s best to just let them run with it.

Unfortunately for me, it was on a mission and took me all the way to that dreaded place in my bathroom: the scale. Now, here is a tool I don’t believe should even exist. It is one of those things that push women to go through extremes and resort to rather drastic measures. Once I was standing in front of this item of torture, guess what! It made me climb onto it. How rude!!! Of course, I had to look; after all, it obviously had an agenda, so I bent my head down… Interesting that, it’s a movement that remind me of shame and embarrassment... Anyway, I went to take a very quick look, the type that barely registers what it sees, hoping what I was about to see wouldn’t ruin the rest of my day. And then, the penny dropped … That digital number staring back at me only re-enforced that angry feeling inside.

Like many women, I have had a life long battle with that dreaded scale and what it represents. Most of the time, I deal with it rather well and manage not to let it get to me. Although, another way to look at it is that I just ignore the problem all together. I have spent my life trying to accept the way I look and the shape I am. It wasn’t always easy, and still isn’t. But I feel I have survived the stereotypical ideas connected with my own size.

Yet, I can’t help but think about the culture of image obsessed we live in. I often worry about the young people being raised in this crazy world. Between the fantasy worlds of TV/Movies where everyone is picture perfect, the fake world of fashion magazines where every photo is air-brushed and improved until it doesn’t look like the model any longer, and the oh-so-perfect world of celebrities who have access to every trick in the book to transform them into someone you’re unlikely to ever cross path with in the street, how can anyone feel that they belong?

I feel, in our effort to be healthy, we’ve gone too far, and moved into a whole different dimension, going passed the health issue and into a much more sinister area. And in that move, our judgment on others has changed. We might have become more aware of racism and discrimination regarding creeds and colours, but we’ve moved it into another area of our judgment on people’s physical appearances.

Consider this, for a moment. When you see someone in a wheelchair, or walking with a limp, what comes into your mind? How do you judge that person? More often than none, you probably wonder what happened to them and feel sorry for them. Now, think of what might come into your mind when you cross pass with an overweight person. Are you really feeling sorry for them? Or are you more inclined to judge them? Take those two people and place them in a pub, having, let say, fish and chips. Which of the two will make you think “Bad idea mate, you really shouldn’t be having this, you’re already in bad enough shape”? Do you ever think that when you see a group of healthy looking people having a pint and a cigarette outside your local? Probably not, as you can’t see the effects those habits have on their bodies.

And maybe, you do none of those things. Maybe you’re just well adjusted and I’m not. After all, I wanted to use the word obese instead of overweight, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I hate how it sounds and its implication. Then I realised I was making generalisation and in a way, discriminating against others than might not think the way I do. Well, tough! After all, this is my space, it is all about me and how I feel about the world surrounding me. Besides, I really don’t think I’m that way off the mark!