A Letter to My Beautiful Body,

First and foremost, I'd like to say, I am so sorry.

Not long ago, I detested all aspects of you. I called you names, cursed you in the mirror, and cried myself to sleep because you wouldn't change for me. I hated the fact that you reflect my metabolism, my eating habits, my levels of exhaustion, whether I'm an avid exerciser or not, and my genes. You get blemishes and you don't fit into some of the clothes that used to be baggy on me. I chastised your lumps and bumps and texture and curves in what I thought were all the wrong places. I blamed you for the majority of the unhappiness I've experienced.

In third grade, I was using the restroom, and a girl in the next stall over said my name. I hadn't noticed her, but apparently she'd noticed me walking in. She proceeded to tell me how fat I was and how ugly I am because of that. She told me my friends thought so too. She continued spewing hateful, mean words about my appearance as I silently washed my hands and rushed out, shaken and upset. To this day, I don't know who that other little girl was, though I will never forget her voice because I believed what she said. The seed of the hatred that would grow for you throughout my adolescence was planted and began to take root.

As I got older, I hated that you wouldn't let me eat certain foods like raw veggies without reflexively gagging and sometimes throwing up. Twelve-year-old me sat on my bed with a bag of baby carrots and a trash can as I tried to eat one, preparing for the possibility of getting sick. I began to cry and complain about you to my mother and how I didn't look like my other skinny friends. She told me to learn to eat salad and ride my bike. That was how she lost weight.

I only loathed you more as I gained weight with the onset of puberty. I'd never been a tiny girl in the first place, and you seemed to pack on pounds faster than I could count. I became depressed in high school and cried when I undressed and saw you in the mirror before a shower. My brother called me a lard and my dad told me I didn't make it through to the next round of a singing competition because I was too chubby that year. He assured me he'd buy me some running shoes and I'd be stunning when I lost twenty pounds. You no longer fit into jeans that weren't stretchy and I scratched at you in fits of anxiety and tears. I felt the hate sprouting through to the surface of my being--the hate couldn't be repressed for much longer.

The summer before junior year, I learned what you were capable of when I joined the cross country team. You were strong and able, and my big thighs looked slimmer in my sequin-y homecoming dress that year. I was so proud when people told me how good you looked, but I still could not see what they must have. I knew you could do more for me, and then I'd be able to love you.

First, it was 25 pounds down, and then 30, and then 40. The girls in the dressing room during musical rehearsal called me skinny mini, and one even said I was too thin. I knew she was just jealous of you--I knew that that couldn't be true because you hadn't reached your potential. I still detested my fat legs and less than flat stomach, despite the new sight of ribs and hip bones that appeared for the first time in my life. I could love you soon, but not yet.

And somehow, throughout all this, you still loved me. You fought for me. Your resting heart rate was 38 in the hospital after the months of starving you and purging food from you put me in a bright-yellow "FALL RISK" bracelet. Suddenly, I was forced to realize that going on hating you was what could very well kill me.

The hate inside slowly began to wilt, though it screamed for its source of nourishment. It longed for me to feed it with negativity and self-incrimination. But instead, I began to give you rest and feed you again, and looking at you no longer pained me constantly.

It has not been an easy journey for us. I still have my days where I look at you and shudder, but those days are far and few in between. Your duty throughout my existence on this earth is not to be the skinniest body in the room, or even "skinny" at all. Your duty is to help me carry out all the hopes and dreams and ambitions that can't be reached without self respect and love for all of the amazing things the body goes through on a daily basis. So, I suppose I will end this with a final thank you for all that you make possible.

Love has taken root here, and I am blossoming.

"I stand in awe of my body." - Henry David Thoreau