I have struggled with weight management since I was a kid. I remember going on my first diet when I was thirteen. While all of my girl friends were wearing their cutest bikinis at the pool, I was rocking a tankini or a one-piece. My body type was not ‘trendy.’ The boys my age during my middle school years made that very clear. I remember the first time someone I didn’t know acknowledged that I was overweight. I was fourteen and standing in line with my sisters at a grocery store. In my daze, I heard a question I will never forget: “Boy or girl?” Of course, my confused look prompted the cashier to continue her line of questioning with: “Your baby,” she said as she gestured to my stomach, “is it going to be a boy or a girl?” My 8^th grade self replied with, “I’m not pregnant.” Hand to God, the woman was brazen enough to follow that up with, “Well, you just must be a bit chubby then.”

I hope you are laughing like I am as I write this; but I know that I wasn’t laughing that day. I wasn’t laughing when I started noticing every single flaw on my body. I wasn’t laughing when my weight went up and down and up and down for seven years following that incident in the grocery store. I am not laughing now when I was told just the other day that I am not being a good feminist when I say that I don’t personally choose to be ‘body positive.’

Let me explain what that means to me. I am at a point in my life, surrounded by a group of people who tell me that I should love myself no matter what size or shape I am. The person leading this campaign is my boyfriend, Gregory, who tells me everyday that I am beautiful no matter what I look like. There is also a certain stigma that if you lose weight, that you are ‘selling out’ or must hate who you are (Google what happened to the stunningly gorgeous plus size model Ashley Graham when her fans thought she lost weight). I love who I am, I love my body, and the things that it can do are incredible; but I know that I want to take better care of myself so that I can be healthier. I have hereditary high-cholesterol, asthma, hypo-thyroidism, and a plethora of other medical issues. If I can take positive steps, like losing weight, to decrease the negative long-term effects of these diseases, then I would be stupid to not do them. I can still be someone who refuses to praise their current weight, while still loving my body for what it does for me and how it works. I know that I felt less sluggish, I didn’t get out of breath as easily, and I did not have daily headaches and blood pressure spikes.

Me at a much healthier weight, roughly two years and thirty pounds ago.

One of my best friends and I were recently talking about what body positivity means to us. Madison is a CrossFit athlete who does incredible things in the gym on a daily basis. She can out-lift many of the guys that I know, and she gets a lot of grief for it. In our talk, we were discussing changing what the definition of “body positive” means. Being body positive is stereotypically seen as loving every inch of your body, accepting and forgiving its flaws, and being happy the way that you are. In response to this, Madison said: “I don't think [body positivity is] something like 'being okay with your body the way it is' because, frankly, that's unrealistic. I think it's realizing you can be who you want to be and no one is stopping you.” So I am choosing to claim Madison’s definition of being body positive. I am choosing to not love myself the weight that I am now because I acknowledge that it is unhealthy for me personally.

Madison in her fierce representation of what being body positive means to her.

Body positivity can be an incredible thing in acknowledging that we are all different shapes and sizes. You don’t have to conform to a societal standard or gender norm. Be who you want to be. Look how you want to look. Like in Madison’s case, she didn’t let anyone stop her from her training. She wanted to be stronger, so she did it. She told me that she hears a lot that she is “ripped” or she is “manly” and guys don't like that. To them, she has the same advice that I have for you if you are struggling with accepting your body the way that it is, “Screw that. Everyone has a different definition of what they think the ideal body is.” Create your own definition of what health and happiness for YOUR body is, even if it does not fit the standard definition of ‘body positivity’. Most importantly, and my constant message to everyone I meet: love yourself; you are worthy of love no matter what you look like.