masterofmidgets (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
masterofmidgets) wrote2011-06-22 08:21 pm
masterofmidgets) wrote2011-06-22 08:21 pm
Entry tags:
Love Is Meant For Beauty Queens
Since I got home last week, I've been borrowing my dad's bike in the evenings, after the temperature drops below 80, and riding around the neighborhood. Not long rides - I haven't owned a bike since mine got stolen when I was a freshman, and this uses my muscles in different ways from all the walking I do, plus my dad's bike is a bit awkward for me since I'm about 8 inches shorter than he is. But I put my headphones in with music or a radio drama and bike around for fifteen or twenty minutes, until I get bored and come home. Towards the edge of the neighborhood you start getting closer to the river basin and there are some nice trees. There's even some actual farmland. One of our neighbors has sheep! And last week I got moo-ed at by a very disgruntled cow. It was pretty fun.
It's weird - I've been reading a lot of HAES and Fat Acceptance blogs the last year or so, and in some ways I think the ideas about exercise, fat athleticism, and joyful movement have been harder for me to internalize than the ideas about food and eating. I mean, changing how I deal with food has been a process - I still catch myself thinking in terms of "good" foods and "bad" foods, feeling guilty because I slipped or screwed up or did something self-indulgent, looking around in restaurants to see if anyone is staring at my plate. I'm still working on figuring out what and how I want to eat to make myself feel good. But most of the time I'm mostly happy with how I eat and how I think about food. It helps that I'm surrounded by people who love to cook, and eat, and share food, and don't put any pressure on me to stop enjoying that. And that my parents have both let me explain HAES to them, and have been really supportive of what I'm trying to do. The food thing really is going okay.
But exercise is...different. I have always, always been the clumsy kid. The awkward kid. The picked-last-at-everything kid. I remember crying after every dodge-ball game because of how hard the other kids would throw the ball at my face, knowing I couldn't catch it. I remember running the 16 minute mile, hating myself every single breathless step. The way my teammates looked at me when we played volleyball and I fell on my ass. The way everyone looked at me when I had to get up in the President's fitness test and prove that I couldn't do a single pull-up. In my head, exercise isn't something fun. It isn't something you do because you want to. It's something other people force you to do, and then you are terrible at it, and then everyone makes fun of you until you want to die.
(And people wonder why I get incoherently rage-y when they start talking about making gym mandatory again all the way through high school. Fuck the childhood obesity boogie monster, I would never put another kid through what I went through. But anyway.)
I posted a few months ago about realizing that I can eat like an adult now - that I am allowed to try things and not like them, and if I don't like them I never have to eat them again - and how it's freed me up to try and like a lot more things. It's a lot harder for me to make myself believe that the same thing is true for exercise. No one can ever again force me to run a mile if I don't want to. It doesn't matter - it really does not matter - that I cannot do a pull-up, or catch a ball, or make a free throw. I don't have to be good at every sport, or any sport, to be a worthwhile person. Exercising should be about doing things I actually enjoy, things that make me feel good, not making myself miserable just because I feel like I have to. And there are things I like doing - walking, and biking, obviously, and I swim like a fish and I think I'd like to try weight training again when I get a chance. But even when I'm doing those things, I think I half expect to turn around and see all the people who made me hate myself in middle school and high school, waiting to laugh at me and tell me how much I suck. And then I feel worse, because I am letting the fear of imaginary mockery stop me from doing what I want. Which is clearly bullshit.
But you know what? I'm doing better. This week I reminded myself that people are not laughing at me now, and that I care fuck all if they do. This week I went bike riding and let myself enjoy it. That's a pretty small step! But it's a good one, I think.
It's weird - I've been reading a lot of HAES and Fat Acceptance blogs the last year or so, and in some ways I think the ideas about exercise, fat athleticism, and joyful movement have been harder for me to internalize than the ideas about food and eating. I mean, changing how I deal with food has been a process - I still catch myself thinking in terms of "good" foods and "bad" foods, feeling guilty because I slipped or screwed up or did something self-indulgent, looking around in restaurants to see if anyone is staring at my plate. I'm still working on figuring out what and how I want to eat to make myself feel good. But most of the time I'm mostly happy with how I eat and how I think about food. It helps that I'm surrounded by people who love to cook, and eat, and share food, and don't put any pressure on me to stop enjoying that. And that my parents have both let me explain HAES to them, and have been really supportive of what I'm trying to do. The food thing really is going okay.
But exercise is...different. I have always, always been the clumsy kid. The awkward kid. The picked-last-at-everything kid. I remember crying after every dodge-ball game because of how hard the other kids would throw the ball at my face, knowing I couldn't catch it. I remember running the 16 minute mile, hating myself every single breathless step. The way my teammates looked at me when we played volleyball and I fell on my ass. The way everyone looked at me when I had to get up in the President's fitness test and prove that I couldn't do a single pull-up. In my head, exercise isn't something fun. It isn't something you do because you want to. It's something other people force you to do, and then you are terrible at it, and then everyone makes fun of you until you want to die.
(And people wonder why I get incoherently rage-y when they start talking about making gym mandatory again all the way through high school. Fuck the childhood obesity boogie monster, I would never put another kid through what I went through. But anyway.)
I posted a few months ago about realizing that I can eat like an adult now - that I am allowed to try things and not like them, and if I don't like them I never have to eat them again - and how it's freed me up to try and like a lot more things. It's a lot harder for me to make myself believe that the same thing is true for exercise. No one can ever again force me to run a mile if I don't want to. It doesn't matter - it really does not matter - that I cannot do a pull-up, or catch a ball, or make a free throw. I don't have to be good at every sport, or any sport, to be a worthwhile person. Exercising should be about doing things I actually enjoy, things that make me feel good, not making myself miserable just because I feel like I have to. And there are things I like doing - walking, and biking, obviously, and I swim like a fish and I think I'd like to try weight training again when I get a chance. But even when I'm doing those things, I think I half expect to turn around and see all the people who made me hate myself in middle school and high school, waiting to laugh at me and tell me how much I suck. And then I feel worse, because I am letting the fear of imaginary mockery stop me from doing what I want. Which is clearly bullshit.
But you know what? I'm doing better. This week I reminded myself that people are not laughing at me now, and that I care fuck all if they do. This week I went bike riding and let myself enjoy it. That's a pretty small step! But it's a good one, I think.