This blog post is written for Voice in Recovery WeightStigma Blog Carnival. Throughout the next month or two in preparation for the National Weight Stigma Awareness Week (September 26-30) Voice in Recovery (and Binge Eating Disorder Association) is having a blog carnival where everyone can share their experiences and bring about awareness on the topic of Weight Stigma. Please visit the website and join in the Blog Carnival!
Stigma. Stig-ma. Stig-muh.
1. A mark of disgrace or infamy; a stain or reproach, as on one’s reputation.
2. A mental or physical mark that is characteristic of a defect or disease. (dictionary.com)
Personally, I don’t hear the word stigma a lot; but when I do it’s usually used when talking about taboo subjects, in my anthropology classes, or when talking about mental illnesses. You hear about different social stigmas but one I (and I’m assuming the public) do not really hear about is weight stigma. That’s right; I said it, weight stigma.
There are various times in my life where someone has made harsh remarks to me about my weight, however one memory sticks out more than the others. This comment was not made in the start of my eating disorder, but it was a key part that led to me quitting something I loved and it gave more power to my eating disorder.
Ballet class. I absolutely loved it. The pink tights, black leotard, the whole-nine-yards- I loved it! I enjoyed the intensity of class, the classical music playing, and the gracefulness of each move. I particularly liked how the teacher taught class. He was classically trained and principal dancer in his home country’s ballet. I looked up to him. He corrected every wrong move someone made and pushed his students harder than one possible. In his class of around twenty-five, he had a select few of students that he pushed harder and focused on more- I was one of them. He would call the select few students out, tell us how fantastic were doing, what specifically we need to improve on, and use us as examples to everyone else. At first, this was great. Who doesn’t want to feel special by their teacher? Who doesn’t like to be called out in class for doing something good?
Although this felt great at first, it took a turn for the worst around the middle of the year with him. He started comparing my body to other petite girls in class. I recall during one class, as everyone was on their backs on the floor doing hundreds of sit ups, my teacher would walk and look at each person as he counted the number of sit ups we did. When he got to me he stopped over me and watched me for a second long than the others and said in his broken English, “You need to lose that weight in your stomach.” I was stunned. I knew I had some extra pounds on me but I was by no means overweight; however, once he said that statement, my eating disorder really kicked in to high gear. A normal healthy weight no longer would be accepted as okay or healthy. I was fat. A fat ballerina. After we finished working out, a group of girls and I were complaining about the intense workout we just had and my teacher looks at me and says “if you were to lose that weight you would be a great ballerina.” It wasn’t just me that heard this comment… my friends did to.
It is difficult to put into words how these words affected me. My idol, someone I looked up to.. just told me I need to lose weight. He would continue with these statements.
Beyond making me upset and anxious to go into this class- a class I once loved, I felt uncomfortable in my own skin (more so than ever), and I started paying more attention to the number on a scale. Because of the pressure I started to feel in my ballet classes and worrying about my health, I eventually had to quit ballet. Now I’m not blaming him directly for my eating disorder, but I do think his comments played a part in continuing my disorder and leading me to become more obsessed about what I ate.
What I’ve learned since my ballet days is that people hear these comments all the time. People look at others and make comments about their weight oblivious (?) to the fact that saying phrases like you need to lose weight in order to fit some ideal can cause serious harm; and truly affect the lives of those who they are speaking to. Putting pressure on people to lose weight (when not a health risk) can be extremely hurtful. As you can see from my story and to the others who are posting about WeightStigma these negative comments can influence eating disorders and continually perpetuates the idea that the size of our bodies determine how successful we are in life… or in my case how successful I would be in the ballet world.
This is ridiculous. This is a serious problem our society faces. The weight/size/stature of a person does not tell ones personality/talents/successes…
Now its time to my weight is no longer going to define me and cause me to be scared to be seen in my pink tights and leo. I’m not going to be afraid or persuaded that I cannot do something because of the shape of my body and I no longer want to hear these harsh comments made about weight.
Help me in changing our communities from holding the idea that there is such thing as a perfect body or that the model type body is the only thing that is beautiful; dancers help me change this idea that in order to be a good dancer you don’t have to be petite/underweight/super thin and that you can be a beautiful dancer no matter your weight.
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