While working as a day camp counselor at the YMCA in South Bend, I found myself having a tough conversation with one of my campers. This girl was in fourth grade and had the kindest soul and the best energy of any kid I know, but on this particular day, she pulled my aside and said, “Miss Nicole, how can I eat healthier? I need to lose some weight because I get bullied for being fat.”
To say my heart broke would be a cliché and an understatement. Sitting in front of me was this little human who had so much to offer the world, and all she could focus on was the way other people viewed her body; that was her driving force for wanting to “eat healthier.”
I can write article after article about why society is messed up for creating an environment where fourth graders think they need to go on a diet and why beauty standards are unrealistic and harmful, but as I reflected on my own experience trying to create a healthier lifestyle, I realized another problem young girls and boys face: the backwards way in which people approach a healthy lifestyle.
When I was younger, I struggled with body image issues, the same way a great deal of young people do. I thought if I worked out multiple times a week and ate healthy foods and logged every calorie I ate, I would then be skinny and muscular, and I would end up loving my body. It doesn’t seem like the worst plan, right? Take care of yourself, see results, and love those results. Unfortunately, the results take time and slip ups happen. I often found myself upset with my progress—or lack thereof—far more often that I found myself actually loving myself.
Through my own journey with health and fitness, I learned that the key is not to change your body into something you love; rather, it’s to make these changes out of the love you already have for your body. This isn’t easy, especially if people remind you of the parts of you that you struggle to love. But the only way to make actual lifestyle changes and to keep at it is to love your body, to forgive yourself when you eat too many cookies or skip a workout, and to keep going.
I told my camper all of this as I was figuring it out myself. She kept calling herself fat, and I kept telling her “No, you’re not fat. You may have fat, but that is not who you are.” I was talking as much to myself as I was to her, but after she agreed to take my advice, I agreed to as well.
If you struggle with body image issues, please remind yourself that you have way more to offer than just what you look like. Remind yourself that as a human, you’re pretty awesome, and the parts you don’t like do not define you. If you want to make lifestyle changes, do it because you love yourself and you want to be the best version of yourself. At the end of the day, remember that change cannot come out of fear or hate, only love.
