Body Image Gone Wrong

Body dysmorphic disorder, as defined in this study by the British Journal of Psychiatry, consists of a preoccupation with an ‘imagined’ defect in appearance which causes significant distress or impairment in functioning.

Wikipedia has a slightly looser definition, which coincides with the view of my former psychologist and friend, who is intensely concerned with the increasing rate of body obsession in young people today. And by young I mean starting as young as 4 and 5 years old.

Wiki defines in this way:

Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) (previously known as dysmorphophobia is sometimes referred to as body dysmorphia or dysmorphic syndrome is a psychological disorder in which the affected person is excessively concerned about and preoccupied by a perceived defect in his or her physical features (body image).

A person suffering from BDD could regularly complain about one, or a range, or features about themselves and will often become so obsessed that it starts to impact on them socially. They may feel uncomfortable going to work, or school. They may constantly obsess on their physical shape. In some cases what can appear in the beginning as BDD can transform into a greater over all body obsession, eventually turning into Anorexia Nervosa.

While in its technical definition BDD is only ‘real’ when there is clear evidence of the obsession impacting socially or physically, it is becoming apparent that there is an ongoing and dangerous obsession with body image throughout the western world that is having an enormous impact on young people.

In this article (http://abcnews.go.com/Health/mom-year-daughter-botox-young-young/story?id=13580804) from abcnews.com a mother gives her 8 year old daughter Botox, and she’s happy to receive it because she perceives that she has wrinkles that are corrected via her Botox injections. And 8 year old believes that she needs Botox to smooth out the lines in her face.

An 8 year old.

I had coffee one day with a dear friend and her 4 year old girl. Mummy asked her little girl if she’d like a babycino and the dear little sweetheart said “no mummy milk makes you fat”. It was just heartbreaking. Some folks will say she was just mimicking her mother, and they’d be right, but does that make it any less horrifying? She had heard her mum say that time and again, and made a strong connection to it. At 4 she had made the connection to drinking milk, turning fat, and that being bad. To the point she’d miss out on a previously loved treat for the fear of getting fat.

A 4 year old.

This is the horrifying reality of the world we live in and its dangerous obsession with body size.

Every day people see images in magazines and on the television that project a totally unrealistic body shape and size. A body gained, generally speaking, through a very strict diet and many hours of exercise with a personal trainer. Something the average Joe can’t afford to do around work and family.

Every day the news, in a variety of formats, tells us that eating this will make us fat. Eating that will give us cancer. We’re constantly bombarded with how the evil fat is ruining not only our lives, but the lives of friends and family who have to live with this dreadful awful imposition that is being overweight. And in addition to the evils of fat we constantly have affirmed that wrinkles and getting old are a fate worse than death. So is dry skin, boring flat hair, freckles and pale skin. Get tanned, get toned, cover those flaws in your skin, and give your lifeless hair body. Every part of our bodies is critiqued and analysed with solutions being offered by magazines and cosmetic companies until we can be assured that if we use X moisturiser we’ll be as gorgeous as the models that grace the covers of our favourites magazines.

The result of this never ending focus on how you look and the fact that no matter what you do you’re just not good enough is resulting in babies believing they need to avoid dairy and making children that should be playing in the mud believe that they need a toxic poison injected into their face.

And so much more.

The instances of eating disorders in young women, and lately more young men, is rising very rapidly. In a study in Victoria (http://www.eatingdisorders.org.au/media/key-statistics.html) it was found that a very alarming 1 in 10 girls between the ages of 15 and 17 exhibited symptoms of a serious eating disorder.

And worse, a 2005 study commissioned by Dove, surveyed 3,300 girls and women between the ages of 15 and 64 in 10 countries. They found that 90% of all women aged 15 to 64 worldwide want to change at least one aspect of their physical appearance, with body weight ranking the highest.

90% of women were dissatisfied with their bodies and wanted to change something about themselves.

In the spirit of this topic I must confess that I’m one of the 90%. When I sit down and think about it I have a laundry list of things that I’d like to change about myself. I’d like to be healthier, I wouldn’t mind being a bit smaller, I’d really like my calves to fit into normal size knee high boots, and I wish my finger nails didn’t break all the time.

The thing I like about me, though, is that I have to force myself to sit down and think about these ‘faults’. Day to day when I get ready for work in the morning I look in the mirror and I like what I see. I know my size, I know my ‘faults’ and I think they add overall to the greatness that is me. Most women think about and obsess on those things about themselves they don’t like, and it becomes something to focus on, work on, change.

I should acknowledge, however, how long it took me to get to this place where I’m happy with me and my body (for the most part).

As 16 I was a compulsive eater, in that I watched every tiny bit of food that went into my mouth. This was the start of my eating disorder. From about 12 I started to be a curvy girl. I got hips and tits pretty early and it was a source of amusement for those I went to school with. Although I was a tiny size 6, my busting boobs would cause quite the stir with the fellows, and made the girls quite catty. As a result of constant mocking about my size I decided to fix it by not eating unless forced. I’d have breakfast with my mum watching, and dinner when forced, and nothing in-between. And I’d drink enough water to drown a small child. The result was a gradual loss in body size, and a reduction in both hips and tits. My weight at this time was about 50kg or 100lbs.

At 17 I met up with a boy who quite liked my tiny frame, and we moved in together. Working in a lolly shop and eating out quite regularly, as well as a feeling of safety and contentment lead me to gain a wee bit of weight back. Boyfriend did not like that and teased me about being chubby. The result? Living on jelly beans and obsessively exercising until the weight again plummeted. This time to just under 45kg or about 90lbs. You could see my ribs, my collar bones, and my hips jutting out of my body.

And it was awful and I hated myself.

At 33 I have only just found the self-awareness and strength to understand that my body, flaws and all, doesn’t define me. I’ve discovered many great things about myself that have nothing to do with my appearance, and with that understanding have come to learn that what I look like, weak nails, lifeless hair, big thighs, bad skin, it has nothing to do with what kind of person I am. And that allows me to read through a beauty magazine and not feel self-loathing. Instead I feel anger and disgust that we, as a society, can allow these all pervasive messages of ‘you’re not good enough’ to impact our tweens and children to the point of them adopting harmful diet practices and injecting themselves with toxic poison.

I look through the latest celebrity trash mag and feel sad for the people whose job it is to write about Jennifer Aniston’s latest diet secret, and the 10 ways to get smaller thighs. And I feel worse for the ladies that read it and feel like it’s oh so important that they must work on having smaller thighs to feel better about themselves.

Or must know the 20 ways to get better skin.

Or the best tips for better hair.

Because at the end of the day, what does it matter what your hair looks like, or how your manicure is, if you can think about yourself, what you do, what you give to the world, and know for sure that it’s far more important that the way your skin looks.

So the question is, what can we do, as people, to try and combat this world we’ve made for ourselves? How do we teach kids to feel better about themselves in a body obsessed society? How do we fix this? What can you do to stop this malicious trend of self-loathing that is becoming a dangerous disease impacting children and young people world over?

For a start, look in the mirror and instead of listing your flaws, how about you just say “fuck I’m awesome” and walk away just feeling good about yourself. It’ll change your life.