"You're so tiny"

My blog is a space where I write about my thoughts and feelings, in order to make sense of them and to stop them from just being inside of my head. I mainly write about things that are important to me, issues that I feel need addressing and pretty much anything that I deem important. However, there has been something that has bothered me for a while now, yet I have always put off writing about it mainly due to the fact that I didn't know whether or not it was too personal, or too out there to publish. After an incident yesterday, I felt that it was the time to write about this - although I would never regard myself as influential in any way, through my blog I know that I have a voice and a platform to address topics which I see as important and may help people understand the impact that they have on other people.

Whilst I'm terrified to post this, the thought that it may be able to help someone, or even make people stop and think before they make a comment that they may see as 'harmless' yet can have more of an effect than they realise, truly motivates me to write and publish this. So ... here we go.

I was never a 'big' child, aside from the expected 'puppy fat' which I developed during my pre/early teens - which, admittedly, I didn't have much of. I've written before about there being a growing pressure on young girls to look a certain way, and I know that this was something that affected me - I remember crying on multiple occasions about the fact that I had put weight on, and it truly would make me feel horrible. As young girls develop into women (although I think I'm still waiting for that to happen... haha) it's expected that they're going to put on a bit of weight - unfortunately we can't wear kids clothes for the rest of our lives (however hard I may try!) - yet it still came as a huge shock to me when I did.

I remember being in my early teens and having constant hang ups about my body - I used to constantly think about how much weight I wanted to lose, and dream about having a toned stomach and shapely arms. However, although I thought this all the time, I never really did anything about it - mainly due to my love for anything of the chocolate variety, and the fact that I'm not the biggest fan of exercise.

As I grew up, my weight levelled out and I developed a figure which was slightly on the smaller side ('the figure of an 11 year old boy' as people like to point out), and I was now faced with being constantly torn between wanting to stay like that, or to gain a few pounds and be more 'womanly'. Yet due to 1) a fast metabolism, 2) being a vegetarian and 3) not having a tremendously big appetite, this never happened. Over the past year, I have lost weight due to understandable reasons, but was on my way to becoming more accepting towards my body and yes, perhaps the 'lack of' assets that I possess. After the incident yesterday, I came home and clicked 'new post' on my Blogger page, and felt the need to rant, just to let everything out, admittedly to save me from keeping it all in my head and it leading onto a bigger issue.

Here you go;

I'm writing this because I've had enough. At the time that I am currently writing this, I have come home after experiencing a situation where I was made to feel like complete and utter rubbish about myself - in particular, my body. For some reason, as of recently, people have felt the need to comment on my figure, and I'm SICK OF IT. For many people saying things like 'oh, you're so tiny' or 'I think you could do with putting a bit of weight' is deemed okay, and is apparently meant to be taken as a compliment - which, if I'm perfectly honest, I'm still trying to figure out how that could be. If I was to turn round and say to someone 'oh, you're so big' or 'I think you could do with losing a bit of weight' (which I would never ever EVER dream of saying to someone, but let's just look at this from a hypothetical point of view) it would most definitely not be deemed as socially acceptable or okay in any shape or form, so why do different rules apply to people who are on the smaller side?

Body confidence is something that is becoming well recognised and celebrated, yet I honestly do believe that people need a bit of help with understanding the meaning of this. Body confidence shouldn't just be about praising people with curves or even attempting to make them feel better by pointing out how 'disgusting' it is when people's hipbones stick out. Once you really look into it, some of the things you find are so utterly insulting - an example being 'Real Men Go For Curves, Only Dogs Like Bones' - as if we should somehow put on weight to complete our lifelong quest to find a 'real man', it truly is just ridiculous. I think body confidence should be more about celebrating every body, regardless of your shape or size, and less about comparing the two in order to make someone feel better - because, realistically, you're just making another person feel worse. There's been countless occasions where I've felt good in an outfit, and then had a comment said about my weight - which has resulted in me going and covering up in a big jumper or, my favourite thing EVER, my dressing gown.

I think it's a universal truth that we all want what we can't have, whether we admit that or not. Whilst I would like to blame people's comments on jealousy or whatnot, I still don't think that it can be excused - would we be so desperate to find an explanation if it were aimed at someone who was a bit larger? What I find particularly sad is that I can honestly say that I don't know anyone who's happy and confident with their body, and I wish that I could change that - yet I know for a fact that the way to go about this isn't by looking at other body shapes and comparing yours in a more positive light, it should be about remembering the fact that every body (&everybody) is beautiful in their own way - regardless of whether they're a size 4 or a size 40.

To be kind and respectful towards others, we firstly need to start with ourselves. Instead of looking in the mirror and thinking about what you'd like to change about yourself, how about you instead focus on what you like about yourself? If you're struggling with that, read this quote by Shane Koyczan, one of my all time favourite spoken word poets;


I'm sorry for the long rant, but I felt like it was time to address this. It's 2017, and people are still commenting negatively on other people's body types, and I'm fed up with it. How about before you say anything, even if you mean it in a nice way, you take a couple of seconds to think and process what you are actually about to say - starting by putting yourself in the other persons shoes and thinking about how you would feel if they were to say it to you. There's so so much more to a person than just how they look but, speaking from experience, it does feel absolutely awful when people make comments about your appearance. So, for now, how about we practise self love and self care, and then project that towards other people?

I hope you enjoyed (??) this blog post, and I'll see you next week.

Love,
Grace x

3 comments:

  1. Spot on. We've all read it in this house. Each of us can take something from this

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  2. Thank you Carole! Hopefully see you soon xx

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    Replies
    1. I wait for these blogs. Sometimes you speak for my 'little' girl 😡

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