Own Your Flaws | How Body Shaming and Criticism in Early Years Taught Me to Love Myself

I remember when I was around five years old, people would often say to my mom, “She is extremely skinny.”. Most Indians in my surroundings have normalised body shaming for decades, and reacting to their comments has been considered rude. One is expected to embrace this toxicity, else be prepared to being cornered.

My medical history wasn’t going well around that time. As long as I can recall, I would get sick quite regularly. I even caught malaria once when I was three, and it took me one whole year to recover. My appetite dropped. I’d barely eat except some sweets and things with added sugar. Once I got a taste of sugar, I was addicted to it and refused to even try vegetables and other healthy meal and snack options. Little did I know that that would be my ultimate struggle for over half of my life. Back to the point, a doctor once suggested to eat eggs and I did, but no improvement. My family of origin has been vegetarian, so eating eggs was the limit.

Most people wouldn’t try to know about the background story I just said, but would not hesitate to act mean. As a child, it did not bother me as I was still discovering humankind, but it was downright annoying to my mother. I can now relate since my child is skinny-shamed at present. We are all tolerant enough to brush things off like this if it’s told a couple of times on an occasional basis. But if every other person we encounter says something negative on repeat, it cuts through our skin.

Fast forward to my primary class, I began to gain body mass and it kept bulking throughout my teen years. Now was the time when they commented on how much I ate, how I looked, that staying slim should be the goal until marriage, and so on. With absolutely no guidance at all on food and nutrition, what should I eat and in what quantity, I mindlessly experimented with several failed attempts. There used to be useless advice by people who had no experience and knowledge in hand, no educational degree, and yet were confident about how to reduce weight.

Several of them were naturally gifted with a lean body structure and fast metabolism that made me envy them. They would be the ones who could consume five chapatis in a go with no trace of cellulite. It was downright frustrating to make efforts like aiming at blind spots where there was no guarantee of results, but I was doing it anyway.

The worst part, there was no strong will or motivation to stick to a routine I set. Not eating my favourite stuff was a punishment, and I would give up at some point. Not getting any result at all would further demotivate me. This write-up is not about how to lose weight (except traces of experiments on myself) because there is ocean of contents circulating already, but more about my personal struggles as a young teenager and a person in her early twenties and thirties.

My first successful attempt of weight loss

My first successful attempt to lose weight occurred during my summer vacation after my class tenth board exams. I got a good company of a neighbour girl somewhat older than me, who was also keen in shedding some of her weight, and we would both go for tracking on a daily basis. I made real efforts on cutting carbohydrate rich food like chapatis and rice, and instead focused more on fruits and vegetables. On top of that, I consumed lukewarm lemon water without fail, and it worked like charm within 45 days of regular tracking. Five kilograms of loss at an age of 16+ years.

Then I went to Goa with my family when that vacation was still going on, and so, put on some back again. But this time I knew what to do. I discovered it myself through reading and experimenting.

Struggle as a growing teen student – Score Well, and Look Appealing

I sometimes feel that as a girl who is still growing up and needs to prove herself in fields like studies and appearance in parallel are tough spots to conquer. One could achieve either but seldom both. There is this ‘beauty standard’ that never leaves girls and women alone, and they are forced to match those standards until their death.

When they actually achieve their set targets, they are bullied for something else out of insecurities and jealousy from other folks. Boys have insecurities, too. But they are the ones who can talk about it from their viewpoint.

Worst Beauty Standards in the World

Fat Shaming or Not, How beauty standards damaged the health of women from around the world

If you look into the historical data, you will find some weird sh*t designed specifically for women. Some popular real-world examples include – wearing extremely tight boots in China centuries ago (search for Foot Binding in China) that deformed their feet's bones, putting on a circular plate around the lower lip area (lip plating or labret piercing) in some remote parts of Africa (Mursi, Suri, Surma tribes, Ethiopia) even at present, being obese in middle-eastern region to the point of needing to have surgical removal, and so on.

So many parts around the world where being lean is the norm, women struggle mentally and there are well-documented instances of developing conditions like Anorexia Nervosa leading to death if not addressed on time.

Unaware of the fact that people put each other down to camouflage their own insecurities, I spent years in pleasing them by trying hard to keep up with the beauty standard, the term I wasn’t familiar with back then.

I would gain and lose weight on repeat, and there are moments that I discuss here in this very blog. After the first successful attempt as I mentioned, I could not maintain my body and it kept looping back to previous physical state. In the next two years, it got worse. I began to become obese when I was promoted to class 12. As per my height, I should have had 52-54 Kg approximately, but reached 67 Kg instead. There was already pressure building up to score good grades in board exams, but here I was barely surviving my mental health, let alone my physical health.

Body Dysmorphia - The Harmful Effects of Body Shaming

How does the decline in mental health affect willpower and determination, and in turn, physique?

If mental conditions like stress, anxiety, and depression surge, an individual cannot function normally no matter whether they achieve results. Either they would not be able to concentrate in minutest of daily tasks, or would be an over-achiever with constant pressure to prove things.

There is a whole list of reasons why one reaches depression, sometimes to the point of being suicidal. It could be a combination of genetics or circumstantial events or both. Some people never experience such extremes, maybe due to their avoidant tendencies. Other experience it, but don’t reach that threshold of committing suicide. If someone is battling with a major mental health crisis and still shows reluctance to admitting that they have an issue, let alone proactively working to treat it, it leaks through other means. They might snap at someone, get irritable, and so on.

My mental health went down due to multiple reasons, such as getting mistreated, mocked, bullied, taunted, yelled at home environment, neighbourhood, and school. Being criticised due to my appearance held a huge part in that bullying. I gradually began to have body dysmorphia. This collectively had a negative impact on my mental and physical health. People either eat more, or their appetite completely drops if they are depressed. I put on weight due to poor mental health.

As mentioned earlier, the shedding and putting back my body mass had always been a struggle, there are instances of losing it for limited period of time. If there was an event to look forward to, it got easier. This happened just before commencement of 12th board examination, when Farewell was about to arrive, so I lost 12 Kg back again via different strategy this time. I felt good for a while about my appearance when I wore a red-black combination saree. But that was temporary.

What happens if our targets are conquered? We feel better about ourselves, that we are capable enough. Hence, it was a nice motivation to focus solely on studies. It was like a mental checkpoint. Something like – I had achieved this, now time to focus on that. I keep talking about studies alongside not to divert the original point, but because this was yet another area where results weren’t showing, an added reason why my self-esteem was spiraling downwards. There was no pressure or repercussions at home whatever results I was bringing, but if someone else is getting all the praises because of their scores, it is like a subtle pressure that silently builds up one doesn’t ask for like a stake on their self-worth.

Co-relation between weight gain and mental health

But here is a thing – shedding body mass index makes no promises to bring back mental health on track. Therefore, even if someone becomes slim, it’s a good ego upliftment for a while yet not a lifelong fix. One has to work separately through deep inner work for their mental health crises.

As a student, pupils are expected to make the best use of their time, and mental illness is already a taboo subject, working on this part is kept on back seat. Individually, I wasn’t even aware that I was battling clinical depression, let alone working to improve it. On top of that, the time was limited and there were hundreds of topics in the syllabus to cram.

Depression is not an overnight arrival. It is gradual and suddenly we feel that something is seriously off within that we cannot explain. I was always made to believe through the years, directly, or in a subtle way that I wasn’t good enough and worthy to be liked, loved, and praised, and so, the inner critic started forming in my psyche like a permanent rust, and that self-hatred slowly sculpted within piece by piece until this day. I am not depressed at present as I know my trigger points and ways to deal with them. But this is how it entered my world.

In those days, I began counting the number of things I sucked at instead of blessings, looks, natural talents, and skills. I genuinely believed that everyone was ahead of me, and I would remain behind in many aspects for the rest of my life. A good concentration in studies also required some degree of good mental health which wasn’t in place, so I was losing my sh*t by comparing myself with my peers.

When the board results were out, I was unable to bring even average result. I got supplementary in one of the science subjects, which acted as a barrier to get admission in good colleges. The previous plans to move to a new city were put on hold for a while. In addition, there was a deep shame that I failed in one subject about which I did not want to talk. Talking would mean admitting and accepting the truth. The idea was to hide this fact from the rest of the world by secretly studying in silence and pass the subject.

The practical next step was getting distracted by clearing the backlog so that my new college wouldn’t cancel my admission. This time the stars aligned well and I cleared it. The three years went fairly well and I graduated. I did not yet work on mental health. Everything else was on priority, except this part.

As usual, my attempts to lose weight continued the entire time. I would get the results, but couldn’t maintain it due to my love for food. It was a never-ending loop.

They skinny-shamed for being lean, and fat-shamed at the time of putting on weight.

When I realised that people would put me down no matter what, I had to take the route of owning my authentic self, the good parts and the bad parts with equal acceptance. I could no longer hate myself if they hate me. The change in this perspective formed somewhere in my late twenties. I have instances to share how I started to plant that seed once this realisation hit.

When it is Time to Own Your Flaws

Owning flaws is not easy, but once we reach there, there is no looking back. After growing up in a society that praises high achievers, where there is little to no room for those having average capacity let alone the lesser ones, surviving in such backgrounds is hard.

There are people who either flaunt their achievements or lie about it if they don't accomplish anything. By repeatedly saying out loud, they eventually believe their own lies. Getting praises and a good image are crucial since other people’s opinions matter a lot in the population of South Asian/Indian subcontinent.

To own one’s flaws is ego death. Death of the ‘idea’ of you people have in mind, and returning of the real You that already exists but was kept hidden. When there is no agitation of people’s perception of you, slowly and steadily, authentic evolution arises.

Now the question hits, if your tactics of people-pleasing have been working tremendously fine for all these years, then why should you bother about showing them the real self, the version you might be scared of showcasing since you don’t believe it’s worth showing? Have you ever experienced that feeling of disconnection with yourself? Like you are in a middle of something great where you are supposed to be happy but are dissociated instead? Or a constant pressure to keep up the well-crafted image? What if someone finds out something about you which isn’t nice and now you are afraid that person would reveal that to the rest of the world? That’s why. When we are not afraid of our flaws then who would put us down, and for what?

Of course, this is not for those who have sinister tendencies. But most of us are just afraid of trivial issues. Know that people have this habit to speak something negative and it is impossible to keep everyone happy. You have to rise above that.

Own Your Flaws by Tyrion Lannister – The Game of Thrones Reference

Sometimes movies and television series have great philosophies we can actually implement in our lives or learn a thing or two.

I watched The Game of Thrones series some years ago. There was this character Tyrion Lannister, who was born a dwarf. He was constantly blamed, name-called, and shamed for being this tiny, the one who ‘killed’ his own mother at the time of his birth because his head was large enough to tear his mother to death. He had no other choice to embrace the way he was born. That’s why he was one of the most beloved fictional characters in the series. I personally loved some of his quotes.

Once you’ve accepted your flaws, no one can use them against you.

Tyrion Lannister

Never forget what you are, the rest of the world will not. Wear it like armour and it can never be used to hurt you.

There are instances in real life when some individuals take birth in a certain way, and that does not conform to the societal norms, such as dark skin. Some are not born with ‘flaws’ but meet with an accident, for instance, that might make them paralysed, or be a victim of a planned acid attack. Should they all self-sabotage, or learn to accept their situation?

Just a few inches increase in my waistline, or a few more pimples or blemish marks would shatter my self-worth. I would always wonder how an acid attack victim leads a normal life with a constant remark of “Who would marry her?” because marriage has been the main indicator of her worth. Most of them cannot because people in their surroundings are real pain in the arse, yet there are empowered cases I read. This is how I had to own whatever I am, whoever I am. And not getting validation most of my life acted as a real catalyst. When people are not pleased with you anyway, there is no pressure that so-and-so person would be disappointed. They already are!

How getting criticised in early years, and later not being approved of my past mental struggles, shaped my personality?

There are instances where some people had questioned why I, being born in a privileged background, could feel worthless, lacked confidence and self-esteem, and battled depression twice. I’d ask them to spend one whole year in an environment where other people should never validate them, mock them constantly, tell them that they would never achieve worthwhile in their life like a daily drug dose, and then come back happy. I had literally spent, not weeks, not months, but over two decades of my life in such surroundings.

After getting criticism more often than praises, I feel that I deserve at least be recognised for the efforts I put in years to become a version of myself who is slowly learning to find love within, even without external approval. This is disheartening to keep explaining myself as if I am talking to a wall. Disheartened because people who questioned my personal battles, were close.

Example How Name-calling, Cursing, and Shaming Caused a Plant to Die, Literally!

To put it into perspective, how words could harm someone for life, I once came across a Facebook post about plants that I want to share. There was a display of two exact same plants in the same physical conditions, getting water, sunlight, and everything else vital for their wellbeing, except one thing. One plant in that experiment was told positive things, and the other one was not only deprived of it but also was cursed. Within a few weeks, the cursed one became lifeless and the one that was told good things was thriving. The post circulated a lot on the internet over a decade ago and I believed that it was true.

If a flower doesn't bloom. You fix the environment it grows in, not the flower.

After years of questioning why certain things occured to me, I came to realisation that we somehow have to go through drastic situations for half or more of our lives to trigger self-love within. A child would believe what is being told to them. If they say, you are beautiful, funny, you’d start believing that you are. The reverse is also true. If they tell you that you are boring, fat and ugly, and nobody would find you attractive, you would believe that as well.

After some soul-crushing experience, I had to shed my old beliefs regarding the idea of attractiveness and upgrade my mindset beyond the ordinary.

How Reframing Your Mind Helps

How seeing through the lens of ‘health’ and ‘nutrients’ reframed my thinking process and how it impacted my physical self?

My weight loss struggle remained a constant loop of battles because I was focusing more on how I looked rather than putting efforts on the nutrition part, working on possible deficiencies and stuff.

There came a point when I wasn’t just dealing with gaining weight but hormonal imbalances and biological impact due to that. This made my weight loss problem even more burdensome. I was not losing at all, or even if I did, the increment was fast and drastic. My love for junk food items worsened the case.

There came a point when I had to find out the root causes behind so that the efforts I put were precise and razor sharp and not wasted. After finding out that dairy products were the main culprit behind all this, I instantly cut back all of them. With many other changes alongside, such as consuming right amounts of protein, Vitamins, iron, calcium, Omega-3s, etc. I could finally maintain the shape with authentic health inside and out.

Correlation between Mindful Eating and Weight-loss

Mindful eating refers to concentration on food and not using distractions like mobile phones or television. This helps in grounding to your present reality, and that further helps in mindfully understanding the hunger cues. Screentime doesn't let us consciously know whether our stomach is full. That's why it leads to overeating and weight gain.

Additionally, I also worked on training my mind whatever I was consuming was healthy and delicious. The way we look at it is important because if we see junk food as tasty, and healthier options as a punishment, the will power and discipline would eventually explode. To stay consistent what we plan and begin in our daily routine needs determination which can’t be achieved without a positive outlook.

Hence, I lose weight, maintain it, and also feel good about my appearance. It’s a win win! Not that I don’t get conscious at all about my looks at present, but it is more manageable than before. This is definitely not an overnight process but takes a while based on how someone is willing to make changes within.

My determination to gain real knowledge about weight loss has put me in position of ‘someone who knows how to lose weight and maintain’. I’ve been directly called over the phone/communicated by people as if I am some kind of nutritional/health expert. The only advice I can give to them is that will power and determination are the only ways one can stick to the weight loss journey they plan. People go out of their way to make sudden changes in their lifestyle for a week only to be back to their older routine. That’s why only a handful of people achieve it and many don’t.

If your goal is to lose body mass, make a good plan based on what information you receive from sources that you think might work on you, and follow through one baby step at a time. You can’t eat an ice cream today ‘one last time’ and consume salad and spinach the next day. It’s not feasible. Reduce little amounts of food from your natural dietary habits. Cut off your favourite junk completely for at least 3-4 weeks and then a very little portion of it when you do eat them. The more you give yourself time to not munch on them, the more you’d starve less for them. This isn’t applicable in case you are going on a hunger strike. Else it will back fire like a nuclear collapse.

But remember, there are no shortcuts for that. No amount of pills, morning walkers, herbal teas, acupressure shoe-sole, etc. would help you without any lifestyle changes. If you’re really making adjustments on your lifestyle then buying those things wouldn’t be needed in the first place.