MY STORY: Once upon a time, there was a little girl who was born in a world which had one standard of beauty. From the beginning, it was clear that she did not even come close to the unrealistic standards of beauty in her society. She was reminded daily from her beloved Barbie dolls, her favorite Top 40 musicians and actresses, the subtle remarks of well-meaning family members, and those constant TV commercials and advertisements in the magazines. She was pretty much confronted with these ideals of beauty through every medium in society every moment of every waking minute.
As she started school, she was further reminded by her peers of these standards. Words like "ugly," "fat," and "dog face" became as common as the air she would breathe. An everyday occurrence that made her feel worthless and disgusting. She would endlessly dream about changing this and changing that perhaps through surgery someday. She would put baby oil on her terribly pale skin and suffer multiple blistering sunburns because she was told "tan is beautiful." For years, she would sit on the far left of the classroom and cover the entire side of her face with her right hand because she felt her chin was too small and her nose was too big. She would never say a word because she did not want anyone to ever look at her because she felt she was too ugly. She hated every freckle, her plumb belly, her full lips, and so on and so on.
She grew older and constantly felt unworthy and depressed. Because of this, she studied Psychology in school and wanted to help people with her life. Her body was the antithesis of an athlete, but she found aerobic dance and fell in love with the movement, still always trying to fit in and always missing the mark. Life continued to unfold, babies arrived. New reasons developed for her to hate her body based on society's ideals. Ironically, it was when she was sitting in the office of a plastic surgeon for a free consultation to fix this and to fix that, that she had an awakening. It would cost tens of thousands of dollars to "fix" her, and this just did not seem right.
Disgusted and frustrated, on her way out, she metaphorically noticed a "red pill" (nerdy Matrix reference) which she readily took and began to learn just how far down the rabbit hold actually went. This was a turning point, and she DID NOT have any plastic surgery. The scales began to fall off of her eyes, and the truth was/is shocking.
She is now almost 50 with a body which has given birth to two amazing humans. She embraces every freckle, jiggle, and feature which makes her unique. The irony is that after taking the red pill, she now she feels more confident, worthy, and empowered than her younger self (which looking back now understands that she was not really that gross after all). She no longer needs to conform to the unrealistic standards of beauty artificially designed by her society for other's financial gain and is eager to share what she has learned to uplift others.
She went back to school to study what she really loved, Health Education, which is a perfect blends of psychology and health science. During her studies, she also found the healing power of Yoga and incorporates that into her lifestyle. Now she is on a mission to work with women to help them find their worth, gain their confidence, embrace their health, and know their beauty in a world which capitalizes on constantly making them feel inferior and and not good enough.
At this point, it would be appropriate to say, "The End," but instead it is just the beginning. At this point, you know the girl in the story is me. Instead of the labels that I used to accept (ugly, fat, worthless, dog-face,etc...), I now enthusiastically accept the following: Health Coach for Behavior Change, Trauma-Sensitive Yoga Instructor, Movement Therapist, Personal Trainer, Body Image Ambassador, Low Impact Fitness Instructor, etc.... I will never live up to the body ideals of the world, but I no longer need to or label myself by my physical attributes; I label myself by what I can offer to the world. I hope you feel it through every class I teach and every interaction you have with me.
Please know you are beautiful and worthy just as you are. We do not have to change, but we can seek better health behaviors to stay strong and healthy because our bodies are the vessels with which we do incredible things with our lives. My services are individualized and eclectic based on you. Explore my site and if you are ever interested, please contact me. Thank you for reading my story.