We’ve all seen it scrolling down the Body Positivity hashtag on twitter — The ‘healthy’ talking about how health should triumph, health is the only thing that matters, about how you don’t deserve body positivity if you aren’t ‘healthy’.
(Trigger Warning: Mental illness, Depression, Eating Disorders, Starvation, Self-hate.)
Not only is this incredibly rude, but it is also exclusive and damaging to those of us who can never be healthy. Messages outlining the tag on twitter are telling people that they can’t be happy in their bodies if they aren’t this ideal picture of health but they seem to forget not everyone can be healthy.
My experience: I’m a fat 20 year old struggling with my mental and physical health.
When I was in High School I developed an eating disorder. Periodically my body would reject food: gagging when taking bites of a sandwich, only being able to keep down small amounts of soup, periodic fasting for days on end. Five years later I still have days where my body doesn’t want to eat. I get scared of food and can’t bring myself to eat anything over a limited amount of calories. No matter what size my body is at I will experience short relapses. Is starvation healthy? Does my uncontrollable fear of food mean that I don’t deserve body positivity?
What else excludes me from being healthy? Major Depressive Disorder and Anxiety. My mental health should really be called mental not-health. My depression sends me into episodes where I can’t bring myself to leave my bed, stay hydrated, or even clean myself. Medication has never helped and a simple jog doesn’t make MDD or anxiety disappear. Is it healthy for a 20 year old to have to ask her boyfriend to talk to shopkeepers or check the shadows in the corner of rooms? No. This isn’t healthy, and never will be regardless of whether I heal from my disordered eating. Does this mean I don’t deserve body positivity?
Why is it so hard for people to understand that health is so much more than eating vegetables and jogging?
Body positivity was never intended JUST for your healthy bodies. Body positivity used to celebrate the disabled, mentally ill, chronically and terminally ill, the fat, the thin, the somewhere in-betweens, the societal underdogs that don’t get their bodies celebrated in magazines or on T.V. shows. Pushing the idea that to be body positive you have to be healthy is unfair and unjust. By spreading this message you are doing a disservice to your fellow human beings that don’t have the privilege you do. I’m glad there are people out there who can make it through life with full control of their minds and bodies, but you people need to understand that we aren’t all this fortunate.
Please, stop your exclusive view of body positivity or start your own movement — I promise you are doing far more harm than good.
If you enjoyed this please consinder buying me a cup of coffee! Thank you.
