Lauren S

A Personal Paradox

Who I am as a human being pretty much goes without question from myself. I’m really proud of who I am, what I continue to work for, and the amount of love I have to give. It’s just that my feelings about my own flesh eat me alive.

I don’t know how to accept my beauty in a present moment. There are these times when I’m able to see myself and feel beautiful, but there are also hours, sometimes days I spend really kind of ...tearing myself apart.

Maybe I don’t look at myself enough?

I feel disassociated with my body sometimes. I can look at a photo of myself from a past time and see how I’m pretty, but then I look in the mirror and it slips from me.

How can I feel good on the inside but not on the outside?

I can barely find pants to fit my body shape. Even bra’s & women's wear is a difficult challenge. Who are they making these clothes for anyway? Because they sure don’t fit me at all. My ass is always too big, but my waist is too small, I’m left constantly pulling my pants up because they fall down the sides of me. I gave up on wearing a bra long ago, i’m tired of picking up my boobs and watching them spill out of everything that’s supposed to be “fitting” for them. Am I plus size? am I not? Why does this persons medium fit me, but this persons large is barely enough to wrap around?

Growing up in a mormon state my mom even though she was not religious always told me to lift my shirt, that having cleavage is a call for attention… but she gave me these boobs? was she taught the same thing? Did she know better or was she also living in her own insecurities & societal norms.

I spent my younger years hanging with the pretty people in hopes that I would somehow gain what they had.. could I be pretty enough? Would the hot & popular boys ever want me? Would they look at me the same way they do at the skinny girls? I came to find that I was chasing a facade and I was never able to achieve what I intended to. Instead I began to follow my heart and more than I could’ve imagined has come from this, yet body acceptance is still on the far end of all of this.

Why am I so far away?

Why can I look at all of my friends and see their pure unapologetic beauty, yet I’m so far from seeing my own. You see? This paradox I live in eats me daily.

But instead of sitting in my state of constant wonder and this paradox I have decided d to create forward movement, and so I began with allowing myself to be naked and unveiled in front of two women that helped me feel powerful, their love was absolutely unconditional and at no point did I question what I was doing. To have these photo’s taken of me made me feel whole for that hour of my life I was unveiled and beautiful no matter which way I stood. I will remember that feeling forever, and I will look at these photo’s and remind myself THAT’s the real me.

Thank you 36-24-36 for reminding me that there are more people who feel like I do. So many moments I feel so alone in all of this, and the truth is that I’m not. Not in the slightest.