Beginning Influence on Body Image
I work on weight loss. I remember the exact year I started on this mad, complicated, endless, frustrating quest. I was a freshman in high school. I had a crush on my social studies teacher, John McCutchen. I found a book on military exercises at home and started. I diligently worked out every day in my bedroom. It was the first time I realized I was having seconds, at the dinner table, just like my brothers. For years I felt like one of the boys. I played with them, fought with them, competed with them and had no desire to go through, what my older sisters were, to be a “lady”. It seemed pretty complex and time-consuming. The nuns, who were my teachers at the the Catholic school for eight years, scared the crap out of me. It didn’t seem a girl could win in any way, shape or form. But, when you have a crush on a guy, you realize what girl-hood is or what social norms and body forms should ...