Since you asked, yes, it is possible to be happy with yourself and your body. When I was younger I felt bad about myself a lot, but as I've gotten older I've become much happier and accepting of myself. I'm pretty happy and satisfied with myself and where and how I am today. There are things that worry me, sure, but I feel like my self esteem is in a good range.

I mean, no one is ever completely satisfied: for example, I could stand to exercise more and spend less time procrastinating by posting on internet message boards, but it doesn't make me hate myself that I don't.

This is a great question, and one that I think about a lot since I'm raising a couple of girls.

I've always had a pretty good body image, and I think a lot of it for me had to do with athletics. I think when you're athletic through those rough developmental years you tend to view your body as more than just an ornamental thing for male viewing pleasure. That being said, I did feel a bit self-conscious about my muscular arms and shoulders, since I was in HS in the early 90s, and the athletic female body type hadn't really acheived the acceptance it has now, so I was made to feel like I should be more "delicate" by the girls at my private school who aspired to the anorexic ideal. But generally speaking I felt OK about my body, and I think being active in sports, as well as being brought up as a critical thinker by my parents, helped me the most.

I hear ya. For me, my self-esteem has to be compartmentalized. I love my job, my friends, my family, my cat, my partner, and those things make me feel good.

But I hate my body. And I love AND hate food. And these things, unless I'm careful, can start to overshadow the things I do feel good about. While I'm not in the throes of my eating disorder anymore, there are pieces of it that creep back into my life unless I'm diligent. And there are pieces of it I don't think I'll ever let go of completely.

I am more than my body. But my body makes everything I do love about myself and my life possible. It lets the inner me hug and kiss the people I care about, it keeps my brain fed, it gets me from point A to point B. And it will do these things for me as long as I respect it enough to keep it healthy.

For me, part of my recovery process was getting angry. It was recognizing the reason I equated thin with perfect/good, and realizing that by buying into that line of thinking I was participating in a patriarchial, misogynistic society that I thought should be dismantled. "Gaining weight and getting my head out of the toilet bowl was the most political act I have ever committed." -Chernik

I don't have any answers for you. I just wanted to let you know that you're not alone.

I'm perfectly content with my body, and it's really not all that different from when I used to dislike it. I think there were a couple of things that were key for me. I learned I have a sleeping disorder and once that was treated my attitude in general was just so much better. It was amazing how much that had been weighing me down and making me crazy.

Once I addressed that, I had the energy to exercise and really get into cooking for myself, and during that process, became much for mindful of my body as an extension of myself and something worth taking care of. We only get one of these to live in. Exercising and treating my body good by being mindful of what I put in it (which does NOT mean I ever count calories) has given me so much positive energy and that nice buzz you can get after exercising. The exercise has toned my person somewhat, but it's really not what has made the process valuable to me.

Having a sleeping disorder makes me really value the time and energy I have rather than getting angry at the time and energy I don't have. Worrying about my body is not a valuable use of my time or energy.

I'm much more happy with my body now than I was when I was in high school/college, so like MissKittyFantastico said, my attitude has shifted as I've gotten older and lived more, accomplished more, felt more confident and comfortable with myself in general. I also can relate to what Rachel_in_WY said about athletics giving me a sense of my body as a functional machine and not a decorative piece. I liked being strong and being competent at DOING things.

I'm also tall and dense (more muscle than the average woman) so I LOVE to call people out on their skewed ideas of what women should weigh. The only examples we get are tiny and/or skinny actresses and models who usually lie about their weights. Thus, many men and women have this absolute idea that a number like "125" is the ideal weight regardless of age, body type, or height. I'm 5'10", I weigh 160 lbs, so I love when someone says "omg..when a woman hits ____ she really needs to lose some lard" and I say something like, "Really? Well I weigh 160" and wait for the embarrassed backpedaling. Some co-workers of mine even made me get on the scale in the loading dock b/c they didn't believe me. First off, volume scales exponentially (not linearly) with height, which most people don't take into account. Secondly, I have muscles so I am quite dense. I wear a size 7/8 dress and size 8 jeans, so this "aiming for a size 0 or 2" is just silly to someone my size.

Which get to my point that we really don't have a realistic idea of what real bodies look like, how much real women weigh, and how much variation there is in both of those. Comparing ourselves to media images or advertising ideals is just silly...

I'm also recovering from an eating disorder and while I still have body image hang-ups, I've made much progress. For me, part of my recovery was in realizing the historical, cultural, economic and political trends at play in why thinness is now held next to godliness. What started as a passing interest has now developed into my life's graduate work in feminist food studies and the social history of food-related disorders. The more I learned, the more I realized how I had been bought and sold by much greater forces than the size of my ass.

I also am a prolific blogger on things related to both my personal recovery and graduate research (the-f-word.org), which also helps reinforce my recovery. Blogging and thinking about these issues nearly every day helps remind me where I've been and where I never want to return.

As well, being active physically and eating healthy helps me feel strong in both mind and body. During my eating disorder, I felt compelled to overexercise as a form of self-punishment and have had to rediscover the joy of movement for movement's sake. These thoughts still creep in from time to time, but I try to recognize them for what they are and work through them.

It is not a myth. This reminds me of a book called something like 365 ways to love your body. For some reason I can't find it on amazon now. I remember one of the things it talked about was taking a really good bath. Personally, one thing I like about baths better than showers is that I can enjoy my body more in a bath.
I agree on the food and exercise. It feels really good to cook and eat good nutritious food. People seem to think of nutritious food and think it's gross but there is so much delicious and healthy food out there. I eat when I feel like eating but because of what I eat I feel fine with that. That could have some impact on how I feel with my body because I've heard people who often eat junk feel bad about it because of what it will do to their body. I'm not eating a lot of junk food daily so I see it as a necessary treat rather than losing control.
Anyway, I don't know how you eat so maybe this isn't helpful at all but that's how I see food.
Maybe the fact that I don't have a TV so I see very few commercials helps. I must get way fewer negative cultural messages about body, skin and hair from the media than most people.

I swing rather wildly between being quite okay with my body to manipulating my weight to have something other than my problems to think about.

When I'm very stressed out, I tend to restrict my meals and exercise more. It's odd, because it's less connected with disliking my body as it is (not to say I'm immune from the images tossed at me by the media) and more with, well, a sense of accomplishment as the numbers go down on the scale.

I have an impulse-control disorder called trichotillomania (which is basically compulsive hair pulling). It makes me very self-conscious for a plethora of reasons. One is that representations of flowing, beautiful, long hair are perhaps even more omnipresent in the media than sub-normal body weights. Another is that I can't subdue the nagging feeling that this problem is due to my own lack of willpower. When I start restricting calories, exercising more, and losing weight, it reassures me that I do have self-control, especially because losing weight is something other people have a lot of trouble with.

It's sick, I know.

I used to only restrict and exercise for short spurts, when I felt particularly stressed or when my trich flared up. But ever since I went on some medication to help with the trich, those tendencies have gotten way worse. The medication certainly does control impulses, which is bad if you sometimes fall prey to limiting your food intake. I am pretty much immune to eating if I don't make myself.

So eh? Healthy body image exists, I've been in that mindspace before, but there can be a lot of reasons other than social imagery that can spur bad body image. Sorry, probably doesn't help, but it's been on my brain recently.

I would say I have good self esteem with regard to my body, but it hasn't been easy or uncomplicated.

I'm 4' 10", regularly pass for 15 at the age of 27, have few curves to speak of, have quite a scattering of moles, plenty of scars from medical issues that made my body feel like an enemy or an alien machine on the brink of collapse, and knobby knees on legs that could use a few extra inches of length.

BUT - I also think I have rather nice hair, and I rarely get pimples. I know how to dress my body in a way that both pleases me and is appropriate for what I'm doing. I'm not sure I'd be quite the feisty little thing I am if I wasn't, well, little and therefore seemingly easy to take advantage of. And, for all its quirks, my body lets me do some amazing things - dance, heal, travel, learn... Feel. Live at all.

It's not about being 100% positive about your body, it's about finding things you DO like about it and recognizing the place of the rest. EDs like to tell their sufferers "Forget about all the complexities; your life will be perfect if you're thinner". They're lying through their teeth.

Well, I'm in recovery (according to all official documents, as far as I'm concerned, I'm already there# for anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa and let me just say, congratulations and the best of luck for your recovery! You've made an EXCELLENT choice #this is probably one instance where I'd say you "chose life" [pardon my lame jokes])

Trigger Warning: Icky numbers down below.

To give you a rundown, I'm about 160cms tall (about 5'3" I think), my low weight was below 40kgs (88lbs) and the heaviest I've ever been was around 65kgs (143lbs). Honestly before recovery, I didn't think it was possible to actually like your body either. I thought it was just a matter of pretending. Well, I guess I learned otherwise.

My psychiatrist gave me some valuable advice: What do you like MOST about yourself?

I told him I didn't know because I really hated myself, he chuckled slightly and told me it was impossible to hate everything about yourself 100%, so I told him what I really liked about myself most was MY MIND.

"What do you need to have a healthy mind?" he asked. I didn't know. I had this to ponder upon. I went home, freaked out about my dinner, popped my valium and went to bed.

"Give yourself that one compliment a day on the thing you like most and then rest can often fall into place" he added as I left his office.

The next day when I was busy critisicing myself in the mirror (this tends to happen a fair bit if you have an ED, no?) it dawned on me. How was I going to have save the animals, stop world poverty and end patriachal oppression if I was too busy counting calories and hating MYSELF?
I realised then and there that I couldn't. I realised then that a healthy mind and a healthy body must co-exist.

For the longest time (and I'm sure other ED recoverers/sufferers can probably agree with me here) the words "healthy body" to me translated to fat. But I knew then they didn't. You can't prop up a brain that's filled with so much information and craving more when its body is starting to shut down on itself.

So with that one compliment a day on my magnificant brain (which I still love very much) lead to me thinking, "hey, you know, unlike everyone else I know I've never had a full on acne break out, I smoke, I drink and I do a bunch of other shit and my skin isn't suffering" - BANG, brick number two in the recovery wall was in. I realised hey, my brain and skin are great. Then it struck me again, hey you need food, water and LOVE to make your brain stay strong, and you need all of the above and then some to keep your skin looking good.

From that one session I learned that the easiest way to learn to love your body is to do it in steps. Little bebbehh steps at first, and then when you've got them underway it's easy to look at the big picture and go "Hey, you know, I'm not that bad after all."

Spending a lot of time on photoshopdisasters.com and seeing how airbrushed and fake all my "thinspo" was also made me realise what I wanted was never achieveable all along. Thin didn't equal control anymore. Me having control of me did.

I really hope that helps.

xxx

First off I just want to say well done for being in recovery. I don't think that's said enough. Recovery is hard, so much so that some people live with their disorders for twenty or thirty years, or they die, rather than eat and get better. I was Anorexic for four years and from one ED victim to another, I'm proud of you.

I think that one of the stupid things (and there are many) about most 'love your body, love yourself' campaigns/advertising slogans is that they perpetuate this myth that if we buy x product we can feel fantastic about ourselves *cough*Dove*cough* or that 'good feminists' or 'real women' should respect and love their bodies. Why? because, surprise surprise, they make money out of it.

Look, here's the truth. Everyone, men and women alike, has the odd body/appearance hang-up. Nobody likes 100% of themselves all the time. My mum is a feminist, she used to go to parties in tuxedos instead of dresses, never wore a bra, finds women who want fairytale weddings unfathomable... but she still complains about her belly flab or her wrinkles like everyone else. There's no such thing as this perfect feminist woman who's totally happy with her body and never does anything anti-feminist. The important thing is that you UNDERSTAND that when you look in a magazine, you see a heavily airbrushed, well-lit, heavily made-up version of models and celebrities which looks nothing like the reality and is unattainable.

But most importantly, that your value lies in more than what you look like. Every time you feel fat, ask yourself, so what? If you had a sweet, loyal, funny friend who was fat, would it make you think less of her as a person? Would you stop loving your mother, or sister, or whomever, if they got fat? When you have an eating disorder, you feel like weight/being thin/food is the most important thing in the world because it's all you have. At least, for me, I clung desperately to my disorder because losing weight was the ONLY thing I was good at. If I gave up being thin, I would be nothing. I truly believed that with all my soul because I hated myself so much and I was so miserable. But it wasn't true. I just had an abusive relationship with myself.

You have to stop the self-bullying. Obviously ideally you need a therapist for this but if for some reason that's not an option, Robinson Publishing has a great series of self help guides using cognitive behavioural techniques, including one for self-esteem, one specifically for Anorexia Nervosa, another for Bulimia/Binge eating etc and they are really really helpful. The other book I can't recommend highly enough is "Life Without Ed" by Jenni Schaefer.

I still have feelings of insecurity and self-loathing all the time. I still think "I'm useless, I can't do anything". The difference is that now I can challenge those beliefs rationally, by saying to myself "I feel useless because of X, but am I really useless?" then listing things I have done that show I'm not useless. Even being in recovery in itself shows you're not useless, but I'm sure there are lots of other things too. Look at a picture of yourself as a child and ask yourself - would you call her useless or ugly or whatever? Would you say the stuff you say to yourself to your best friend?

I could talk about this stuff all night, but it's late and I need to get to sleep!

When I don't eat, it's so that I can exercise control over some part of my life. And if I mess up with something, then it's okay, I'm still a good person because I deprive myself of food. (Yeah, I'm not sure how I make that leap either). I'm proud of how skinny I can get because it seems to indicate that I'm more focused on my studies than on my own health.

I'm recognizing that this is what I'm doing, but I haven't really dealt with it yet.

I think it is possible to love yourself. I don't think I'm there yet. I don't want to turn this into a religious discussion, but sometimes, when I remember to turn my thoughts to God, remembering that God loves me is enough to get me to take care of myself, for a little while at least.

I've always been a fat woman, since late childhood. It was horrifying, embarrassing, self-hate-inducing, all of that. Until I started realizing that in spite of a few uncomfortable conversations and a couple of catcalls, being fat hadn't actually hurt me. I'm 5'6" and over 350lbs (I don't know how much over, because the scale at the doctor's office only goes to 350). I'm happily married, physically healthy, have really great, nourishing friendships, a beautiful and healthy son, and I'm 90% of the way to my Ph.D. As a fat woman, I've gotten a high school diploma, a bachelor's with double major, and a master's degree. I've had great sex. I've traveled to Europe and explored Paris, London, and Edinburgh on foot. I've had a healthy pregnancy. I've fallen in love, and been loved in return. I've had the world take my opinion seriously. Granted, my life would be different if I wasn't white, if my parents weren't solidly middle-class, if I was disabled, etc. I have a lot of privilege. But I look like an anorexic's worst nightmare, and my life's not actually a nightmare. At all.

West Virginian Stat Senator Wants to Ban Barbie

Seriously, I'm 20 and I've been doing that whole self-affirmation thing in the mirror ever since I was thirteen and they first introduced it. I'd look in the mirror and (for about twenty seconds) I would tell myself how awesome I was, what pretty hair I had, what pretty eyes, what cute lips, etc. Since then, it's evolved a little bit, sometimes I'm more playful (give myself a wink and say "What's up, sexy?") and sometimes I just look in my eyes and zone out, but it's all about focusing on the good and realizing that people will prefer to see that than any imagined faults.

This affirmation thing has gotten me through my teen years - it's not like I think I'm hotter than some Hollywood drone, but I'm definitely confident in my appearance to a certain degree. It helps. *shrugs*

Thank you so much for posting this jensy. I feel the exact same way. I feel like Im fighting a battle that can only be lost.

But the comments were really uplifting and definitely made me feel hopeful.

Its hard for me, though, to distinguish between eating healthy and exercising to feel good about myself and eating healthy and exercising to control (lose?) weight. When I read that type of advice, I get bitter and assume the poster just has a masked eating disorder. And then I push the advice to one side and write it off as meaningless.
What to do?

Body image is a big old sore spot for me though I rarely admit it. I grew up with an abusive parent who sewed the seeds that sprouted weeds even after I turned 18 and wasn't legally mandated to see him anymore. More to the point, I look like a more slender Scarlett Johansson with a face very reminiscent of Angelina Jolie's, so I approximate an ideal pretty closely. Easy, despite seamstress bills? No.

Even now that I've developed some self esteem, so often people relate to me first and foremost on the basis of my appearance. This is really alienating, since most men in my life have treated me like an expensive car and many women, even strangers, treat me like an enemy. My sex life was horrible for years and years because I learnt from my 'lovers' that my body existed to please them and nothing further. Furthermore, being naturally 'gorgeous' also breeds enormous insecurity: what happens when I get old? Will no one want to be around me anymore, since my looks are the main (or, says a nasty little voice, only) attraction?

When I was in high school I shaved my head, wore very masculine darkside stuff with sport bras, and didn't shave, to try to get the body that attracted all sorts of negative attention to go away. In college I restricted my diet 'til I was 95lbs at 5'7" (which was torture since food is one of my greatest pleasures). I never did anything too stupid because of a few very close girlfriends and my mom, who all knew something was going on and always subtly reminded me that I was good for more than what I look like.

My body image finally improved when I ditched long-standing sources of negativity in my life (cut off contact with abusive relatives, consciously rejected the sex industry's model of female sexuality, bought a vibrator and finally had an orgasm, etc.). I generally decided that I didn't need anyone's approval in order to exist and reminded myself of it over and over and over and over.

These days, in my mid-20's, I not only spend hours over the stove but hours at table (yay!), go to the gym twice a week, still don't shave or wear makeup, and no longer suffer from gnawing insecurity all the time. Especially in our culture where women's worth is equated with our looks, nobody is totally free of this crap. But you can climb out of the hole if you keep vigilant.

You know, this may seem very silly, but something that really helped me learn to love my body for what it is (and not what it "should" be) was stopping the purchasing the bulk of my clothing at major stores.

When I was about thirteen, I had a growth spurt and my somewhat pudgy prepubescent shape evened out into something a bit more proportional. Thus, I needed some new jeans; my mom took me to a department store, and I promptly discovered that I couldn't haul any of the junior's department jeans over my ass. This was mostly because they were designed for girls with pre-pubescent builds and no hips, I recognized later, but it crushed my self-esteem for weeks.

When I started looking for my clothing in alternate venues, I felt a lot better about myself because I realized that it was the clothes that were the problem more than the body they rested on. Although I don't use my clothing and makeup as armor, like many women do when going into the world, I was honestly surprised at how empowering it was to find something that fit and flattered my shape. Different cuts in clothing, which in my experience are often difficult to find at the mall or in big stores, make all the difference in the world; while many designers seem blind to the fact that there are as many shapes as there are people, there are just as many that embrace it. All bodies are beautiful, it's just a matter of figuring out how to showcase them in a way that you like and makes you feel good about how you look and feel when you leave the house in the morning. For a proliferation of quality goods from a variety of designers who target women of all shapes and sizes, try eBay-- not an advertisement, it's just where I've had the most luck, in terms of price as much as nice clothing. (Just make sure you have a tape-measure with you, and demand measurements from the sellers!)

I don't know how useful you'll find that, but it's helped me; another thing that's kept me liking myself is focusing on good and productive things that I've done and like the results of. For example-- finally icing a cake correctly, writing a really kickass essay, stuff like that.

I recommend trying something that's interested you for a while but you've not done before-- a hobby, a craft, anything-- but in a noncompetitive environment where you can have fun; if you like your labors and the fruits of your labors, you'll eventually become fonder of the person who is doing the work. For me, self-acceptance came very slowly, and kind of in a spiral-- I started at the edge of my personality, appreciating superficial details about myself, and eventually ended up at my actual personality.

Finally, something you've probably heard a thousand times before: "comparisons are bad" Don't bother comparing yourself to other people; it's energy better spent on focusing on things you love. If you have to measure yourself, only do it in relation TO yourself; see how far you've progressed from where you were before, and be proud.

I wish you the best of luck on the rocky road to contentment with the self; congratulations on having the strength to grapple with your eating disorder.

I think every woman has a self-esteem issue at some point in their lives, whether due to social standards or struggling with weight, or what have you.

I myself, go through phases. I will get up in the morning, get undressed for a shower in front of the mirror and say, "Damn, I look so GOOD!" and then when I get out of the shower, I look in the mirror again and say, "What? I'm UGLY? When did THIS happen?"

Every woman is someone's "taste" in women, but I think that most of all, confidence is a woman's best feature, physically.

Hey, thanks for posting this.

For someone who has struggled with neurosis for years, I know how you feel. I did not have an ED, but I believe that I can empathize with the mindset.

I used to hate everything about myself. It was a lucky day that I could not say something self-defeating to myself. Some days I would feel really great, sexy, smart. Other days I would feel hideous, horrible, stupid, unattractive. I would try self-affirmations in the mirror. They were like a band-aid on a gunshot wound.

Now, I'm completely over it. I am a 21-year-old woman who is now completely comfortable with her body and almost with her mind (I still have a lot of developing to do, but I am very proud of the fact that I am even trying to develop my mind in the first place)

This is what worked for me and I hope it works for you if you try it.

1. Total T.V. Turn-off. I love the show Weeds. Nancy Botwin is just so sexy, and every time I saw the show I would wonder "should I grow my hair out? should I get some shoes like that? I could be like her, I could be that sexy if I really tried and maybe got a new outfit and a new haircut" One day I caught myself thinking those self-defeating beliefs, and linked those beliefs and the images I was exposing myself to to the overarching themes of feminism and body dissatisfaction. I then decided to try not watching any TV for a while. It was hard at first, but I re-found my love of reading and writing. I stopped comparing myself to other women on the street and in the television or magazines. I learned to appreciate women for their sexiness without wanting to become them.

2. Got rid of my mirrors for a bit. I moved my mirrors into another room and just got used to living in my body, without knowing what it looked like. The only time I got to see myself was when I was in pictures with my friends. It was very good to see myself not posing, but looking natural and a little goofy.

3. Got rid of other beauty routines, like shaving. I found that I was not as disgustingly hairy as I thought, and that I actually liked how my armpit hair keeps all the smells in and keeps me cool so I don't sweat as much. I don't even need to use anti-perspirant any more, and I'd been using prescription strength on and off since I was nine! ( I also started shaving my legs when I was nine, because my mom made me wear tights to school and the hair on my legs made the tights itchy)

4. Found myself a uniform, of sorts. I used to go to an all-girls' school where we had to wear a uniform every day. As soon as I got to college, I found myself missing my uniform. So I found a pair of well-fitting trousers from Patagonia, an environmental company that makes really good clothing for women (sorry I'm a bit of a salesperson when it comes to brands I like). Their clothing is very comfortable, VERY well made (this stuff is meant to withstand camping, hiking, rock climbing..etc) fits my body very well, and has lots of pockets! I found that wearing the same few styles of clothing, ones I knew that looked respectable and clean, gave my day a predictability and myself a peace of mind.

Anyway, after all of that (took about 8-10 months), I can honestly say that I am in a state of mind that I used to think was impossible. It was not a smooth journey, and there were times when I wondered if I shouldn't go back to trying to look pretty.

The day I knew that I was 100% comfortable with my appearance was the day I accidentally shaved my head... practically bald. My friend shaved a bald patch by accident on the back of my head when she was trimming my hair (I have shortish hair and can trim the back with clippers on a 1" setting) I started laughing and said, well I guess it'll all have to come off! So I shaved my entire head, bald! It was so hilarious, but when I looked at myself in the mirror, I was not disgusted or ashamed. I liked the feel of the wind on my scalp, and I realized that I had "cured" myself of my bodily self-hatred months ago.

There were some other psychological things I had to go through as well, like allowing myself to hate people who had wronged me in the past and to not blame myself for some things I had no control over. I realized how much striving for perfection, moral and bodily, was destroying my mind. Before, I was thinking "how am I going to build that school in Rwanda if I'm beating myself up all the time?". Now I think "how am I going to get my degree in psychiatry if I'm off building a school in Rwanda?"

I also realized that I wanted legitimate power. Power that men get through violence and power that women get through their appearance is bodily power, and I think, a less legitimate power than mind power. The power that men and women get through emotional manipulation is also a very inferior form of power, it is like admitting that you couldn't achieve power without cheating. It is not the sort of power that I think is legitimate or 'personal'. Personal power for me is the power of my mind, power to construct an argument, power of insight, to change peoples' minds, or control them not through manipulation, force or my body, but to have them willingly follow me. And it all started with self-control.