Doll

How I appear in pictures isn't what I think I look like. You know how when you hear a recording of your voice you can't believe that's what you sound like?  It's like that...only physical appearance.  I psychoanalyze my warped ideas of what I look like and I know it has to do with all those hurtful things that were said to me long ago.  I remember specific moments throughout my life that I was told blatantly that I was ugly.

Middle school was by far the worst.  I remember several, but one boy in particular that constantly would greet me by saying "Hey ugly!" I swear if I ever hear my son saying that to a girl I'll take away everything he owns, which doesn't even compare to the damage a boy can do to a young girl by saying that.  I still struggle to believe people when they give me compliments.  When I imagine in my head what I look like, I'm skin and bones...courtesy of nicknames such as "bones" and "freeway, not a curve in sight."  I imagine one of those girls that you see in an advertisement for eating disorder recovery.  I see a face covered in acne, chicken pox scars, and my skin disease (HHD).  I'm insecure about wearing shorts and skirts because I picture that I look similar to a flamingo.  I had many nicknames in high school, Bones, Mango, Frayner, Mandi, Magnanimous, Nefarious One, and one that I loved being called...Doll.  There was a small group of people who called me Doll.  Doll is a nickname that I think is worthy of the person pictured above.  When I was called Doll I felt pretty, I felt like I was that girl I saw in pictures.  I struggle to convince myself I'm an attractive person.  Maybe this is the case for all women.

When I compare myself (and I know all women do) to my friends, I think of them as all being prettier than me.  Yes, all of them.  Each of them possess qualities I wish I had, just ask me and I'll tell you what physical quality it is (side note: this blog is about the physical self, on top of the physical qualities there's many other qualities far more important that my friends possess as well).  Qualities that some of them know they have, but some don't.  It's the friends that don't realize it that I wish I could help, because I imagine they feel as crummy as I do about myself.

Males have so much power over a female's self esteem so early in life.  It took me YEARS to wear a skirt again after a boy in the 2nd grade went around saying "Friday flip up day" and flipped up my skirt.  I remember a friend's attempt to convince me that I was pretty in middle school, which tragically backfired.  She took me around the hallways at lunch to many of the boys we knew and asked them "Who's prettier?"  Unfortunately for me the boys, ones that were dumb enough to reply, said she was prettier, including my crush at the time.  To a middle school boy she was prettier, she had bigger boobs than me (or rather, she had them, and I didn't), and she wasn't towering over them like I was, she also wore clothing that was flattering to her body type.  It's hard for a girl who's straight as a rail to find anything flattering.

When the numerous people said "Amanda, you're so skinny!" all I hear is "You could really use a steak" (which is also something I was told).  I blamed myself, and myself alone, for my best friend's eating disorder.  She obsessed over how skinny I was.  I remember wearing clothes that were baggy to try and hide how skinny I was.  Constantly wearing a big square gray sweatshirt, trying to hide.  I still blame myself, and kick myself for it, for Samm's disorder.  My logical side knows better, I'm able to tell myself "Don't be dumb, you know there's more to an eating disorder than simply having a skinny best friend."

We grow up not talking about our own flaws, not in a open manner at least, in a critical manner yes.  A couple weeks ago a coworker of mine was afraid to ask me a question about my breasts and how they changed after I was pregnant.  She complained that they are now mush and lack shape, I told her I experienced the same thing, that my breasts too lack fullness to such an extent that they start to come out the bottom of my bra (even with underwire) similar to the way the insides come out of a slightly cracked egg.  I love the part of the movie Mean Girls when Lindsey Lohan's character says "I used to think there was just fat and skinny.  Apparently, there's a lot of things that can be wrong on your body."  I try to focus on the good things when I look in the mirror, in effort to overpower my warped sense of self.

Looking back at pictures of myself when I was teen, I don't know how I didn't realize how pretty I was.  I felt completely invisible. And I'm sure I'll be thinking the same thing years from now.  Just wish I could convince myself in the here and now.