I think I’ve always had a problem loving myself. I know the world doesn’t need one more girl with low self-esteem. As large a population as we are, it is just the most god-awful loneliest feeling. I am an African American female, and every single day that I wake up, I feel ugly. I guess from an unbiased standpoint, I really don’t look that bad, and these emotional histrionics are entirely uncalled for. At least that’s what your: therapist, mother, husband, partner, friends, and your own good common sense tell you.
You know better don’t you? When you look in the mirror, you always see the little bit here and there that’s keeping you from complete perfection. For me, it’s existing in a world of beautiful, confident, silken haired, slender, blue-eyed, white women. I know this seems absurd, but I’ve always existed in a social circle where almost all of my friends are white, and I can therefore see with my own dark, sad eyes, and all the ways that they are beautiful and I am not.
Luckily for me, growing up, I didn’t have any major weight concerns, I wasn’t rail thin, but I had what I’d like to think was a nice body. I ate what I wanted, and never really paid that much attention to calorie counts and blah, blah, diet, blah. However, as is often the case, I was a fat girl waiting to happen. After my freshman year of college, I literally ballooned. At 5′2″ I probably went from a curvy 125 pounds, to a plain old round 153 pounds. It was immediately commented on by all who knew me when I returned home, and thus began my obsession with weight.
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