Body Dysmorphia is a Bitch

A quick anecdote to illustrate the evil, sneaky, manipulative, irrational, ridiculousness that is body dysmorphia:

There is a woman. Let’s call her M. I see M almost every day. For months I dreaded being around her because I was convinced she was sooooo much thinner than I am and it made me feel like a pregnant hippo in comparison and inevitably left me full of intense body loathing that was quite capable of ruining my entire day. A while back I happened to discover that M and I actually wear the same size jeans. I felt a little better about myself. For all of five minutes. And then, instead of my perception of myself changing at all to reflect the indisputable proof that I, in fact, do not resemble a pregnant hippo, my perception of M’s body started to change. I found myself looking at her and thinking that she wasn’t as thin as I had previously thought and that she actually didn’t really look that good and that she had clearly gained a huge amount of weight overnight and I actually started completely panicking about being the same size as her.

Sometimes I feel completely insane.

 

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