Confessions of a Binger: Saturn Returned, Lesson Learned.
I was born with curves I didn’t know what to do with, and I hated them. I stopped growing at barely 5’2” and hit my peak of puberty at 9, At an ultra skinny, blonde, and white school in Utah. I had a C cup in 3rd grade. I was tan and Jewish. I stuck out like a sore thumb. I was constantly bullied and was trying desperately to just fit in. I put sun-in in my hair and dyed it to as close to blonde as I could. I didn’t go play outside anymore to whiten up, and although I tried at first to slim down, I found the best way to get the popular girls to like me, was to get fat. I could hang out with them and in the most non-threatening way possible, especially because I was told that it was “unfair how pretty” I was. And I wanted friends. That has felt like the ultimatum my entire life. Look healthy and be alone or be fat and have friends. And most of the time I feel alone, I go up in weight. And it always spirals out of control. Mostly because I don’t work through those feelings, I run away from my body and when I find myself emotionally present again, I find my clothes way too tight, costumes not fitting right, and almost dumbfounded as to how I wound up in this body again. At my heaviest I was just around 227lbs. Now I am just under 190. And I’m working through it. It’s going a bit more slowly this time because instead of the healthy (and unhealthy) bingeing patterns I had held onto for almost 10 years, I finally said, out loud, and to my therapist, “I need to unpack this.” This morning at yoga, I had a choice, I could be repulsed and deny who and what was right in front of me, or I could accept it. And work IN my body. And this evening I could have hidden in shame, but I didn’t. I went to an event that I ended up feeling so grateful to be in the room for... Over this last month that I had been stumbling into a plan, I kept thinking to myself, “it would be so much better if I could just go away for 3 months to some kind of “fat farm” instead of feeling so embarrassed and ashamed and honestly confused because the woman who I am and feel like is different from this body that I currently find myself in...but, I am right in the first few months of my Saturn Return, which, for all of you non-astrology people, means that the lessons that I didn’t really digest up to this point in my life, come back and hit me hard, and force me to go deep. And I could run away AGAIN. OR, I could LOVE my body. The body that actually IS the body I feel like, but with some armor on, my protection. I have abused my natural curves to hide me from people getting close enough to hurt me, that’s the truth. And, as ironic as it sounds, to be invisible. But I don’t want the armor anymore, it has actually caused me so much pain time and time again, so if this state seems to be my foundation of safety, I have to CREATE a new, healthier one because I am the only person who is coming to save me. And this time, I’m not ashamed to honor it, the bit by bit it comes off, the bit by bit those cells shrink, to reveal the beautiful curves I was born with, and honor the muscles that hold me and shape me. To reveal me. Out of hiding. Vulnerable. And Stripped.
Your body will change so many times in your life, maybe from circumstances different from mine, but love it, love YOU. At every shape, at every age, and at every stage.
-Anna Lisa Fischel, Actress
Patricipant in the Body Aesthetic Project: Philadelphia, October 2017
I was born with curves I didn’t know what to do with, and I hated them. I stopped growing at barely 5’2” and hit my peak of puberty at 9, At an ultra skinny, blonde, and white school in Utah. I had a C cup in 3rd grade. I was tan and Jewish. I stuck out like a sore thumb. I was constantly bullied and was trying desperately to just fit in. I put sun-in in my hair and dyed it to as close to blonde as I could. I didn’t go play outside anymore to whiten up, and although I tried at first to slim down, I found the best way to get the popular girls to like me, was to get fat. I could hang out with them and in the most non-threatening way possible, especially because I was told that it was “unfair how pretty” I was. And I wanted friends. That has felt like the ultimatum my entire life. Look healthy and be alone or be fat and have friends. And most of the time I feel alone, I go up in weight. And it always spirals out of control. Mostly because I don’t work through those feelings, I run away from my body and when I find myself emotionally present again, I find my clothes way too tight, costumes not fitting right, and almost dumbfounded as to how I wound up in this body again. At my heaviest I was just around 227lbs. Now I am just under 190. And I’m working through it. It’s going a bit more slowly this time because instead of the healthy (and unhealthy) bingeing patterns I had held onto for almost 10 years, I finally said, out loud, and to my therapist, “I need to unpack this.” This morning at yoga, I had a choice, I could be repulsed and deny who and what was right in front of me, or I could accept it. And work IN my body. And this evening I could have hidden in shame, but I didn’t. I went to an event that I ended up feeling so grateful to be in the room for... Over this last month that I had been stumbling into a plan, I kept thinking to myself, “it would be so much better if I could just go away for 3 months to some kind of “fat farm” instead of feeling so embarrassed and ashamed and honestly confused because the woman who I am and feel like is different from this body that I currently find myself in...but, I am right in the first few months of my Saturn Return, which, for all of you non-astrology people, means that the lessons that I didn’t really digest up to this point in my life, come back and hit me hard, and force me to go deep. And I could run away AGAIN. OR, I could LOVE my body. The body that actually IS the body I feel like, but with some armor on, my protection. I have abused my natural curves to hide me from people getting close enough to hurt me, that’s the truth. And, as ironic as it sounds, to be invisible. But I don’t want the armor anymore, it has actually caused me so much pain time and time again, so if this state seems to be my foundation of safety, I have to CREATE a new, healthier one because I am the only person who is coming to save me. And this time, I’m not ashamed to honor it, the bit by bit it comes off, the bit by bit those cells shrink, to reveal the beautiful curves I was born with, and honor the muscles that hold me and shape me. To reveal me. Out of hiding. Vulnerable. And Stripped.
Your body will change so many times in your life, maybe from circumstances different from mine, but love it, love YOU. At every shape, at every age, and at every stage.
-Anna Lisa Fischel, Actress
Patricipant in the Body Aesthetic Project: Philadelphia, October 2017
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