She wailed, I listened. She lost weight in the last two years and her body is a completely different one.

She’s noticed, unmistakeably, that her friends, strangers, opposite sex, and her own family hold her in higher regard since she lost the weight.

As petite tears of overwhelming sadness left her eyes and followed the sweet, shallow lines framing them, she said “Why do people feel like it’s okay to comment on your body only when you lose weight?”

This was not an actual question, it was a statement, an observation, a jab in the heart.

I thought through all the possibilities: all the things I could think of cleared her observation. You’re taught not to say anything about facial scars, burns, abnormalities, inconsistencies, plastic surgery (unless your close), handicaps, disabilities, chronic illnesses, oxygen tanks, braces, halos, warts, limps, AGE, RACE, sexual preference, sexual orientation, sex period. But if a person loses weight: “Oh you look great, like you’ve lost weight.” And it gives that person away. Were they thinking you were heavy all this time, but now you’re thinner, better than ever, stronger, in control, more distinguished, impressive, powerful? Beautiful? WORTHY?

The middle-schooler in me, despiser of bathing suits since I feel exposed, constant waist-checker in the mirror, comparing the roundness of my face from photo to photo.. I feel so deeply intertwined to the surface value judgments of my body even though I don’t actually BELIEVE that people’s value is determined by their appearance, subconsciously and to certain degrees, I do. Specifically, I must be thin. Sure there’s the hope that my boobs look good naked, that my nipples aren’t weird or my upper lip hair doesn’t catch a shadow and brand me Frida Kahlo (what would be wrong with that anyway? Oh wait, she led a miserable life. But I don’t think it was because of the ‘stache).

My friend absolutely right: The only time in our society that it is okay to comment on someone’s body is when there is less of it. How effed up is that?

She said “Why is it that people can have whatever problems- alcoholism, addiction, but if you use food as a crutch you get abject cruelty?”

“And why do people determine my value based on the single factor: the pull of gravitational mass on my body?”

That slayed me.

“I mean, people think that me and my friend are dating and they never used to ask me that before I lost weight.”

And here comes the part that broke me:

“I have way more anxiety about my body than when I was heavier. I used to be comfortable with my body, happy with my body. But now I have so. much. anxiety.”

This attitude, this understanding about appearance is so deeply rooted in my own mind about myself. On good days I think of myself as the upper easchelon of attractive people. But I never put myself in the smokin’ hot gorgeous stand-out category.

BUT FUCK THAT SHIT BECAUSE THIS IS MY BODY. THESE ARE MY KNEES. I HAVE KNEES THAT WORK DAMNIT. I lay claim to two eyeballs that open and close and assist me as I get around this world. I have a butt that cushions my fall. I have a larynx that works and even sounds good when it wants to. I have a tongue, DAMNIT. I CAN EAT.

MY BODY WORKS. What does that have to do with my societal sway, my cultural importance, my self-fucking-worth?

I want to thank my friend for inviting me into her sadness because it made me realize a very dark, very real current of my own fucked-up thinking and insecurity. This world needs love and I don’t care if you wear Xtra-Tuffs and hoodies, have a beer belly or gray eyebrow hair or shave your armpits or don’t shave your armpits or stress eat a box of cheez-its on a train.

You are beautiful, god damnit. I am beautiful. We are beautiful. Uhcgk.

Why do we have to fight for and defend something we’ve had all along?

In the meantime, I am actively going to engage my mind to put everyone on the same level. I don’t want to categorize people based on their appearance. “You’re pretty I don’t want to get too close to you, you might outshine me” or “He’s out of my league” or “I need to lose 10 pounds before I can wear that bathing suit.”

JUMPINJEHOSAPHAT Why am I 30 and this is still just as hard as it ever was?