Size Acceptance - Love Who You Are - What does that mean?

By: Flossie Alexander, Fitness & Nutrition Editor

When I got up this morning and signed into Facebook, I seen that someone put on my page an invite to a “Size is Sexy Party.” I had seen another one come out a couple of days ago for another invite to a different size acceptance party that had music set to it that wasn’t so flattering, at least to me. The music on the video this morning was awesome and very flattering. With the body acceptance movement in full force, I ask, being a BBW myself, what does body acceptance mean to me.

Having been an overweight girl most of my life, I always thought I was that way because my grandmother always told me I was “big boned.” I thought that was the reason why I was overweight. Even until up to 5 or 6 years ago I accepted that was why I looked the way I did, even though all the signs were there that it wasn’t, truth I was ignoring. Having grown up in a very poor family, the way we looked, felt, the way we treated our bodies was far from what we were concerned about. We were more worried about where our food was coming from every day and not about how much cardio we put in or weights we lifted. I actually thought gyms were just for rich people. I took that attitude into my adult years because I was conditioned to think that way.

I was on a conference call a while back for a book that is coming out for “Big Boned Women” and a lady made the comment, “before I was a big boned women,” and it stopped me for a moment. What does that mean to her? What is being big boned? What does body acceptance really mean? Why are we the way we are? Are we making the choices because of survival? Because we don’t know any better? Or because we take that road because it is easy and that choice is there. For me, all of these questions apply to me and I think of them every day.

After my doctor told me at the age of 33 that my blood work showed that I was pre-diabetic, I would have double knee replacements before the age of 40, my cardiac enzymes were elevated and at risk for a heart attack, the truth could be ignored no longer. I had to start making choices to do what is right for me no matter how hard it was if I didn’t want to fall apart before I was 40. If I didn’t, where would I be at 60?

Over the last few years I have been searching the meaning of “body acceptance” and searching for that confidence I was meant to have. Not through books or TV talk shows but through real people. What I do know is, to me, body acceptance is loving me for who I am yesterday, today, and tomorrow and treating me the best way I know how with the knowledge I have at the moment that is forever changing.

For me, body acceptance is coming out of the survival mode, slowing life down, and doing what I didn’t know to do in my younger years and that is taking care of me and my health from knowing good nutrition to hitting the stairs at the college because I need to get my “cardio” in for the day! Body acceptance is to me, doing what is right for my body and not taking the easy way out because that choice is there.

Body acceptance, to me, is after doing all the right things and knowing I will never be smaller than a size 12 because I am big boned and petite was never meant for me. Body acceptance for me is after doing all the right things knowing I have a bigger rear than the girl next to me because that is how my body was meant to be. Body acceptance to me is loving me for who I am with the knowledge I have and doing all the right things for me physically, mentally, and spiritually. What does it mean to you?

Be Healthy Every Day, You Are Worth It.

She's So New York wants to know: What does size acceptance mean to you? Are you happy with your size? If not, what are some of the ways you're changing your eating and fitness habits? Have you changed your diet and started an exercise regime? Discuss!