Turning the Tables on Twiggy

So go with me on this one - you're grocery shopping, trying to make smart choices.  You're feeling good, and you get in line to pay.  As you wait you glance up and are smacked in the face by images of Angelina, Tori....all the celebs.  Skinny clothes show sick thin arms and legs, rarely a curve to be seen.  They're sitting right next to diet magazines.  And you're there in your size (ahems) and start feeling crappy.  You try to look the other way, and what's there?  CHOCOLATE.  Cruel, isn't it? (I think its funny that this is nearly the same scenario even in a Whole Foods, its just pictures of super thin yogis next to DARK chocolate.)

Body image just sucks.  Flat out.  And the irony is that there are extremely few women I know who aren't bothered by it.  I know thin women who think they are too thin.  Healthy women who think they're fat.  Thin women who think they're fat. UGH. We are assaulted with the idea that we're supposed to look like the women in magazines, movies, on TV.  I don't know about you, but I "gave up" trying to do it.  I still didn't feel good about me.  I was just resigned to that fact that 1,000 calories a day wasn't going to happen. 

So what's different now?  Perspective, people!  Its amazing how you can mess with your own head - in a good way!  I am by NO means over this issue - I might never be.  But check this out:  (are you ready?) I have BANNED myself from reading celeb rags.  Its true. (I think I just heard my cousin Meredith faint.) These were my staple plane items, got me through pregnancy when the pregnancy dumbs made it impossible for me to read a whole, real book.  They were my guilty pleasures, my brain candy.  But you know what - they really annoy the heck out of me now.  And I think the reason is this.  Since I started Crossfit (jeez, I'm starting to sound like I'm in a cult.  "Put down the kool-aid, m'aam!") the main images of women in my face all the time look like this:

I seriously get to see these women all the time - sometimes every day.  (They're actually REAL - amazing, eh?)  So now I see those magazine images and think - where's the muscle??  They could be snapped like a twig!  I have no desire to mimic those images.  I have TONS of desire to mimic these ones. ;-) 

So I'm turning the tables on Hollywood (I'm sure they really care).  As Jessica E says - "IN YOUR FACE!"  It may have taken me until my late thirties, but I'm taking back my body image.  Yahoooo!