I know models’ bodies aren’t realistic, but I still can’t help but want one

Model bodies: They’re perfectly thin and have no bumps or even a little bit of fat.

I know the perfect body isn’t really realistic but I wanted it, and still kind of do. I still want it because that’s the overwhelming majority cultural norm in modern day society. What it tells me is that I need to be skinny to be liked, to be wanted, and to be worthy as a person. I know this isn’t true – my friends and family love me for who I am and the shape of my body is irrelevant. But I can’t help but be affected by the, sometimes, photoshopped models, and women, in the media – they’re everywhere.

In all the movies, TV shows, and advertisements out there, you could probably only count the number of women who aren’t perfectly skinny on ten fingers – the ones who look like the more accurate representation of an average woman.

Growing up I’ve always struggled with my weight and eating. I’ve never had a disorder of any kind and ate anything and everything, and was viewed as “normal.” I didn’t have the body you “should” have. I was so affected by what I saw in magazines because a model’s perfect body told me there was more to it. To me it meant success and a perfect life. What it told me was that if I looked like the girl’s I saw in magazines, if I achieved the golden aspect of womanhood – tiny legs, a flat stomach, zero fat – then everything else would fall into place. If I got the model body I would do well in school, everything else about my looks would be perfected, people would treat me better, I would find the perfect boyfriend – the list goes on. In reality everyone has problems, and nothing is universally perfect – nothing should be.

I used to always feel pressure to get a smaller stomach so I was constantly sucking it in – that’s not a healthy environment for girls to grow up in. We are told that we need a certain body type, one that some can’t physically have – they just aren’t built for it.

Always being around photoshopped bodies and crazy skinny models affects women of all ages a lot – especially girls growing up. Women and girls are inadvertently taught that they need to have a “perfect” body, the model body, and if they don’t it’s their fault. They’re taught that they can change for the better, that they need to change, that they need to be better. While telling women this, they are also telling them that they are what they are and that they cannot change, and they’ll be stuck like that forever. This modern day cycle leads to internal blaming and stable attributions, which results in women blaming themselves for being who they are, someone they believe will never change no matter how hard they try.

Growing up looking at skinny models we believe that if we don’t look perfect we will get bullied or berated for how we look. That if we don’t look like everyone else, who we view as perfect, we feel like an outsider and have difficulty making friends, holding a conversation, and are affect even to the extent of grades and performance of any kind.

I felt like I had to try really hard to make friends, and that if I had the body everyone desired it would be easier for people to like me. I thought that if I had a flatter stomach it would make me more attractive and guys more willing to talk to me. I believed the attention girls my age were getting was because of their “perfect” bodies so if I had a flat stomach I would get more attention.

There was a point I was really close to being as skinny as I wanted to be. I got to the point where I lost five pounds of stomach fat in less than a week. The change in my body was just because I’d been training more and eating healthier, but it didn’t feel right. I felt excited that I had actually achieved my personal goal, but frankly it felt kind of disgusting. Growing up as a chubby child, I had always dreamed of having a flat stomach, as I saw my friends had. I always felt like the pudgy one of any group of friends. But once I got my dream stomach, it was unnerving.

It wasn’t natural, and even though technically I had inadvertently achieved what I’ve always wanted since I was a pudgy little kid, I didn’t want it because it didn’t feel like me. I didn’t feel like that was something that made me feel good, even if I looked good.

Even though I hadn’t come to my goal I had by unhealthy means, such a flat stomach made me feel unhealthy because I associated such a drastic change in body type with an eating disorder. I knew that getting a certain type of body wouldn’t make me happy, but the message actually hit home when I realized that, especially if you idealize something so much, once you get what you’ve been wishing for it’s not all it’s cracked up to be.

Of course, some people actually have a “perfect body” naturally because that’s how they’re built. But for the vast majority who don’t just know that achieving the perfect model body won’t necessarily make you happy, but I can only speak for myself.