The choice to lose weight isn't a betrayal of the sisterhood...it's not anti-feminist
I had an interesting online conversation with a couple of women 30-ish years younger than I about unwanted attention from men.
One wrote about how, upon losing weight, she was getting attention she didn’t used to get when she was heavier.
The other said, “One thing I’ll never need again in my life is male attention.”
She went on to say that she didn’t understand why older women complain about becoming invisible as they get older.
”I don’t understand. How can you miss that sort of thing? I’m almost happy to be grossly overweight.”
The other one replied: “Older women who miss that most likely have not experienced the trauma some of us have so it isn’t a negative for them. Or they rely on the external validation for their self esteem or are coming to grips with being considered past their prime.”
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I will never forget when I came home from my senior year in college (1984) after having lost a significant amount of weight by taking amphetamines (aka “Speed”). My mother (who was newly single at the time) took me out to a bar wearing a mid-thigh-length black sweater dress with a plunging vee in the back, black pumps, and a long strand of pearls that I wore looped once, tightly, around my neck, with a long length running down my back.
The attention I got from men was intoxicating on its own, but you know what the best part was? My mother was proud of me.
I was a sexy woman with a “good body”…no longer a chubby, awkward woman-child she felt ashamed of.
I became an object.
Until I regained weight and became, once again, a chubby, awkward woman-child.
I know the theory: many women gain weight to protect themselves from men. I didn’t think that was my issue because I thought I was supposed to like the attention I got from men, even when they were treating me like an object, which happened more often than not.
In hindsight, maybe it was my body’s way of trying to protect me.
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I have grappled with this idea that I shouldn’t want to lose weight, that somehow it’s a betrayal of the sisterhood or anti-feminist.
Getting back to that online conversation, in response to the woman who said “Older women who miss that most likely have not experienced the ‘trauma’ some of us have so it isn’t a negative for them“ I replied:
Oh, we (older women) experienced the trauma, we just didn't know that's what it was. Or at least I didn’t.
I am nearly 62 and for the past 20 years I've been unpacking the fact that I was socialized to see being cat-called (harassed or even sexually assaulted) as a good thing. I was literally taught that my appearance was what made me valuable.
The first 30-ish years of my life was full of trauma (and shame) and as I said, I just didn't know that's what it was.
The last time I lost significant weight was 20 years ago (in my early 40s) and back then it was all about being worthy and valuable as defined by others. An object.
This time around it's about being the subject, the one who define my worth and reclaims my dignity.
I am in the prime of my life right now. I'm prime AF :-)
My desire to lose weight now has not a single thing to do with men or what they think. It’s not about becoming some outside definition of feminine. It’s not about making my mother proud of me so she doesn’t have to feel shame about my body. It’s not about becoming small and meek. Or perfect.
It’s about taking up as much space as I damn well please.