My First Gray Hair...(Dun Dun Dun)

The other day I went in to get my haircut.  I won’t lie it was way overdue and I was so excited for my hair to feel clean again (not clean like I don’t wash it, but clean like I don’t have any more split ends).  I go to Remedez at the Orem University Mall and a man named Jared does my hair.  I have never had a male cut and color my hair before him, but it only took one chance with him to fall in love with his work! He really cares, is detail oriented, he knows what he is doing and what looks good.  And to be honest I tend to get along better with the single and forty year old male (who may or may not be gay-I know you are all thinking it anyway, I might as well just say it) than with the 20 something  girls in there.

So this lovely day he is cutting my hair, and I am just sitting there in pure bliss… I was so happy to be getting it cut. Then all of a sudden Jared blurts out, “You have your first gray hair!” Yes that is an exclamation point, and yes it was said with excitement as if he were happy he was the one to find it. But truth be told I had actually found it a few days earlier…

Have you ever wondered how you would react to something or feel when a certain event takes place?  I am sure you have.  I have.  I do it all the time.  Some of my most favorite ones are how will I feel when I get proposed to? or what would it really feel like to know that I have a little person growing inside my tummy (I even thought about this one today, so congrats to Lindsay and Pete!)?  But another one that I have vainly wondered about was what I would feel when I found my first gray hair.  Well now I know…

I always told myself it wouldn’t bother me.  It’s just hair, and if I can afford it my hair will be colored anyway (not because of the gray but because I am not a huge fan of my natural color or lack of color).  There was also a part of me that worried it would bother me, and I knew that just wasn’t appropriate since I seem to always be telling women that they are more than what they look like and they can be loved even if they don’t ‘look’ perfect.  So if I did freak out about a gray hair I am pretty sure that would qualify me for the hypocrite card.  So I would just tell myself, it would be no big deal, not to worry about it, and equally cliché phrases to keep myself upbeat about the thought of finding gray.  But I couldn’t help but think that maybe it really would bother me.

And when the day finally arrived, when I finally found that lone strand of gray I found myself actually feeling excited like I had just found a buried treasure.  I mean there is only one gray hair on my whole head of hair, which is kind of like a treasure, right?  Instead of telling myself I was old and single which definitely puts me in the old maid category, I told myself I was wise and distinguished.  This little gray strand symbolizes that I have lived and learned and now I have something that shows it! My little gray strand tells the world that I have experienced a thing or two, and while I have hardly any answers I do have my own experiences and they are worth something!

Can Chicken Legs Be Beautiful?

My whole life I have been told that I am not only skinny but that I have chicken legs. Being skinny was definitely part of my identity. Often times this identity hurt me more than it ever helped me. I thought I was too skinny and that people hated me because of it. At the same time I got the message from the media that being skinny was desirable and sought after. Yet I felt I was hated because I was skinny. I was utterly confused.

Fast forward to the present (well somewhat, maybe more like college). Same confusion. I would get a lot of praise for being skinny and at the same time feel a lot of shame because I was skinny when someone else wasn’t. And then to top it all off, I even began to feel I wasn’t skinny enough because there is always someone who is skinnier or smaller than you. I didn’t understand how I could hate my body and know that others envied it all at the same time.

Today I am in a much better place. I love my body. I love my body because it is mine. I love it because it is imperfect. I love my body because it is constantly changing and adjusting. I love my body because it is beautiful. It has taken me a long time to get to the place I am at, and let’s be honest… I still have a long way to go.

Today I want to share how one thinking error I had about my body changed into a thinking truth.  My chicken legs (the ones I always thought were too skinny) were suddenly the recipient of many compliments.  At first I was completely shocked that someone would complement my legs. Really? Are you serious? Are you sure? Uh, ok. But all the compliment giver ever heard from me was a thank you. 

Lucky for me my roommate didn’t stop after that first compliment. Time and time again she would tell me how great my legs were… until finally I started to believe her. Slowly, bit by bit, I began to think maybe she isn’t just saying this, maybe there is some truth to this. While this compliment may have taken a bit more time to sink in, it is still true. 

Now, without further ado I would like to official add the following compliment to my compliment journal: You (Marietta) have great legs!

 I love my legs! 

One More Step.

We know that every advertisement we see has been airbrushed and touched up. We know that even though the ad is there to advertise the product and show us what the product can do, the results we are seeing are most likely fake from digital enhancements. We know that there is really no way to get what that girl in the picture has, even if I do buy the product. And maybe I shouldn’t say we but instead I. I know these things. Do you?

When I am checking out at the grocery store and am surrounded by magazines, or when I see a commercial on TV, I am known to say something about how what we are looking at isn’t real. Those women have been digital enhanced, airbrushed, and who knows what else to present the ‘perfect’ yet unattainable picture, planting false beliefs and unrealistic expectations of what women should look like.

I don’t hold back my comments depending on who I am with, guys get it just as much as my little sister. The part that surprises me is that after I remind them that all the pictures they are looking at are fake, not real, airbrushed and digitally enhanced they will often say “really?” Or “all of them?” Or even, “No! I am sure she really looks like that.” This tells me that even though I have dived into the world of digital enhancements to learn what the truth is, not everyone has and these advertisements continue to plant the lie that what they are seeing is the expectation of what a woman should look like.

I believe becoming educated about advertising and their dirty little tricks is empowering to women. I know it helps me. It helps me when I can tell myself...she doesn’t really look like that. She does have some wrinkles and it’s OK that I have wrinkles. Wrinkles are natural. Most of the articles I read on this subject are aimed at the consumer, educating the consumer on what goes on in the advertising world. Well I think that something needs to change on the advertising end. How far can they take this manipulation of the female body before we say enough is enough?

Shine’s recent article, L’Oreal ads for Julia Roberts and Christy Turlington banned for airbrushing, explains that two different L’Oreal ads were banned by The British Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) after L’Oreal was unable to provide un-airbrushed shots. Advertising Standards Authority chief executive, Guy Parker said, “Advertisers must be able to provide appropriate material to us to demonstrate what retouching they’ve done in the even we question them, and mustn’t mislead. In this event, L’Oreal didn’t provide us with the evidence so we were left with no choice but to uphold the complaint.” Or in others words, the advertisement was banned from the UK.

Can you even imagine what it would be like if advertisers actually had to show us exactly what we would be getting from their product in their advertisements? I can’t quite picture that world yet, but I would like to see some of these advertisements getting banned in the US. One step at a time.

In the article they also discussed that the reason L’Oreal could not provide un-airbrushed pictures was because in Julia Roberts’ contract it stated that no un-airbrushed picture shots can be released. Now I have no idea who wrote this contract, maybe L’Oreal and maybe Julia Robert’s agent. Who knows? And I doubt I would be able to guess the true intent behind either party adding this statement to the contract. But I do hope that it isn’t because Julia Roberts doesn’t want to show people what she really looks like. Can you imagine? One of the most recognizable faces doesn’t want people to see who she really is? I can’t say I blame her. If I were in her shoes, and pictures could be found everywhere of me with flawless skin (still fake, but flawless none the less), I can’t say I wouldn’t want the ‘truth’ to get out, and disappoint so many people who think I really looked like that. The truth is I think Julia Roberts is beautiful, but not for her fake flawless skin. I think her smile is beautiful. I think her laugh is beautiful. And I think the way she radiates is beautiful.

Worth More than a Number!

Growing up we never had a scale in our house… at least not that I can remember. And if we did it was only around when I was super young. Even without a scale in the home I knew how much I weighed. And I knew I got a lot of attention for being skinny. Sometimes that attention was negative… being called chicken legs as a kid never quite felt like a compliment. There was a part of me that secretly craved these comments, whether they were positive or negative, they all meant the same thing: I was thin and I was beautiful. And oh did I crave to be beautiful. Beauty meant the perfect life, it meant someone, anyone, or everyone would love me, care for me, and accept me. There was another part of me that felt guilty or bad for being skinny, as if I was doing something wrong because I was skinny and others weren’t. Whether I listened to the part of me that craved the attention or the part of me that felt like my skinniness was wrong one part remained true: being skinny was a part, if not all, of who I was. I can’t remember exactly when the good and the bad comments about how skinny I was started to diminish. But when they did I literally had an identity crisis. If I wasn’t skinny… what was I? Being skinny was who I was, it defined me, and if people didn’t look at me and see skinny what would they see? That question frightened me right to the core. What if they didn’t see anything worthwhile?

Looking back I realize this was a huge turning point in my life. It would have been so easy to resort to unhealthy habits to try and ‘stay’ skinny. I could have started a diet, or exercising excessively, or behaviors that are even more destructive. In truth all signs pointed me in that direction. And to this day I do not understand why I didn’t go that way and why other girls did. I can tell you that there is no real difference between them and me. I found other ways to cope, equally as destructive (which we won’t be diving into today, we’ll save that for another day).

There is a part of me that wonders how a scale in the home could have changed my coping behaviors. Would that increasing number of a growing girl been too much? Would it have tipped me over the edge to dieting and excessive exercise? Would my worth have been defined every day by the number on the scale? Honestly, I don’t know. And I never will know how the scale could have changed my life. It scares me to think that something could have that much control over me, and I am so grateful that it never has.

Maybe your own story is somewhat similar to mine; maybe it is exactly the opposite. No matter what your story is we all have one. To this day I still do not own a scale. And I will never own one. I refuse to play into the notion that the number on the scale attributes any significance to my self-worth.

Do you have a scale? Where is it? What does that number mean to you? What does that number give you? What does it take away from you? How does that number make you feel? How does it control you?

Throw it out! Throw the scale out! I may be skinny or I may not be skinny. But I am not defined by my body or my weight! You and I are worth more than the number on the scale!

Still not convinced? Check out these other blog posts put on by our friends at Beauty redefined!

“Weigh Less. Smile More.” How Fitness Magazines Define Healthy in Very Unhealthy Ways.

Thin Ideals and the Way We Feel.

The Lies We Buy: defining Health at Women’s Expense.