My Daughter the Teenage Nudist
This is a really interesting documentary about positive nudity (despite the stupid title) and I recommend giving it a watch.
Does anyone know any other good documentaries about nudity or body image? Leave a comment or send us an email at projectnaked[@]gmail[.]com
I’m really not sure how to begin discussing how my feelings towards my body have changed over the years as I love this blog and want to do it justice and also, until I stopped caring so much about my body, I was really never sure how I should feel. Perhaps “should” in there is a very telling word! While at school I was heavily into sports and trained at least 8 hours a week and as a result was healthy but incredibly skinny (I recently saw a photo of myself at 14 and was quite freaked out by the sight). I did the whole developing thing late and fast. At 15 or 16 I started my periods and went up 3 cup sizes in two months. The boob job jokes were quite flattering at the time but did make me more self-conscious.
This was when I was at the age where you really start to care about your body and are very vulnerable to media and advertising. While I never really attracted anyone of the opposite sex until I was 18, it was when I was 16 that I had more body confidence because since I wasn’t fully developed I had the media ideal figure with boobs but very skinny. Naturally, I stopped sports, started drinking and smoking and developed an adult body so the model-like waif disappeared never to be seen again! That didn’t stop me thinking I should still have it and trying to regain it, even with crazy and very unhealthy diets pills from the US (“if they’re illegal in Europe then they must totally work!” is not a good line of thought). Perhaps this was due to media, my mother’s constant dieting or just me, but I was unhappy with my own body, even though I’ve never been larger than a size 10, and I hated that I could also sense myself judging other women’s bodies and probably making them feel the same! Patriarchy at work I guess…
The biggest change for me was living at uni with no TV, and later no internet, and surrounding myself with only the sort of people I wanted to. After a few years of great friends and increasing amounts of communal nudity I now feel that I am finally comfortable with my body. This nakedness began at solstice and festivals with skinny-dipping and saunas and dancing round fires but I have also had several naked parties with friends in the comfort of private flats (apologies to West Princes St for that time I forgot to shut the blinds!).
I now have smooth legs, hairy armpits, a couple of tattoos and piercings in eh… intimate areas. My body is not small or large but has a little bit of fat all over, ok- maybe a bit more on my belly, and my legs wobble when I walk and I’m totally ok with that. Since I stopped wearing a bra my boobs are considerably bouncier as well! My friend and I even had a fantastic time decorating my new room with our naked bodies and lots of face paints.
One of the things which makes me happiest now is how comfortable I finally am and how liberating it feels! I love being naked!!
*Trigger warning for self-harm/anorexia/bulimia*
This is a cliché, but it is difficult to know where to start when writing about my body. From existence? We talk about ‘bodies’ as if they are somehow separate others, yet what am I if not purely my body? Perhaps that scares me more than if my body and mind were separable. Growing up my body was me, always – I ran, or grew, or was damaged in a playground fall – yet at the beginning of the inevitable slide into puberty bodies become something else; untrustworthy objects that swell and act defiantly out of our control, things to be scrutinised and unwillingly accepted with time.
Since around about 2nd year, I increasingly saw my body as something I should use in some way to express myself – whether by trying to distort it to somehow show the ‘real me’ or (this came first) by using it as something which I could use for emotional release. I got into the habit on binge-eating after school to deal with stress and general teenage angst (and then grew increasingly horrified at the weight gain, which felt completely unconnected to my actions); later, when that didn’t help, I got a release from pocket scissors in the webbing of skin between my middle and ring fingers. I wore gloves to hide any marks, but eventually stopped after a mortifying moment when holding hands with a friend.
Every year, I made a secret New Year’s resolution to lose weight, and gain control over my body, and eventually, in 2009 I gained ‘control’ in the form of an eating disorder that effectively lasted for two years, and which still lingers in some ways. The mind-set of these things is incredible – the only way I can describe it is to compare it to an addiction where control, starvation and listening to the commands that eventually occur unprompted in your head are the drugs. The first six months are now a sort of blur of rules and numbers, and a thrill in feeling my body shrink that increasingly gave way to exhaustion, and the unwilling realisation that I, in fact, was no longer the one who had any control at all. Recovery was longer and slower than I ever expected it to be, and in many ways lasted longer than the disorder itself. But the process taught me so much. Calorie-counting is insane! A calorie is the measure of the energy required to heat 1 litre of water by 1 degree C. Thin doesn’t mean healthy, fat doesn’t mean unhealthy. If you listen, physically, bodies tell you what they (you) need. Scales are inaccurate and weight fluctuates by kilos. Most importantly, advertising is mad: for years I failed to see that women are beautiful when they are healthy and confident, not when they starve and pout. I still have difficulty doing this sometimes, but at least I can now see it’s a lie.
The most important thing that came from recovery was a newfound, unshakable, almost instinctive respect for my body. It never fails to amaze me just how strong my body can be, and how fine-tuned it is to my needs. When I starved, my metabolism slowed right down; my periods stopped to save energy; the hair or my arms and face grew longer and faster to keep me warmer; I craved food until I binged. Despite my best efforts it held on to every ounce it could, and kept going. That alone, and the disparity between how I felt and how I feel, have made me eternally grateful for my body – regardless of the occasional hatred of my body’s appearance or new weight – new hips, new boobs, the sour disappointment of ill-fitting clothes – I can’t help but love some small, deeper part of it simply for being alive and strong.
One month ago today, we decided to take one of our ideas and actually try to make it happen. We didn’t really know what Project Naked would become; we just wanted to get women talking about their relationships with their naked bodies in the hope that we could learn from each other’s experiences. We felt that there were stories that we weren’t hearing in the media. Women’s magazines claim to promote happiness in your body, but it always comes with a catch. You can love your body – with these control pants! You can love your body – with this ten-day bikini diet! You can love your body – with this boob job! And we think that’s a dangerous way to think about your body, as a thing which constantly needs improving. We wanted to hear what real women thought about their bodies.
But what it’s turned into has been more amazing than anything we could have imagined. We’ve been moved and inspired by the honesty and bravery of the women who’ve shared their stories. We know how challenging it can be to talk about the experiences we’ve had with our bodies, and this project has highlighted how central those experiences are to our lives. We thought this was a project about body image, and in a way it is, but it’s become something much more than that. We still want reading these experiences to encourage women to love their own, lived-in bodies, and we hope that it does. But deeper than that, it’s shown us stories of the courage and resilience of women, and that is truly inspiring.
Here are some excerpts from some of the stories we’ve had submitted so far. If you haven’t already, read through them in full; it’s totally worth it.
“I do not fit the “Aussie beach babe mould” because I am Scottish. Our family has big ears, knobbly knees, and our women are curvy, our bums wobble and I love it. We are beautiful just the way we are.” – Mollie, 18.
“I feel like I can’t travel this road with my female comrades. I can’t embrace my femininity because it repulses me. I don’t mean that I want to be male. I’m proud (insofar as you can be) to be a woman. I wish I could dance and be naked and feel free but I don’t feel that I can in this gendered environment … The problem is that, rather than change my own way of thinking, I’m waiting for society to break down so that I can be free of prescribed roles and this will never happen.” – Anon.
“The first time someone calls you a ‘lady’, as in “Mind you don’t bump into that lady”, is pretty weird. And for me the first time I called myself a woman was pretty weird too. But the word fits me now. I am an adult woman, and it’s high time I got used to it.” – Anon, 24.
“My body works (for the most part), it doesn’t matter all that much in the end if it looks nice, because for me, it’s a vessel for my voice. What I’m saying, what I’m shouting, what I’m singing, what I’m signing, what I’m making art on, what I’m writing, what the way I look is saying, the list goes on and on- none of this would be possible if it weren’t for my body.” – reclaimthecunt
“My body is hairy and wobbly and a lot of the time I feel ashamed of those things. But my body is warm and strong and life-giving and pleasure-giving and when I’m naked with a lover, all I do is laugh because I fucking love the human body and I guess that includes mine.” – Anon.
“When I see myself naked now, for the most part — I feel lucky and proud. I feel lucky because I have come to embrace myself and my body. I have become completely comfortable with myself (most of the time anyway!). I feel lucky because I’ve never hated my body. It works hard for me and I often don’t treat it as well as I should. I’ve abused/mistreated it countless numbers of times and yet, it hasn’t given up on me. I feel lucky because I can see beauty in my body, and I know there are an unimaginable number of women that can’t see beauty in theirs.” – intheflesh
“Being tall, thin and toned gave me no solace when I was cowering in the corner of my bedroom hearing things and no drive when I couldn’t get up for sadness. My love for my body comes from laudatory friends, ogling strangers and society’s skinny fetish. I like the looks, the comments and the compliments. It gives me a high and a warm feeling inside. This is a false and dangerous way to build confidence; Like an unsteady Jenga tower.” – Anon.
“I have come such a long way from looking in the mirror and hating what I saw, willing myself to be different, from clutching at towels to cover every inch of my naked body so no one would see even a bit of me. I feel freed from it, it is an amazing feeling to just let go of all that bitter pain and just be exactly who and what I am.” – Anon.
“And since I’ve rediscovered masturbation, and the ability to appreciate how my own body looks and feels during it, I’ve had the best orgasms of my life. Some days I think I’m skinny, some days I think I’m fat – but importantly, most days, I don’t care. My body doesn’t haunt me the way it used to. I’ve experienced enough body changes now to know that things are never as permanent as they seem, and worries are never as important as they seem either.” – Anon.
“I have forgiven my mum, I have forgiven those boys, I have forgiven my rapist. I know why the world is a mess. Capitalism and patriarchy endorse the commodification of women. Woman’s body has been territorialised and yet we are held accountable for the violence carried out on our bodies. I know this and my empowerment comes from taking steps with other amazing. analytical-minded people to change this. When I do think on these people it is with pity and the knowledge that I am strong, that nothing can defeat me. I would not have this without the community of women I hold so dear. As I cry writing this it is with pride and happiness.” – rouge
“I love sex and have had wonderful naked experiences with people who made me feel comfortable and safe and right in my own body, with my own nudity. And not just because they liked the way I looked naked, but because I could trust them with all parts of me.” – Anon, 23.
“I started to cry and she gave me a cuddle and said ‘mum, I wish you can see what I see. You’re amazing, you’re gorgeous, you’re beautiful both inside and out, you’re talented, you have the biggest heart of anyone I know and I want to be just like you when I grow up.’ My 12 year old has become my rock when I should be hers (although she assures me I am) it’s because of her I started and continue with Egyptian belly dancing (although some of the costumes make me feel very self conscious) She’s my inspiration.” – Anon.
We want to thank all of the women who’ve submitted stories so far, and everyone who’s visited and shared the blog. We hope this project can keep growing. If you’d like to submit something, you can send it to us at projectnaked[@]gmail.com.
Love,
Hannah and Megan
What can I say about how I feel to be naked? I’ve loved my body. I’ve hated my body but I suppose I should really start at the beginning. I developed and became curvy very young. I was the only person in my primary to start her periods and have breasts and I was bullied for it.
In high school I quickly became prey and men took advantage. I became hateful about everyone and everything. I didn’t know or understand what love was because I’d never experienced it. In my middle and late teens I never had a problem with being naked, with wearing very skimpy clothes, I looked good and I knew it. I was a size 10-12, toned, rock solid dancer’s legs, my breasts were neither too large, nor too small for my body (although I wanted bigger) my hair was waist length and I had confidence by the bucket load.
I started going out with someone when I was 18 and slowly I changed. I stopped paying attention to my hair – it just got washed. Make-up – there was none. Tight flattering clothes – changed for baggy jeans and big jumpers. Secretly I hoped that my ex would fight for me and want me back (I lost count the amount of times he told me ‘I love you’) Obviously not enough. He started going out with someone, who I perceived at the time to be hideous. She told me she would have and take what was mine and I told her to try, she got him and I got my confidence destroyed by someone all wrong for me, and I went to a very bad place with drink and drugs. I stopped most of it, although I continued to binge drink and smoke a lot of hash.
I eventually went out with someone 21 years my senior, I quickly became pregnant and my first daughter was born, we were married the following year and a year and a half after that my second daughter was born. I thought we were happy. Sex was wonderful and plentiful but as I became larger and my body changed so did our sex life until eventually it became non-existent. I went back to college and he stayed at home with the children; all through that course he made my life hell with the constant put downs and heavy drinking. I started exercising and became toned again back to my small size 10-12 and his attention changed as well. I put on weight again and as the weight came he went and sex again became almost non-existent. I went back to do a different course, the girls were in school all day and so was I. I loved it! I made some amazing friends that I still have to this day and he even got his drinking sorted, although every time he had a relapse I’d get the constant put downs and snidy comments. My aunt told me he was jealous and to just give him time – ‘his male pride’s been hurt’ she would say to me. All through that time I couldn’t look in the mirror. I hated what I saw, because when I looked in it I saw a fat, frumpy, old house wife that’s long past it and I was only 30.
At 31 I fulfilled a life long dream and attended a course at the RSAMD where I found out about Trilogy and I had the privilege and honour of taking part in its final ever show. It was a sisterhood of strong, independent, amazing women, of all ages, shapes and sizes dancing naked together and for the first time since before my children were born I was PROUD TO BE NAKED AND A WOMAN. I often describe that time as a life changing experience because in many ways it was. I was so proud of all of us that I decided to show (who I thought were) friends the cast photo of us all. Suddenly my amazing experience that I was so proud of was turned into something sleazy, dirty and something to be ashamed of and I was asked to leave the job were I was because they’d put in a complaint at management level. I retreated way into my shell, although no-one would know because I hid it well, except from my oldest daughter. She pulled me up one day saying ‘mum, you’ve stopped exercising’ and I asked her how she knew and she told me it was because the scarf wasn’t covering the mirror anymore, I always covered the mirror when I exercise and here I thought no-one noticed. I started to cry and she gave me a cuddle and said ‘mum, I wish you can see what I see. You’re amazing, you’re gorgeous, you’re beautiful both inside and out, you’re talented, you have the biggest heart of anyone I know and I want to be just like you when I grow up.’ My 12 year old has become my rock when I should be hers (although she assures me I am) it’s because of her I started and continue with Egyptian belly dancing (although some of the costumes make me feel very self conscious) she’s my inspiration.
How do I feel to be naked? At the moment – I mostly hate my body and I avoid looking in the mirror. In certain clothes when they suck everything in I sometimes love my body but now when I put myself down I think about my girls and how they’re proud of their mum. I think about my Trilogy girls and the time we had. The girls are proud that their mum had the guts and the confidence to stand in front of an audience and dance in her birthday suit and deep down although sometimes I need reminding – so am I. I’m an artist – I love the human figure in all its glory of any shape and size. I just wish I could love my own again and I hope the next time I tell my story it’ll be from a happier place.
– Anon
*Trigger warning for sexual assault/rape/anorexia/bulimia/alcohol abuse*
I was a thin child, undistinguishable from the other lads: a tomboy. The only girl out of a group of 13 who lived in each other’s pockets. We did everything together. I was accepted. Until that is, in the words of Jarvis Cocker: I became “the first girl at school to get breasts”, to menstruate. At the age of ten my life changed completely. Three of these boys stripped me naked in our local park: they grabbed my genitalia and breasts; they pointed at me; they laughed at me. In short, they colonised my body. Their gaze followed me throughout high school. They owned my body in the most negative sense: I became anorexic; I became a compulsive eater; I became bulimic. When I left school I also left the country. Still, I could not escape their mockery.
In my twenties I was raped after passing out at a party. I woke up to find a relative stranger stabbing my body with his penis. I told my mother. She blamed me: “this would not have happened if you had not been so drunk. Had you been leading him on?”, she asked. I did not speak to my Mother for a year. I was disgusted with her. I learned to deal with my obsession with food by turning to alcohol instead. Alcohol provided obliteration and a (very) short term confidence boost. It was a means by which I could have sex with partners who refused to believe I could not have sex with them due to triggering affects such encounters had on my mind. Obviously being raped should not be traumatic enough to dull the desire for a sensitive lover such as you! Such is the mind of man under patriarchy.
After getting lucky with a great therapist and much hard work and facing up to reality on my part I am now learning to befriend my body. I no longer abuse alcohol. This has been the greatest step in being able to realise my self-worth. I do not need to obliterate my feelings any more because they are largely positive. I desire lucidity because I want to remember all my experiences to the full. Occasionally, I still find myself obsessing over food but, fuck it! Who doesn’t! If I want to eat Nutella from the jar I will and I won’t feel guilty about it. I do, however, make sure that I exercise and have plenty of fruit and veg in my diet. Not because I want to become a rake but because I want to be healthy (both mentally and physically) and live for a very long time.
I have forgiven my mum, I have forgiven those boys, I have forgiven my rapist. I know why the world is a mess. Capitalism and patriarchy endorse the commodification of women. Woman’s body has been territorialised and yet we are held accountable for the violence carried out on our bodies. I know this and my empowerment comes from taking steps with other amazing. analytical-minded people to change this. When I do think on these people it is with pity and the knowledge that I am strong, that nothing can defeat me. I would not have this without the community of women I hold so dear. As I cry writing this it is with pride and happiness.
– by rouge
Throughout my teenage years I had all the usual hangups, worrying that I was fat or oddly shaped. I wasn’t, I was a size 12-14 with great proportions – I look back at photos and think my body looked amazing, and that I was foolish for not appreciating how little trouble my body gave me then, but hindsight is 20:20. Four unhappy years at university down the line and I’m somewhere between size 14 and 18 depending where I shop, and the shape of my body has changed, probably forever. This is a story with a somewhat happy ending (although it’s not really over of course – instead of an ending we’ll call it an ongoing), but first I’m going to take a tour of the main issues I’ve had with my body over the years.
Stretch marks
When I first put on weight I was distraught, not particularly at being bigger, but at the irreparable changes my body had gone through – the long, red, angry looking stretch marks that snaked their way up my belly, right at the front, making me embarrassed to be naked even around long term partners and saddened that I’d probably never wear a bikini or certain types of clothes again. Aged 14 I developed long horizontal stretch marks across my back, it looked like I had been whipped, but they’re faded now except in certain lights and I never really cared that much about something I couldn’t see anyway. While the stretch marks elsewhere on my body felt like a natural part of growing, these stomach scars felt like some kind of awful punishment – for being greedy, for being lazy, for being unhappy, for being stupid enough to let them grow in the first place – every kind of self critical thought you can imagine. Weight can be lost and gained and lost again, but stretch marks are forever.
I felt like I’d blown my only chance to have a good body while I was young, before life and age and babies. I felt I could accept those processes of life as normal, but my body felt abnormal. No matter what size and shape my body is in the future, those marks will be there. They aren’t forever in the way that I convinced myself they were though – over time I’ve continued to put on weight and they have continued to spread, but the marks that bothered me so much before are now silver or white, and the new ones are slowly losing their redness too. I find, for some bizarre magical reason that I’ll never understand, that they seem a whole lot less visible and less prominent when I’m aroused – I don’t question it, I just allow it to boost my confidence. And the way I feel about them is that I am just not as bothered by them as I used to be. I’m not totally okay with them, I still sometimes cover them up when I’m otherwise naked and I’m lightyears off being comfortable enough to wear a bikini, but instead of feeling like my life is over because of them, I’m confident that they will change, concern me less, and that I can cope with them in a way I couldn’t before.
Boobs
My boobs are big, round, sensitive, squishy, they slightly sag but are easily pushed front and centre. They can get uncomfortable and sore from lugging them around all day, the skin on my nipples breaks easily, and I have chronic lower back problems that I doubt will go away, but nevertheless I like them as they are. The size of my chest has resulted in a lot of attention, mostly negative and unwanted. People make comments in the street, stare, talk endlessly about it as though it’s a topic I should find interesting, act like I couldn’t possibly know my own bra size, make presumptions about me. The one that bothers me the most is that people presume there’s something ‘obvious’ about you if you have big boobs. Like the size of a body part that you’ve never chosen or determined means you’re easy, stupid, not worth the bother, not very interesting. Sometimes people refer to me as “Boobs”, like there’s no other noteworthy qualities about me. Often my family imply that I should cover them up more, I don’t see the point. Aside from the fact that I pick clothes based on liking them and not how much of my boobs they cover, I don’t get any less comments about the size of them if I wear something high necked, and I’m not going to wear clothes I don’t like just to please other people.
Contraception
I started taking the pill when I was 16, put on weight and had stressful mood swings, so I stopped taking it. When I was 20 I got the contraceptive implant, which coincided with a bad relationship (more on that later), but it also increased my weight, I bled every single day, and the impact it had on my mood was huge, so I had it taken out after three months. I think it’s awful that we expect women to bear the burden of contraception – especially because in the process we have to make our bodies a test site for a bunch of different hormones and their various side effects that can affect our mental and physical wellbeing. I stopped using hormonal contraception because it was upsetting me, and condoms are great anyway. However, I’ve recently decided to go back on the pill, trying a different kind, because my periods are so bad. Testing the pill is a horrible, trying process of weighing up side effects and benefits – at the moment, the benefits for me outweigh the worries. I wish I didn’t have to make those choices, but I do, so hopefully I can find the right thing for me. At the moment, this uncertainty about what unpredictable changes my body might go through is my biggest source of body worries.
Self-esteem
I want to talk about how I’m more accepting of my body now than ever before, but first I’ll need to explain how I reached the peak of hating my body last year.
I’d been in a relationship with a guy for nearly a year when I found porn on his computer. It wasn’t the kind of porn where people have sex, it was the kind of porn where very large women eat food while naked or semi-naked on camera, for men to masturbate over. After finding videos on his desktop, I looked at his internet history and found that not only did he watch videos, he joined pay-to-view porn sites, wrote on forums for ‘bbws’ and ‘feeders’, joined dating sites for men to meet large women where he pretended to be single, and even met up with one woman for drinks. It wasn’t just a sexual preference, it was a fetish. Any confidence I had flew straight out the window, for my body and my mental health.
Both of us identified as feminists and I couldn’t believe he would do something like that – to me, and to the women he was objectifying. I explained how upset I was, and told him my feminist objections to porn, to the fetishisation of types of female bodies for the sake of male gratification, and to the culture of ‘feeders’ – I don’t see much difference between a man encouraging a woman to diet because he finds it sexy, and a man encouraging a woman to eat lots of food because he finds it sexy. It’s controlling and manipulative and dangerous. Whatever size a woman is should be determined by her alone, not male fantasies. He apologised, said he understood and would stop.
I didn’t have the strength or the will to leave him despite how horrified I was, because it made me ill. I felt alone, confused, trapped, anxious, depressed, incredibly paranoid, and thinking about or looking at my body felt traumatic. I double questioned every thought I had. I thought, am I fat, and is that why he finds me attractive? Or am I not fat enough for him and he wishes I was more like the women in the porn? Both options were unpleasant, and made my body repulsive to me. I found going to the shops and being seen in public a struggle, I stopped wearing tight clothes, I became paranoid about what my friends were saying about me, I hardly masturbated and when I did it was joyless, I hated myself and felt alienated from everyone else. I can’t fully describe the levels on which it played with my perception of myself and other people, it’s not something it’s possible to entirely understand and explain, I just know that it scarred deep. When months down the line I found he hadn’t stopped doing it, I knew it was a losing battle and I left him. It took a while, but I came to realise it had never been about me or my body, but about his problems and his issues with control. I was able to finally recognise the way he treated me and the things he said to me as emotionally manipulative and abusive, and I’ve never looked back.
The first couple of times I had sex after that, I covered my body, but I don’t do that any more. I was still in poor health mentally, but the sense of relief and freedom was tangible and it really lifted a lot of the pressure I felt in my head about my shape. I’m sometimes still shocked at how easily I began to be able to look in the mirror, see my body as it is and not want to cry, previously an alien concept to me. It’s not that I wouldn’t like it to be different, I’d like to be slimmer, I’d like my belly not to hang the way it does, I’d like it if I could stop crying in changing rooms when I have to get the bigger sizes and the lights are so unflattering, I’d like a lot of things. But I feel able now to look in the mirror, see what I see, and get on with my day because there’s nothing immediate I can do to change it and it is what it is. There’s nothing wrong with what it is, and anyone who wanted me to change it wouldn’t be worth my time. When I’m focusing on improving my mental health, worrying about my body feels like a waste of energy.
Sometimes, things can pop up which trigger me and put me back in that headspace where nothing made sense anymore and my body felt like a cruel joke. When I see ‘real life’ magazines with stories about feeders on the cover, when I see the TV guide and it says they’re showing “Fat Girls and Feeders”, and sometimes when I see fatpositive blogs and images of large women’s bodies on sites like tumblr, I crumble. I don’t feel that way because of the women’s bodies – I don’t think there’s anything wrong with them and it pleases me when women of all sizes take ownership of their bodies and are positive about how they look – but because it reminds me of the men who abuse and fetishise large women for their own sexual pleasure, and how much damage one such man did to me.
But, time (and talking about it) heals some wounds, and I’ve come a long way from last summer when I hid in a tent and cried for hours after seeing a magazine article about feeders at a campsite. When the issue comes up, I can explain my experiences to people without wanting to melt into a puddle. And I have the wisdom of experience to know that I’m stronger than I gave myself credit for, and that what my body looks like is the least of my worries so long as I’m emotionally supported by the right kind of people, including myself. And since I’ve rediscovered masturbation, and the ability to appreciate how my own body looks and feels during it, I’ve had the best orgasms of my life. Some days I think I’m skinny, some days I think I’m fat – but importantly, most days, I don’t care. My body doesn’t haunt me the way it used to. I’ve experienced enough body changes now to know that things are never as permanent as they seem, and worries are never as important as they seem either. Of course there are times when I still berate myself for not looking a certain way, for not exercising or for what I eat, but I find those days are fewer and further between the better my mental health gets and the more accepting I am of my own feelings and experiences. A good counsellor, good friends and good sex mean the world to me right now.
Friends
Recently my best friends and I sent each other photos of our vaginas. It wasn’t sexual, we’re just generally nosy like that and like to compliment each other – we all have great fannies of course. It was a sincerely nice and funny bonding experience. Some people (particularly men) who have heard about it react fairly oddly, as if it’s the last thing in the world they would expect close friends to do. It makes me sad that most men, and a lot of women, are more likely to learn about genitals and sex through porn, with all its distortions, than through honest discussion and learning from friends. No one has helped me to appreciate and understand my body sexually more than my friends – from the friend who gave me my first orgasm, to the friends that tell me their experiences of types of sex I’ve yet to try, to the friends in primary 7 who taught me the function of the clitoris when we experimented with masturbation and reported our findings to each other. There’s no better way to learn about sex, about your body and about yourself, than to have friends that you trust and talk to and share experiences and thoughts with.
My words, unfortunately, take a different line to the inspiring messages I have read from other women here. This blog initiated my first ever exploration of my thoughts on my body and I am uneasy about what I found.
I am an outgoing and vibrant, confident woman and the way I feel about my body matches. I have the fortune of being able to eat what I want. I enjoyed a toffee popcorn doughnut today, recommended by the way, without a moment’s thought. I am frequently (classily) scantily clad and I feel great when I’m naked with men. Deeper than that however, this exploration has lead me to realise is a web of vanity and praise-seeking. Here lies a cautionary tale…
In fact, a dangerously self critical mess of insecurities and neuroticism lurks behind this veneer. I have struggled with depression since I was a teenager and have had two breakdowns including a terrifying period of psychosis. My happiness about my body never waned during these times and it gave me no reassurance. Being tall, thin and toned gave me no solace when I was cowering in the corner of my bedroom hearing things and no drive when I couldn’t get up for sadness. My love for my body comes from laudatory friends, ogling strangers and society’s skinny fetish. I like the looks, the comments and the compliments. It gives me a high and a warm feeling inside.
This is a false and dangerous way to build confidence; like an unsteady Jenga tower. My dependence on what other people think of me is a not a desirable personality trait.
With my friends I joke about my mental instability and they know me as a bright and slightly vain social butterfly. I doubt this post will come as much of a surprise to them. But sometimes I worry that the difference in my mind and my veneer is off putting to people getting to know me.
I’m proud of my confident veneer of course – I built it from a scared and bullied little girl – but my story can be a harsh reminder to others that appearances aren’t everything. On reflecting for this blog I now wonder if I didn’t have this body to fall back on would I have learnt to build confidence from the inside?
For me, how I feel about my own nakedness really depends on my mental health and personal wellness. It can vary from time to time. I picture it on a continuum with one side being – extremely.hideous.monster – and the other being something like – foxy.supreme.being -. I don’t ever reach one extreme or the other (thankgoodness!), but I believe having good mental health and balance in life is so crucially important to how we view ourselves, and our place within the wider world. When I’m feeling stressed out and anxious, I look at my body and I see something that’s tired, used-up and in need of repair. I feel heavy, grey and lumpy. I feel fragile and brittle. I see no vibrancy in my skin and no life in my eyes. However, when I’m feeling well-balanced and healthy mentally, I know that I eat better and exercise more often (even without making a conscious effort to do so). So, during those times I feel proud of my body. I feel sexy and strong. I feel soft and alluring. I feel confident.
As I look back on my (nearly) 30 years of life, I remember spending summer days of my early childhood naked, sitting in the grass, playing in my backyard, or skinny dipping in our pool before bedtime — they are all pure, warm and comforting memories. Adolescence for nearly everyone, brings change, insecurity and self-doubt. When I was an adolescent I felt awkward, and for years I hid myself in massive hoodies and XL jeans. I didn’t want anyone to know that I had lumps on my chest, or curves underneath the layers of fabric. I didn’t know how to dress my rapidly morphing figure or have the confidence to try. I felt safe when I was hidden. I realize now that one of the reasons that I hid myself was because, as a tomboy, it took me a long time to come to terms with what femininity meant, and to find what femininity meant to me. I will never be stereotypically ‘girly’.. and I feel 110% ok with that these days.
When I see myself naked now, for the most part — I feel lucky and proud. I feel lucky because I have come to embrace myself and my body. I have become completely comfortable with myself (most of the time anyway!). I feel lucky because I’ve never hated my body. It works hard for me and I often don’t treat it as well as I should. I’ve abused/mistreated it countless numbers of times and yet, it hasn’t given up on me. I feel lucky because I can see beauty in my body, and I know there are an unimaginable number of women that can’t see beauty in theirs. I’m no longer embarrassed or ashamed of my body – I don’t try to hide it anymore. : ) I feel proud of my naked body because I can see my mother’s knees, curves and breasts in it. I can feel that my skin now reminds me of how hers felt. There are so many strong and beautiful women in my family and I am proud to be one of them.
Two women that have heavily contributed to how positively I feel about my own nakedness are my Mum, and one of my life-long friends, KP. I am forever grateful to both of them for helping me achieve the level of love and comfort that I feel when I see myself stripped down.
by intheflesh
*Trigger warning for mention of sexual abuse and discussion of abortion*
When I was 11, other girls liked my body because I was thin and I had started growing breasts.
Someone else liked my body and coerced me into sharing it with them when I didn’t want to.
All I wanted was to get my period and be a real woman.
When I was 12, I bled for the first time and every month from then on, I hated my body because it caused me pain. Once I started menstruating, I wasn’t thin anymore, either.
When I was 23, I had the worst period I had ever had. It was summer and it was hot. I was pacing and crying and moaning in agony.
That was the last period I had for a while.
When I took the pregnancy test and it was positive, I just laughed. I had taken the morning after pill. It had made my breasts hurt. I knew then that it wasn’t working and that I was pregnant, but I ignored it. Finally a friend forced me to take a test.
There was never any question of continuing the pregnancy. I was single, homeless, on the dole and mentally ill. It was the first and only time I had ever had unprotected sex. It had happened on the most fertile day of my cycle. And my body did something amazing and started to grow a baby.
I started the process of being referred for an abortion the day I found out. I secretly delighted in the life inside me. I relished in every symptom of pregnancy that I had. I worked out my due date. I followed the progress of the embryo.
I was pregnant and single, and maybe it was hormones, but as I waited the ridiculous delays and jumped through the ridiculous hoops that would allow me to terminate an unwanted pregnancy, I had the most and the best sex of my life. I had a lot of orgasms of my own, and I gave a lot to other people.
I’m not pregnant anymore.
Sometimes I’m sad about that. But it taught me a lot about my body. I learned that my body was capable of miracles.
I know I can create and carry life. I intend to again one day.
I know I can endure incredible pain. Never let an anti-abortionist tell you lies about women getting abortions on a whim, for a laugh, and using it as contraception. I have never experienced such pain and physical trauma. Pacing and crying and moaning in agony a thousandfold.
I know I am capable of experiencing and giving incredible pleasure.
I didn’t know these things before.
My body is hairy and wobbly and a lot of the time I feel ashamed of those things. But my body is warm and strong and life-giving and pleasure-giving and when I’m naked with a lover, all I do is laugh because I fucking love the human body and I guess that includes mine.
Project Naked 
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