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I almost forgot that this week Weightless turns one! So I wanted to share what I’ve learned thus far. Also, I want to extend a huge and heartfelt thank-you to Weightless readers. I appreciate you coming here every day and reading and commenting. This blog is my baby, and I appreciate you sticking around.

Before I began Weightless, I had studied body image and disordered eating for over four years, both in undergrad and grad school. And I learned many valuable facts and read through tons of research (and did some of my own).

But it wasn’t until I started writing Weightless that I learned the most about the nuisances, the messes and the meaning of body image.

Thanks to many fantastic bloggers, experts and readers, I’ve learned, and I’ve grown.

I’d sum up my lessons into one major one: Body image is an analogy, a metaphor, a mirror that reflects back the rest of your life.

It’s the window into your self-worth.

It’s the language that captures and translates your self-image.

I used to think that hating your hips had nothing to do with how you felt about yourself as a whole.

So everything in my life was OK, but the number on the scale just needed tweaking (lots of tweaking). Once that was taken care of, my life would kick-start, and it’d be a celebration. This beautiful parade with nothing but happy faces marching through the streets.

I used to think that how you ate – restricting, emotional eating, bingeing – also had nothing to do with your self-image. With the color of your life.

But in reality, how you eat or how you view your body has everything to do with how you view and live your life.

In her book, Women Food and God, Geneen Roth says that emotional eating is equal to bolting. We obsess over food and then numb ourselves with it because we don’t think we can handle the world. We don’t think we’re resilient enough.

So we focus on the little-bitty. Like how I focused on grammar when my dad passed away. Or how I sampled (and stuffed) every Russian delicacy after my grandma’s funeral.

Christie, from Honoring Health – a blog about intuitive eating and living really – illustrated this connection between food and life and relationships beautifully with her post about Tom.

I also learned that my negative body image – true for most people, too – wasn’t about wanting to have thinner thighs or a flat stomach. Yes, I yearned for those things, but it also meant being a different person.

These physical changes would finally make me popular, well-liked, admired, anxiety-free and adventurous. My life would suddenly change as soon as I was skinny.

It is these lessons, these realizations that bring insight and growth. I realized that I don’t have to wait until I’m a certain weight to change things about my life. To fully accept myself. To take care of myself. To be healthy. To be happy.

Thin is an illusion, and I’m happy that I can finally see through the mirage.

And that’s a true and exciting celebration!

Again, thank you so much, everyone, for reading Weightless, and for helping me to learn and grow.

How have you grown in the past year? What Weightless posts have resonated with you? What kinds of posts would you like to see here in the future?

Today’s favorite post. Ashley, from Nourishing the Soul – a blog about disordered eating and media literacy – featured a must-read interview this week with Ron Saxen, author of The Good Eater: The True Story of One Man’s Struggle With Binge Eating Disorder. Be sure to check out part 1, part 2 and part 3.

P.S., And because it’s Friday, and because it’s my birthday, I’ll leave you with the cutest and sweetest image EVER that’s sure to make you smile…

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    Last reviewed: 5 Nov 2010