What I Know Now

If I could go back and talk to that little girl, I wouldn’t tell her to love her body.

I know now that healing isn’t that simple.

Instead, I’d tell her this:

Your body was never a project to complete.

You don’t have to earn your meals.

You don’t have to earn love.

You don’t have to become smaller to deserve taking up space.

And the women around you aren’t the enemy.

Many of them were simply trying to survive in a culture that taught them the same things.

The difference is that your story doesn’t have to end where theirs began.

Somewhere along the way, I decided I wanted to learn a different way.

One where food could become nourishment instead of fear.

Where movement could become joy instead of punishment.

Where worth wasn’t something I had to earn.

I didn’t know it yet, but that decision would change the rest of my life.