July 25, 2007
When you lose weight, the compliments and the numbers on the scale are so addicting. Every pound shed reaffirms your worth. Every compliment convinces you that you are more valuable to society and to the people around you. Smaller sized jeans make you giddy with happiness. That high is something you don’t want to lose, you become obsessed, and everything about you becomes defined by TRYING TO BE THIN. If someone loves you, you know its not because of who you are…no of course not, they love you because the number on the scale is saying the right thing.
Then the number starts to go up again…because try as you might, you just CANNOT DO IT. You cannot eat like a normal person. Food controls your every thought, and you want to limit yourself and have self control, and you want to exercise and be healthy and be normal. But a demon takes over and all of a sudden you’re not you. While you’re eating you’re someone else, and then as soon as you snap to it and realize all the crimes against your body that you have committed, you hate yourself for it. You LOATHE yourself for it. You feel guilty, you beat yourself up, you promise that tomorrow you will try harder, that you will only eat celery and no carbs. This is going to be the month that you start losing weight again. But when tomorrow comes, you feel so guilty about what happened yesterday, and you feel like its useless, like you already ruined everything by binging yesterday that you go deeper into the depression…and the monster takes over again, and you binge again. Its such a vicious cycle and so hard to break.
But what you don’t realize the entire time that you are yo-yoing up and down the scale, is that most people don’t notice. You don’t realize that the people who love you….they loved you when you were heavier, they loved when you were skinnier…your weight did not affect the way they felt for you! Sometimes its so hard to see beyond the negative.
Think about it this way…when you receive a compliment, how long do you remember it for? A day, maybe a week — or if it was truly an exceptional compliment it will stick in your head for a month or two. But a put-down…of course that stays with you forever. That time your grandma told you you shouldn’t smile for pictures because it makes you have a double chin, or that time when you stayed with a friend’s family and they made you feel ashamed for eating everything on your plate and told you that you shouldn’t be eating so much, you’re already the biggest one out of all your friends, or your cheerleading coach making a huge deal out of the fact that she had to order a bigger skirt for you because you couldn’t fit into any of the “normal” sizes (the special order skirt was only a size 12 for pete’s sake and crying out loud…and I wonder why I developed such crazy issues with my weight). Those memories stick in your mind forever…and in some way, shape or form, carrying those negatives with you, makes you feel like you will forever be the worthless fat girl that those people saw.
Why aren’t we able to purge our mind of the bad and retain only the good? Why is it, that only just now after really sitting and thinking back about that cheerleading coach, after really digging deep in my brain, do I finally remember how my best friend stood up for me? In front of the coach putting on a big show about a size 12 skirt, my friend said, “Well, she’s the strongest one on the team, you can’t expect somebody who’s pure muscle to fit into a size 0!” Why didn’t I appreciate my body for the amazing things it could do, instead of berate it for not complying with my coach’s standard of beauty?
That is my wish for myself and anyone else who has ever struggled with similar problems — that we would all be able to let go of the bad rotting inside our heads, making us incapable of accepting ourselves. If we can get beyond the bad, try to retain more of the good, maybe then we will be able to believe that yes, we are worthy of being loved no matter what the number on the scale says, no matter what our outward appearance shows.
July 20, 2007
Hearts were broken tonight in Chile. And, no, don’t worry. I’m not talking about another act of terrorism. What I speak of is even worse. The Chile U20 soccer team lost to the Argentine U20 soccer team in the semi-finals of the U20 World Cup.
To understand what this defeat means to the people of this country, you have to first understand their relationship with Argentina. Pure competition. The two countries hate each other. Chile thinks that Argentina stole their land (it’s true that they took a huge chunk of it during a war a really long time ago). Both countries claim to own Antartica (as does the US). When you go to Argentina and tell them that you are a foreigner living in Chile the first thing they do is start to ask you questions, “What country is pretty, Argentina or Chile? Do you like Chilean guys or Argentine guys? Whose shit stinks less, ours or theirs?” You get the idea. Futbolistically speaking, Argentina has always been far superior. Maradona, who’s right up there with Pele, a soccer legend and all time great, comes from Argentina, for all you people who are out of the soccer loop.
Now, let me tell you about the present day. There has been talk that the future generations of Chilean futbol (sorry, just can’t bring myself to call it soccer) players coming up the ranks, will form the best Chilean team ever. Well, this was supposed to be the miracle generation. These kids playing in the U20 W.C. made it out of the group stages of play in 1st place. They went on to beat Portugal, a world reknowned futbol playing nation, and Nigeria, a team that on paper was physically superior. The hopes in Chile continued to rise with each passing game that this miracle team won. THIS team was going to be the one. TODAY was going to be the day that the Chilean futbol team FINALLY put those Argentines in their place once and for all. The players were full of boyish confidence, and unlike any other generation before them, they actually believed they could do it.
That’s what made me cry when the final whistle blew. Other teams before them had always accepted that Argentina was better. Asi de simple. But this team dared to dream, as corny as that may sound.
The officials in the game were horrid. The temper tantrums and out of control play from the Chilean side were even worse. After the game 10 Chilean players got arrested for fighting with the cops in Canada (although there has been talk that the cops were abusing the players and Chile is filing a formal complaint with Canadian officials first thing tomorrow).
All in all, what was supposed to be a really beautiful day of hope for the Chilean people, turned into a nightmare.
One thing I think most people from the States will never understand is the amount of pride that goes into a futbol game in a third world country. If you are a developed country, there are so many things that you can be proud of. In the US some people are proud of our economy. For others, their sense of pride of country comes from our military strength. We certainly never lack gold medal winners at the Olympics. Our athletes hold world records, our movie stars are known world wide, our military prowess is feared (or was).
In the history of this country, Chile has won one Olympic gold medal (tennis). ONE! Winning a major sporting event is everything to the people of this country…and seeing as how soccer is almost the only sport that is played here…well, you do the math.
The loss today was devestating.
July 18, 2007
Yesterday there was an attempted attack on the British Embassy in Chile.
I CANNOT BELIEVE THAT EVEN CHILE IS NOT SAFE.
Fortunately, no one was killed and only one person received minor burns. Possibly responsible is an anarchist group, Len Czolgosz Autonomous and Destructive Forces, named after the man that was responsible for the assassination of William McKinley (a US president, if you’re reading this and you don’t know who that is).
Obviously this attackers really didn’t do their homework. There was hardly any one at or around the Embassy because they attacked on a Chilean holiday. Thank God, Allah, Buddha, whoever, for idiotically stupid terrorists
In international news this wasn’t even a blip on the radar. But I just can’t stop thinking about it. Chile, mi querido Chilito…Chile is like Switzerland people! They never rub anybody the wrong way! OK, so that’s only technically true ever since they got rid of brutal dictator, Pinochet, in 1990. But seriously, ever since then they’re a very neutral nation. And, there’s really not even that many British tourists that come to Chile either, only about 50,000 a year. Again, that’s a drop in the bucket.
Terrorists sicken me. I just cannot wrap my mind around the fact that some people think its OK to KILL OTHER HUMAN BEINGS to make their point (US government included).
In the US I always considered the possibility of a terrorist attack. And in any country, I would definitely think twice before moving next door to a US Embassy. In Chile I know I may be at danger for other things — being killed in a hospital by incompetent doctors without proper technology, getting my cell phone robbed 5 times in one year, suffocating to death on the overcrowded metro system, getting jumped for wearing the wrong team’s jersey at a soccer game, etc. But getting hurt because of an act of terrorism here would’ve never crossed my mind until yesterday. I always felt immune from those sorts of political dangers in this country.
I can be a big worry wart. So now I’ll have to add terrorism, even in Chile, to my mental checklist of things to fret over.
Leave Chile alone, please. This country has enough problems as it is, without adding crazed, violent anarchists to the big picture.
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