Fear of Falling

Hello again.

So. This will be my first tumblr post since last august. Because I stopped blogging when I moved for university, and that 8 months is almost over and I’lll be home soon. And I forgot about this for a long time. And I was happy. 

I’ll tell you right now that the reason I left tumblr was because it gave me an eating disorder. It might sound stupid, but being bombarded by pictures of impossibly beautiful and thin girls every day? It takes its toll.

So I took a break. And I like to think I’ve gotten healthier over the course of my time away. I don’t eat gluten anymore, and rarely eat meat, but make sure I get enough protein and vitamins etc, and I go to the gym. And I like to think along the lines of “I don’t want to lose any more weight. I’d just like to be stronger, healthier, fitter, more toned”. 

And I’m beginning to realize that train of thinking might be just as harmful. I logged on today for the first time in 8 months and suddenly “thinspo” seems to be disappearing, and “fitspo” seems to be taking its place. At first I was like, Yeah, this is great, getting people to be healthier! 

But the images are often just as unrealistic. And cause just as much self-hate. And I’m a little worried, because these are things that, outside of tumblr, I came to appreciate these ideas of beauty as opposed to just thin-ness. And maybe I’m slipping back into a kind of unhealthy idea of myself without knowing it. 

I do watch what I eat - I try to eat organic and local and fresh produce and less gluten. But I don’t skip meals anymore, or drink water obsessively to try and cancel out hunger (which never worked). I am exercising more, I’m going to the gym every day I go to class, and I’m trying to start doing yoga again, and I am looking to see a difference. But what is the negative side of this? I like to think I’m going about this the “healthy way”, but I look at those fitspo images, and I see things I want. It worries me a little. 

I’m curious as to what others think. Thoughts?