Letter 7: Letting Go

When we make peace with discomfort

Happy Wednesday! Please welcome our next contributor, Nabil Tueme!

Even though it was twelve years ago, I still remember teaching Nabil like it was yesterday. Deeply thoughtful, profoundly reflective, and self-aware, she was (and always has been) in a class of her own. I remember thinking to myself then that I would have given anything to be like her when I was sixteen years old. A true old soul with a gift for words, I am grateful Nabil and I have stayed close as I’ve watched her soar through her undergrad career and now follow her successes as she earns her Ph.D. in Sociology. I’m certain you’re going to enjoy her keenly insightful letter today. — Molly

“The body often contains emotional truths that words can too easily gloss over.”

Esther Perel

It’s hot in New England today. It’s the kind of hot that people around here spend the entire year talking about. The kind of hot that leads people to declare, “What a beautiful day!” to everyone they encounter, from coworkers to gas-station attendants, both known and unknown.

Most especially, it’s the kind of hot that people believe is ideal for a day at Cape Cod Bay. Thus they arrive in droves, sometimes waiting for hours, bumper-to-bumper, to cross the Sagamore Bridge – to loll on the beach, bikini-clad, behind a spiked seltzer in a red Solo cup caked in sand. One observes groups of friends blasting chart-toppers, couples taking turns kneading sunscreen into each other, and impossibly plump, rosy-cheeked toddlers under floral or nautical bucket hats. 

It is hot. It is too hot for me. And I hate the beach. 

Sunset at the beach in Sonora, Mexico, where my family is from.

I spent a decade trying to pretend that I actually enjoyed the hot summer days of beach season. For me, the summer always meant being aware of – and uncomfortable with – my body. I jokingly say that I grew up during the Golden Age of diet culture. South Beach Diet, Atkins, and Weight Watchers had reached their zenith of influence in the early 2000s (these days, they’ve been replaced by Keto, intermittent fasting, and Noom), and no television, teen magazine, or doctor’s office was immune to their ubiquity.

Their approaches differed – for example, South Beach promoted a low-fat diet while Atkins advised the opposite – but the urgent message they communicated was the same: I needed to get my body “beach-ready” for the summer, and I needed to do it now. By the end of high school, what began as chronic dieting developed into a life-threatening eating disorder. I now know that I wasn’t alone: in fact, research shows that 35 percent of dieters develop disordered eating behaviors.

It wasn’t until my mid-twenties that I finally sought treatment for my eating disorder. By many measures, I’m recovered now. But while I’ve made considerable peace with my body, recovery hasn’t made me like the summer more – in some ways, it’s made me like it even less. 

See, I recovered into a fat body. And I don’t mean this in the dysmorphic and disparaging way that my sicker self, then a size 2, meant it. When I say I’m fat, I mean it as a neutral, objective descriptor. I’m a size 16 now, which means that I can no longer walk into a mall and find clothes that fit me.

It means that I may be subject to a “random” weight inspection by airlines whose services have become increasingly inaccessible to the diversity of bodies in which we humans come.

It means that people tell me they are concerned about my health but were mum when I was at my sickest – underweight, anemic, and suicidal.

Finally, it means that the summertime – impossibly hot and humid days like today – is even more uncomfortable than ever, thanks to conditions like hyperhidrosis and thigh chafing (“chub rub” as it is commonly known).

But here’s the thing: one can be uncomfortable without also being ashamed. 

All of my beach pictures are taken in the evenings when the people and sun have left for the day.

My boyfriend and I have been obsessed with ‘90s thrillers lately and a few weeks ago we watched The Edge, starring Anthony Hopkins and a young Alec Baldwin. They get lost in the Alaskan wilderness and Hopkins’ character, a brilliant self-made billionaire, has this great line about survival. He tells Baldwin that most people who die in the wild die, not of starvation, but of shame: “‘What did I do wrong? How could I have gotten myself into this?’ And so, they sit there, and they die.”

In our culture, we learn that our appearance is the most important and interesting thing about us. We also learn that our appearance – particularly our size and weight – reflects our character, worth, and health. That it will make us beloved and belong. When we aren’t the picture of beauty or health, we learn that we alone are to blame. And that we ought to be humiliated. 

The kind of shame this logic evokes prevents us from seeing that what is new or uncomfortable in our body can simply be new or uncomfortable without also being distressful. Separating shame from discomfort, therefore, enables us to think coolly about how to get ourselves out of the woods, so to speak, and let go of what is unrealistic or unhelpful.

For me, loving my body feels unrealistic. Instead, I try to make peace with the discomfort – to acknowledge it, approach it with curiosity, and sit by its side as compassionately as I would sit with a grieving friend. When I can’t love my body, I try to at least treat it with dignity and respect.

Sometimes, that means feeding myself because my body deserves to be nourished, regardless of its size.

Sometimes, it means moving my body in ways that feel good, by stretching or going on a short walk.

What it means for the rest of my life is no longer having to pretend that I like the beach – not at a size 2 or a size 16. And right now, it means sitting indoors, A/C on blast, watching corny ‘90s thrillers with my boyfriend. And that’s perfectly fine by me.

“It is not a question of if you will survive this, but what beautiful things await you when you do.”

Chanel Miller 

My 5 Favorites

• I recently purchased a year-long subscription to Headspace, an app available on the Apple App Store or Google Play. I use their bedtime-guided meditations to fall asleep. Not only do I fall asleep faster, but I also find that I wake up less throughout the night. Amazing!

• Megababe’s Thigh Rescue Anti-Friction Stick is unmatched for summer chub rub. 

• I love this refreshing juice recipe from Tasty. I add two small red apples to it, and it is perfection. 

• One of my favorite podcasts is Body Image with Bri. Bri is a licensed mental health counselor who specializes in body image and self-esteem and is just amazing at what she does. She’s also on Instagram.

• I just got a pair of high-waisted biker shorts (with pockets!) from Old Navy. They are so comfortable and cute and go up to size 4X. 

With gratitude,

Nabil Tueme

P.S. Have you had to make peace with something difficult? We’d love for you to share your experience in the comments below.