How Body Image Affect Us
What do I look like?
Our body image, which is the perception of our own body, its attractiveness, functionality and how acceptable we deem it. It starts forming in early childhood and continues to form when we age. Unfortunately, this image isn’t always a positive one but often negative - unrealistic and distorted.
We have strong ideas of how our body should look - shaped by opinions and comments of our partners, family, friends but also very much by social media and television.
In fact, social media puts a lot of pressure on young people to look “perfect”. Influencers and models promote distorted ideas of beauty, while their bodies might have gone through starving, purging and other harmful practices, or plastic surgery
Obsessive concern about body shape and weight has become very common for young adults, teenagers and even children, but why do people develop poor body image?
Body image is complex, it can be negatively influenced by experiences like traumatic events such as sexual, physical or psychological abuse. It affects all of us at any age. Body shaming is a very common traumatic experience (teasing, comments about weight or even straight-out fat-shaming). Continuous shaming leads to deeply ingrained dissatisfaction with our own body.
Symptoms of negative body image
A poor self-image can lead to a number of unhealthy habits and health conditions like:
☐ Eating disorders (Anorexia, Bulimia etc.), mood disorders, body dysmorphic disorder
☐ Self-abuse, self-harm tendencies (cutting)
☐ Low self-esteem, feelings of failure or inferiority
☐ Avoiding certain situations, social withdrawal
☐ Relationship problems
Problems with negative body image and eating disorders frequently go hand in hand. Many of us come to the conclusion that losing weight will make us more attractive and feel better. But the restrictive eating and over-exercising that follows can lead to unhealthy obsession and eventually eating disorders.
The dissatisfaction and unhappiness can feel overwhelming and may interfere with relationships, work and all other activities. You may develop the need to compulsively check your body in a mirror, pinching parts of it or weighing yourself obsessively. Or you may try covering up parts of your body. This can be very stressful and time consuming and even lead to complete social withdrawal.
How we think we are seen and valued is certainly important for our self-worth since we go through life and relationships in a physical body. But if it becomes an obsession or a great source of misery in your life, a qualified therapist can help you develop strategies to get on the right path to feeling at home in your own body. There are a number of therapy options like Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Acceptance Commitment Therapy (ACT) and others.
You can contact me for more information: admin@alfordjeremy.com