Look down, hold my breath. 

Soft steps. Tiptoe on the scale. 

Open my eyes. 126. 

Scrolling through social media, I stumble upon post after post of flawless 5’9 Malibu barbie dolls and their extraordinary beauty by matching our feminine ideals- each with an hourglass shape matching the golden ratio of 34’ at the chest -24’at the waist-34’at the hips, skinny and feminine or athletic and lean, beautiful, but none would ever breach the 120lbs threshold. And so I began to associate “beauty” with being more like her. In addition to the daily stress of being an adolescent swamped in school projects and my own endeavours, I found myself neglecting reason and eating in acutely unhealthy patterns. Somehow, subconsciously, my mentality towards my own physical beauty began to deteriorate and I went to extreme measures to look more like her. For days I would stress eat, worry about my weight, eat less, and then be sickeningly proud of the numbers on the scale. It appalled me that I would never be like her and I would, once again, uptake this unhealthy cycle of mental and physical self-torment.

Cold. I don't know why.

Flickering red, blue, and white. 

The screaming sirens approach.

At 9:30 pm Saturday night, August 31st, I was admitted into the hospital. When I came to, the bright fluorescent lights glared down on me, a wave of ammonia crashed into my head, and the steady beep beep beep of the heart monitor began to accelerate as I realized where I was. I had been passed out on the floor with irregular heart palpitations, covered in cold sweat. The doctors released me a few hours afterwards with the news that I have a new, irreversible condition: hypoglycemia. This meant if my body doesn't intake enough glucose, I will start having visceral reactions. Never, until this point, had I realized that in my pursuit to conform to what I thought the standard of beauty was, I had managed to irreversibly damage my body.

But I am not alone in this struggle. According to a study conducted by Hudson et al. (2007) to determine the prevalence of eating disorders through a national survey, at least 30 million people of all ages and genders in the U.S. suffer from an eating disorder. In every 62 minutes, at least one person dies as a direct result of an eating disorder. The majority of these statistics arise from the teenage female population. But why do young girls feel the most affected by this?

A study spanning from the 1950s to the 1990s stumbled upon the psychological sensibility of this; they discovered a correlation between perceived attractiveness and self-esteem, especially among female teens. The study showed that females tend to form a more intimate relationship with peers, hence they highly value the opinions of said peers. The concern for how others may view one’s body rises around the time of puberty, contributing heavily to the changing psyche at this delicate time period. 

There could also be a biological explanation as to why females in particular seem to be more concerned with outer appearance and fitting a norm than their male counterparts. A future study conducted by Feingold & Mazzella (1998) piggybacking off Cohn (1987) found during puberty, girls tend to gain more body fat, resulting in a physique that is more discordant with a seemingly universal cultural ideal of thinness. In contrast, males tend to gain more muscle mass and get taller, resulting in a physique closer to the muscular male cultural ideal. However, we have never seen such high percentages of eating disorders nor have we seen such high statistics relating to cause of death to problems with body image. Perhaps because of the ease of interconnectivity for the majority of the U.S. population, we do not need those peers anymore to criticize ourselves; instead we become our own critic.

But maybe we can tamper down those statistics and lower the amount of destruction obsessing over body image can leave. Emerging fashion companies in the U.S., such as Fabletics and TomboyX, are pushing for a wider selection of sizes and styles straying from the normal male and female ideals limitation. For example, Fabletics openly includes plus sized models in their advertising and TomboyX started with a vow to include sizes from XS to 4XL! There has been a recent push to promote self love and combat the cultural stereotype for the feminine ideal of thin bodies with companies such as Fabletics and France banning the idolization of women below a certain weight. We see examples globally to promote a diversity of body types and encouraging positive self image.

Trying to obtain the “ideal” body is often chased by adolescent girls since this is the time period they are most vulnerable to low self-esteem by perceived appearance. But this pursuit is often dangerous with unforeseen health hazards both physically and mentally. The major factor to most eating disorders stem from the unhealthy obsession to look a certain way. There should not be a pressure for any child to look a certain way and we should not teach the impressionable youth- especially at the time of delicate adolescence- beauty comes in one size. Body diversity is something to be celebrated and now, more than ever, this is being recognized.