TW // discussion of weight loss/dieting, mental health problems, etc.

I’ve been fat all of my adult life (I’m now 36). Once puberty hit, my body just started holding on to every ounce and never let go. As a millennial hitting puberty around the year 2000, needless to say, it was rough. Add in a thin, health-obsessed “almond mom”, and you’ve got a recipe for ✨trauma✨ and a crazy amount of self-loathing. I started weight watchers at 13 and my mom paid me for every pound lost. Every pound gained, on the other hand, was a disappointment.

Luckily, both my mom and I have wised up, and we have healed from that time in our relationship and I forgive her. But this isn’t really about my relationship with my mom, or even with dieting and the fatphobia that’s baked in to our society — this is about my own journey of self love and acceptance, into celebration of my body.

The singular focus of my obsession and hatred of my fat body when I was younger was my belly. Oh my god, the way I used to stare at it in the mirror and sob, wishing I could hack it off, get lipo, anything to look like the models I saw in my Delia’s catalogs that were delivered to my house monthly (despite the fact that I couldn’t wear a single item from their store, as I was already a size 18 and plus sizes were pretty much sold exclusively at Lane Bryant back then).

I hated my belly with the kind of white hot hatred I now reserve for mayo, Donald Trump, and people who drive slowly in the fast lane. It was the cause (or so I thought) of so much pain and anxiety (the real cause was fatphobia but I digress).

When I finally discovered Fat Acceptance, Fat Liberation, Body Positivity, etc, I was well into my 20s and absolutely sick of the cycle of dieting, gaining it back, and hating myself. My 20s were a time of enormous work on loving what I saw in the mirror - and it worked. Healing my relationship with my body truly changed my life. However, while I could stand the look of my body in the mirror, I still struggled with being able to touch and be touched in one specific area — my belly.

When partners would try to touch it during foreplay or sex, I’d recoil and ask them to please stop. The sensation was too odd. How could a part of me I hated for so long bring anyone pleasure?

I worked on it, just like I had my body image, and finally, I could stand my stomach being touched lovingly, even sexually. But I didn’t necessarily enjoy it — it was like rubbing my elbow. Fine but not stimulating. And so it remained for years. Just another part of me, neutral.

Fast forward almost a decade to last night, lying beside my husband (who absolutely worships me, every part of me, every day). He was holding me as usual before falling asleep, stroking my belly and occasionally giving it a squeeze. I started feeling… turned on. Extremely turned on. He didn’t touch any other part of me, and I realized I was dripping wet. My thighs were literally stuck together. We ended up having some of the hottest sex I can remember… all because he played with my belly.

That definitely healed something in me.

Love your bellies, they’re beautiful and perfect. ❤️