Great Body, Pity about the Head

Dear Peeps,

We have all had mean stuff said about us over the years. But the teenage years are a sensitive time, especially as our body image is formed.

I went to a high school in country Victoria, a small town, where they had a festival about potatoes and every year they crowned a Potato Princess🥔.

For year 11 camp we got bused to QLD and spent 2 weeks travelling around. So cool! It was the highlight of your time at high school. I was so fortunate that S&P paid for me to go. 😍

First stop - Great Keppel Island aka Paradise!! We swam and hiked and just had fun with our mates.

Second stop - Fraser Island - not as beautiful as Great Keppel but stunning in its own way. Just watch out for dingoes and mean boys.

Mean boys? What does Ro mean?

One night I was walking back to my tent, which I shared with 3 other girls - yes we did laugh and talk all night💕💕💕💕. I had amazing friends. I walked past a tent, which was filled with boys and heard one boy, lets call him 🤡 speaking.

🤡 said "Great body, pity about the head." I was like, wow they are rating the girls. Then I heard another boy say "Yeah, Ro has a great body." They were talking about me. Of course, I ran back to my tent and felt sad.

When I think about this camp, this is the first thing that comes to my mind, not the positive stuff - lots of positive things happened. Our brain is wired to focus on the negatives to protect ourselves. Remember in my mental health post, I discussed changing your neural pathways, well, this is a time I should have done that. However I was a young 16 year old girl, who knew nothing about neural pathways.

🤡's comment has been stuck in my mind for years. I know I have a great body due to genetics. S&P are a good height, slim and they raised us to eat healthily. But I also got some other heredity traits, which I wish had not been passed on, and my nose 👃is the main one.

My Dad's side of the family all have a big bump in their nose. His Dad had it, my Dad and Aunty have it and I have it. I was never self conscious of this until 🤡's comment. Now, I don't see anything else. What I should see when I look in the mirror is an attractive woman, with beautiful green eyes which sparkle ✨with life.

This comment has been reinforced as an adult. I often get told I look like Elisabeth Moss, from Handmaids Tale.

We have the bump in our nose in common.

Quick side road - I was on a day cruise to Phi Phi Island, in Thailand, and everyone on the boat was looking and whispering about me. I thought it was because I was travelling alone. This went on for 8 hours until we finally docked and a 20yo German man asked me if I was the lady from Handmaids Tale. I said "No". He said but you are English, like her. I explained I was Australian. He did not believe me and he seriously still thought I was Elisabeth. I should have lied and had a photo taken with him😂.

I feel like the only thing I have in common with Elisabeth is my nose. And guess what, I don't find her attractive. So when people say I look like her and people say this a lot, I cringe on the inside because they are reinforcing 🤡's comment - pity about the face🥲🥲.

I can now reflect, as an adult, I am attractive but I am not classically beautiful. 🐒🐒 are classically beautiful and are lucky they did not inherit the family 👃 but they did get the ✨ eyes. They seemed to get the best parts of me and my ex husband - phew.

Every time I think of this camp now, I am going to say 🛑 stop to the bad memory and think about one of these positive thoughts.

1. I made one of my best friends on this camp.
2. S&P loved me and worked hard for Big Bro and I to have every opportunity in life.
3. I had the most amazing 2 week holiday in QLD.
4. I rocked mt bikini👙.

I know everyone has had mean stuff said about them, please try and find the positive and swap the narrative in your brain.

Feel free to share the negative comment and tell me the positive you can replace it with.

And please stop telling me I look like Elisabeth Moss, I am three years older, so she looks like me😂. But if she needs a doppelgängers, I am happy to step in.

Don't let the mean kids bring you down.

Love,

Ro