Learning To Love My Body *trigger warning*

*Trigger Warning* I will be touching on Eating Disorders and Body Dysmorphia within this post so if this is something that makes you uncomfortable and you may find triggering in any way it may not be the post for you. 

I did a post two years ago about how I dealt with having an Eating Disorder through most of my teens and twenties and since then I have been trying to help myself love the skin I'm in. If you've been in a similar position to me you'll know just how challenging it is to sometimes look in the mirror and not like what you see.

I still have moments where I feel for lack of the better word, shit. I hate how I look, I'll pick at features of myself that I heavily dislike. But I am trying to better myself and learn to enjoy food, learn to enjoy exercise and not be afraid to where clothes that I want to wear.

Since that post I have started to gain a lot more confidence. I started going to the gym not to lose weight but to make myself feel more fit. I would walk up flights of stairs and be exhausted when I get to the top so I wanted to change that and not have something like that be such a challenge. Personally I love cardio even though a lot of people hate I feel so accomplished after I've done it!

In summer last year I posted a bikini photo for the first time ever and it was scary but I'm so happy I did it. This for me is a huge stepping stone in loving the skin I'm in.

My diet has changed too, I cut out more and more meat products mainly because I genuinely don't enjoy them and there's so many better alternatives out there now. I really enjoy cooking as well that has really helped with how I enjoy food now, it's more satisfying knowing that I made it from scratch and I know what's in it. 

Pinch of Nom are my favourite series of recipe books at the moment and I do a lot of things from there. My favourite is Thai though, I could eat that for the rest of my life! My finace still eats meat, mainly chicken so when I do cook I make the same things normally but one with meat and one veggie for me! I think learning to cook and widen your variety of food helps so much. I am at the stage in life now where I feel like I know things that I do like and what I don't like. 

I'm not on a restrictive diet, I eat healthy but still let myself enjoy fast food or chocolate! I like the balance and there's nothing wrong about that. This works for me personally, everyone is different. 

Something that I found really helps me is Foodies on Tik Tok. Random? Maybe to some but for me I love watching 'What I Eat In a Day' videos on the platform because it's realistic and not pushing diet culture on you. It helps me to be excited to eat and also helps me find me to find new recipes too which I LOVE! Some that I love personally are; Veganbeautygirl, emmamatthewsxx, sabrinacorrinx, chloesshitpost, tee.aaliyah to name a few! They honestly make me feel so much better about food and just learn to enjoy it. 

Something I don't think I covered in my last post was having a food phobia. The correct term is Cibophobia which is where a person is scared of certain food types. I have this with certain foods and I think people get very confused about it. I never knew it wasn't considered part of an eating disorder it actually comes under anxiety. There are certain foods and meals that I hate and I hate smelling them, tasting them etc. What is frustrating is people just assume you are really fussy and don't like anything but the reality is you just don't like them and there's nothing wrong with that but like me I do have a phobia of certain things and I know I will never eat them because I quite simply don't want to. So it can be hard explaining that to people it doesn't always makes sense to them but it doesn't have to make sense you just want them to understand and accept it. 

Moving on, I am so happy to look at myself and see how far I've come even if I do have those days where I feel pretty down about myself, it balances out with how much better I feel inside and out. Hoping that I can keep this motivation and enjoyment and become an even better version of myself!

Thank you for reading

Rebecca

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