(Not So) Tiny Dancer

I am in powerful denial about my body.

Like a lot of women, I have issues. I am short (5’3” give or take ½ inch), “well endowed,” and hour glassy with smallish hips. I’m going to be 59 soon, and people tell me I have a “rockin” body. That’s fine. They can tell me that until they’re blue in the face, but I still look in the mirror and can’t figure out what the hell they’re talking about (even though I weigh less now than I did in the sixth grade).

I was an overweight child and still remember the humiliation of that fateful 6th grade year when my class was escorted to the auditorium where we lined up to be weighed in by the school nurse…in front of each other. I was horrified of course. My best friend, who was right in front of me, was first on the scale. When it was my turn, I closed my eyes, and I heard my “number” reverberate through the semi-empty auditorium. To my surprise, I jumped for joy. I was elated because I weighed the exact same as my best friend. I thought to myself , ”What was I so concerned about? I’m fine!!”

It didn’t occur to me until many months later that she was a good 4 inches taller than I was.

Denial…it was powerful then too.

The first time I remember feeling different because of my weight; I was 8 years old in my first ballet class. It was me, a rolly-polly redhead in a pink tutu, adrift in the middle of a sea of little teeny tiny blonde girls (at least that is how I remember it but there must have been a brunette in there somewhere). The other little girls were nice to me. They didn’t seem to notice or to care about my size, but I did. However, I did love dancing, so I stayed with it for about six months until the recital came around. I quit the class a week before the performance. I couldn’t bring myself to be on stage with beautiful little fairy girls.

By the time I reached my freshman year in high school, I weighed 160 pounds. I was miserable, had had enough of the teasing and the struggle with clothes fitting properly. I went on a diet and lost 45 pounds. That was in 1965.

How ridiculous is it that I still (often) see myself as a person with a weight problem?

I have recently come to understand that it is not the memory of garder belts snapping open in the middle 7th grade English, or blouse buttons being launched from my chest when I raised my hand too high, or being sung to with “fatty fatty 2 by 4 can’t fit through the bathroom door,” or a host of other embarrassing moments I endured because of my weight. What has its unrelenting grip on my self-image is the lack of acceptance I still carry for that little rolly-polly redhaired girl.

I never accepted her as a part of me, and she feels it. We have no relationship. And, clearly, her hold on my self-image is much more powerful than any I have been able to generate. She is insisting I see her, acknowledge her, fold her into my Self.

I decided to spend some time with my 8 year old me last weekend. I acknowledged her to both of us and let her know that I was sorry. I talked to her for a long time about all the wonderful things she has given me: my absolute abandon and joy when dancing, my redheaded sassiness and playfulness, and a whole pot of sunshine whenever she comes out to play.

No response from her. Her denial of me was powerfully palpable.

I have continued talking to her as I go through my days just to let her know that I am not a woman who asks for forgiveness without expecting to earn it. This morning out of nowhere, while in meditation, she emerged and sat on my lap…just sat there looking around my home. She eventually turned around to face me. In her eyes, I saw that pure forgiveness that I sometimes think only children are willing to radiate out. We looked at each other for a long time.

I told her that in looking at her I recognized there was so much to love about her (no pun intended). And we laughed at the ridiculousness of my sorry attempt at a joke and my denial of one of the absolute brightest parts of me.

She head hugged me, cautiously. And I head hugged her back.

Then I signed us up for a Salsa class this weekend. We can’t wait.