All Bodies Are Summer Bodies

Jul. 25

As a millennial with an Instagram account and a television, I am no stranger to the influence of celebrity and media on body image. I grew up in the era where magazines set the standard of beauty to be a 110lb frame adorned in the lowest of low-rise jeans. It was impossible to avoid the media’s explicit commentary on women’s bodies, praise for weight loss, or ridicule for anything above a size 6. “Beautiful” was a title reserved for a very specific type of person, and it was not the kind of person that looked like me.

We now call this “diet culture”, but I didn’t know that at the time.

Growing up, I spent many years dreading the warmer seasons, with particular anxiety around the months that required a bathing suit for full participation. The thought of being in public, in a bathing suit, was a personal nightmare for me.

It’s hard to see how and when these messages start to really impact your self-esteem. For me, it happened so slowly that it was hard to even notice the changes. Yet somehow, I went from being a little girl that had to be dragged away from the water and her love of swimming, to one who had to be coaxed into the water, even on hot summer days. I stopped packing my swimming goggles to go to the pool and started packing body dysmorphia. I wore t-shirts over my bathing suits and clung to the comfort of hiding my body underneath an oversized, Costco beach towel. Even now, I can’t exactly tell if the beach towel was acting as some mechanism of control over how uncomfortable I felt, or a means to protect myself from the gaze or judgement of others. Either way, there was no towel capable of shielding me from my own judgment or self-critical gaze.

As I write this now, I have so much compassion for the little girl who convinced herself that she didn’t like swimming. I want to wrap my arms around the teenager who painstakingly compared herself to the girls on One Tree Hill and The O.C. We only get to be that young once. I feel so sad for the years of my life when I allowed judgment of my body to stop me from enjoying my life.

Today, “body acceptance” and “body positivity” are actively discussed. Finally, the media and pop culture are better representing, including, and celebrating the beauty and diversity of size, race, ethnicity, gender expression, and more. I am still occasionally visited by the ghost of these self-critical thoughts, as the summer comes around each year.

I know that I am not alone in this. The fitness and fashion industries still capitalize on, and perpetuate, the fear of bathing suit season and marketing toward body image vulnerabilities is still very present today.

“Hot girl summer. Summer body ready. Bikini season.”

The notion that your body isn’t ready or worthy exactly as it is to enjoy summer is toxic.

All bodies are summer bodies. Exactly as they are, without any change or hustle. Your body is already a summer body.

All bodies deserve to swim, walk on the beach, go camping, eat s’mores around the campfire, be barefoot in the grass. Smell like sunscreen and bug spray. Play with your kids. You deserve to take photos of all these moments and capture these moments, without judging, editing, or deleting them.

Our bodies are the ultimate multi-taskers. They breathe and grow, heal and move. Our bodies have carried us through a global pandemic. They are strong no matter what size they are. They deserve to be respected and enjoyed no matter what season it is. As you read this right now, your body is a summer body, so be sure to let yourself enjoy the summer, exactly as you are.