They’re always with me. When I laugh, when I cry, when I scream. To Everyone, it’s less that they are my friend who accompanies me and more that they are me. It feels like we’re twins who get mistaken for each other even though we’re not even identical; we’re fraternal. And Everyone is upset with me when they feel like I’m not treating my body like I should. Because she’s a girl’s body. And a girl’s body should not be as hairy as I keep my body. A girl’s body should not move as sporadically and recklessly as I move my body. A girl’s body should not wear the clothes and sport the haircuts that I have my body wear and sport. And yet, my body is still too much of a girl’s body to be anything else. A girl’s body is not my body but somehow a girl’s body is all my body could ever be. It doesn’t make sense.
It took a long time for it to sink in that Everyone thought I was being a bad friend to my body. I was being a bad friend by letting my body eat whatever they wanted, by letting their hair grow the way they wanted, by letting them move in the way that they wanted.
I’m not a bad friend. I take care of them, in the best way that I know how, in ways that nobody else knows how to. Even if my body was exactly like how Everyone wanted them to be, they would still never be happy with me or my body. Because no matter what, Everyone is only ever going to stare through my clothes and ogle our shape, categorize the color of our skin and decide who we are, pity the scarf on our head, and then pity us. Everyone is not going to care about anything that cannot be stripped off us with their eyes and placed into a box.
That’s why I stay good friends with my body. To keep us standing and happy.
Unruly Bodies 
TW: eating disorder
Hell yes. Growing up, I thought being skinny = being healthy = being happy. Turns out, that’s not the always case (at least, not for me). My body wasn’t made to be a size small. I tried. I did the disordered eating thing. The starving and bingeing, the scooping at my tummy fat in the mirror and crying. I lost weight the bad way, and it didn’t feel good. I feel almost lucky that COVID happened when it did, because it broke the cycle I was in before it could get too bad. Trapped indoors with no one else to see my body for months, I started eating again. I gained the “COVID-*19*,” and, to my own surprise, I didn’t care. When no one else was around to judge, I realized: I really like my body. I’m hot! I’m happy! These days, I try not to think too much about how other people see my body. I know it better than anybody else, and it’s better than it’s (and I’ve) ever been.
I’m really sorry to hear about your struggle growing up, but I am BEYOND happy to hear that you’ve been able to grow to take care and appreciate yourself. It’s a really good feeling when you’re able to be buddies with or even just neutral about your body. Takes a LOT of pressure off.
I understand you so much, when I was younger I would do the things I loved ran around and acted like a fool but when got older and it was time for me to be “a lady” I felt so out of place and like I was a vistor in my own body. Sometimes I do wish that I could revert back to my old self and not care about any of the social views on what a body should look like but I haven’t gotten there yet maybe sometime in the future I wont care about what other people think and just be happy with myself the way I am.
I hope you get to that point soon! Sometimes, it’s really hard NOT to feel like I’m constantly being watched and judged. Feeling like that only leads to me judging my body, appearence, self-worth, etc. It’s not helpful at all and only really makes me feel worse. And it’s so hard to stop feeling that way so it’s all about baby steps! Combatting that feeling of being scrutinized by society in small ways by letting myself break certain body/appearence related expectations was helpful to me.
Earlier this year I took an FAS body appreciation questionnaire thing and it helped me to realize that, at least in the broad strokes, my body functions and lets me experience pleasures like eating and cuddling my cat and even though I live with chronic pain and image issues I’m still really glad I have my body. She is pretty rad, and I want to work on treating her better, because she does a lot for me.
I’m glad to hear that! Seeing my body as my friend was really helpful in moving past a lot of the expectations society has concerning my appearence.