Take up some fucking space

A pep talk in three parts

CW: This post discusses weight- and dieting-related trauma.

1. The weight we carry

I need new photos for my website.

I do not want to get new photos for my website.

I would much rather stick with the same two pictures I’ve been recycling and repurposing since 2017. I actually like the way I look in those photos, and that happens basically never. It only happened then because I was much smaller than I am now (you don’t want to know what I was, or rather wasn’t eating at the time in order to cling to the upper edge of a so-called “normal” BMI), the light was really good that day, and somehow the stars aligned to catch me at exactly the right angles.

I look a lot different now. Thanks to a pandemic, a thyroid condition, regular aging, the inevitable metabolic consequences of a lifetime of weight cycling, and the monumental decision to stop going to bed hungry every night, my body takes up more space than it did in those pictures.

But if I don’t want a website full of stock photos, I need new photos of myself that show the face I have now, the body I have now — this body that has held me and cared for me and kept me alive, kept me from starving (even when I hated it for doing so), this loving, loyal body that has only ever tried its best to serve me, that has always, always yearned to take up more space than our culture permits.

2. Wisdom, power, and chubby cheeks

I was lamenting this to a friend. I showed her the old website, the old photos, and expressed the deep shame and hesitation I felt about getting new pictures taken.

I’ll never forget what she said:

In these pictures, you look so young. That’s not a bad thing. But when I see you, I see the woman you are now. I see the years you’ve lived, the lessons you’ve learned, the path you’ve walked to become who you are.

I looked at myself, and I saw weight gain, chubby cheeks, new wrinkles, gray hairs, all the perceived flaws that time has wrought.

My friend looked at me, and she saw wisdom and power in the person I am now.

3. Take up some fucking space

I was feeling brave a couple weeks ago (and my hair looked great because I’d just gotten a haircut), so I used my computer camera to take some photos of myself in my office, imagining props and poses I might use if when I hire a photographer to do the same.

These are my three favorites. They aren’t high-res enough to put on my website, but they gave me some good ideas to share with the photographer:

Photos by author

I like these pictures. More importantly, I like the woman in them. I like her warm brown eyes, her black turtleneck and cool glasses. I like her big smile. I love her purple notebook. I like the journey she’s been on, how much she’s grown in the last eight years, the wisdom and power she exudes. She’s come such a long way from the days when she tried so hard to shrink herself.

This is a woman who takes up space, and I fucking love her for that.

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