I’m Trying to Lose Weight for This Very Taboo Reason

It’s not okay to say this — but it should be.

Because I want to look f*****g good, that’s why.

And that’s the honest truth. I cringe thinking about my reason behind wanting to get fit, but damn, I can’t deny there’s something empowering about feeling like hot shit in a killer outfit. The more I say it out loud the more comfortable I feel knowing that I really do want to look good. And there’s nothing wrong with that. Truly.

But in today’s western world it’s not okay to want to lose some fat to achieve a certain aesthetic. We have to be accepting of our bodies as they are. There is truth and merit in being kind to and loving our bodies the way they are right now. But there’s also nothing wrong with wanting to better ourselves.

I’ll get into this more a little later, but here’s my story.

I’ve never been really heavy — for context, I’m just shy of 5'4" and weigh 150lbs — but I’ve also never been super fit.

Unless you count my prepubescent dancing days. But once I turned 11 and stopped doing ballet 5x/week the weight piled on.

Long story short, the intense ballet school I went to closed down and we didn’t find a school for a year. My Ukrainian grandmother moved in with us during that year and so many dumplings and blinchiki were shoved…