Monday, July 11, 2011

Burning Question #9

Let's talk about insecurities, we all have them.  But is it possible overcome them? 

I have chosen to speak about one that I feel I have mostly overcome.  Most of you know that I am 5' 9" tall, emphasis on the tall (well 5' 83/4").  I know that I'm not quite an amazon woman, but that is pretty tall for a girl.  I was one of the first to get tall and was always considered to be a tall kid.  I remember in elementary school standing at the tall end of the line with the boys {and a couple girls} and I thought it was grand to be so tall!  But as I got older and taller and started passing the boys by, I got more and more self-conscious about it.  I don't know why boys take longer to catch up on the height end of things, but in Jr high and the first part of high school I was taller than a lot of the guys around me.  Being tall had its pro's as well- I was a dancer and it is nice to be tall and have long lines but {here is another one of my insecurities} I have short legs and bigger hips so compared to some of the other tall girls on my dance team, with their FOREVER long legs, I looked stubby and more curvy than I wanted.  I know that some guys didn't ask me out or ask me to dance at the "stomps" because I was taller than them.  There was a kid in my high school show/a Capella choir with me that called me and my tall friend 'amazon women'.  Ya, that didn't really bode well with me or help with my insecurity.  Lastly, a lot of my high school friends were shorties.  I would always laugh with my friend Ashley that I looked like her mom when we went out because she was so tiny and looked very young. ha ha 

Luckily, as I got older and went to college there were more tall boys around and I was getting less worried about my height.  However, I still would hunch over a bit and wasn't as proud of my height as I should have been.   I always told my mom that I would marry a tall guy and breed tall boys, to which she would reply, "don't discriminate against the short guys, you never know who you might meet".  (My mom and dad are both 5' 9", so my mom doesn't wear heels a lot, LOL)  But I insisted that I would marry a tall guy and boy was I right.  Chris is over 6' 8".  So he has nearly a foot on me and when I met him everything changed.  I could wear heels without feeling self-conscious because he still had AT LEAST 6" on me.  He made me feel smaller even though nothing had changed about me physically.  Now you can see me running around in 5" heels which would make me 6' 2"!  I still have to make sure that I don't hunch, out of {bad} habit.  But I have come to appreciate my height.  I will make sure to instill a sense of pride and beauty in Lola so that hopefully she won't feel as insecure about her height as I did.  Both of my kids will be tall and are already!  There are tall genes hitting them from both sides of the family.

Hunching and still super tall

Little hunch

Mini-hunch and creepy Chris
 
Notice my bent legs, totally doing a squat to look shorter. Plus I just had Lola so I was super insecure about my weight.

Sometimes when I see pictures of myself with my friends, I think, I look a lot bigger than so and so.  But I stop and think, everyone is different and I doubt other people would look at that photo and knit-pick at me the way I do to myself.  I have a healthy body that does what it is supposed to and I need to be happy in my own skin... and for the most part, I am. :)

What insecurities did/do you have? Have you been able to overcome it/them?  What were some things that helped you?

9 comments:

  1. Hunch is okay, you still look FABULOUS!!!!

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  2. Well, let's just say my chest matured much faster than all the other girls. I was excited when I got to wear my first bra but the first day I did, my friends made fun of me. By middle school, being in the band and having boobs I was a walking American Pie punch line. I wish I could say there was something I did to get over the insecurities....yes I did do the double bra thing for a few years...but finally other girls caught up or boobs became old news. Who knows but that was my beef as a younger girl.

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  3. being the youngest girl and having 7 GORGEOUS sisters, my biggest insecurity growing up was that i wasn't as pretty as them, or as good as them, or as funny, or as kind etc etc. haha sometimes i still feel a little insecure about that! i guess just one day, i realized that that i'm my own kind of pretty, and its okay to be just me... it took awhile to get used to that idea though. i think as women we tend to compare our bodies, brains or actions to others, and what we need to realize is that on the outside, women we see look perfect, but on the inside we all struggle and have things we need to improve on. i dont know if that even makes sense hahaha

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  4. I have so many insecurities I would take up your whole page. Lol. But to name a few they would have to be my stomach, my nose, and my thighs. Working out has helped me overcome some of my body issues. And I have came to terms with my piggy nose. "It is what it is" is what I tell myself. I also have been working on telling myself positive comments. I don't want my girls growing up having as many insecurities as I had, so I try to be positive around them, hoping that they will grow up having positive thoughts about themselves.

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  5. I don't think there is a girl out there that doesn't have some sort of physical insecurity. No name a few of my own it would be my stubby legs & Asian nose. It's a shame that our society focuses so much on being thin & pretty. Having children has honestly taught me to love every part of myself. I'd hate for my children to think they were ugly because of my own insecurities. And I was lucky enough to marry a man that tells me I'm beautiful every single day.

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  6. I never knew you have been self conscious of your tall-ness Dari! Isn't it crazy to find out the things other people are self conscious of. I myself have always been self conscious of my crooked teeth and my ugly ass feet, I overcame the crooked teeth thing after I realized that it was too hard to only smile with my mouth closed after my sophomore year of highschool, so now I don't care so much about my crooked teeth, I rarely think about them in fact. My feet, I am slowly getting over that one as well, mainly because there are some really cute sandals out there that I want to wear, so I'm wearing them and flipping my ugly feet the bird...also, I've realized there are people out there with way uglier feet than mine who wear sandals, ha.

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  7. I totally relate to this one.

    I'm 5'8" and most of my friends are shorties, so I look like a giant next to them. I'm always a good 4-8 inches taller than everyone in photos.

    I haven't grown a lick since I was about 12, so it took awhile for the guys to catch up :)

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  8. I've always wanted to be a few inches taller so being tall is good but I understand your insecurity about it. Alot of tall girls seem to be insecure about being taller than the rest in middle school and high school. I've always been shy I overcame it for a few years during college but reverted back to it. I don't like being shy but it has been so hard to overcome it. I guess it's easier to sit back and let others talk. If I have something really important to say I'll say it but I have a hard time being the talkative one. I'm also insecure about my bust and belly. I wish both were a bit smaller. If I exercised I could probably fix that.

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  9. I used to be so insecure about my boney shoulders, now I would give anything to have them back. They now have a nice layer of fat covering them as well as the rest of my body:) Oh and my small boobs, but the fat has helped with that situation;)

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