In our culture obsessed with dieting and weight loss and flat abs and perfect skin and big butts and hairlessness and cellulite and and and….. the pressure to maintain a perfect image that fits society’s impossible expectations is immense. Immense is an understatement. From childhood onward, we are all inundated with images of perfect people that don’t even exist. Although there has been a movement to end the extreme editing of images presented to us in the media, the editing is still there, making the people we look up to into beacons of unattainable beauty.

Society is gravely affected by this. And young, impressionable girls, I think, are hit hardest of all. We’re taught to love ourselves, but then shown a million ways to improve ourselves. Who do we believe? And in the age of social media, where everyone presents only the best aspects of their lives, we believe everyone is more beautiful and more happy than we are.

Where do I fit in? I was not immune to the self-esteem sabotage. Especially since I had an interest in fashion, I was surrounded by images of rail-thin women in elegant clothes and makeup. Naturally, I thought it was possible for my body to look like that. I thought that was the peak of beauty. I thought I could never be taken seriously in the industry with the muscular body type I was given. So, I developed an unhealthy relationship with food.

This was what my body looked like in high school, when my body image issues were at their worst. I really thought I was fat. I would obsessively exercise for hours every night. I would eat one pudding cup for lunch and force myself to take forever to eat it, so it seemed like more food. I really thought I was fat. All I can do now is laugh at how stupid I was.

Before that point, I was a competitive swimmer and spent upwards of four hours every day in the pool. This is hard on the body and requires a lot of fuel. This also builds a lot of muscle. Muscular women are not attractive, according to society. My brother told me that no man would ever love me because I was so muscular and had no curves at all. When I quit swimming, my curves came in hard and fast and I was left feeling like a stretch mark-marred whale. I had nobody to tell me that it was okay to gain weight. In fact, the girls I was surrounded by were just as obsessed as I was with obtaining that desirable body.

I’m happy to say that I am not like that anymore. I have gained an appreciation and a respect for my body and all that it does every day. If my body isn’t strong, I’m not strong. But it isn’t easy to believe these things. It’s especially hard for me to accept the fact that I’ve gained 10-12 pounds since high school. I always think it’s because I’m not taking care of myself, or that I’m eating in excess. But that’s not always true. Our bodies change. Our metabolisms slow. They really make us believe these things are completely in our control, when that’s not always the case.

I do think that the fashion industry has some responsibility to change the way bodies are portrayed in the media. Cast women with realistic bodies. Avoid enforcing industry-wide standards that encourage models to engage in unhealthy eating and exercise behaviors. Stop treating models as hangers for the clothes, which not only creates an unrealistic expectation of what bodies should look like in clothes, but also objectifies and dehumanizes the women wearing them.

What have you experienced in terms of body image and self-esteem? I am optimistic that things are changing. Slowly, but they are.