#I thought- that maybe we wouldn't be following a patriarchal beauty standard in a LESBIAN show but they did

[artemismatchalatte]

Still thinking about how even on a lesbian tv show, none of the women seemed to have any body hair at all... seriously?!?

It seemed so unrealistic to me. Unless I'm the weirdo here.

[xxshankxx]

growing up with white beauty standards - a little brown girl's perspective

content warning: mentions of racism, colorism, childhood, insecurity, weight, eczema, self harm, medication, dysmorphia, conflict with family. also poor grammar lol. let me know if there's anything else worth mentioning

i started to feel insecure as i went through the timeline, which is nobody's fault other than the culture of comparing ourselves to others and how irrational our thoughts can be as a result of racist and patriarchal indoctrination. i see people who are pretty, petite, and pale. and i think, i am not pale, or petite. am i not pretty? without even thinking, comparisons and conclusions have been made and now i feel insecure.

so i'm taking a break from scrolling to sit with my feelings. and to think about where they come from.the following is just some reflection and rambling about my experience growing up as a brown girl. the racist, colorist, and colonial beauty standards i grew up with are still buried deep, and it'll take a lot of deconditioning to dig them out and learn to be content in my body.

when i was a toddler, i still lived with my grandmother. she would always praise how pretty and white my skin was compared to hers and my mothers. as i got older and my skin and hair grew more pigmented, i started to feel more insecure. was i still pretty, now that my skin was brown like my grandmas?

my grandmother would also weigh herself every day, and complain about how she's getting old and fat and ugly. i started to weigh myself because that's what my grandmother did, though i didn't understand the numbers yet.

i think about how when i was 7 years old or so, and i had really bad eczema. i had to take weekly "bleach baths," baths of cool water mixed with a cup of household bleach, to prevent my scratched up skin from becoming infected. i secretly hoped the bleach would lighten my skin and hair. it didn't, that's not how bleach works, but i didn't know any better at the time.

i remember thinking my nose was too wide for my face. i wanted a thinner, pointier nose, like my white relatives and my brother had. i remember sitting in the passengers seat of my mothers car, complaining about my nose as i looked in the visor mirror, when my mother told me she tried to shape my brother's nose by pinching it when he was a baby, but she didn't do that with me. i wondered if it was too late to start pinching my nose to change it's shape too.

when i was 10 years old, i would sit next to another asian girl named grace at the lunch table. we wouldn't eat lunch, instead comparing the sizes of our thighs, saying "i'm so fat! my thighs are bigger than yours" / "no, you're not fat! you're beautiful! my thighs are bigger." we were both very skinny. i know i was underweight, and i looked it too. i sometimes wonder how grace is doing, and if she still thinks her thighs are "too fat."

in middle school, i would never wear white, and i avoided wearing light colors as much as i could. because i didn't want to look darker in contrast. i had also heard that dark colors make you look thinner, and light colors make you look fatter.

this was also around the time i started developing symptoms of my affective/mood disorder. so i was a stereotypical depressed kid wearing black on black, hating myself, listening to angsty music about anger and sadness and death. at least my scars are pale, i thought, maybe that's the color i'm meant to be.

i think about how in high school, i'd get anxious going out on a sunny day for fear of tanning and becoming darker than i already was.

i came out as a lesbian in high school. the first girl to ever ask me out told me, "i don't like dark-skinned people, but you're not too dark." was that supposed to be a compliment? i wasn't flattered. we didn't date.

high school is also when i took the mood stabilizer that made me gain 50lbs in 5 months--maybe helped along somewhat by puberty, who knows. i went from skinny, petite, technically underweight, as i'd been my whole life up until that point, to mid-size, as i am now, outgrowing all of my old clothes and developing body dysmorphia when my body changed faster than i could adjust to it. it was so rapid, and for the first time, i felt real insecurity and anxiety about my weight. my doctor was proud of me for gaining. my mother relentlessly reminded me that i'd gotten fat and i needed to eat less and exercise more.

i never lost all the weight i gained on that med. my thighs are fat and my girlfriend loves it. i'm darker now than i was a few years ago. and i still have lots of pale scars. i wear sunscreen regularly, but to protect against sun damage, not against tanning. i definitely grew into my nose, i usually quite like it. and i bleach my hair because i love dying it pink, not because i hate looking brown. i'm not afraid to wear bright colors anymore, and i only avoid white because it's easier to stain. my mother and grandmother still have a lot to say, but i do my best to ignore them. on a good day, i'll ask them, what's wrong with my gaining weight? what's wrong with me getting dark? i got my looks from you. and i don't think you should hate your body so much. it's done so much for you. it's accomplished many things. it deserves respect and compassion and love regardless of how it looks. if you don't want to see me, you can close your eyes or i can leave. but my body isn't the problem.

and it doesn't have to look like the pretty people i see online. and pretty doesn't have to be one look. yes, flowers are lovely, but so are stars, and doves, and trees, and rainbows, and you, and me. all different, and all lovely. anyways i'm done being moody and reminiscent for now. i don't feel as insecure anymore. thanks for being here to process those feelings with me.