Stop to consider before you comment on someone’s outfit. Whatever you’re about to say, is it necessary? Is it kind?
For three decades I have quietly struggled with body dysmorphia. I am about as average as it gets. I am a US size 8, I am 5’6”, there is nothing about me that stands out very remarkably.
More important than my height or size is that I can climb a 5,000ft peak with my husband and run a 5k without trouble and go on all the adventures I please because I do my best to take care of myself.
Yet despite all this I often look in the mirror and somehow see an eight foot billion pound twenty armed sea squid staring back at me (metaphorically speaking). I can stare at myself and know there is nothing wrong with the jeans and t-shirt I have on, and then change my outfit five times before going back to the original outfit, stressing anxiously the entire time.
I have to deliberately practice self validation to walk out the door in the simplest outfit sometimes. I have to stand in a mirror and tell myself stuff like this:
“I have just as much of a right as anyone else to exist on this planet, no matter what I look like”
“It’s nobodies business what I look like”
“I’m not Korean and I am not supposed to look Korean” (this one is specific to the fact that I live in Korea and I have a very non-Korean shaped body).
“I should wear what I like unapologetically”
“The people important to me love me exactly the way I am”
No one I know would guess how difficult it is some days for me to just put on clothes and leave my house, especially because I love eccentric styles and am pretty sure I was a Harajuku girl in some past life. I’ve created this illusion that because my style is different then the average I must be completely confident about how I look. This seems to make people feel like they are entitled to comment on my clothing choices.
So when you meet up with someone, please don’t say things like “aren’t you going to be hot in that?” Or “jeez what happened to your shirt, did the cat get to it?” (Yes someone said this to me recently because I was wearing an intentionally distressed sweatshirt). “I don’t know how you are wearing that…”
Feel free to just say nothing at all about a person’s choice of clothing and instead say something like “I’m so happy to spend some time chilling with you today!”
You really have no idea what someone’s experience with their body and clothing is, no matter how comfortable and outgoing you may perceive them to be.
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