The already heartbreaking story of Terri Schiavo's short life and slow, embattled death has just taken on new significance for me after reading
this column by Connie Schultz in today's Cleveland Plain Dealer.
Apparently, Terri had grown up as a chubby kid and became bulimic as a way to control her weight. On the night of her heart attack, at age 26, she and her husband, Michael, had had a big meal and Terri went into the bathroom and made herself vomit. An electrolyte imbalance caused a massive heart attack and led to her being in a persistant vegetative state, from which most doctors agree she will never recover.
more below
We all know about the ensuing legal battles between her husband, who wants to disconnect her feeding tube and allow her to die, and her parents, who think they see fleeting glimpses of the old Terri when she blinks or displays a reflexive smile, and want her to remain on life support. I will leave the experts to debate the legal and ethical implications that this creates.
As a woman, and one who has struggled with weight as it relates to self-image, I want to talk about how Terri got to this place.
I find it horrifyingly ironic that this young woman, who felt fat and unworthy enough in her life to, at times, starve herself, or then binge and purge, is now at the center of a court case that will determine whether or not she starves to death.
As I stated above, I have struggled with weight and self esteem my whole adult life. My history involves bouts of moderate depression, and a long-term, simmering form of mild depression. It is kind of a chicken and egg thing for me. Did the depression cause the weight and self esteem issues, or vice versa?
All I know is that after the birth of 4 kids and mounting financial, marital, and emotional pressures my weight became like a cinder block around my neck. I have always thought that if I could just shed this extra 40 lbs my life would be worth living. I know this is bullshit, but my point is that many women feel this way. We always feel unworthy. We always feel that we are too fat, too short, our hair is too frizzy or too straight. Our noses are too big. Our skin is too freckled, or too light or too dark. Not to mention our breasts. They're either too small, too large, too saggy or uneven. A friend of mine says that now, after nursing two kids and hitting age 40, part of her getting ready to go out routine includes standing in front of the mirror and adjusting her breasts so that they are both pointing in the same direction!
Okay Kossack women (and men too if you want to chime in) how many of you feel that you are trapped in some evil vision of what society thinks a woman is supposed to look like? How many of you have suffered bouts of depression, anxiety or even downright hatred of your body because it's not the way it's "supposed" to be?
Even more importantly, as the mother of a beautiful 20 year old daughter, how do we teach our daughters to love themselves, warts and all?
UPDATE....Thanks to all of you who contributed postively to this diary. Your comments are still here, all of them, but I had to disable them for awhile to let things cool down. As some of you know, some incredible ugliness developed and continued for days after it left the front page. I asked politely that it stop, but it continued to the point that I could no longer bear to read my own diary.