The summer season is nearly here and many people associate it with sunny days at the beach and lots of outdoor activities with friends and family. However, a significant number of people have other feelings creeping into the back of their minds: anxiety and insecurity. Especially when it’s time to wear shorter and more revealing clothing, these feelings may dominate and ruin their fun.

As temperatures rise, so do feelings of self-consciousness. While many people consider it the most relaxed season, summertime can be challenging for people who are struggling with negative body image or body dysmorphic disorder (BDD). BDD is a mental health condition where a person spends a lot of time worrying about flaws in their appearance, which are most of the time unnoticeable to others. This condition may cause a downward spiral in a person’s life, leading to depression and suicidal thoughts.

Truth is, it is quite normal that a person feels as if their body is not enough, or that it is too much. But, this is only normal when it happens every once in a while. So if you find yourself checking every small detail of your body in every mirror or car window you pass, you may want to talk to someone about it. The symptoms can be quite vast from being extremely preoccupied with your appearance and your “flaws”, which leads to the constant thought that you are deformed and ugly, to avoiding social situations and big events, not to compare yourself to every beautiful person there.

This problem with body dissatisfaction originates from long ago. We are all aware of the medieval high society trend with corsets, as well as the famous fashion shows from the 90s. The historic fashion standards and constantly changing trends have all led to this. 

The causes of this condition are not exactly known. Still, scientists associate it with a chemical imbalance in the brain, genetics and it can often appear as a result of a past traumatic experience, especially if a person was teased, bullied, or abused as a child. Sometimes, other problems may cause you to feel dissatisfied with your body, and as the feeling of discomfort grows, it also may trigger the rise of problems differing from a feeling of shame because of an eating disorder, the size of certain body parts, or constantly trying to hide self-inflicted scars.

But, another reason for this condition can be the one and only, the origin of all our insecurities: social media. It is the main platform for unfair comparisons between the real and the fake. Every day we are flooded with thousands of pictures of pretty young women and good-looking men who seem to have perfect hair, a symmetrical face, and not one stretch mark. Then you open up their profile and drown in their perfection and end up thinking to yourself “How can someone be so flawless, if only I could look like that”. Everyone tries to look so happy, healthy, and perfect online when in real life none of that is real. Even the loveliest beauty gurus pose for the camera sucking in their stomachs and spending hours editing their pictures before they post them. This has caused an enormous rise in body negativity throughout the years. There are 12-year-old kids, who are not even teens yet, comparing their not fully developed bodies to fitness gurus in their late 20s. That’s why they start dressing more and more grown up, because social media has taught them they have to be skinny, but also have muscles, yet also be curvy. It is impossible. Even more so, as time passes we completely detach from the image of a normal human being. The population wants more and more and more. Recently I saw a tweet commenting that Margot Robbie was “definitely mid”. According to Urban Dictionary, “mid” is a form of insult used to label something as average. It is totally absurd that the actress that played the lead role in last year’s “Barbie”, a movie that even more so sheds light on women’s struggles with their body image, was called “mid”. This is a definite result of society’s detachment from reality and the inability to differentiate between the real and the imaginary.

This brings us back to summer. Temperatures are high and you have to wear shorter clothing, which can make it harder to hide your imperfections. Some people have a crisis before going to the beach, because of how intimidated they are by wearing a swimsuit. Still, quite frankly they have to wear one. Or if they go on a hike during the summer and get all sweaty. They feel so ashamed of themselves, when in reality that’s completely normal. In their mind everyone is staring at them and silently judging the way they look. So, people suffering from this may find themselves in a spiral of different excruciating diets and disordered eating before the beginning of summer. 

Is there an end to this everlasting feeling of insecurity and shame? If these thoughts are interrupting your day-to-day life, you might want to talk with someone you trust about it or seek professional help. In case you’re too shy for that, you should try to make small changes in your everyday life. It is advised that you can start with unfollowing all of the toxic beauty standard profiles that flood your feed and surround yourself with more supportive people, in real life as well as virtually. One of the most important things in life is to be kind to yourself. So, why not look in the mirror and instead of saying all the bad thoughts out loud, try to see the bigger picture objectively? Imagine you are looking at a friend instead of yourself. Learning to love yourself is a long and scary road, but once you collect the courage to start, no one can make you feel worthless. So yes, this summer enjoy that extra slice of cake and wear your swimsuit without any shame!

Dela Dodevska 

Sources:

Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) – NHS (www.nhs.uk)

How to deal with negative body image in the summer (patient.info)

How to deal with negative body image in the summer (patient.info)