Seeking Self-Approval

Seeking Self Approval

My goal is probably not one that most people would set for themselves. Most people set their goals in terms of their education, career, and family. My goal is to lead a healthier life style because I got tired living with obesity and being unhealthy. At the age of eleven, my doctor officially diagnosed me as an obese child. Being overweight did not affect me personally while I was growing up in my country of Saudi Arabia. People in my country are not as concerned with looks are as Californians. Saudi Men all wear the same thing, white garment called "Thoob," so no one was different from the others. When I moved to California, I began to feel social pressure to drop my excess weight, the sooner the better. Californians have an ideal image of men as slim and athletic. I felt so pressured for being different that I sited a goal to lead a healthier life style for myself to achieve. I had multiple problems living with obesity, such as poor body image, social pressure, low self-esteem, and to seek parent's approval. With the negative experience of childhood obesity, I have come to learn a valuable lesson to pursue and maintain a healthier life style.

The mirror can be your friend or your enemy. I considered it my worst enemy because I had to look at something I feared: I had to face myself at my worst physical shape. I had what was called "man boobies": they were the worst part of being overweight, followed by my chubby face. Sometimes I would wear several layers of thick clothes to cover my "man boobies," even if the weather was hot. That is how much I hated my body. But what is funny is that I did not feel this way about myself until I moved to California five years ago. Now, I live in a world that favors the slim, athletic body. That world did not help, instead that world made me feel unpleasant feelings such as anger towards myself and jealousy towards others who were in better shape than I was. Brained-washed by television and magazines to look in a certain way, I felt I was not worth looking at or even worth loving. I wanted to be someone else: a thin, good looking man. Sometimes I would look in the mirror and wonder, "How did I do this, how did I eat so much that I have led myself into obesity?" These questions remained unanswered for quite a while. I never appreciated what I had, and always wanted what others had. This paranoid feeling began to be unhealthy; I was consistently staring in the mirror and pointing out what was wrong with my body. When I was obese I avoided swimming with other people because I was not comfortable enough to show my body to anyone. A point came in my life where I got tired of seeing myself and body in a negative way and from this moment I decided to change my eating habits and exercise more, leading a healthy life style.

Obesity means having too much body fat. A child is obese if his or her weight is twenty percent higher than the ideal weight for a boy or girl of their age and height. According to the health system at the University of Michigan, nearly forty-three percent of children living in the United States are obese. Unfortunately, I was one of the victims of childhood obesity. Obesity changed the way I saw myself in a negative way, such as changing the size of my clothes from small to large and sometimes to extra large. The clothes size did not bother me much, except when I had to buy clothes that were not the right size for me because my weight was not normal for my age. Living with obesity caused me a lot of health issues such as shortness of breath, lack of movement and exercise, and joint problems. The main reasons that I became obese are that I ate unbalanced meals and avoided exercise. Being unhealthy and obese destroyed me from the inside and I felt horrible most of the time. But that was about to be changed when I met my, then, brother's girlfriend Ina. Ina helps me be motivated to reach my goal of dropping my excess weight and lead healthier life style.

Living in California has shaped me up in a good way, but the process was never easy for me. I am in a position I like, but not where I want to be. Moving here, far away from the place I was born and raised, was hard enough for me. Back home, men wore "thoob" and the women wore the Vail, because is the tradition of my culture. Living here forced me to change my clothing style, and the way I styled my hair. But mostly I felt the pressure to drop the weight because being overweight was not considered to be cool and being cool was something I wanted to be. Californians have a certain image of themselves as in physically good shape. Obesity was not something Californians had in their dictionary; beauty is a factor for them that could always work to their advantage. Dropping the weight and leading a healthier life style is something I wanted to do since I moved to California five years ago. Maintaining a healthy life style is a positive thing, but not when it becomes an obsession. Many teens who live with obesity grow up with low self-esteem because they hate their body image or the way they look. Social demands cause people to see themselves in undesirable way. I felt the same way when I was an obese teen. Even though I have shed some weight, I still feel the same way I did when I was obese, because I have not reached

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