Ok folks, I am going to rant a little because, well, thats what blogging is for right? 
There is this whole new trend of “STRONG IS THE NEW SKINNY” in women’s fitness. Now I am not saying that this is necessarily a bad thing but lets step outside of it for a few minutes and take a look at it.
The women’s fitness magazines are full of pictures of these amazing looking women that are not only thin but have some muscles as well. They don’t look like starved out Victoria Secret models but they dang sure don’t look like me or very many women that I know who lift weights and are strong. Have we really improved the picture of what looks good on a woman if 98% of the population still cant obtain what is in the magazines?
Don’t get me wrong, I know these women work very hard to have the physiques that they have just like I am sure the Victoria Secret models work at keeping themselves starved down to nothing but if the average woman can’t get there is being “strong” any better than being skinny?
I spent four years on what is probably the number one bodybuilding/fitness social media site, Bodybuilding.com. When I first started I actually thought that I could obtain what was in the magazines. I was 37 years old and set a goal to be in the best shape of my life by the time I was 40. I was fat but active and figured that I should be able to get my bodyfat lower and by all means look like the women in the magazines.
I had already been working out for a few months and so I added in some cardio and started working on my diet. Over the next four years things changed in my programing and my diet and I certainly hit my goal of being in the best shape of my life by age 40 but I didnt look anything like the women in the magazines! My bodyfat had gone from 32% down to 12% and I was still too fat to have been able to wear average length shorts without cellulite showing on my thighs!!
It was around this time that I left bb.com for a number of reasons but I just couldn’t see the use in being there any longer because it dawned on me that no matter how great I looked that short of starving myself and doing cardio ad nauseum I would NEVER be able to get the cellulite off my thighs and ass! And I was tired of all the women striving to achieve something that they never would other people spewing out information that wasn’t really going to help these women! If I can be at 12% bodyfat and still hating my body, what good were the amazing pictures of the women in fitness mags and on the social media sites really doing for me other than making me feel horrible about the fact that I could never be like them?
These women train and eat and limit their diets similar to the starved Victoria Secret models only they claim it is healthier! Is it really healthier if you can not maintain that diet and that bodyfat all year long? If you spend 12 or 16 or 20 weeks dieting down for a competition or photoshoot or both, is that healthy? Is that a healthy image that the average working class woman can aspire for? I don’t think it is! Aside from a very select few who make money for being in that shape all year around, most of those women gain weight post event when they actually start eating food again. Why? Because they have to eat! They have limited their food intake so much that their metabolism is all out of whack and the body is going to be all excited to have anything in it that it is going to want to keep it around for awhile! They don’t look photoshoot ready 365 days a year!
I wish there was a fitness magazine that would have the huevos to use women who workout and work 40 or 50 or 80 hours a week. How about photoshoots of women who haven’t dieted for the shoot? What about the average mom who has 3.4 kids and onlyspends an hour a day in the gym and doesn’t eat perfect? Why not pictures of women who haven’t been photoshopped to remove all the imperfections and cellulite? Why cant we have real life women with real life pictures instead of models who look amazing but have a body that we will never have?
I work out 4-5 days a week. I get up every morning at 4:30 so that I can have this time in the gym. I then work an average of 10 hours a day at least five days a week AND take care of my family. I lift heavy weights, I don’t do cardio, I kind of watch what I eat, I weigh 172 pounds, I have cellulite on the back of my thighs that I hate but I have no doubt will never go away! I am the average working class woman! Every woman I know who works out and lifts heavy weights doesn’t look anything like what is in the fitness magazines!! Even the naturally thin women who have good muscle tone don’t look like those women! Why are we featuring yet another unattainable body type for women to strive for and fail resulting in continuing poor self image and body issues?
Just think of how well a magazine would do that didn’t show the exception but rather the rule? I would buy it! If it had real working, not perfectly beautiful, not dieted down to be something they aren’t women who told how they managed to be the best they could be even if it wasn’t perfect. How they managed to workout, work and take care of their family and yet still lived with cellulite! What tricks they had found that worked for them to learn how to eat better even though it wasn’t perfect! What lifts they found made the biggest improvement in their bodies other than the overly regurgitated popular women’s workouts!
I am trying to be the best and most fit me that I can be at the age of 41! I will never look like the women in the fitness magazines or on the stage! And as much as I would love to look that way, I know now that I never will and I have resigned myself to that fact and therefore no longer view those women or those magazines because it makes me feel bad about myself! It then leads me to wonder how many other women it causes to just give up because they finally realize that they are never going to look like that so figure why bother trying?!
All I can say fellow working class women who are into fitness, don’t give up, you can only be the best that you can be which is better than trying to be what you cant be!!
