There’s this photograph of me. I’m 10. I’m wearing my school uniform: a woolen green sweater, a knee-length kilt, and grey socks. I’m chubby with a slight double chin. The waistband of my kilt is creased. My arms are spread wide out on either side and I’m just beaming, my little dimples almost overwhelmed by my cheeks. I had no idea what was coming.

I didn't realize I had no reason to smile until the next year. I had just started a new school and I overheard one of the other girls saying, "She's really nice, but she is fat."

You could hear the emphasis in the way she said it.  As if fat was the most repulsive thing you could be, even at 11. As if fat was somehow the inverse of kind, but far far worse than kind was good.  Before that comment, I had never thought about my body, or at least, I can’t remember it. I was adorably and painfully plump but I had no idea. I had the boundless confidence of childhood still. Case and Point: when I was 9, my Halloween costume consisted of two pairs of opaque tights- one on my lower half and one on my upper half. But with this comment brought a life-long obsession. I started wearing horrible, tight, grey, spandex underwear under all my outfits. When I took them off I would have red marks around my waist. Sometimes I’d wrap cling film around my waist and sleep like that.

Then at 12, sitting in my friend's basement. There were boys there, and I remember it being one of the very first times boys were there. One touched my friend Claudia's stomach and approvingly declaring, “You’ve got great abs!”

I wanted that boy in particular to look at me the way he had looked at Claudia. I knew then. Abs were the key to my success. I remember poking my shame, wondering how I could have gotten so far without these abs, knowing that now I needed them.

I started doing 100 sit-ups before school everyday once learned what an abdominal muscle was. Looking back on it now, how better that time would have been spent had I joined a team, had a creative project or even gone for a walk with my mom. Instead, I was huffing away alone in my room, cursing my body with each repetition.

Then at 15, trying on Miss Sixty jeans in the largest size they had available, waist 30, squeezing pale fat into a tight stonewashed waistband. The changing room attendant said how nice they looked on me but when I closed the curtain I could hear her laughing. I clenched my fist and hot shameful tears streamed down my face. I wouldn’t tell my mom why I was upset, or why I wanted to leave the store so quickly.

I started spending 3 hours in the gym every day doing mindless repetitions of exercise. I'd hide away when I changed for gym class. I would stand naked in front of a full-length mirror every day, gathering my fat, checking my progress.

Then at 25, finding a screenshot of a snapchat on my friend’s phone. It was taken from behind: me on the elliptical machine wearing lycra shorts, little bulges of fat spilling over. The grey bar held the text, “Not trying hard enough, love!”. I felt like I’d been slapped.

I started training for a marathon, running 6 hours on the weekends. Twice, I passed out from overexertion.

I have spent the majority of my life obsessed with the way I look, and particularly, my weight. I have thought about my body in a negative way for at least 10 minutes on average a day since I was 13. Conservatively. I’m 30 now so that adds up to 62050 minutes or a month and a half straight. Think of all the other things I could have been doing. And that is just time spent thinking about my body, never mind the exercise.

But I've never had a full-blown eating disorder. Many, many, many of my friends have been down that road, vomiting creamy pasta surreptitiously while their boyfriends hovered outside the door, or conveniently 'forgetting to eat' for what seemed to be months. One particular friend confessed to me in college that she spent all of high school carrying rotten fruit in her backpack to discourage her from eating. Yet none of these cases seemed that worrying to be honest. None of us loved our bodies; none of us even liked them.

No, I've never been sick in that way. But like a lot of other women (all other women?), I am sick in my obsession. I wish I could reclaim all that lost time. I didn't realize I was starting down a long, lonely and ultimately useless road. I’m not really any happier with my body than I was when I was the little fat girl sucking in her stomach in the elementary school bathroom.

I turned 30 this year and I still do 100 sit-ups a day. Well actually I do 100 second planks now since I heard sit-ups are ineffective (almost 20 years of my life wasted). I cycle. I try to make healthy choices. But I’m frankly, fucking fed up of worrying about body.  

That being said, I can’t stop. I try on at least 4 outfits before leaving for work everyday and usually end up in some variance of black, more black, and a flowing cardigan or kimono depending on weather. I still think about my body late at night, while my husband and daughter sleep. I rate my days as good food days or bad food days, cursing myself as stupid, worthless and somehow immoral if I’ve eaten dessert or had some potato chips (which I do often).  As if each pound, each ounce, were a failing of my character.

How can I reconcile this with being a feminist? How can I be a role model for my daughter or the children I teach? I don’t want to lose any more time. How can I return to being that carefree girl with widespread arms?