Dear Miss. Dominique Ramirez,
I recently saw your story in the news. (Click here if you missed it. To sum it up briefly, Miss. San Antonio was allegedly fired from her duties due to weight gain and was told to stop eating tacos. She is now a size 2 according to the article. It sounds like a complex situation that will be decided in court). Your story was another reminder that we live in a world that still has an unhealthy emphasis on weight. The pressure to be extremely thin teaches women to dislike their bodies, engage in unhealthy, extreme (and sometimes dangerous) dieting and to fear being judge by their weight.
I'm an avid fan of Operation Beautiful, an organization that encourages people to support each other through positive, encouraging messages. You can do so by leaving an uplifting note in a public place such as on a restroom mirror or a car door. The notes below were inspired by all the other people who have felt judged because of their shape or size. Please feel free to tweet it forward.
In a 2003 study published in the journal of Eating and Weight Disorders, researchers reported that over one-fourth (26%) of the women in a beauty pageant had been told or perceived they had an eating disorder which reportedly began at 16.25 years. Almost half (48.5%) reported wanting to be thinner and 57% were trying to lose weight.
In another study of pageant winners from 1923 to 2002, researchers at Rutgers University found that only 23% of pageant winners had a "normal" body mass index (BMI), 26% were so thin they met the World Health Organization's criteria for being undernourished and two would have been classified by the American Psychiatric Association as anorexic.
Hopefully, one day, studies on body image, eating disorders and beauty pageant contestants will just be ancient history.
Susan Albers, Psy.D., is a licensed clinical psychologist, specializing in eating issues, weight loss, body image concerns, and mindfulness. She is the author of 50 Ways to Soothe Yourself Without Food, Eating Mindfully, Eat, Drink, and Be Mindful, and Mindful Eating 101 and is a Huffington Post blogger. Her books have been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, O, the Oprah Magazine, Natural Health, Self Magazine and on the Dr. Oz TV show. Visit Albers online at http://www.eatingmindfully.com
