Kiss My Muscle-Toned Ass

Y’all, it’s truly crazy the eras and phases my mind, body, and spirit have gone through over the past 3 decades, and the future arcs I will enter going forward. In early adolescence, it was all about lack of self-assuredness and shame over my body. The last of my friends to flourish and bullied by my peers for my flat-chested, non-curvy figure and plain features. My ‘insecurity era’ was fraught with self-doubt, ample tears, and lots of embarrassment over the ridicule and neglect from the boys at that time. I remember the shift in young innocence, to hearing my peers regurgitate the words they had heard a thousand times before from their mothers-a gentle reminder that kids are directly impacted by the words and actions of their parents; (for instance, I recall a friend specifically saying at a 9 year old’s birthday slumber party, that she couldn’t have the pizza or she would get the *mother’s maiden name* thighs and hopefully find someone to marry before that genetic trait reared its ugly head). All of a sudden, I began to think of how I would be perceived from others. And while some of my friends began the grumblings of weight and figures, I stared in the mirror at my skinny frame and undersized self and wondered why I still looked like a little kid compared to my friend’s budding and blossoming bodies. In middle school, boys began to take notice of my best girlfriends, and often times seemed annoyed that I dared to join their group at the lunch table looking like the malnourished little boy that I did. I would often go home crying, wondering why I was so ugly, so ‘unwomanly’, and just hoping that one day I would wake up and be a curvy knockout.

All of this heavily impacted the next phase of my life, my ‘overly-sexualized era.’ This period was characterized from some severely unfounded confidence at the predatory stares from my male counterparts over my newly developed body parts that accentuated my fuller figure. Suddenly a monumental shift had occurred, and I was now receiving lots of attention, and it made me feel good. Sure, it was all superficial over some attractive cleavage and a rounded derriere, but I didn’t care. What mattered to me at that point is that boys that at one point bullied me for my ugly duckling exterior now showered me with compliments so that I would give them the time of day. And as young and naive as I was, I couldn’t see that it was all a game to them, only interested because of my breasts or my ass and not because of who I was. My worth to the world was now solely because of my outward physical appearance, and because of this, I was lambasted with a bunch of false assumptions, played out stereotypes, and wholly looked down upon as simply an object of desire and nothing more. Looking back, this may have been my saddest era.

At the time, I thought how wonderful to be lusted after and have guys clamoring over me after having previously endured some painful grievances. It mattered little to me that they were really only interested in one thing, and that all I was to them was an object to be won and then eventually discarded. But I was finally called beautiful, and hot, and sexy, and all of the things the magazines the grocery aisles are adorned with telling us how to appear more thin and attractive to the opposite sex. I fell for the bait, hook, line, and sinker. I was obediently listening to the invisible voices delegating to society what is deemed pretty. I bought the heels, the dresses, expensive makeup, hair extensions, self-tanner, and still, I was never truly happy. In fact, whenever my Facebook memories pop up from 10-15 years ago, it is all post after post commiserating on men and just being downright negative when it came to relationships or even my own happiness. That’s the problem when you place the fate of your emotions solely dependent on someone else rather than working on yourself first. So I clamored away at flirtatious behaviors, and getting all gussied up for a night out, knowing full-well I would get hit on numerous times, but never with any substance. Is this what the world wanted from me?

Then, I graduated college and decided to make a change. I moved to North Carolina and threw myself into a newfound love, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, Muay Thai, wrestling, and MMA, with the dreams to fight in the cage one day. Those who knew me in my wild party days were shocked that I began to eschew tight dresses for a gi and makeup for muscle rub. In fact, 8 years ago today is when I shaved off the whole underside of head, formally reigning in my ‘Wolf Queen’ era. I took care of my body; instead of filling it chock full of alcohol and junk food, I was now consuming copious amount of protein and electrolytes. I now had men either fetishizing a strong, capable woman who could fight, or being malicious over the fact that they couldn’t hold a candle to my newly acquired skills. So they would find the need to insult me, calling me manly, because they are now the insecure ones simply for the fact that I worked harder and I became better. They can say I’m intimidating, but really, they’re just intimidated, and I make no apologies for coming into my own and finding myself. So again, I find myself on the outside of the societal cusp of what is deemed traditionally attractive for women, and yet, I am the happiest I have ever been. I see a beautiful woman in the mirror every day, and even have a loving husband who makes me feel like that knockout I always wanted to be. And if I once again hurt some feelings over MY opinion on finding myself beautiful, well, they can kiss my well-muscled ass.

Eff society’s beauty standards for real. I went through feeling depressed that I looked like a little boy, to being viewed as a hot object with nothing below the surface, to now even being called a man by those who clearly have some occipital issues if that’s what they think about a 5’0 122 lb lady. True, this lady is a badass black belt and pro MMA fighter, but all that means is I worked incredibly hard, and I now have the muscle tone to show for it. I am absolutely so proud of the growth and development I have gone through and endured, and am 100% in love with the strong woman I became. I stopped comparing myself to my peers and other women that I saw, and instead admired them for their own uniqueness and celebrated our strengths and differences. I think the most beautiful thing a woman can be is an authentic, kind, and good human, regardless of whatever the exterior shows to the world. Sure, it helps knowing that I could now choke out the boys who teased me in middle school without breaking a sweat, and that the men in early adulthood who made me feel so worthless and insignificant are minuscule specks when compared with the fact that I got me not just a good man, but one of the best men to ever walk this planet. But none of that is important now anyways. I am so happy in this phase of life, so in love, so proud of all that I am doing and continue to do, and so very damn beautiful.