"People see bodies like mine and make their assumptions. They think they know the way of my body. They do not."
Hunger is the memoir of one woman's body. Author Roxane Gay is brutally honest in the memoir about her body. At age 12 she was viciously gang-raped by a boy she thought of as her boyfriend and his friends. It would be decades before her family found out, but it was almost immediately that she started to hide her body from others in an effort to protect herself. She went off to boarding school for high school and without a vigilant mother to help her with dietary needs Roxane started to put on weight.
"The freedom of being able to eat, so extravagantly and without limit, offered me the only true pleasure I knew in high school."
The author takes us through her life and her relationship with her body. From something as banal as smoking to her fluid relationships and her venture into bulimia, holds nothing back. With a careful eye, Roxane Gay examines what it means to be fat in America. From weight-loss surgery to shopping, traveling, and even a simple visit to the doctor. She speaks about the impossible standards that are put on women to conform to societal beauty standards. She specifically mentions celebrities like Oprah, Jennifer Hudson, and Valerie Bertinelli, all extremely accomplished women who made it seem like their life was still lacking in fulfillment until they lost weight. One of the richest women on the planet and an Oscar winner still did not feel successful until they lost weight. How messed up is that? There are judgments and criticism at every turn for someone, especially celebrities, who do not meet the criteria what others deem to be "normal."
"I (want to) believe my worth as a human being does not reside in my size or appearance."
The above quote probably spoke to me more than any line that I have read in a very long time. Not only have I had weight issues, but I was born with a physical disability and there have been many times in my life where I was made to feel "less than" because of my appearance. My heart and my mind know that it is them, not me that is deficient, but it still stings. I have lost a lot of weight this year and I have done it for me. Not for anybody else. My husband has been supportive through it all and has never once made me feel less than for being morbidly obese. However, many people have commented on it my weight loss, does that mean that I was "less than" before in their eyes? This is always in the back of my mind, no matter how much weight I lose I cannot change the fact that I have a physical disability. If someone believes my worth is tied to my appearance I will never be worthy of them. And sadly, I know there are people out there who make assumptions based on my disability and there is nothing that I can do to change that.
Bottom Line - Hunger is not one of those motivational books where the author loses all of the weight and is skinny at the end. Nor is Hunger a cautionary tale of what will happen if you are overweight. Hunger is a raw and honest memoir of one woman and her body. And it is one of the best books that I have ever read.
Details:
- Hunger by Roxane Gay
- On Facebook
- Pages:320
- Publisher: HarperCollins
- Publication Date: 6/13/2017
- Buy it Here!
Post a Comment