When I decided to use Psilocybin for trauma healing, I thought it was going to focus mainly on my childhood which is where I have most of my trauma; however, I was pleasantly surprised when it decided to focus on a struggle I currently have. I can say that this realization has been the most life-changing so far, and I’m happy it happened.
My Battle With My Physical Self-Image
Since I was young I struggled a lot with my self-image and there wasn’t really anyone to help me change my views. The first thing I noticed was my body wasn’t growing like my friends: When I hit puberty all the girls around me started growing boobs and year after year I had waited for mine to start growing and they never did, I was stuck at an AA cup from preteen to late teen and it completely destroyed me. In my late teens I had begun to experiment with different things to take to hopefully grow a cup size or two but it never happened.
After I realized that I also started getting comments from everyone around me of how skinny I was, looking back, I was skinny however, there was nothing I could do and I needed to be patient with my body and focus on being healthy but that didn’t happen. It was as if people could tell I was starting to struggle with my body and thought it was the perfect time to tease me. Comments of, “Look at your wrists! They are so small!” “I don’t want to touch you, I might break you.” It’s going to be windy today, don’t blow away!” and so on.
When I finally got some female friends, I remember asking one of them what they thought of my body and if it was too skinny and I remember being so crushed because they told me I wasn’t just skinny, I looked anorexic. I wasn’t that skinny and this girl was known to be a hater but at the time I couldn’t think past that, I thought that’s what everyone saw. I started wearing baggy clothes all the time and I never dressed pretty or in anything that would show my body.
By the time I was 19 I decided I was going to try one more time at gaining weight, this was probably my 6th attempt, but I was dedicated and knew I could do it. For 2 months I planned every meal, snack, and workout. Counted calories and made sure I hit my goal of 3500 a day no matter what I ate. And to my surprise after 2 months I succeeded, I had gained 16 pounds and not many people were saying things anymore. I felt beautiful for once.
However that didn’t last long because even though I felt beautiful and didn’t believe on a deeper level I was. I was still trying to figure out what weight would be perfect and other fine tuning things.
One day I showed my friend in Canada my results because she too struggled with gaining weight. I was so proud until she texted back saying I looked amazing; however, she didn’t want to gain weight how I did because she wanted to keep her stomach flat. After that I couldn’t look at my stomach the same.
Not long after I started taking birth control and due to that I gained 20 more pounds which devastated me. I again no longer felt pretty and thought everyone must be disgusted at how fat I was now. My husband told me he loved my body, but I believed he only said that so I wouldn’t hate myself more, same with my best friend.
Trip Time~
At this point, I weighed a healthy weight, one i found stunning on so many others yet I looked at myself and I felt disgusting. I had lost 5 pounds the month prior but I couldn’t see it and I was ready to lose more.
It was a Wednesday afternoon and I decided to trip, the two previous times I had tripped were bad experiences however I realized in the second one that I had a lot more trauma then I realized and I kept fighting the experience because I didn’t want to see what it had wanted to show me (Highly don’t recommend this)
I took a dose and laid down and waited for it to come and show me something, I had meditated that I would heal and be okay experiencing these things. I didn’t know what to expect though as all previous times had been bad. After it kicked in I felt a little nudge telling me I didn’t take enough and so I got up and took a tiny bit more.
I then started to cook chicken noodle soup as the last time I wanted comfort food after and we didn’t have any. During the cooking I broke down crying because it was the first time I was able to cook and enjoy it. Early on in life I had took up the responsibility of cooking because my mom was too overwhelmed to cook and if I didn’t cook then we would continue eating crappy fast food. Since then I had never really enjoyed it, I just did it out of necessity.
I was blown away though, food had never looked so pretty, and the sounds of cooking were so calming and healing to my heart, I was having a blast.
I had gotten most of the soup done when I caught my reflection in the oven. We have an inwall oven so it was pretty high up so I could see most of my body. I stood there frozen for a few minutes, tears just streaming from my eyes, I wasn’t even crying I just had tears falling (very weird lol). My husband came into the kitchen after a bit and saw me just standing there and he rushed over to make sure I was okay to which I then started crying and telling him I was really pretty. He laughed me off and told me he knows and the had been telling me that all along.
At the time he didn’t realize how big of a moment this was for me but he quickly realized and started asking me why I felt what I was feeling and what I saw. He then took me to our full body mirror and held me there and kept pointing out all the parts of me that were beautiful.
I cried so hard. So many times I would stop and look at that mirror and say the most heart-wrenching things to myself, I hated the way I looked and thought my body was absolutely terrible. I had gotten to the point I wouldn’t even look at myself anymore as I didn’t want to see the reflection.
But here I was, looking and admiring myself.
Those stretch marks weren’t so dark and obvious anymore, I wasn’t as distortional as I thought, my fat wasn’t really fat, and the most shocking, my stomach. It was normal, it wasn’t fat, it was normal. I stood up straight and looked down and could see my feet, I could see my thighs, I could see everything. I cried so hard for all the hate I spewed at myself, all the damaging comments I’ve made.
I truly was beautiful.
After a few hours, and realizing some other things my husband and I sat down to eat the soap I had cooked. It was best soup I have ever cooked, when I’m not panicking about getting dinner done quickly and actually enjoying the process, I make some pretty good food. My husband and I talked over things and I had shown him what I had been seeing all along when I looked at myself, but with my new found perception, I had lost 20 pounds from what I saw to what I see currently.
I was in what I call my post-mush clarity when I went over all the things I realized.
First: I’m beautiful
Second: I have really bad posture and that made more of an inpact on my apperance than I realized.
Third: I don’t have to eat till I’m sick
I guess from the time I made myself eat 3500 calories a day to gain weight I also taught myself some bad habits of thinking I have to eat until I’m about to puke instead of just eating till contentment.
Fourth: I love exercise, and from that trip on I stopped using it as a way to hate myself and instead because I genuinely enjoy working out.
Fifth: when I was young I always thought once I got in a relationship I would feel beautiful, if my spouse told me how amazing I looked I would believe it and in turn see that too but it never happened, if anything I saw myself in a worse light. No matter how much someone finds you attractive or compliments you, nothing beats actually seeing it for yourself.
Applying
Ever since that trip I’ve been sitting straight and walking with good posture, I haven’t been over eating and I’ve been really nice to my body.
I truly can’t get over how I look, I keep stopping to look at myself in the mirror and just admire myself. It feels weird to say that but after hating myself for so long I am beyond grateful to now see what I have. Oh and don’t get me started on pictures I had previously taken.
I truly hope those who struggle with body image issues one day heal and can see how beautiful they truly are.