5 Feet, 10 and a Half Inches

An opinions piece by Lillie George, Co-Director

I marked the wall with my pencil and watched the column grow. My stomach turned when the tape measurer read 5 feet, 10 and a half inches. Surely I made a mistake, so I checked again. I watched in defeat as my fingertip hit the same, daunting altitude. 

Each day for almost two years I stood, back against the wall with butterflies in my stomach, to check and make sure I hadn’t grown any taller. It was my little routine: every night before bed I would measure myself and then spend the next 30 minutes or so staring at my reflection in the mirror. I’d twist to the side, to the front and back again. Each time I looked I found something new: the bump in my nose, the veins on my hands, the bones sticking out of my shoulders, and, worst of all, the pale, skinny legs that went on and on and on. 

“You could be a model!” 

“Being skinny is a good thing.”

“Your parents must be tall.”

“Do you even eat?”

These are some of the things I’m told and asked regularly. At first glance they seem like compliments. Though they come from the right place, they only heighten my sensitivity. Walking through the school hallways or down the street, all I can think about is how tall I must look. Every girl I pass I subconsciously compare myself to. It’s ironic, even illogical, this pressing insecurity I have. Long and lean is often labeled as “ideal.” And yet, the girls I see each day look nothing like me. All of my friends are average-sized; all of the girls with homecoming dates are shorter than their boyfriends in heels, and in each group picture, I defeatedly take my place in the back row. 

Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) is characterized as a body-image disorder that causes persistent and intrusive preoccupations with one’s appearance. It is something I only recently accepted that I have dealt with and something that, unfortunately, affects countless others like me. 

At my darkest points, my mind has wandered and I have been tempted by dangerous options. At one point, I convinced myself I would rather put my health at risk with some type of growth stunting drug rather than continue growing. Often, I have had to stop exercising just to keep my weight from falling, for fear of another backhanded “you’re so skinny!” compliment. It has clogged the vision I have of myself to the point where I can hardly recognize the girl staring back at me in the mirror. Despite all of this, however, I am learning. I am growing (both emotionally and physically) and, slowly but surely, I am healing.