Outgrowing Clothes
Jan 30, 2024When I got rid of my pre-recovery clothes (and I did this in stages), it was never just about sorting through a closet and putting things into bags.
It was grief.
It was saying goodbye to the idea that had carried me for so many years — the hope, the fantasy, the symbol of my “best self.”
The self I believed everyone would like more.
The self who seemed to hold more social power.
The self who, finally, would make me feel proud of me.
She also promised escape — from my weaknesses, my fears, my insecurities, my vulnerabilities. She was the fantasy of wholeness.
And while she may have been only a symbol, she wasn’t without real power. Thinness does come with privilege — privilege I longed for, and privilege that was very real. I don’t want to dismiss that or pretend I was wrong for wanting it.
So when you throw away her clothes, you’re not just cleaning out a drawer. You are grieving her.
It makes sense that it feels hard.
Outgrowing anything is painful. But I try to remember:
We are outgrowing something, not losing something.
The parameters where we once defined wholeness, safety, and success have simply grown too small. And when they no longer fit, we are forced into a broader landscape — one that may feel unfamiliar but is also more expansive, more authentic, more ours.
Alongside more comfortable clothes come more comfortable spaces to exist. Spaces that don’t demand we shrink to fit.
I want to be full, whole, and alive; not empty, shrunken, and afraid. I don’t want her clothes to define me anymore.
And in many ways, body image healing has been this: feeling ready enough to redefine who I believe I am.
