Being Confident in your own Body

Hello everyone and welcome to my first ever story. I wanted to start with a topic that has had an effect on me since I began my teenage years, CONFIDENCE. The first time I began to notice my body changing I was 9 years old. I started to develop quite quickly compare to my friends and I was really scare about that change. When I was just 9 years old I moved to Florida and that's when everything began to change for me, and not for the better. I started 5th grade not knowing any English, my native language is Spanish and it was already difficult enough to do homework because I didn't understand anything. I used to cry while doing my homework because I felt so stupid not knowing anything, at the time I thought that was going to be my only problem. Boy was I wrong. As the days progressed, my self-esteem began to decline, that wasn't even the worst part yet. I began to get bully on my second week of school, I remember it like it was yesterday, It was really traumatizing. Now, the bullying wasn't anything physical, it was emotionally, which I think is worst in my opinion, at least for me it was worst then any physical pain. This continued on till I finally started middle school. In 6th grade I met my best friend who I am so thankful for, we are still best friend till this day and I am 20 years old. During my middle school days everything was good, now fast forward to high school, freshman year. My body was bigger then ever, I have changed completely and not for the better, I gained a lot of weight. I kept seeing this other girls with bodies that were to die for, I wanted nothing more then to be like them. I began to try and eat healthy and exercise but it never worked, it was no use. I got so envy that I began to try and cut my stretchmarks out, yeah you read it right, CUT. Not the smartest idea if. I tried to try out for the track team, couldn't do it, I was too fa and too slow, so I gave up. I felt undesirable by the guys at school, I didn't have many friends, or any friends for that matter. The only friend that I had was my best friend, let's call her Mary. Now, at times I did envy my best friend because her body was amazing as well, I thought, how can a girl like her be friends with me.. Well, let me tell you why. It's because she saw who I was, truly, she saw me for me, not my appearance. It took me so long to figure that out, that if nobody saw me for me, for who I truly was then they were not worth it, they were not real friends. After I finally finished and graduated high school I began to see my self worth, to see who I truly was and who I wanted to be. All of those little incidents that happen to me weren't so little, they affected me so much emotionally, but because of that I finally learnt to love myself. I began to love my body, treat it like the temple it was and the temple it is now.

Now, the questions is... How did I learned to be confident in my own body? Well, the answer is easy, the first thing I had to do was to get all of those bad memories and use it to my advantage. I piled them up together and used it to motivate me to get to where I needed to be. And it helped, lots! Now, this is where the real work began. I began to drink water, eat healthier, and even do yoga! I began to love my body for what it was, for better or for worst and I couldn't be happier about that. I began to wear clothes that made me feel at my happiest, clothes that made me feel at my best. The next step was to take care of my skin, that was the biggest turn around I've ever done in my life, after I started to take care of my skin I began to feel like a whole new person and I just loved the feeling of my skin being clean, that definitely boosted my confidence levels up. Flash forward to today, I've never felt better about my body. The moment I stopped caring what other people thought about me and my body was the moment I began to truly live. That is the key to being comfortable in your own body, stop caring what other people think and live your life to the fullest. If you want to change how you look, make sure you do it for you and not to please anyone else. Live your life to fullest, and don't let anyone bring you down.

BE WHO YOU WANT TO BE AND STAY STRONG, IT WILL GET BETTER!