So, I danced for a little bit in high school. I always felt self conscious and uncomfortable because I have never had a typical dancer's body. I've been overweight pretty much my entire life. I stopped after about a year and chalked it up as just not for me.
Near my new job, there's a dance studio that I was walking by almost every day on my lunch break. After a few weeks of walking by, pausing to look in the window, and then moving on, in late February I ended up scheduling a lesson, just to see.
I'm definitely one of the larger people in the studio. Most of the women there are very thin. But you know what? I've decided I don't care anymore. I love it, and this time I'm refusing to let myself get in my own way.
And it's such a nice environment. There was a showcase in March. I'd taken less than a month of lessons at the time, but my teacher pushed me to do it. I was so glad they did! Again, I'm bigger than most women who dance. In the dressing room beforehand, I was kind of fretting. I stood in front of the mirror, huffed and said, "Well, this is as good as its going to get, I guess." One of the other women stopped me and told me I looked beautiful.
I sat with a group of women, and we worked it out that whoever wasn't dancing for a particular set would video the people who were on the floor. No one made me feel like I shouldn't be there because of how I looked. When I got off the floor after a dance, the woman taking the video for me gave me back the camera and just said, "You're going to be so, so happy when you watch this."
I go to group classes and it's great. No one treats me like I can't do things because of my size. There's a woman there who's a bit bigger than me. The only way I hear people talk about her is, "She dances so well. Do you think we'll all dance that well when we've been here as long as her?"
And idk. I went in kind of expecting to need to have shields up, and it's been so, so wonderful to realize that it isn't necessary. And when I dance, I have moments where I feel pretty and graceful and elegant on a way I don't think I ever have before.
There's another, more elaborate showcase in June with choreographed dances. I signed up as soon as I found out about it. I'm excited to get dresses. I'm a little nervous, because the previous showcase had several couples on the floor at a time and this one is one dance at a time, so it will be the first time I dance in front of people where me and my partner are the only ones on the floor. But I'm also really excited.
I'm just so happy I finally decided to let myself enjoy this without letting body image issues get in the way. I wish I'd been able to let go and do the same back in high school. And I'm also so, so grateful to have found a studio that doesn't buy into the toxic "dancers must be thin" mentality. My very first lesson, I said I was a beginner because high school was a long time ago and I haven't danced since. When we finished my lesson, my teacher looked at the paperwork, scoffed at me, and crossed out the word "beginner." And when I tried to argue, he insisted, "No, you already know what you're doing. You're a good dancer."
In my next lesson, he started leading a patterns I didn't know, and I'd stop and apologize. And he would shake his head and say, "It's not you. I just want to go hard and forgot to ask if you've done this because you dance well."
I'm having so much fun! And it's been speeding up my weight loss progress, because I get even more exercise putting in the time at the studio and practicing at home and I'm using and toning muscles I hadn't really been working. I started losing almost a year before setting foot in the studio. But with building the extra muscle tone, in just the past week I've had three people compliment me on my weight loss.
Anyway, that's probably enough rambling.
TL;DR: I finally let myself dance and just enjoy it despite being overweight. And not only do I love it, but I've found a fantastic, supportive studio where people make me feel so welcome and confident and don't seem to care about anyone's weight at all. It's been such a blessing and I'm very grateful
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