You Can’t Be What You Don’t Eat
Once on a dinner date, my ex-boyfriend asked me if I ever felt pressured to dye my hair blonde when I moved to Utah. I laughed out loud before realizing that he was serious. Going blonde had never occurred to me; if anything I was toying with the idea of dying my hair purple. But I knew exactly what, or more precisely who, he was referring to.
You know who I’m talking about too. She’s everywhere in Utah, but especially the Utah Valley corridor. She has fluffy eyelash extensions, perfect tanned skin, high-waisted jeans with low-top Vans, and beach blonde hair with barely-there brunette roots.
She’s also thin.
And that was the pressure I bowed to, not the bleach.
Eating disorders present a major health crisis to girls everywhere. In data from 2008, 65% of women in the US experienced some form of body dysmorphia or disordered eating, and another 10% experienced symptoms that could be clinically diagnosed as an eating disorder. College-aged women make up the highest-risk category, with most eating disorders beginning from ages 18-21. The pressures to perform well academically, socially, professionally, add up in an unfamiliar, unstructured environment such as university. Under this stress, poor self-esteem and anxiety can drive girls to unhealthy coping mechanisms such as disordered eating. It’s a tragically common story across campuses nationwide. But if personal experience is any measure, there’s something about Utah Valley that seems to compound our national epidemic.
It might be a Mormon thing. After all, the LDS church has historically sent mixed messages about women’s bodies. Cultural (if not doctrinal) emphasis on modesty instills a sense of shame in young girls. It’s supposed to be about virtue, but if my body is something to be hidden, there must be something wrong with it. Simultaneously, most justifications of modesty teach girls that their bodies are responsible for men’s thoughts and actions. This linkage can create an unhealthy pattern of controlling our bodies in an attempt to control other people’s emotional responses to us. The positive self-worth of “my body is a temple” and “I am a child of God” is all too often drowned out by these other messages. But religion alone is not a satisfactory explanation, as a 2007 study by a BYU professor found conclusively that LDS women residing inside Utah have a less positive body image than LDS women outside of Utah. There must be something in the water.
I think it’s aphrodisiacs. Unlike other college towns, Provo's culture revolves around marriage and marrying young. About half of BYU’s graduating class will be married in any given year, but it feels like so much more. It’s hard not to feel the need to compete when everyone around you is rushing to the altar. Like it or not, physical attractiveness is linked to marriageability. Guys want hot, fit, skinny girls to have monogamous sex with for eternity. At least, that’s what we tell ourselves when we see another proposal on Instagram and it’s that blonde girl again. Because simultaneously, Provo is extremely homogeneous. How many versions of her did you see yesterday, in your feed or on your commute? And how many looked happier than you felt? There is intense pressure to conform to the mold that appears to be successful, however painful it may be to contort ourselves into conformity.
So, we silently count calories and skip out on the Creamery ice cream or bring home two pints to binge alone in the dark. We get more than our money’s worth from memberships to VASA and CrossFit and Golds, disguising insecurity as health. We take turns being disappointed by the bathroom scale and stare into the mirror, pulling and pinching at our bodies until they look just the way we want. And worst of all, it works.
When I told my boyfriend no, of course not, I’m not that stupid, he laughed too. “Of course you wouldn’t care about that, ‘cause you’re hot” he smirked. I sat in silence for a moment, feeling the weight of his compliment, then smiled and pushed away my plate for the waitress to clear.