My Body

I think I may appear vain or overly concerned with my appearance because of how much time I spend exercising each day. I suppose it is fortunate (?) that society approves of the way in which my depression and anxiety manifest in a need to punish myself physically through extreme exercise. But I don’t spend much time thinking about my physical appearance except as a way to measure my satisfaction with various objective goals it helps me achieve, like race times or weight-lifting numbers. To me, my body is an after-effect of mental illness, not something I work toward in itself.

A friend once told me I had the fastest nighttime routine she’d ever seen (she and I were sharing a hotel room at a writing conference). I was a little baffled by this because I didn’t even know what kind of a nighttime routine she was talking about. Put on pajamas, go to bed. The end. What more could there possibly be?

I understand a little more now about putting on anti-aging creams, taking off makeup and so on. I don’t do these things.

I’ve had people tell me that I’m “lucky” to have great skin. Maybe that is true. I don’t know. I also really, really do not like the feel of makeup or other creams on my face. I’ve had people tell me that I must be really “confident” to never put on makeup or even think about it. I don’t think I’m confident at all, not when it comes to my looks. I’m well aware that I’m not fashionable and that I often don’t look as good as (maybe) I could. I’ve even been told on occasion that I’m sloppy. If it’s in a professional context, I probably could fix that? If absolutely necessary? Though I’m not sure I could maintain a job that required constant maintenance of my looks.

The part that I think may be different for me is that I don’t care about the face in the mirror. I care about my body when it comes to what it can do. And while I’m not trying to say that this means I’m superior to other people or suggesting you should do what I do (please do not feel compelled to punish yourself the way that I do), I truly don’t care how I look or what signs of aging I display. Wrinkles, gray hair, scars, saggy boobs, age/sun spots—all unimportant.

For one thing, when I look in the mirror, I don’t necessarily identify with the face or body I see in it. I know that they belong to me in some way, but they don’t matter. I suspect this is related to a similar problem in the very limited dating that I do. A photograph of the person means absolutely nothing to me, except how it was staged can indicate personality. But I don’t like or love people at all because of how they look. I am kind of blind to it. I like people because of how they talk. I don’t even know if I’m a sapiosexual. I don’t need a smart person. Only an interesting one.