Let’s talk about something different for once. A topic I’ve been avoiding for almost a year.

I lost 0.8 pounds this week. Good, right? Except that I’ve gained about 30 since moving to Chicago. On the one hand, I’m fully frustrated with myself and my lack of focus. On the other hand, I’ve been busy and I’ve been learning a lot more about my body issues since gaining back some of this weight.

I have never been comfortable with my body. Even when I was at goal weight. I was more comfortable with wearing nicer clothes, but my actual body… not so much. I wouldn’t even be naked in the privacy of my own home, completely alone. When I went to sleep in the sweltering nights of summer, I would do so in a baggy t-shirt, a skirt, and a blanket covering me. A blanket always covered me. Let’s not even get started with my issues with sleeping with other people in the same room… college roommates, friends, and people I’ve dated can attest to this: I made sure the blanket covered me completely, save my head, at all times of the night. I didn’t want people to see my body when I had absolutely no control over it.

Since moving to Chicago, yes I’ve gained weight, but I’ve also been surrounded by body-positive people. People who are, in some ways, “body activists”. They promote healthy body image. They’re yelling to riot, not diet. They’re telling me that I’m amazing, even with the lumpy stomach.

I haven’t made great strides in terms of being in front of other people, but I can now deal with going to bed scantily dressed. If I’m alone. It is August, in Chicago, after all, and I don’t have a fan or air conditioner!

So now, I’m frustrated with my weight gain, not because it makes my body unsightly again, but because of the health implications. My father’s family has a scary history with breast cancer (my father died of it when I was 15, one aunt has lumps that aren’t malignant yet, and my other aunt just got diagnosed). Currently, I do everything I can to prevent getting breast cancer (vegan diet, exercise, no smoking, very light alcohol consumption, et cetera, et cetera)… except that I’m not at a healthy weight, and that is one of the main factors of getting it, especially with a family history.

And yet, I feel that if I tell my friends that I’m doing Weight Watchers again (which is a very healthy approach to a lifestyle of eating correctly), I feel that I’ll be judged for”being on a diet”. It’s not a diet. It’s a health thing. I want to be healthy. I don’t want breast cancer. I shouldn’t be judged for that.

Because I like who I am, I don’t have body issues, I just have family health issues.