In 2024, the average daily time spent on social media in the U.S. was two hours and 16 minutes (Statista, 2024). So much of our time and energy is dedicated to online platforms such as Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, or Snapchat. Higher social media use can lead to negative mental health outcomes, such as depression, anxiety, and poor sleep (U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory, 2023). The content we view often portrays unrealistic standards for beauty and bodies, leading to comparison and feelings of inadequacy. This can result in poor body image, disordered eating behaviors, and decreased self-esteem.

Social media is not all bad. It allows us to connect and cultivate a sense of community and maintain relationships with others. Social media provides an outlet to express ourselves. It gives us access to countless resources to learn more about diverse experiences and perspectives. Social media offers a source of humor through hilarious reels or memes that give us a much-needed laugh. 

In the past, I struggled to find balance in my relationship with social media. I found that as I was consistently keeping up with how others were spending their time, I was not living my own life. Many of my clients navigating recovery from an eating disorder, body image concerns, and other mental health struggles have also wrestled with the role social media plays in their lives. Finding balance with social media is unique to each individual. For some clients, eliminating social media use altogether has provided space for needed healing. For others, social media accounts have offered access to resources and support for current mental health challenges.

Questions to explore about your relationship with social media:

• What prompts you to turn to social media? 
• Connection with others, a source of distraction, to numb uncomfortable feelings (such as boredom, sadness, or loneliness), etc.
• What feelings arise while you are scrolling through social media?
• How do you feel after consuming social media?
• Does your social media consumption hinder or enhance your ability to connect with others in your daily life?
• What does balance and mindfulness look like in your personal relationship with social media?

Things to Consider:

• Create Boundaries (American Psychiatric Association, 2024; Oliveira, 2024)
• Creating your own boundaries with social media could look like: setting limits for screen times, muting social media notifications, designating a specific time for social media use, creating media-free areas in your home, or taking an intentional hiatus from social media
• Cultivate Your Feed
• Unfollow accounts that promote comparison and unrealistic standards
• Fill your feed with accounts that are educational, uplifting, and empowering
• Practice Critical Consumption (Oliveira, 2024)
• Instead of engaging in mindless scrolling, actively seek out content from credible, evidence-based sources
• Recognize that you are viewing a “highlight reel” of curated, photo-shopped, and filtered content that is not always representative of reality

If you’re struggling with body image concerns, it makes sense that you may also have struggles with sex. Sexual intimacy brings many of the ultimate forms of vulnerability together, and if you don’t feel comfortable with your body, you might find it difficult to connect and enjoy sexual experiences with a partner.

Here are a couple of things I hope you’ll remember if body image struggles are impacting your sexual relationship.

First, you don’t have to have a “perfect” body in order to enjoy sex. Despite what the media has portrayed for the last several decades, people in a variety of bodies can have fulfilling, meaningful, enjoyable sexual relationships. While the media might insist that you must be young, thin, conventionally attractive, and able-bodied to have and enjoy sexual experiences, this is simply not true. In real life, people in bodies of varying sizes, abilities, and ages are enjoying meaningful sexual connection. It’s true! People with acne, stretch marks, cellulite, wrinkles, body hair, and hair loss can and do enjoy loving, healthy sexual connection. The same goes for people in bodies with chronic illness, limb differences, ostomy bags, movement disorders, visual impairment, or other conditions.

Second, while body image happens in the mind (our thoughts, perceptions, and beliefs about our bodies), satisfying sex happens mostly in the body. The biggest thing you can do to help yourself when body image struggles interfere with sexual connection is this: reconnect with the experience of being in your body. When your mind starts pulling your attention toward body criticism or self-conscious thoughts, remember that your bodily sensations are your anchor for sexual connection. If you intentionally connect with your senses and let your mind be present, you can help yourself through negative body image thoughts.

All of this is easier said than done, of course. Working through body image struggles can be a complex journey. Seeking support from therapy, learning about sexual and relationship health, and having honest conversations with your partner are all excellent ways to help yourself work through body image struggles.

This topic is important to me as a marriage and family therapist. I really believe that healthy relationships are the backbone of our wellbeing as a human race, and I care about helping people find ways to strengthen positive connections with themselves and their partners. All people deserve to feel comfortable and confident in their bodies and in their relationships. Here are some other resources to support you in the realm of body image and relationships:

More Than a Body by Dr. Lindsay Kite and Dr. Lexie Kite

Come as You Are by Emily Nagoski, PhD

Other blog posts: Navigating Recovery While In a Relationship, Part 1 and Part 2

And coming soon, Balance Health and Healing will be launching an online course I created called Body Image and Sex! The course is meant to help you overcome body image struggles and improve your sexual relationship.

I’m excited to share it with you! Join the Waitlist here.

I am passionate about body acceptance work. I teach it, practice it, and continue to learn and evolve my understanding of how to do this work. The body acceptance journey is often described using the metaphor of a ladder. In fact, when I lecture about body acceptance, I use the following image to capture the idea: 

However, when we used this image in our Body Acceptance Group this last month, my understanding of this “progressive approach” was turned on its head. So many clients share about how they can be in a more accepting or healthy place with their body one day and, the next, feel right back at “ground zero.” Others describe how they can inhabit multiple places with their body at once. For example, they can feel grateful for their body while also feeling disgust for how it looks. They can feel compassion for what their body has gone through and also resent that it refuses to change the way they want it to change. It suddenly became clear in this discussion that the ladder doesn’t fit these experiences at all. I know body acceptance is a non-linear journey, but when we talk about progress, we talk about being in different places than we were before. It’s as if we keep arriving or stepping up to somewhere new, and different, and stable. The journey is so much more fluid and complicated than that. In this group, I suddenly envisioned a better way to conceptualize the body acceptance journey. And it’s one of bubbles. 

Our experiences and relationships with our bodies are deeply rich, historical, personal, complicated, and nuanced. In a holistic perspective, we always carry with us each of these lived feelings, perceptions, beliefs, and behaviors in our bodies. Sometimes certain bubbles expand and take up a lot of room. For example, an event or interaction in our lives may trigger more negative feelings about our bodies. Or maybe we are feeling more vulnerable in general and are more prone to feel amplified negative emotions about our bodies. 

Through body acceptance work, there is active movement to amplify and grow different ways of being with our bodies. There is choice in what works for you and what you value, and this journey involves a lot of trial and error and hard work. For some people they really resonate with amplifying body gratitude and find a lot of joy and relief in this. For others, maybe they want to focus even less on their bodies and so focus on identifying and living more intentionally, their values (valued living) and feel a lot of relief in doing so. Some enjoy experimenting, growing skills, and amplifying many different ways of being with their bodies and find at different times, different tools and orientation work better than others. In this work, you will notice these other experiences you are intentionally amplifying will take up more space in your lived reality with your body. And while this doesn’t make more painful experiences or beliefs disappear completely, it changes the overall experience with yourself. 

This lived experience in your body is a moving, changing, fluid experience. As we work, we build confidence and more stability in inviting and amplifying the experiences, feelings, and beliefs we want to have in our bodies. But this doesn’t mean hard days disappear where other feelings and experiences rear their heads and dominate the day. 

There is no “falling backwards” or “getting worse” with this framework of body acceptance. It is simply awareness that certain bubbles are larger today, or this week, and this affects how we feel. We can make conscious choices to use the tools and knowledge we have to attend to the bubbles we want to grow and amplify and have compassion for ourselves on days we are simply doing our best to get by. The body acceptance journey, just like mediation, is a practice, not a final destination. Over time it is easier and more and more rewarding, and it continues to invite us to work and be with ourselves in intentional ways as we move through this messy experience that is life. 

Throughout the past year, my body has carried me through many life-changing experiences. She has carried me through grief, joy, connection, and has provided me the opportunity to grow in ways that I previously doubted possible. 

As I reflect on the ways that my body has shown up for me throughout it all, I am filled with comfort knowing that I can count on her to continue putting one foot in front of the other even when things feel unpredictable and vulnerable.  

The postpartum experience has given me the opportunity to find compassion for my body in ways that I had previously yet to experience. Writing a letter to my body allows me to process these physical changes while identifying both positive and neutral experiences within the adjustments. 

A letter to my postpartum body:

Thank you for showing up for me with a lens of connection and love as I navigate changing roles and challenge fears related to the unknown. 

Thank you to my soft belly for safely housing my babies and then providing a safe place for them to cuddle. 

My tired yet strong arms for holding and caring for the two of them even on days that I didn’t think I was capable. 

My powerful legs that supported me in moving forward through the hardships, grief, and joy. 

My weary eyes that fought to stay awake throughout the many sleepless nights.

My lips for the countless kisses, asks for support, and I love yous said. 

My mind for enduring all of the changes that have occurred, physically, mentally, and emotionally. 

I am proud of you. Thank you for walking through these changes with hopefulness. Your adaptability brings me comfort and peace. 

I challenge you to engage in this exercise and allow neutrality to become a part of your life experiences, too. 

Have you ever heard of the term disenfranchised grief? Disenfranchised grief is the act of grieving something that is not socially acceptable. This applies to the loss of relationships, jobs, dreams, or even an idea. The quote, “It’s okay to grieve the life that you thought you would live,” stands out to me as I have worked with many individuals who grieve aspects of their life before eating concerns were present. Grief symptoms can be heavy, surprising, and potentially isolating at times. However, knowing the grief process can bring awareness and normalcy through the course. 

The Kubler-Ross Grief Cycle consists of five stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Although many people experience all five stages as they process through their grief, there is no specific route to take in effort to grieve the “right” way. I often refer to the grief process as a rollercoaster ride, full of sharp turns, unexpected loops, and seemingly ongoing without end. With awareness of how disenfranchised grief can impact recovery, we can choose to honor the process, and disempower the symptoms that continually show up. 

As you navigate recovery, you may grieve life before feeling as if your relationships revolved around recovery needs, how it felt to connect with friends when food was present, the ability to engage in meals without feeling overwhelmed with anxiety, or what it felt like to be comfortable in your body without always identifying ways that you wish it could be altered. It is essential to allow yourself time and space to grieve and seek support from family, friends, or a therapist. Over time, as you come to terms with the changes, you can begin to adapt to your new circumstances and find meaning and purpose in your current life.