I find that my thoughts are usually revolving around unhappiness with my body, and have been doing so for most of my adult life. I was thinking last night that life is short, and I really don't want to spend any more of it being unhappy about my body. My body is what it is, and I can feed it healthy food and make healthy lifestyle choices, but I will never be a size 6, and can't I just be OK with that? In 5 years I will yearn for the body I have right now. I look at pictures of myself from years ago, and wonder "why the heck was I so unhappy with my body? I look great!" (even if I was heavy). There are so many things to do with the time I have left, and I don't want to carry this constant unhappy thoughts about my body around with me. I'm really tired of them. Such a constant negativity. Anyone else feel/has felt the same way? How do you/did you deal with these feelings?

YES! I have been going throught he same thing.
I am finding that I am more critical of myself than anyone else would ever be. I have lost a significant amount of weight- 68? lbs now but still struggle with this. When I look in the mirror I am not seeing myself accurately, I am seeing my flaws, not how far I have come. I am realizing the issue is my own body image.
I am tring to keep a better photo journal of my loss for side by side comparison.
I enjoy reading magazines, tv but these models have mostly perfect physiques. That is not reasonable for most of us. When was the last time you opened a magazine and saw a woman with cellulite posing in a bathing suit? I am trying to be more real and understanding with myself. I don't want to be model thin- I want to be healthy!!

Anyway, I found this neat site mybodygalley.com where regular woman (not models) upload pictures of themselves. I glanced through trying to figure the weight that I wanted to be. Looking at the picture I found the more attractive bodies to be heavier than myself. It really helped me to have a more realistic body image. And to see beauty for what it is not just a number. I am still working on this everyday though....
KariAnna

I feel exactly the same way, but I just can't seem to break out of it. I've always been overweight by a few pounds, but in my early 20's I was usually only 20 lbs overweight -- still cute. I guess I internalized that message: "I am cute," and it became as much a part of my personality as my other attributes. Now that I'm older and heavier I'm at a loss. I feel so ugly and useless (my career is at a slow down too). My husband becomes better looking as he ages and his career is on the right track (I benefit from this greatly, obviously, but on a deeply personal level I feel inferior).

I aged out of it I think. I'm almost 60. The LOOK of my body doesn't matter anymore *shrug*

I am happy now to be healthy and so what if I have a yucky body.

That's what my acquaintances, that are older than I, say too

Hahaha....it's funny that I can relate to this since I'm only 26!! But I really can. After two big babies ruined all the skin from my collar bones to my knees, it doesn't matter what I weigh. The physical appearance of my body doesn't really matter much - since even if I get down to goal weight, the basic appearance still won't look all that great! The only person who'll see my body anymore is my husband, and he actually likes me round, and says all my stretch marks remind him about how miraculously my body created his two amazing kids. For me this is a lot more about being healthy, and giving my kids the tools and knowledge to choose to be healthy too. My end weight goal was chosen simply because that's what I weighed before I got married, when I last felt active, healthy, and in control of my life.

I can really only remember a short window of time when I was 23-27 when I lost about 25 lbs and looked great (5'3" and 123 lbs). I managed to stay under 136 until I was 35 or so, and it's been downhill ever since. I'm not that far from that weight now (thanks to low carb) but I can't remember a day when I didn't wish to be thinner. I wish I could age out of this, but it's not happening for me. I will say that my lipids and general health eating this way are excellent, but I'd like to look great, too.

I've been going through exactly the same things you're describing. I feel like I've always been unhappy about my body and it has affected my social life to some extent. The funny things is, I've been looking through some photos from when I was younger and I thought "I actually looked good back then, why was I so insecure about my body?". Ten years from now I'll be looking at photos from now and think the exact same thing and regret that I've been wasting time feeling sorry for myself instead of enjoying my youth and my body. I definitely don't want to have any regrets when I'm older, so I'm working on feeling good in my own skin, accepting things I can't change and working to improve the things I can actually change. By the way, I think this is a great topic!

My skin sucks. Not from acne--I managed to avoid that--but I'm super fair-skinned so I get sunburned a lot and now I have sun damage on my face and forearms, not to mention I scar extremely easily and can get keloids (scar tissue overgrowth), which means no piercings. I'm 45 years old and come from a long line of short squat women. No one's going to be mistaking me for Angelina Jolie anytime in the future. But I'll take good health and looking okay dressed and being fortunate that it takes a LONG time for wrinkles to show up in my family.

We are so hard on ourselves.
I know I'm not in my twenties anymore (I'm 46)
but I hold that image in my mind even though I know it's not attainable

It makes me wonder if I'll ever be happy or satisfied with where I'm at

Same here! Thanks, Dad, for the oily skin! haha