Dude looks like a lady

Flipping through channels last night (yes, I should get a life), I came across a program on TLC called, “Supersize She.” And like when encountering a train wreck, I couldn’t look away.

One complaint the lady bodybuilders had was that most people don’t consider them feminine because of their muscles. Honey, it’s not the muscles. If your face looks like a man’s face and your voice sounds like a man’s voice and your body looks like a man’s body, you’re not feminine. Well, you’re not feminine looking anyway. At one point, the woman we’re following watches a video of her much younger self competing. Here she still looked like a woman. She was muscular but still had female-looking features. She even says, “Look how cute my face was.”

All I could think was how this kind of obsession must be something like anorexia. They aren’t healthy – they say so themselves. They starve themselves before competitions, forgoing even water so their muscles will pop. Then, minutes before the competition, they gorge on sugary foods so their veins will bulge out.

I don’t like the way male bodybuilders look, so this isn’t about what a woman’s body should look like. And, I’m not going to say we should be happy with the body we have – no one really is. But obsession is never good and wanting to be thought of as feminine and then working so hard to look masculine, just seems wrong to me. And, I don’t think a woman can achieve that body type without some pharmaceutical help. The acne was one indication. The deep voices and aggressive behavior were another.

On the other hand, she set a goal for herself and worked hard to reach it. I wish I could be so driven.