by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com
The other night, I finally sat down to watch VH1’s Behind The Music about Courtney Love. Watching the Courtney Love interviews felt like visiting with an old friend. She’s still the same — endearing and maddening at the same time.
At some point late in my sophomore year of high school, I decided on a little side project. I was on a mission to hear and find out about as many women-fronted rock bands as possible. This led me to nearly lose my mind over PJ Harvey, Babes In Toyland, The Breeders, Belly, L7, Concrete Blonde, a tape that I magically had of a band called the Slits, and of course, Hole. I still loved The Smiths, and U2 and the Pixies, and Pearl Jam’s first album, but the women rock stars were the real deal. They spoke to me in a language that my sad, teenage heart could understand. They spoke to me because I spoke their language.
In the days before the Internet, before DVR, when VCR timers were still a bit wonky, I would stay up late on Sunday nights, often until 2 AM, watching MTV’s 120 Minutes in the hopes that they would play one of my favorites. I’d read Spin, and maybe NME if I could find it, and I’d buy the Village Voice every Wednesday in the hopes of reading about them. PJ Harvey was my favorite, her songs were so full of angst and pain and sexual disquiet that she was almost embarrassing to listen to. The press would show up at her lonely little studio in Dorset, and she’d confess to journalists that she never dated anyone until she was 20. In those days, she would get on stage wearing all black, her hair pulled back, a tiny person with a huge voice and huger talent.
Courtney Love was different. She was tall, larger-than-life, fond of arguments, brash, mercurial. She wore baby doll dresses and tons of red lipstick and played her guitar from between her legs. Her voice was scratchy, with none of the usual singer niceties, but she screamed a lot, which gave her audiences the license to scream along with her.
And yet for all her brashness and screw-you attitude, the thing that I kept noticing as I watched her on t.v. last week was her face. Over the years, she’s had a multitude of nose jobs, limp implants, and probably botox and other things. Courtney’s interview revealed a person who had never been okay with her appearance. Even in her early 20’s, while playing a pregnant woman in a movie, she was so concerned about looking fat that, every day, she took a little stuffing out of the pillow she was using to look pregnant.
So what, right? She’s a rockstar who’s in the public eye, lives in Hollywood, etc. etc. etc. But with Courtney Love, it’s a particular kind of bummer. She’s written song after song about how much it sucks to be objectified and 
how much women are just seen for their relative attractiveness and bodies. She sees all of it, but still internalizes it. In other words, she writes songs about how much b.s. women in go through in terms of their bodies and body image, but she’s still in a place where she feels the need to drastically alter her face and body.
In essence, she’s in a spot that a lot of you reading this are in the right now. Perhaps you’ve been reading about HAES and body acceptance and you think, intellectually, that people should accept and love their bodies, but you’re not there yet. Or, you’re able to get to a place of acceptance and then something — a friend’s comment, something on t.v. — throws you out of it and you’re back where you were, feeling crappy about your body and thinking body acceptance is not for you.
If this is the spot you’re in, I want to hear from you. Comment below (and make sure to leave your email address) and tell me a little about your struggle with loving your body. One commenter (chosen at random from commenters who comment by midnight Eastern on July 8th) will receive a FREE 60 Minute Body Love Breakthrough Session with me.
Golda is a certified holistic health counselor and founder of Body Love Wellness, a program designed for plus-sized women who are fed up with dieting and want support to stop obsessing about food and weight. To learn more about Golda and her work, click here.
Share yr body image cognitive dissonance & be entered to win a free Body Love Breakthrough Session. –>http://www.bodylovewellness.com/2010/07/…
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@Margarita — Thanks! I know, it’s such a striking difference.
@PJ — I just want to say “totally” regarding everything you said. I actually keep thinking Courtney looks more and more like Madonna all the time.
And yes, I miss Sassy immensely!
@Tracy — You are exactly the person I’m talking about. Thanks for sharing your struggle here. (And by the way, if you’re the only one who does so, we’ll be chatting in your free session soon!)
I carried 135 pounds on a 5 foot 1 inch frame in high school. My ribs & hip bones stuck out but I felt that I was fat. I hated my body because it wasn’t good enough or beautiful enough. Eight years and 90 pounds later, I still struggle with those body issues & bad eating habits. But I have, thanks to sites like yours & a husband who has adored me through all my sizes, finally begun learning to love myself for who I am, whatever size that may be. I am making better food choices & exercising for my health, not my weight. I am now more concerned with living long enough to enjoy my grandchildren than I am not embarrassing them. I believe that my case, as well as Courtney Love’s, proves that the battle needs to begin on the inside. It’s difficult though when our hearts and feelings bruise easier than our bodies.
I don’t exactly relate to the Courtney Love place, but I relate from a similar place.
I’m an activist. Fat activist, anti-shame activist, body-love activist, be-who-you-are-and-fuck-everyone-else activist. My photography business is built around the idea that sexy comes in a much wider variety of colors, shapes, sizes and abilities than Cosmo would have us believe. And when I look in the mirror, I like what I see. I think I’m hot and sexy and cute and curvy, and my rolls of fat don’t bother me.
And yet, I don’t like the way my body WORKS. And part of that is about lifestyle (I’m a nerdy, geeky computer girl who isn’t very active), and part of it is about the real effect that my weight has on what my body can do safely. I subscribe to HAES, but I feel like I don’t have the tools I need to measure my progress toward my “getting healthy” goals. All of the online tools and charts measure progress by weight-loss, which I don’t think is the end-all-be-all measurement of success…and, ultimately, isn’t really my goal, anyway. At the same time, I’m the kind of person who needs and wants a way to map and chart my progress because it helps keep me motivated and feeling empowered and reassured that I have the right to make the choices about what feels good to me and my body.
So I feel stuck. I sometimes give in and use the online tools that track weight-loss, even though that’s not really what I’m trying to do, because at least it gives me something to feel like I’m making progress and staying on track with being active and not eating crap all the time. And what I really want is a community of other fat people who believe in HAES, and are also struggling with what it means to be active and fat. I want a place to vent about going to the gym and getting the “good for you!” comments…and yet, I also want the “good for you” validation from people that I know share my core value that FAT ISN’T BAD.
Wow, Golda. What a beautifully written post! I couldn’t help but stare at Courtney Love’s before and after photos. The differences are so striking – and so sad.
I think it’s fantastic that you’re offering a free 60-minute session with you!
Again, thank you for an excellent and eloquent post!
I’m where Courtney Love is. I do believe that HAES is where it’s at, but I am having a hard time accepting my body. There are days when I feel good about it, but over all, I struggle with the idea that I will ever be good enough in this body. I struggle with feeling like I’ll ever find love at the size I am right now. I mean, I am getting older and have never had a boyfriend. I know that part of it has to do with my own psychological issues (which I’m working on), but part of me feels it’s because of how I look.
Also, I sometimes feel the pressure to look a certain way in society. I mean, we all can see how fat people are treated in this culture. Some people are really hateful. I already have other characteristics about me that I can’t really change (race and sex) and then there’s weight on top of it. I vacillate between wanting/trying to lose weight and rebelling.
Also… OMG! Someone needs to revive ‘Sassy’ right this minute! I mean, “Miss America: Indentured Servant?” I miss the early 90s.
Obviously this is my favorite blog post ever. :)
I watched “Behind the Music” too and I couldn’t help thinking how real, and tough, and suffused with punk greatness Courtney looked in her pre-nose-job pictures. Nowadays who can tell the difference between her and Goldie Hawn and Meg Ryan? (Which is insane because Courtney is a lot younger than either of those women, but all that facial work makes everyone look sort of permanently 60.) You’re right; there’s a major disconnection between what she knows and what she does.
(Thanks for posting the ‘Sassy’ cover. Aw! Kurdt!)