Get Naked More

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Get Naked More

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Most girls (and boys) become aware of their bodies as sites of sexual attention as secondary sex characteristics begin to emerge. This awareness usually comes long before they’ve developed a clear understanding of what their new bodies mean, socially. An unfortunate part of this developmental stage are the emotions that surface after confronting the perversity of media, culture, and some adults.

Diego Rivera (Mexican, 1886-1957) Weaving, 1936| To me, this image represents the ability an individual has to look back on the strangling threads of lone memories and make a complete picture out of them.

Weaving, 193

I know that now as a twenty-two-year-old woman. But, as a girl, all I knew was: catching the scanning eyes of men old enough to be my father made me want to rip the skin from my muscles. (Maybe the word I am looking for here is violated. And somehow guilty for causing that reaction.) They weren’t the only ones to do so (just the most unforgivable). The snotty-nosed boys I journeyed through kindergarten, and elementary school with also began to have googly eyes that would trail the outlines of my pubescent breasts.

Their unrestrained eyes were not enough. Something, something extra had to be added to seal the deal and really make my middle school experience memorable. So, they started a game (we all love games, right??). I didn’t learn what it entailed through explanation. I learned by immersion.

On a weekday in June, I heard a litter of boys giggling for several minutes in my classroom. I had been friends with a few of them, especially Chris, so I tapped his shoulder and asked, “What’s so funny?”“Nothing,” he said, brushing it off. I didn’t think twice. Maybe it was about India Love or the gossip page everyone followed. I finished some homework and packed up as the final bell rang.

But instead of leaving, all five of them lingered. I picked up my pencil case, and my backpack, and headed for the door because my dad would be waiting outside. I turned back and asked Chris, “Are you guys leaving?”He smirked. “We’re just gonna follow you out.”

It felt off, but not entirely unusual. Middle school boys are weird. I made my way toward the stairwell, and they followed. The moment I stepped onto the first stair, they lined up single file, ran behind me, and each one smacked my ass before dashing out of the building, giggling.

The game was called Let’s smack Anne’s ass. And I hadn’t been invited to the conversation.

At that point, like most girls my age, my body image was already starting to fray. I was just beginning to form a sense of identity and self. That moment severed the link between the person I felt I was and the body I lived in. 

Years later, I signed up for an early morning yoga class. I wore an athletic skort that exposed more than it covered. The instructor that morning happened to be J., a man. I had taken his classes before, but never alone. Never in an outfit that did not fully cover me. I felt anxious—unsure if simply moving my body might be taken as a cue. But that did not happen.

We moved through a flow, and when we got to Puppy Dog Pose, I let myself soften into it. With my ass in the air and my rib cage on the mat,  J. was the same as always. No scanning. No weird behavior. Just a yoga teacher leading a practice.

At that moment, I just had a body. Not a trigger. (In retrospect, it is ironic that the sex that grossly influenced my bodily shame helped heal it. To all the men I have had the pleasure of meeting who are just like J.: thank you.)

Through many sessions like these, I trained myself not to dress my body with the sole intention of shielding it to keep it from betraying me, by arousing attention that could make me emotionally, physically, or psychologically unsafe. I dressed with two intentions: 1) to wear whatever I wanted, and 2) to respect the space and those within it.

If that was a flame, naked yoga was a forest fire.

After the class, I felt a deep sense of peace on the drive home. I was hyper-aware of my feet pressing into the floor of the car, of my hands resting at my sides.

My body was not just an object that I seldom connected to. I was in it. It was mine! Mine, all mine! For once, I was not at war with it, nor was I trying to escape from it. My body wasn’t something I feared would provoke or invite unwanted reactions. For the first time in a very, very long time, I did not feel responsible for how others responded to me. Because I knew, undeniably, that people have a choice in how they act.

And if that is true, then I, too, had a choice in how I saw my body as an adult woman. A choice to stop internalizing shame that was never mine to carry.

So, I extend this question to you: When did you realize your body meant something beyond the fact that it is yours?

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Sources and fun readings to get lost in:

American Psychological Association, Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls. (2007).

“Report of the APA Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls.”

Crooks, N., King, B., Donenberg, G., & Sales, J. M. (2023). Growing up too “fast”: Black girls’ sexual development. Sex Roles, 89(3), 135-154.

Smolak, L., & Murnen, S. K. (2011). The sexualization of girls and women as a primary antecedent of self-objectification.

Tiggemann M., Slater A. (2015). The role of self-objectification in the mental health of early adolescent girls: Predictors and consequences. Journal of Pediatric Psychology, 40, 704-711.

Tolman, D. L. (2002).

“Dilemmas of Desire: Teenage Girls Talk about Sexuality.” Harvard University Press.