Bloggers in the buff: Michelle Gay and Exposed

Like so many young American women, Michelle Gay, a 26-year-old Oregon native, has struggled for years with weight, body image, and striking a healthy balance. After eight years of dieting, Gay got down to her lowest weight in 2009 – and she was miserable.

Cycles of binging and starvation left her exhausted, confused, and struggling to sustain a healthy body. In a bid towards a long-term solution, and in hopes of inspiring and relating to other women, Gay launched a diary-style blog, Eating Journey, where she offers raw, honest stories, anecdotes and ideas for her readers, and documents her triathlon training adventures.

Now, she’s teamed up with other bloggers for Exposed: a photographed series of women and men, in the buff, celebrating the strengths and accomplishments of their physical selves. So far, 15 women and men have been Exposed in the series, including Gay, and she’s hoping to add to their ranks. I caught up with Gay to ask her a few questions about body image, women’s blogging communities, and the burgeoning Exposed phenomenon.

Tell me a bit about your history with body image, and how it has changed since you started the blog and met this community of other women online.

I have dieted for 8 years, and lost 100 pounds. In July 2009, I wanted to lose more weight for someone in my life, who wanted me thinner. I lost 25 more pounds, was the thinnest I had ever been, and I was miserable. I was never thin enough. I had one day a week where I would starve and dehydrate myself before weighing in and then binge, then wake up and hate myself. Each week I would go through this song and dance. Each week I became more and more dissatisfied.

In December, 2008, I was hospitalized with some major intestinal issues, had a colonsocopy, and also no longer had that person in my life. However, I had lost sight of who I was. I put on about 35lbs in six months. Nothing fit. Five nights a week I would go to bed crying, exhausted, stuffed and depressed.

I then went on a life changing trip to East Timor, where scales weren’t found, and communication was mostly cut off. It was just me, the Timorese people, a campfire stove and nature. I came home cleansed, and vowed to change the way I looked at myself, food, and exercise.

This women’s blog-world is growing. Do you think, for the most part, that this is a healthy thing for women? Or do you think it might promote the kind of food-obsession and self-comparison that can lead to more serious problems?

I think in any realm, especially one that is as open as the internet, both the intensely positive and negative is actualized. I choose to only read people who bring me peace, perspective and openness. There are times when I’ll come across a blog that makes my heart ache. I choose to write something positive and encouraging on their blog.

I follow people who don’t count calories or points – you can find that if you want it. I remember when I was struggling with dieting/binging/body image and I would compare myself to those bloggers who I felt ‘have it all together’. What I came to understand is that was all have our struggles. Bloggers who have shared their lives have helped me see that no one is perfect. That even those women who ‘have it together’ still struggle, but they overcome it by coming back to the core values of self-respect and love. That is what I want to give and that is what has enabled me to stop comparing.

However, this view is because I don’t read blogs that are obsessive or comparative. It’s out there, and if you want to compare yourself to others you can. You can also compare yourself to the women at the grocery store, lifting weights at the gym or in magazine ads. I understand how people can say ‘the blogging world perpetuates unhealthy expectations and obsessive behavior’ because people’s thoughts are out for everyone to read. People are going to compare and think that way regardless of blogs, if that’s how they are filtering the world.

Now. Exposed. What inspired you to start it?

I was looking at my friend, Esther’s, blog. She posted ‘The Naked Truth’ where she only wrote negative things about her body.

I got annoyed, angry, and disappointed. Why was this gorgeous, amazing woman, who has given life to a child, hating her body? Why was I hating my body? So I decided to write down positive affirmations on a photograph of my own body. I had the post ready for about three days and then published it. I remember sitting in my room looking at the ‘publish’ button, shaking, and thinking ‘what am I about to do?’.

I honestly just left the post up there. Esther and I talked about starting a “movement” but neither of us had the time to do it. It just started to evolve organically.

I never had a goal about it. I just did it because I was honestly annoyed. I was tired of hating the way I looked. I am exhausted thinking about the amount of negative self-image issues that there are in the world. I just wanted to open one person’s eyes to the beauty of loving their bodies.  I pushed the publish button for me, for little girls, for moms, for dads, for bingers, for purgers, for deniers, and for those on their journey.

What kind of reactions have you received?

I have been blown away by the response. It was really for me, initially, and has spiraled into women and men of all shapes and sizes showing their own personal journey with their bodies. The comments and e-mails that I’ve gotten from people, telling me how they’ve been positively affected by the Exposed movement, is something that I’m so thankful for. I became vulnerable in that post, and was supported.

What’s next for the project, in terms of recruiting women and getting the word out? What are your long-term goals?

Esther and I did discuss having a ‘Project Naked Truth’ where we would post people’s Exposed posts in a separate forum. But I think that the beauty of this movement is it’s something organic. I don’t want people to join a movement because ‘everyone else is doing it’ in this instance. What I envision is that this will be in the back of people’s minds, and encourage them to discuss the broader topic of self-image. This is an intensely personal thing for people, so to put unnecessary pressure or expectations on anyone to participate would be contrary to what I would hope a potential Exposed movement could become.