Negative body image issues impacting female athletes

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Negative feelings about body image is one of the major barriers to women and girls participating in sport.

Transcript

00:00 I think a lot of my struggles with my body image came from a product of my environment.

00:09 As an elite diver, I was surrounded by other elite divers who had a specific body type

00:15 and I think feeling the pressure to have to look like everyone else was a common occurrence

00:20 amongst a lot of our athletes.

00:22 As divers, we are in bathers in our training sessions so there's not a lot that's left

00:26 to the imagination so sometimes you can feel like eyes are on you and at competition everyone's

00:32 judging what you look like and a lot of that I guess comes from internally feeling like

00:37 that might be the case but when you're chatting amongst your friends about the same thing

00:41 and they all are having the same experience you start to believe that everyone is really

00:45 judging you on your body.

00:46 Many athletes experience body dysmorphia.

00:50 It's one of those things where, you know, regardless of what people around you say,

00:55 sometimes it does play on your mind.

00:57 You see images or you see athletes in your same sport, in the same position, looking

01:03 a certain way and it can play on your mind sometimes.

01:07 Yeah, it's extremely difficult, particularly when you're in the outside world and people

01:13 see your body and think, "Oh, your arms are bigger than mine" or "Your legs are bigger

01:19 than mine" and sometimes it can take a hit for an athlete but also we should be very

01:24 proud of the hard work we put in to be able to make sure that physically we are at our

01:31 best.

01:32 I think it's taken me a long time to be okay with myself and my body, like being disabled

01:36 and having a severe scoliosis like I've always.

01:40 There's not many people that look like me out there I would say but for me now is how

01:44 do I perform, how do I feel strength wise.

01:48 So my body image I would say is associated a lot with my sport and how I feel I'm going

01:52 to be with that now rather than looking in a mirror and being like, "Oh, you look at

01:58 your scoliosis makes you really sideways" as a child would probably tell me.

02:02 Yeah, for me it's just learning to love myself the way I am.

02:06 And the feedback from the athletes is when staff and coaches talk to them about body

02:11 shape and type and you do need to talk about that sometimes, you can't ignore it, that

02:16 they would rather words rather than lean or thin, you talk about being strong and being

02:24 capable of performing the activity in the right way.

02:27 So focusing more on those performance words rather than how you look words.

02:34 Physically am I able to do my job?

02:36 Do I go to training?

02:38 Am I able to make that sprint?

02:40 Am I able to push off and make that dive that's going to win my team the game?

02:45 That's what we should be looking at and what also is important is the support around.

02:51 Also important I guess to have good role models which I try and be one in my sport now and

02:54 chat to the kids who are still at school and going through puberty and just letting them

02:58 know that their body changing is completely normal and we're not supposed to look like

03:03 we looked when we were 12, when we're 18 and everything that's happening with our bodies

03:07 is perfectly normal.

03:08 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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