Final 2 Week Plan

     The first goal of my 2-week plan was to go back and think about everything that I have learned from this experience and pick out the most important thing that I have learned. After reviewing all of my previous blog posts and notes I found it very difficult to pick one thing that was more important than the rest because this is such an informative subject filled with so much heavy information. One of the things that I often remind myself of is that if you're not eating enough food, your bones will become weak and brittle, and you could get injured very easily. If you are not eating enough your body will start to burn muscle instead of fat and you will not be as strong of a dancer. Every dancer's biggest fear is a major injury and keeping this fact in mind could help many dancers who are starting to fall into an ED mindset. 

    The second goal of my 2-week plan was to share my experiences with this issue. The circumstance that I was put in is very similar to that of many dancers. As a dancer's body grows and develops through your teenage years it is sometimes hard to process and accept that change. We are always told to be as skinny and small as possible and as we are growing it can be a very hard thing to process. I was always a small kid. I was always the shortest and tiniest one in the room, and I was heavily praised for that. As I got older and grew it was very hard for me because I was constantly trying to get my body back to the way it had always been. I struggled with loving my new body and wanted to look like my younger self again. Quarantine was a very hard time for me, as it was for many dancers. I developed disordered eating and extremely bad habits. I would take 4-hour zoom dance classes, and then workout for 4 more hours, with practically nothing in my stomach. I repeated this routine for months. This dangerous habit lead me to pass out because I had no energy and was working out so much. I wanted to look like the dancers I saw on social media or even the younger version of myself. By the summer I was in recovery, but that's not where the disordered eating stopped. I developed many more habits that were extremely unhealthy over the next year, but I am always able to pull myself out before they become too dangerous. Once a dancer begins to have an ED mindset it truly never goes away. The thoughts will always remain, but you're able to control your actions and remind yourself what is best for you and your body. 

    The third goal of my 2-week plan was to research why diet culture is so bad for young dancers. Diet culture can often lead to disordered eating. Young dancers should never be on a diet because of how toxic it is for their minds and their bodies. Dancers are working out for numerous hours a day, and young bodies need food to grow and develop. Diet foods, in general, are not good for anybody, they're missing nutritional value and are full of harmful ingredients and chemicals. When I was in quarantine in march of 2020, I began to eat many diet foods because I thought that could be a way I could obtain my dream body. I was wrong. Eating nothing but foods with little to no nutritional value is so harmful to someone so young. I began to count my calories until I was eating barely any calories at all. Beginning to eat diet food was what started my journey with disordered eating. Diet food is never the answer and can lead to things that can be damaging to anyone's body, especially if you're a young person who is incredibly active. 

    The final goal of my 2-week plan was to explain what other things can be toxic for dancers besides eating disorders. Social media can be harmful to the minds of dancers. People constantly compare themselves to one another and judge everyone based on what they see online. I know personally that I have been insecure because of things like Instagram and youtube. Another thing is dancewear brands. Many dancewear brands only make clothing items in child sizes, and others only make up to an adult small. Not being able to wear anything from your favorite dancewear brand is a horrible feeling. The dancewear models are often very small and not developed. In some cases, dance competitions and conventions can be extremely toxic for dancers. Conventions nowadays are very political and based off of not how good of a dancer you are, but how famous you are/what studio you go to. Dancers are being judged at all times and are constantly being ranked and put against one another. Certain competitions and conventions will score someone higher if they have a big name, or they go to a famous studio. There are many things that are toxic in the dance community, but if you have a strong positive mindset you can avoid them and enjoy only the good things that revolve around the art of dance.