Megan Crabbe started an unhealthy relationship with food, restricting herself and obsessively counting calories, when she was just 10 years old. At age 14, she was diagnosed with anorexia nervosa. With the help of experts and her family, she got back to a normal weight. But she remained unhappy and never felt confident in her body. "Even though I’d gained the weight back, I was still kind of battling these body image demons mentally and they never really went away," Crabbe, now 23, tells SELF. It wasn't until two summers ago that the Brit reached a turning point. It happened when she was on Instagram, originally looking for photos to fuel her unhealthy obsession with working out.
"I was scrolling through Instagram, looking for 'fitspo' pictures of perfect abs and thigh gaps and things to motivate me even more," she says. "Somehow, I stumbled upon @yourstruelymelly, who's this gorgeous plus-size woman completely embracing her body and just living her life. She looked so, so happy, and I was like, 'Oh my god, maybe I don't actually have to hate myself for the rest of my life because here's this person and she doesn't hate herself, and she's bigger than I am as well. Maybe I'm not destined for a life of self-hatred.'"
Crabbe had tapped into Instagram's growing body positivity community, a group of people dedicated to showing others it's OK to love their body, one selfie, inspiring quote, or motivational post at a time. The hashtag #bodypositive has over 1 million posts on Instagram. And it's wholly empowering, with body activists embracing their size, their so-called flaws, and encouraging others to do the same. Finding the movement was the spark and the support Crabbe needed to start feeling confident in her own skin.
"I kind of just dove into it and really immersed myself in the online community," Crabbe says. "I followed more and more people, and I started reading books about [body positivity]."
A few months later, in late 2014, she decided to start her own body positivity account, @bodyposipanda. She began posting quotes and selfies. And then, when she felt comfortable, she started posting pictures of her body, like the ones @yourstruelymelly had posted that so inspired her. "And the rest is history," Crabbe says. She now has over 317,000 followers. Joining the body positivity community has taught Crabbe how to love herself, reframe her definition of what it means to be healthy as well as happy, and share her experiences with others.
"I used to think healthy meant thin and that fitness was perfect abs and happiness was in a dress size or weight loss," Crabbe says. "And now I realize that healthy has to include our mental health. It’s not healthy if you’re killing yourself at the gym and you're obsessing over everything that you eat and you're miserable. Your happiness has to be part of your health, and however that looks on different people is up to them."
One of Crabbe's most popular posts to date shows two images of herself: One when she was in recovery from anorexia nervosa, and one as she is today. The photo has over 26,000 likes, and Crabbe says it's surreal for her to see it.
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- This 23-Year-Old's First Nude Photo Shoot Is Plus-Size Glittery Magic
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- Bullies Mocked Khoudia Diop's Dark Complexion, And Now She’s A Huge Success
"Talking about my eating disorder years was really hard because I tried to pretend that was even me for a long time," she says. "I tried to distance myself from it, but I realized if that time was going to mean anything and if that pain was going to be worth something, I had to turn it around and turn it into something positive to try to reach out to other people."
And she's doing just that. Crabbe says she hears from her followers a lot, and the message that's stuck with her most was from another woman in recovery from an eating disorder. What she told Crabbe: "She said, 'Thanks to you, I’m turing 15 next month and I will finally have my birthday cake.' And this was someone in recovery who’s never let themselves have birthday cake. These are young girls who are learning how to live again and retrain their life and their bodies and their minds—and that’s what really hits the hardest."
If you need help, visit the National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA) website or contact the NEDA Information and Referral Helpline at 1-800-931-2237.
Hear Model Myla Dalbesio's Body-Positive Poem:
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