3 Guys Share How They Achieved Body Acceptance
This piece is part of a series of stories on weight and weight loss in today’s age of radical body positivity, revolutionized cosmetic procedures, and pharma innovations (Ozempic, anyone?). To read the rest of the stories, click here.
THE DELUGE OF TikTok influencers selling the recipe for the “perfect body,” the fat jokes, and the compliments that were nonexistent before the weight loss can define your body image if you let it. These three men—wrestling legend Mark Henry, fitness trainer Roy Belzer, and adventure travel host Jeff Jenkins—refused to subscribe to society's body ideals. They looked in the mirror and found love for their bodies. Bodies that have given them strength, power, and confidence, no matter what shape or size. Read their stories, below.
FIVE OR SIX years ago, I was in a grocery store, and this little kid said, “Mama, he’s fat.” I told the kid, “No, I’m big and I’m strong.” The embarrassment on the mother’s face was undeniable. But my response to the kid was healing, because when I told the kid that, the kid said, “I’m strong, too.”
I’ve been judged about my weight since the first or second grade. But in my childhood photos, I was always flexing and posing like a bodybuilder because I felt strong and I was confident in my strength. I used to tell people, “You can hit me in the stomach.” I would flex my stomach and let people punch me as hard as they could, and all they would do was hurt their hand. I was meant to be who I am.
From 1997 to 2002, at 402 pounds, I squatted 1,000 pounds, bench-pressed 600 pounds, and deadlifted 900-plus pounds. During that time, I also ran a 5.1 40-yard dash. After I retired from wrestling in 2017, I felt like there was no reason to be as big as I was if I wasn’t going to compete anymore. Now I’m 330—100 pounds lighter than I was when I was wrestling last. I feel pretty good other than the injuries I’ve sustained wrestling.
I know my body is valuable. I have currency built up in what I’ve done in my life with my weight. But the true value is being whatever weight you are and being able to still do everything that everybody else can and more. The people who see not having a six-pack as a weakness are superficial because a six-pack cannot defend you. A six-pack will not define what your worth is. You can look good, but everything that looks good ain’t good.
I WAS A larger kid growing up, so my weight was definitely a hot topic. I didn’t see anything wrong with it until people at school started criticizing the size of my body. Because of this, during my senior year of high school, I ended up restricting my food intake and losing 100 pounds in about four months.
From around the time I was 17 years old until I was 22, I’ve had back-and-forth battles with anorexia, bulimia, and orthorexia [an obsession with healthy eating]. A couple years later, I got certified as a trainer. I wanted to help people who’ve gone through similar things with body image. My focus with my clients is functional movement. The people I choose to work with tend to have goals that are focused on living a fuller life and moving and feeling better without fat loss as a primary goal.
Today I’m in a much better place mentally. The body I’m currently in is a bit bigger than I’ve been in the past, but I’m doing things I never could have done when I was half the size I am now, like lift dance partners onstage and have stamina for eight opera performances a week. (I’ve also done musical theater and opera professionally for about a decade.)
My weight doesn’t dictate my happiness anymore. It was a lot of work with self-love and valuing what my body could do over how my body looked. I see it as an opportunity to love myself in a way that the me with an eating disorder never allowed myself to do.
GROWING UP IN Florida, I didn’t know what food deserts were, but there weren’t any grocery stores around. I was going to the corner stores to get our food and snacks. The only things you could buy were these frozen dinners—things that were high in sodium and cholesterol. The lowest I’ve weighed was 230, and the most I’ve weighed is 443.
A few years back, I remember looking at this book, The Body Keeps the Score [a bestseller by Bessel van der Kolk, M.D., on how trauma reshapes the body and brain]. I began to think, Do I have negative images around my body and who I am? This is at the peak of body positivity, when I started understanding there’s a system in place that’s trying to discourage people from being a certain size and understanding the way the world perceives plus-size people. I was committed to changing that scenario.
My cousin told me, “You should talk about your experience as a fat Black guy traveling around the world.” I didn’t know anybody in the travel space doing this, so I started Chubby Diaries in October 2018. It was one of the first times I felt, It’s okay to just be you and do your thing.
I want to bring the humanity back into people. Jeff Jenkins right now, at his 400 pounds, is having a human experience. I’m not here to promote obesity—I’m here to encourage people to live life now no matter what size they are. Some people would think them being my size is a death sentence, but it’s not. You can be okay with who you are and not the image of who you thought you had to be.
This article originally appears in the January/February 2024 issue of Men's Health.
Want the latest science, real-life stories, and fascinating insights on weight and weight loss today? Click the link below to read all of the stories.
You Might Also Like
