What body shaming does to a woman’s sense of self

By Aruna Joshi

I once attended a family birthday gathering wearing jeans and a black top – an outfit I loved and felt comfortable in. My husband and I were dressed alike, and for a brief moment, I felt good walking into the hall. Almost immediately, an elderly aunt remarked, “Why are both of you wearing black?”

I replied lightly, half-joking, “It makes us look thin.” I laughed it off, assuming the conversation would end there. It did not. She looked at me seriously and said, “But look at you. You have put on so much weight. You must do something about it.”

That single sentence was enough to puncture the evening. Outwardly, I appeared unaffected, but internally something shifted. Amidst the loud music, conversations and laughter, a sharper voice began playing in my mind. “Yes, you have put on weight. Yes, she is right. Why don’t you take this seriously? Join a gym. See a dietician. Do something.”

The voice grew louder, drowning out the celebration around me. Eventually, overwhelmed, I told my husband how I was feeling, and we left the party early. The aunt who had made the remark, meanwhile, continued happily gulping the paani-puris, entirely untouched by the damage her words had caused.

This is how body shaming often operates. It is casual, unexamined and frequently disguised as concern.

The people who pass such remarks genuinely believe they are acting in good faith, motivated by love or responsibility. “I’m saying this for your own good” is a familiar justification.

What is rarely acknowledged is the psychological impact they have on the recipient. Concern, when delivered without empathy or consent, becomes intrusion. And repeated intrusions slowly erode a woman’s sense of self.

I learnt this far earlier in life. When I was very young in junior college, my front tooth was broken. One day, an elder in the family remarked that I should not laugh with my mouth open because the broken tooth showed and it didn’t look nice. That comment landed with extraordinary force. I felt embarrassed and, worse, defective.

Almost overnight, I stopped laughing. I became serious, withdrawn and hesitant to speak, convinced that even talking revealed something ugly about me. My personality altered in response to that single judgement. What had been a spontaneous, expressive self slowly turned guarded and restrained.

Years later, after college, when I began working, I had a colleague who eventually became a close friend. One day, she said to me, with complete sincerity, “You have such a beautiful smile. Why don’t you smile more?” My immediate reaction was suspicion. I assumed she was mocking me. By then, I had developed a deep inferiority complex around my appearance, and trust did not come easily. It took her considerable effort to convince me that she meant what she said.

When I finally told her about the broken tooth and the comment that had silenced my laughter for years, she responded firmly: first, that it was not true; and second, that even if someone thought so, why should I stop being happy because of one person’s opinion. “Let them feel what they want to feel. You cannot change that,” she said. “Why should you suffer because of somebody’s opinion?”

That conversation marked a turning point in my life. It exposed how profoundly a single careless remark can reshape a person’s inner world, and how much effort it takes to undo that damage.

Body shaming is often dismissed as a superficial issue, but its impact runs far deeper.

For many women, the body becomes the primary site through which they are judged, valued and measured. When that body is repeatedly framed as a problem – too large, too old, too dark, too visible – the critique does not remain external. Over time, it is internalised. The woman begins to monitor herself constantly, adopting the very gaze that once wounded her.

This internalisation causes the deepest damage. Over time, self-worth stops feeling natural and begins to feel conditional, dependent on meeting standards that keep changing and are often impossible to reach.

A woman starts holding back parts of herself – confidence, visibility, even ease – until she believes she looks acceptable. Her sense of self becomes something she waits to earn, rather than something she is allowed to have.

The workplace is not immune to this dynamic. Here, body shaming is often subtle, embedded within notions of professionalism and presentation. Comments about looking “tired”, advice on dressing “appropriately”, or unspoken rewards for fitting a certain aesthetic communicate that appearance is part of performance.

Women learn that competence alone is insufficient. As a result, they engage in constant self-surveillance, diverting mental energy away from thinking, leading and creating, and toward managing how they are perceived.

Over time, this constant scrutiny begins to shape behaviour.

Many women slowly learn to make themselves smaller, both in body and in spirit. They choose clothes that help them disappear rather than express who they are. They avoid spaces where they might be noticed. They step away from opportunities not because they are incapable, but because being seen no longer feels safe. And as the body is restricted, the voice often grows quieter too.

Healing begins with a difficult but necessary truth: the shame was not personal. It came from a culture that repeatedly tells women their value lies in how closely they fit a certain image, and then benefits from their dissatisfaction.

Healing does not require loving your body all the time or forcing positivity. Sometimes, the first and most honest step is simply allowing the body to exist without criticism, judgement or punishment. Not every remark needs to be taken in, and not every voice deserves influence.

Ultimately, the way out of body shaming lies in reclaiming a worth that does not need approval. A woman’s body is not a public space open to judgement. It is what carries her through life. And her freedom to laugh, to take up space, and to be seen does not rest on meeting anyone else’s standards and acceptability.

Aruna Joshi is a Mumbai-based author and former architect who spent 18 years designing spaces before turning to crafting words. Through her work, she blends practical wisdom with heartfelt insight to help people live with more balance, meaning and joy. She has written four books: Wake Up (2017), The Happiness Manual (2018), The Subtle Art of Dealing with People (2021), and Morning Mastery (2025). Follow her on Substack at Zen Whispers.