Ambassador Autobiography: Realizing Her Worth

As a boudoir studio, Jezebel VonZephyr has the honor of helping women and hearing their incredible stories. We meet each woman where she’s at in her journey and give her unconditional love and support with the hope that she’ll take a step or two further on her personal journey of growth and self-acceptance. Helping women to step into their light and shine is one of the things we love doing the most! 

As a part of our mission to empower and inspire, each spring we invite a select group of women to become Jezebel Brand Ambassadors and share their stories of growth, self-love and acceptance. Each of them has grown throughout their time with Jezebel VonZephyr and every one of them has a unique and powerful story to tell. 

Today we feature the story of another Brand Ambassador: Kat K! She believed a lot of stories and messages about herself that weren’t serving her. She made the decision to start telling herself new stories after her first JVZ shoot. Let’s hear about her journey! 

My Body Image Story (And the Stories I Tell Myself)

My personal body image story isn’t just about body image, it’s also about personality. Growing up, personality was important and I was always taught that I could be anything I wanted to be. Some of that translated into mostly good things, since I have always been, at least outwardly, fairly body confident. 

I’m short and not “too” big. I’m “cute” with a round face that I wish wasn’t as round, and nothing about me says “stunning beauty”, but I have all the normal things, fingers and toes and ears and nose, eyes that see and feet that walk. 

I’ve never been someone that cared too much about hair and makeup, since I tell myself that I’m inherently lazy and would rather sleep in than get up 20 min earlier to do hair and makeup. I’ve always had my own sense of style and fashion. 

I’ve always been a little odd and quirky. I’ve never paid “too” much attention to the number on the scale and I could look around and say “at least I don’t have health problems” or “at least I can still find clothes in my size at the regular stores” or any number of “fat shaming statements here”. 

The Lessons We’re Taught by Society

As women we’re taught to be seen but not heard, to be helpful to others, to be selfless and giving, to be beautiful, poised, ornamental, and graceful. We’re taught to brush it off, don’t worry about it, move on, ignore it. 

Part of my “feminine allure” has never been any of those things. I can fake it if I need to but I’m more likely to be criticized because I’m too loud (by my own family no less), or too opinionated, or too much. 

Only recently has the narrative changed, or started to change, and are we as women allowed to be whoever we want to be and even then in some cases we’re still fighting.

But the world is changing though, and because of my sessions with the Jezebel Von Zephyr team and my own self work, I’m not afraid of being unique, quirky, bigger and more boisterous.

I recognize now that fat is not a problem or a condition to be afraid of. 

As I’ve grown I’m now more afraid of being physically and mentally weak, of not being able to do the things I want to do, of being less because I didn’t try, not because  of how I look or because I “take up too much room”.

My Younger Years

As a preteen and teen I was bullied and teased because of my clothing, personality, and grooming habits. I was loud, well spoken, silly, and ready to raise my hand and talk in class, with a quirky fashion sense and little to no interest in hair. 

My mother didn’t know how to do hair and never learned to do anything other than put her hair in a ponytail. I taught myself how to braid and curl my hair in self-defense. Most days I don’t have the time to do more than just wash and go. 

I grew up in the 90’s and during that time bullies and mean girls were just something you avoided and tried not to antagonize in school. Looking back now, I recognize that I was bullied in elementary school and middle school. (I knew I was bullied, but looking back I was bullied more than I thought). 

I also recognize that I was probably a bully or a mean girl to some others in high school and I wish I could have done better.

I wish I could have stood up and taken up more room for other’s quirks and differences, not just my own.

As a young person I was always fairly fit. I played sports and was athletic though I didn’t “do” anything to be “more fit”. Though, looking back, my parents required both my sister and I to participate in a “sport” every year. My senior year in High School, when I didn’t get on the softball team, my sister and I took private swim lessons and learned I liked to swim.

Love, Relationships, and Diets

I got engaged at a very young age to my high school sweetheart. (I was 16 at the time.) As part of my “don’t get married till you graduate college” incentive, my father, in his infinite concern over my weight gain in college (maybe 20 pounds), told me that if I could fit into my Mother’s wedding dress that he would gift me additional funds to plan my wedding. (That high school sweetheart relationship didn’t last. I never got married or even to a point in the planning that I had a budget.) 

Though the relationship didn’t work out I knew that I would never fit into my mother’s wedding dress. My shoulders are larger than hers. We’re just built differently, and no amount of diet or exercise would get me into that dress.

I later dated a guy who was concerned with his health, so we started working out together. He could lose weight so easily! We later determined that he was diabetic. Because of health care at the time we tried to figure out a way to manage his diabetes through diet. To support his health journey I cut out soda, sugar, and easy carbs. What that means now that I’m not with him is that I still really only drink soda occasionally and my diet generally doesn’t contain sugar.

I have periodically gone on diets or health plans, but my problem is that none of what I tried or what’s been marketed to me, is really affordably sustainable over the long term. Cut out x types of food for forever, or take this expensive supplement for forever, or deprive yourself of these things and you’ll be skinny, you’ll lose weight. 

None of those diets talk about being strong, or capable, or happy, or will fix any of the other glaring problems in our lives unrelated to weight. (And honestly only 5% of people who diet are successful long-term.)

Messages I Believed About Myself

One of the subtle digs I’ve internalized is that I can’t date attractive men, because I’m not an “attractive” woman. I have a “great personality” but I’m not “beautiful” so I don’t deserve to date men that are conventionally attractive. 

I believed that I could only date men that were sort of attractive or were unconventionally beautiful because of everything I was told. They have to have dad bods, or coke bottle glasses, or poor grooming, or any number of “imperfections” in order for them to be dateable. 

I’m not saying that I haven’t been attracted or haven’t loved some of the men that I’ve dated, but I’ve always tried to date based on personality rather than attractiveness because I wanted to be sure that I was dating for “the right reasons” because of my internalized beliefs.

I was in a long term relationship with someone who I didn’t want to be intimate with because I was dating them for their personality and not if we were compatible in all aspects of our relationship, which was a disservice to them and myself. Now I try to look for a more well-rounded partner, chemistry and personality, as well as all the other important parts while dating.

A Turning Point

Then I did my first Jezebel Von Zephyr shoot. For me it wasn’t the pictures that told me I was beautiful. It was Sara and Tiffany. They have helped me to do more internalizing and soul searching and thinking about who I am, what my body looks like, what my body does, about who I am and the things about me that I need in order to be complete.

Because of my sessions, the photos that they’ve taken of me, how the world has changed and the people I surround myself with, I know that I am worthy of love.

I am worthy of my own love and I am worthy of others love.

I am also allowed to take up space. To be loud and boisterous, aggressive and assertive.

I’m worthy of the spaces I occupy and the opinions and words I have.

Becoming the Person I Want to Be

Love really is blind. And knowing that and believing that will, I hope, make me more open to receive love from the universe.

Because of the Jezebel Von Zephyr team I’m trying to be stronger and healthier, and I’m trying to be more genuine about who I am to all the people I meet. It’s not because I need or should want to lose a few or more pounds, or make more friends, but because I’m recovering from ACL repair surgery.

It’s because I want to continue to dance, hike, camp, and be active, and because I want genuine connections to people and not burdensome false relationships.

It’s not about what I look like–it’s about what I can do, and who I can be for myself and the people around me. 

Does Kat’s story of growth and realizing her worth resonate with you? Her story is exactly why Jezebel VonZephyr exists. We want to support, empower and uplift women so that they can shine and be the best versions of themselves, whatever that looks like! 

Are you ready for a new chapter? Or are you looking to see yourself in a more loving way? Make yourself a priority and book your session for this fall. We can’t wait to see how you grow and shine!