Fatty, 'sissy', gym rat: My early struggle with body image

I was obsessed with my weight and would skip meals. But I didn't seek help because I thought men don't do that.

- Aqil Hamzah

When I was living alone in Jakarta, the first thing I reached out for every morning was not my phone, but my weighing scale.

Like clockwork, I would head straight to the toilet at 5.30am, where I would set the scale on the ground, stare at myself in the mirror, and then plant my feet firmly on the machine's cold surface.

And with bated breath, I would watch as numbers flashed on the tiny screen — the slightest fluctuations in digits eliciting different emotions in me.

A drop from the previous day meant a sigh of relief, while no change was met with indifference.

But the tiniest increase — even as little as 100g — would make my heart sink, and I would make a mental note to skip a meal or two that day, sometimes even all three.

In the three months I was there for a work attachment, I lost almost 10kg - the result of daily workouts at the gym and occasionally going days without eating. The difference was noticed immediately by my colleagues when I returned to Singapore in early December.

My body and weight have changed, but my struggles with my body image have not.

A LIFELONG BATTLE

It's a battle I've fought since Primary 1 when I was made to join the Trim and Fit (TAF) club because I was deemed to be overweight.

Those days, the school hall would be segregated into two areas — the front a calm oasis as my peers sat in their school uniform reading before assembly, and the back a cacophony of colours jumping up and down to the tune of a shrill whistle.

I was one of those relegated to the back, dressed in my PE attire and sweating up a storm as us "fatties" did warm-ups before running multiple laps up and down the stairs.

During recess, the canteen stall uncles and aunties would always give us an extra serving of vegetables after we flashed our TAF club membership card, and there were weigh-ins conducted throughout the year to see if we made any progress with our weight loss.