Understanding Body Dysmorphia and Its Impact on Mental Health

Athletes are frequently celebrated for their physical prowess and dedication to performing at a higher caliber. Behind achievements, however, many people struggle with a specific mental health challenge that goes unnoticed: body dysmorphia.

This condition doesn’t discriminate based on your fitness level or athletic ability. Even if you’re an everyday gym-goer or a competitive athlete, body dysmorphia can distort how you see yourself.

Body dysmorphia involves an unhealthy preoccupation with perceived flaws in your appearance. So often, these flaws are so minor or invisible that no one else notices them. Yet they consume your mental energy.

How Body Dysmorphia Shows Up in Athletic Populations

For athletes, this can become a preoccupation with reducing body fat percentage, building muscle mass, or focusing too heavily on areas that you feel are standing in the way of meeting your fitness goals.

The Performance Paradox

Certain sports emphasize specific attributes. Runners desire to be lean. Football players want to be bulkier. Having such a scrutinizing eye, between your own perception and any external stakeholders, can lead to more frequent evaluation of your body.

Making this evaluation a routine habit can blur the lines between what is healthy and obsession. You end up with this compulsion to assess your appearance every time you pass a mirror. You may opt for baggy clothes to hide the things you think are flaws.

Achieving the results you want can lead to overtraining, potentially causing injury. People also often develop disordered eating patterns in pursuit of an ideal physique.

The Mental Toll

Body dysmorphia extends beyond what you see in your reflection. It shapes your entire worldview.

Common companions of body dysmorphia include depression and anxiety, creating added strain on your mental health. When you’re unhappy with a physical attribute, it sends you into a spiral of negative thinking, one negative thought fueling another.

You may eventually hit a point where your headspace becomes so murky that you choose to withdraw. Your mental energy becomes so taxed that your performance starts to suffer.

The Identity Crisis

As an athlete, it’s easy to tie your self-worth to physical capabilities and appearance. When dealing with body dysmorphia, this connection can quickly become unhealthy.

No matter how hard you train, it isn’t good enough. You may feel like your body is failing to live up to its potential.

The identity crisis that follows around body dysmorphia can be particularly challenging during major life transitions. As you get older and retire from competition, you also lose some of the driving force. If you’re recovering from an injury, you have a cap on how much you can do for set lengths of time to allow the healing process to occur. Without that structure, obsessive thoughts can intensify.

Finding Your Way Forward

Recovery from body dysmorphia requires professional support and the ability to be open to challenging your internal narrative. Your life could literally depend on it.

Effective treatment involves identifying any distorted thoughts about your body and self-worth, uncovering the root cause behind them, and reframing them into something more positive. In some instances, it can be helpful to confront some of your behavior patterns.

For athletes, working with a sport psychologist who understands performance demands and the complex nature of mental health challenges can make all the difference. The goal is to separate your perception of worth from having anything to do with your appearance.

Taking the Next Step

If you recognize body dysmorphia playing a role in your own life, know that you are not alone. No matter your appearance or physical ability, your body deserves to be appreciated for what it is capable of doing day in and day out.

Body image therapy can help you develop a better balance and have more compassion with yourself. Reach out today to begin your journey.