While I was still in elementary school, a fear of being different began to shrink my world. I was bigger than the other kids and I’d already gleaned from the diet talk of adults and television, as well as the teasing from peers, that being different wasn’t a good thing. I was also queer and I didn’t yet know what that meant, but it made me feel even more alienated. At just nine years old, I started dieting and obsessing over how to get attention from boys. Trying to achieve sameness was an act of survival. When I started hiking as an adult, just 10 years ago, it reignited that sense of curiosity and freeness in my body I’d had when I was a younger child. I didn’t just want to be outside, I needed to be outside. On the trail, I could take up all the space I needed. I didn’t have to make myself smaller physically or emotionally to fit our cultural obsession with sameness. The trees and the dirt and the waterfalls continue to show me, time and time again, that I am made of the same stuff they are and I am exactly where I belong, just as I am. 🌱 This is a snippet of an article I wrote about the new @netflix docuseries #OurGreatNationalParks, narrated by, President Barack Obama, for @netflixqueue. I’m really proud of it. You can read the full piece via the link in my stories and the “writing” highlight 🙌 pls share 📸: @scott_kranz Outfit: @eddiebauer 🧥: Ski-In-1 jacket 3X 👖: Powder Search 2.0 Insulated Pants 3X #EBleader #Netflix #WildForAll #NetflixQueue #LiveYourAdventure #UnlikelyHikers #MyBodyTookMeHere #FatAndOutdoorsy #DiversifyOutdoors #PlusSizeBackpackers #FatWanderBabes