Jaded Issue #20

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Story Time

The reason I even got into nutrition and wellness in the first place goes back to ninth grade — when the Victoria’s Secret Angels were it. Gigi Hadid, Kendall Jenner, Adriana Lima, Taylor Hill… those were the girls. The ones I followed, admired, and desperately wanted to be like. The ones who all looked like they weighed five times less than I did.

So what did I do? I fell right into the 2010s “fitspo” and What I Eat in a Day rabbit hole. I tried to live off a handful of almonds, avoided carbs because Vogue said the models didn’t eat them, and worked out just to burn off whatever I did eat. I watched my stomach get flatter, my thigh gap wider — until it all became harmful, obsessive, and honestly, just sad. I was another young girl caught in the trap of trends.

My morning ritual? Flat Tummy Tea. My “meal plan”? The military diet — because one of the models said she did it. And while it felt like I was doing something new and exclusive, I wasn’t. I was just following the same script women have been handed for decades.

It’s the same story, told over and over again — new era, new method, same message: be smaller.
And it didn’t start with us. Here’s where it all began.

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A Tale as Old as Diet Culture

Every decade has had its “magic pill,” its “miracle cleanse,” its “you’ll-finally-be-skinny” promise. The packaging changes, but the message never does: shrink yourself and your life will be fine.

Let’s rewind.

1920s–1930s: The Birth of the “Ideal Body”

The flapper era made thinness a trend — flat chests, tiny hips, no softness allowed. Women started starving for the aesthetic of liberation, but it wasn’t freedom. It was just a new box to fit into, this time with amphetamines as the silent helper. The message was clear: if you want power, be small.

1950s–1960s: The Sedated Housewife

Fast-forward to the postwar glow-up — women were told to “keep your figure slim for your husband.”Diet pills by day, tranquilizers by night. The perfect woman was calm, compliant, and conveniently thin. Pharmaceutical control wrapped in pastel packaging — all under the illusion of “balance.”

1970s–1980s: Empowerment… But Make It Skinny

Cue the low-fat craze and SlimFast everything. The message morphed: it wasn’t about men anymore, it was about you. About “self-control,” “fitness,” and “taking care of yourself.”
But the truth? It was still about control — just in spandex and a smile. Empowerment was repackaged as discipline.

1990s–2000s: Science Meets Starvation

Then came Fen-Phen, ephedra, and low-carb everything. Diet culture put on a lab coat and called it “research.” Atkins, Special K, South Beach — starvation disguised as sophistication. “Health” was no longer emotional or spiritual; it was chemical, transactional, and data-driven.

2010s: The Detox Tea Decade

Enter social media — and with it, the influencer wellness industrial complex. Flat tummy teas, waist trainers, and #fitspo. Suddenly, women didn’t just consume the ads — we became them.
Starvation got a filter. Disordered eating became “discipline.” And the algorithm fed off our insecurities, one “what I eat in a day” video at a time.

2020s–Now: Ozempic Nation

Now, it’s the luxury weight-loss era. Ozempic, Wegovy, Mounjaro — same old promise, sleeker marketing.The body positivity moment came and went, replaced by “effortless thinness.”
It’s not empowerment — it’s control with better branding.

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The Point of It All

The truth is, half of what you think about yourself isn’t even yours. It’s been fed to you — spoonful after spoonful of straight-up nonsense. We’re the perfect marketing scheme. Society idolizes our appearances over our character, measures our worth by how we look, and turns us into trends to be sold back to ourselves.

But I really believe women are waking up. It takes a lot to unlearn this — to see past the noise — but it happens one realization at a time.

Life isn’t a quick fix. And honestly, if it was, it would be boring. The coolest thing about a woman’s body is that it changes, evolves, transforms. Don’t let them take that away from you.

xoxo, Olivia Jade