Whenever I mention that I modeled nude for a figure drawing class last semester, I usually get a variety of responses.

Some people say, "Cool." Some giggle. Some are shocked. But most react with an emphatic assertion that while it's fine for me, they would never do it. They could never be so vulnerable and exposed, especially in front of students they might know. They think their bodies are too this or too that. They aren't model material.

Let me be the first to say that I am the furthest cry from Kate Moss. And I'm glad. Why would I want to look like someone I'm not? Our bodies are gifts to be respected, not cursed for failing to live up to the absolutely asinine beauty standards our culture incessantly imposes on us.

I am short. I am stocky. I will never be able to wear those tiny straight dresses for Skipper figures because I have German hips and can fill out a bra. And the dresses that are made for us vertically-challenged hourglasses are too long. It's difficult to find clothes that fit my unique figure.

But it's still my figure.

No matter how much I work out and eat right, I will never fit the ridiculous cookie-cutter standard for the female body that bleeds into our consciousness through advertising, television and film. We are not even aware of how these images shape our perceptions of one another and, more importantly, of ourselves.

Body image is essential to self-image, especially when how you look still determines who you are, despite vehement arguments to the contrary. Look around. We make judgment calls based on appearances, whether we can help it or not, and most of them revolve around the body. How this person dresses. How this person wears their hair. How tall or short or fat or thin this person seems to be. We assign meaning to these physical qualities, then make assumptions about character. It's wrong, and it's tearing our community apart.

We all know that way more than the annual percentage of students who go to the counseling centers at Notre Dame and Saint Mary's suffer from eating disorders. They live down the hall. They work out in the gym. They dance at Heartland on Thursday nights. They are your lab partners. They are your roommates. You might even be one of them.

I was.

I struggled with anorexia for three years in junior high. My mom used to have the lunch ladies spy on me to see if I was eating. I went for days, sometimes weeks, eating nothing but Grape Nuts and Diet Coke. Once I got really sick from running in the rain during a storm at night. I could have been raped. I could have been abducted. And if I hadn't woken up one day and asked myself why I was doing this, I could have really slipped away.

We will hear a lot about eating disorders during this week of awareness. But of all the information you receive, whether you attend a talk or just pass a poster, remember that these illnesses are mental. They start in the head, poison the heart and eventually destroy the body.

To battle them, we must strip our psyches of the cultural standards of beauty that surround us. We must stop judging on looks. We must stop cursing our bodies and start embracing them.

We must take off our clothes.

• Take your clothes off