Even After Getting Prettier and Losing Weight, I Was Never Satisfied: Body Image Obsession, and How My 15 Years Began

If only I were prettier.
If only I were thinner.
That person wouldn't treat me like this.
I wouldn't be holed up in this corner of a room.
I'd have landed a good job.
I'd be happy.

In my twenties, I carried these thoughts with me 24 hours a day.

But no matter how much weight I lost. No matter how much money I poured into dermatology and plastic surgery clinics. No matter how much I managed and re-managed myself.

If you can't overcome this obsession, you'll never be satisfied.

Starting today, in a three-part series, I'll lay out how I managed, in my own way, to overcome it: 15 years of dieting, 10 years of bingeing and purging, and the appearance complex that came when my once-cured vitiligo flared up again in my late twenties.

Today is the first part, the diagnosis.

⚠️ This post is written in the first person, based on my own personal experience. If an eating disorder or body image obsession is seriously disrupting your daily life, I recommend seeing a psychiatrist.

The judgment is yours to make. I'm simply someone sharing information and experience.

"If Only I Were Prettier": The 24-Hour Thought Loop

In my twenties, I made almost every decision based on my appearance.

Before buying clothes: "Will this make my legs look thicker?"

Before eating: "Will this make me bloated tomorrow?"

Before meeting people: "I'm not feeling great today, should I just stay in?"

Before a job interview: "Is it even okay for me to interview looking like this?"

Every everyday judgment started from my appearance.

And behind every one of those judgments, there was always the same conclusion.

"If only I were prettier, this decision would have been so much easier."

This was the thought loop running in my head 24 hours a day. Right before falling asleep, when looking in the mirror, when meeting people, when going to work, when on a date, in any moment, this loop never switched off.

Some of you reading this right now probably have a similar loop running in your own head.

You can't switch that loop off through willpower. It only unravels once you diagnose it.

How Body Image Obsession Begins: The Weight of Childhood

I was on the unattractive side from a young age.

Objectively. It was a fact my family, my relatives, and my friends all acknowledged.

When I was born, I was supposedly so unattractive that my grandmother didn't even want to hold me. When it rained, my dad wouldn't let me wear a raincoat. "Your nose is so low that rain will get in, so be sure to use an umbrella," he'd say.

My mom had been conditioning me since I was a baby.

"Once you turn twenty, I'll fix everything for you. I'll make you a knockout college student."

To this day, I still don't know whether that was love or violence.

One day my mom fell ill and was bedridden. She struggled to call me over and said:

"The most important things in a woman's life are: first, health. Second, looks. Third…"

I don't even remember what the third one was. I was too shocked by the second.

My parents themselves were striking-looking people. My younger sibling was naturally slim and pretty too.

Whenever my parents visited the school, my friends would always ask:

"Are they really your birth parents?"

At my elementary school graduation, the classmates wrote a rolling paper for each other. On my page, there wasn't a single word about me.

What was written there was just one sentence.

"Your sibling is cute."

This was in sixth grade.

Atopy, Vitiligo, Weight Gain: A Buildup of Deprivation

In my early teens, my atopic dermatitis was so severe that my nickname was Panda.

My eyelids and the creases of my skin were just red and swollen. I remember being too embarrassed to even attend my after-school academy properly.

Just as the atopy started to improve, I, who had been skinny until then, suddenly began gaining weight.

In my final year of high school, at a height in the low-to-mid 160s (cm), I hit 62 kg.

On top of that, in my second year of high school, I developed vitiligo.

One day a friend said, "Why are your lips and the area around your mouth so white?"

When I told my mom, she dragged me straight to the university hospital.

On the way home after being diagnosed with vitiligo, my mom cried her eyes out. After that, pushed by my mom, I went to the university hospital every week. Thankfully, right around when I turned twenty, I was declared cured.

By this point, I had already deeply learned one thing.

"My body is not something I get to decide. My body is an object that other people evaluate."

That perception was the starting point of every diet obsession I'd have afterward.

Forced Double-Eyelid Surgery and a Two-Week Fast: My First Taste of Appearance Power

The moment I turned twenty, my mom dragged me to a plastic surgery clinic.

I was forced to get double-eyelid surgery.

Up until then, it wasn't so much that I had no interest in my appearance. I was avoiding it.

After constantly hearing that I was unattractive, called Panda, asked why I was so pale, I came to hate looking in the mirror.

Every day I just read fantasy novels in the back, grew my bangs down to my nose, and went to get treated for vitiligo. It was one avoidance after another.

When it came to my appearance, I had no self-esteem at all.

That actually made the vicious cycle worse. Because people criticized my looks, I tried to hide more, hated mirrors more, and retreated further into the corner.

But the year I turned twenty:

After being declared cured of vitiligo, getting the double-eyelid surgery, and losing weight by drinking only water for two weeks, I went to university, and people's reactions completely changed.

For the first time, I heard someone say I was prettier than my sibling.

My parents' profile photos changed to selfies of me.

Relatives came over asking, "Where did you get the surgery? Please share the info."

That was when I first realized that appearance precisely changes how people treat you.

That was the starting point of my diet addiction.

10 Years of Diet Addiction and Purging: The Real Nature of Body Image Obsession

I went to an engineering school. Whenever the yo-yo came, the male upperclassmen would notice right away.

So whenever I gained weight, I avoided people.

I always felt, somehow, that being heavier was my fault.

My mom would tell me to lose weight every time she just saw my face, and she'd cry, saying, "I'm sorry I gave birth to you with a body type that gains weight easily."

So from my early twenties, since the yo-yo came no matter what I did, I failed at every diet.

Diet pills, ketogenic diets, fasting, cleanses, meal-tracking apps…

Then the bingeing began, and at some point I started purging.

I purged for 10 years.

Over those 10 years, I saw myself in the mirror at many different turning points.

Right after the eyelid surgery, people praised me. Still, I wasn't satisfied.

When I lost weight, they said I looked even better. Still, I wasn't satisfied.

When my skin cleared up after dermatology, they were envious. Still, I wasn't satisfied.

Back then I genuinely, truly thought:

"Once I lose more, fix more, groom more, then I'll really be happy."

But that wasn't how it went.

Every effort I made for the sake of my appearance only fed the obsession further.

This is the real nature of body image obsession. A structure where the more you refine your looks, the further satisfaction recedes. A loop where the effort to solve things through appearance creates the next appearance deficit.

Over 10 years of purging, there were times I lost weight, gained it, and times I was balanced. The same went for my appearance.

But in no state, not even once, was I ever satisfied.

This is the heart of the diagnosis.

The Diagnosis: Body Image Obsession Can't Be Solved with Looks

Looking back now, the diagnosis is clear.

Body image obsession cannot be solved with looks.

Diet obsession cannot be solved with dieting.

This isn't a matter of willpower, effort, or information.

Throughout my twenties, I worked so hard on my appearance. Dieting, exercise, dermatology, plastic surgery, makeup, styling, I did everything possible.

But the obsession only grew deeper.

This is the biggest trap.

The more you refine your appearance, the more sensitive you become to it.

Minor flaws look bigger, the bar for comparison rises higher, and the bar for satisfaction recedes further.

Inside this loop, no appearance is ever enough.

So how do you unravel it?

After 15 years of trial and error, I came to understand one thing.

Obsession isn't solved with an external tool. It's solved by changing your environment, perception, and tools together.

You need all three.

Environment: reducing the people, relationships, and remarks that evaluate your appearance
Perception: seeing your body not as "an object being evaluated" but as "a tool that I use"
Tools: daily habits that break the diet and obsession loop

In the next post (Part 2), I'll lay out how I started by sorting out my environment.

Style, the friend I had to cut off, the day I spoke firmly to my parents, that was the first step.

Conclusion: The Answer Isn't Inside Your Appearance

If I compress today's content into one line, it's this.

Body image obsession can't be solved with looks. Diet obsession can't be solved with dieting.
As long as you see yourself from inside the obsession, you'll never be satisfied no matter how pretty, how thin, or how groomed you become.

To those of you crying in front of the mirror every day, the first thing I want to say is this.

It's not your fault.

It's not because you couldn't get prettier. It's not because your willpower is weak. It's not because you didn't try harder.

It's simply that the answer isn't inside your appearance.

I wish someone had told this to me, too, as I cried in front of the mirror all through my twenties.

Let's go together, until this three-part series ends.

👉 Next: Part 2 Environment, style, cutting people off, and speaking firmly to your parents

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📩 The First Step to Breaking the Body Image Obsession Loop

Kkokkkok isn't a tool for refining your appearance.

It's a GLP-1 booster, small-eater app that helps you, through chewing 30 times per meal, a meal feed, and community, to see your body not as "an object being evaluated" but as "a tool that I use."

More than 2,000 people who spent four months with us escaped food and diet obsession, not through willpower, but through routine.

CTA 1: Start the 7-Day Free Challenge →

CTA 2: Apply for a Free Kkokkkok Coach Diagnosis →

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❓ Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Q1. Is body image obsession a mental illness?

Mild concern about appearance is something everyone has. But if it reaches a level that disrupts daily life (work, relationships, going out), the technical term is Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD). It often accompanies eating disorders. If it's disrupting your daily life, I strongly recommend seeing a psychiatrist.

Q2. Does plastic surgery help relieve body image obsession?

Satisfaction goes up temporarily, but in many cases the obsession itself doesn't resolve. In fact, a "surgery addiction" pattern, where the next flaw looms larger after surgery, is frequently reported. Before changing your appearance, you need to distinguish whether you genuinely want to change your looks or whether you're trying to run from the obsession.

Q3. How do I stop purging?

Purging is a form of eating disorder, and you need to take it seriously. It's hard to stop through willpower, and you need the help of a psychiatrist or an eating-disorder clinic. I purged for 10 years myself, and it took a long time to stop. Don't struggle with it alone. Get a professional's help.

Q4. My parents keep talking about my appearance. What do I do?

I'll cover this in detail in Part 3 (Tools), but the key is to tell them firmly. That they don't realize how big an impact those words have on you. Parents very often genuinely don't realize how often they say such things, or how large an impact it has.

Q5. I'm scared that if I stop dieting I'll gain even more weight.

This is the most common fear. If you really stop dieting, the first few kilograms may temporarily increase. But in the long run, your metabolism recovers, the binge loop breaks, and you often end up stabilizing at a healthy weight. Most of the 2,000-plus people who spent four months with us went down this path.

Q6. Can people with vitiligo or atopy also overcome body image obsession?

I experienced both vitiligo and atopy myself. The key is not trying to hide your appearance perfectly. These days there are good vitiligo cover products, so I found balance by applying them for important occasions and leaving things as they are otherwise. I'll cover this in more detail in the next post.

Q7. Is there anywhere I can get help for body image obsession?

You can get counseling at a psychiatrist's office, an eating-disorder clinic, and at the Mental Health Welfare Centers run by the Ministry of Health and Welfare. Nonprofit organizations such as eating-disorder associations also provide information and self-help groups. Don't struggle with it alone. Take the hand reaching out from outside.

※ This post is not medical advice. It was written for the purpose of sharing the author's personal experience and general information.
If body image obsession, an eating disorder, or purging is disrupting your daily life, I strongly recommend seeing a psychiatrist.
Vitiligo and atopy are conditions that require care from a dermatology specialist.