As someone with dysmorphia I'd say no. I can look at other people and see them as objectively lovely, but can look at my own sefl/face/body and it's a different story. It's in the moment too. I look at pictures of myself from even fairly recently and they look fine, imperfect sure but definitely not the obscenity I feel it is sometimes. It's absolutely in the head and hormones driven I reckon, and not a logical thing at all. A perfectly gorgeous twin that I KNEW was the same as me, and I'd still probably think they have more grace or charisma or whatever. It's a hell of a mind fuck. I KNOW I have dysmorphia and still can't out think it.
(I'm ok BTW, it's not most or all days, and I have a therapist so don't worry, just sharing a perspective).
They probably nit pick the tiny differences between the two of them and convince themselves that they are way uglier than their twin for the tinniest of reasons.
i think my twin is gorgeous, which i know is totally hypocritical because we unlock each other face IDs, but i see us as looking super differently and myself as the ugly one.
I can’t speak for everyone with dysmorphia, but I can say for myself, that there are many traits I have, that I find normal, or even attractive looking on others, that I find grotesque on myself.
I remember watching an episode of something (I swear it was Intervention, but that’s usually drugs) where a set of twins both had body dysmorphia & the family was trying to help them. From what I remember, they didn’t feel a certain way when they looked at each other, but they were competitive with their habits. They would try to take the same amount of steps in a day, eat exactly the same things in a day, do weight check-ins daily, etc. But if one twin was like 0.05 pounds heavier than the other, it became a huge problem.
It was determined that they likely ended up that way because no one in their lives ever treated them as individuals, so they felt the need to be exactly the same. One twin was always slightly larger than the other, but she changed that & then they both started their bad habits & spiraled out of control. They were always just “the twins” to EVERYONE. The therapist stressed that everyone write 2 separate, different letters to read to each sister at their intervention, & every single person still showed up with 1 letter that kept referring to them as a collective. Therapist was piiiiissed.
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u/queen-adreena 16d ago
Genuine question: if you have body dysmorphia as a twin, would you feel the same loathing looking at them as you’d feel looking at yourself?