Women are finally entering their Thor era

We’ve spent decades shrinking. Now, we’re taking up space.

Jun 27, 2025

“I hope you don’t take this the wrong way,” the vet receptionist said, “but you look like Vincent D’Onofrio from his younger days, you know, when he played Thor in ‘Adventures in Babysitting’.”

She’d just finished checking my dog in when she made the confession.

It happens to be one of my all-time favorite movies, so I could picture him instantly: greasy but godlike, with radiant skin and dark brown eyes, a flowing ice-blond mane, and glistening biceps. He played the gruff owner of Dawson’s Garage, holding the babysitter’s car hostage until 8-year-old superfan Sara offers up her toy Thor helmet and calls him her hero.

When I told my husband, he was baffled. “She compared you to a man. How is that a compliment?”

Me? I wasn’t mad at it. I was ... oddly delighted. I was wearing neon pink bike shorts and a bright blue T-shirt that said “MOUNTAIN BIKING—Cheaper Than Therapy” (spoiler: it’s not, but it is way more fun). My silver hair was swept into a messy bun, and I had barely a stitch of makeup on. I was headed to the gym—I’m finally back to weightlifting after a few years off and was feeling strong.

To be clear, I’m no Thor. I think it’s just the energy I’m giving off these days, and I’m loving it.

The origins of my skewed body image

Most of my life, I thought I was fat.

As early as third grade, I was painfully aware I was one of the biggest girls in the classroom. I assumed something was wrong with my body.

I didn’t understand that bodies came in different sizes and shapes, let alone widths. To me, it was just small equals good; big equals bad.

But when I look back now, especially at old sports team photos, I see something different: a girl with broad shoulders and a sturdier build. She wasn’t fat. She also wasn’t that much different from the other girls, despite what I’d spent a lifetime believing.

Awareness is not acceptance

By high school, I could see I was built more like my father. I had breasts and curves that were distinctly feminine, but the rest of me was pure linebacker—broad shoulders, wide hips, strong legs, and muscular calves. Those calves would define me for years (and still do, to some extent).

But being aware of those differences didn’t mean I accepted them. Despite years of dieting, and gaining and losing the same stubborn pounds over and over again, I never fully grasped that my body simply was meant to weigh more.

I wouldn’t begin to understand the truth until my late 40s. By then, I’d spent a lifetime trying to change my body into something it wasn’t and could never be. I used athletic achievement—first through endurance sports, then more extreme ones like Olympic weightlifting and mountain biking—to make up for my perceived failure to shrink. If I couldn’t be skinny, I thought, at least let me not be weak.

I loved sports too, because they gave me both a sense of purpose and pride in what my body could do. I relished the mental challenges they presented. But underneath it all, I was still chasing approval, trying to prove that this body was somehow worthy.

Ironically, it wasn’t until I quit dieting—and gained almost 40 pounds—that I finally saw clearly: my body was never the problem.

I think about it often now: What would I have become if I’d celebrated this body instead of trying to shrink it? How many years of suffering could I have saved?

Midlife, strength, and the shift that’s happening

Now, I write and think a lot about body image, strength, and what it means to take up space, especially as a woman in midlife. It’s a strange and beautiful time to be living. On one hand, we’ve never been more obsessed with thinness—just look at the collective fascination with Ozempic, rail-thin celebrities shrinking with every red carpet appearance, and the endless speculation over who’s using it and who’s not. But I also see a vocal revolution rising, and midlife women are leading the resistance.

Sure, some of my optimism is personal. But it’s cultural too. For every woman mourning her changing midlife shape, there’s another who’s decided to stop measuring her worth by her weight. I see more and more women—especially in perimenopause—choosing to build, instead of shrink. They’re adding muscle, preserving bone density, and finally reclaiming their themselves—not just physically but mentally. Many are also learning to accept their bodies, perhaps for the first time in their lives.

Strong is having its moment

In the past few months, I’ve seen not one, but two books dedicated to this shift: Casey Johnston’s “A Physical Education: How I Escaped Diet Culture and Gained the Power of Lifting” and

Anne Marie Chaker

’s “Lift: How Women Can Reclaim Their Physical Power and Transform Their Lives.”

Just a few weeks ago, The New York Times profiled Jan Todd, Chair of the Department of Kinesiology and Health Education at the University of Texas at Austin, and a leading pioneer of the women’s weightlifting movement. She certainly left her mark on me. I fell in love with weightlifting while taking her class as a journalism undergrad, because for the first time, I understood just how much strength I had.

And while many popular body positivity influencers have succumbed to the pressure to lose weight, a handful remain—and a new generation is stepping up.

It’s been personally validating to see the love and appreciation for rugby player Ilona Maher, who is challenging traditional beauty standards with her brawn, size, athleticism, and yes, femininity. While our builds aren’t identical, the moment I saw her, I recognized a kindred body spirit. Seeing the pics of her walking the Sports Illustrated Miami Swim Week runway a few weeks ago with unapologetic confidence was the kind of healing my younger self needed.

Even still, she’s facing her own challengers, with thousands of people seeing her bikini pics online and debating whether she is overweight. A total class act, she took the high road in her response:

“I think one of the bravest things we can do is learn to love ourselves, learn to appreciate ourselves, and learn to find the beauty in our bodies... It doesn’t matter if you’re an Olympian or you’re not. My body type is beautiful, is worthy, okay? Yes, it’s bigger than what’s considered beautiful in society, but there is beauty in it.”

Channeling my inner god of thunder

I’m late to the party, but finally—at 50—I’m seeing the beauty in my body. Yes, there’s been brain fog, perimenopause, weight gain, and the hard work of rediscovering who I am now that I’ve stopped trying to shrink myself. But here’s what I can tell you: I am celebrating who I am and my body as it is right now.

I’m back in the gym, finally lifting for strength, not to shrink. I’m mountain biking with other fierce, middle-aged women and feeling alive, embracing the body I’ve spent decades battling.

I’m channeling my inner god of thunder—and loving it.

I'd love to hear from you:

How do you see your body now compared to when you were younger? Has your definition of strength changed over time—physically, emotionally, or otherwise? Whether you're deep in your Thor era or just beginning to challenge old narratives, I’d love to hear what your journey has been like.