Going to the gym gives me so much more than the physique I want, even if body dysmorphia lingers

‘My new online reality informed my subconscious that this image of masculinity was what I wanted.’ Photograph: Brian Jackson/Alamy

For almost my entire life I hated how I looked.

I was by no means unhealthy but a youth spent playing video games and eating heaping mounds of white rice meant I was far from the models, superheroes and movie stars I looked up to.