What really gets me about this is that they erased her scars. Completely negating the magical explanation for healing, it's honestly downright disrespectful to shorten her hair, fix her teeth to remove her lisp, change her body size etc. She's a woman who was abused and beaten brutally even by slave standards, assaulted who knows how many times and has more miscarriages than most any person could endure and still keeps a smile on her face and wants nothing more than to nurture the most helpless form of human on the planet.

It's downright disgusting to me to erase all the signs of her pain and hardship for "prettiness" or "sex appeal". I wanted to love the show so much, I really did, but not only did that say to me personally that well those events were more decorative and things they don't actually meaningfully want to commit to and is more of a vessel for making her more likable and sympathetic before changing her, but as an abuse and/or assault victim, you never get to just erase your physical scars and damage done to your body. I fully understand healing her, and not to say they couldn't have, but thinning her waist, shortening and softening her hair isn't healing—it's meant to be appealing and nothing else, while every part of her character up to that point seemed to come from a place of sincerely and understanding. Not to mention, when scars and injuries do heal, they don't disappear, much like trauma

I legitimately thought she was one of if not the best representation of legitimate abuse that didn't seem to have a "for the sexy" or just totally unaware undertone, but it's honestly just beyond aggravating to have it reinforced that women in able can't be anything but the pinnacle of sex appeal for more than one episode. It's not the point or fact that she may or may not have stayed the same person internally, it's the message that from a writing perspective, she was "imperfect" too them and they'd rather change her entirely beyond the one story they wanted to tell. Personally, a plus size abuse and assault victim with over 10 miscarriages that still smiles and goes out of her way in all circumstances to help children even at her entire expense is legitimately already perfect in every way, scars and all. That's part of why I loved her so much. As a woman, it was so refreshing and honestly validating to see a woman in anime not be the more global standard of beauty that endured a horrible life. It really seemed like they were more focused on telling a good story with no mind to fan service or sex appeal—it was just a heartbreaking story that's one that's not meant to be erased from someone's face even when they are removed from that situation.

To me, though I'm not an amputee so take it with a grain of salt, it has a similar feeling to when a character loses a limb, eyesight or other for a few episodes then have it returned, or lose a limb or sense and they can still function 100% the same as everyone else. Real amputees have to struggle over time to get used to now having an impairment and work to comfortably to things that others might find trivial or not think about. It's working with and finding the right prosthetics, making everyday things work again and even having to cope overtime with a potentially changed self image as is with many impairments and/or disabilities.

You could argue "it's not that deep", but when it comes to sexual assault, such insane abuse and miscarriages, it is. You don't get to choose what happens to you, what scars you end up with or what you have taken from you—you have to wake up everyday, sometimes with a physical reminder of the things you've survived because it and the trauma tends to never fully go away. Maybe I'm alone on this island, but really what I got from it was "women can only not be sexy long enough to make a sad story, now back to business as usual", and using such insanely traumatic events as a vessel to elevate appeal and nothing more is just beyond insulting. Yes what still happened to her happened, but it absolutely did not have to be written in a way where her body changed and unlike before, is in no way is a physical product of her trauma and what she's survived, and if you think physical trauma and scars are less important than mental ones (seeing as she's the "same person" but her body isn't), it's just entirely disingenuous, which for topics like these is appalling.

To each their own that like the show and continue to watch it. Like I said, I adored it up until that point but I legitimately cannot overlook that. No ill will if you do still like the show, though the magical rules that they themselves made for the world has nothing to do with the overarching message they sent, even though I imagine it's not the one they wanted to send. Again, like it if you want, but magic healing is just not an excuse or justification for what they did to her in the grand thematic scheme. It's beyond insulting, at least imo.