Growing up in the 2000s I was painfully aware of my body and what was acceptable and what wasn’t.
Now, it wasn’t screaming in my face what to wear and what not to look like. More like a subtle background track of Weight Watcher’s Carrot cake. The diarrhoea-inducing lemon water and cayenne pepper diet coupled with the latest Strictly reject’s fitness dance DVD.
However, it was clear there were two boxes. The slim figure no lumps or bumps, pure and pretty, or the other.
That ingrained a lot of habits that I am working hard to unlearn now in my early 20s.
I was aware from a young age that my legs were bigger than the other girls in PE. When I slouched my stomach stuck out more than I thought it should. So, I began to make changes subtle enough that it didn’t cause alarm but calculated enough for me to fit into someone else’s comfort level.
I switched to high waisted leggings doing my best Simon Cowell impression to cover my stomach, concealing what the media and societal opinion told me I should.
Like 80 per cent of women in the UK, I was wearing the wrong size clothes up until last year. I would opt for the baggy ill-fitting option. Rather than have to endure a wrestling match in a changing room with a top. Only to hand it back to the woman with a shameful look, like I had done something wrong.
Now, in 2024, the media that demonised my dimply thighs and stretch-marked stomach, for the most part, is changing its tune.
Due to the rise of candid social media personalities, the media woke up to the talent of the plus-size community and the cultural shift of conventional beauty standards.
There is a more diverse sizing ranges in ad campaigns and some clothing retailers’ opinions are changing to what beautiful really means.
However, like any big cultural shift, there is always misgiving, and in the body positivity movement, the gap is clear. We have gone from one end of the spectrum to the other, missing the middle completely.
The celebration of the mid-size community has been for the most part completely missed, when the majority of the UK is a size 16.
Leaving the conventional standards alive and well, putting pressure to fit in with what the media image of the ideal figure and the liberation of the plus-size community. However mid-size people are left in a minefield of being not slim enough not fat enough. However, I refuse to not be enough.
Now it’s one or the other but I’ve decided I’m going for the all-or-nothing approach.
I have stood in front of enough mirrors picking myself apart for the things I can’t and don’t want to change. There will still be days where I cry over my stomach and put my comfort jumper on, I won’t sit in it anymore. I will wear my pinstripe trousers that highlight the outline of my stomach, I will thank my thighs for taking me where I need to go. I will show off the curves in my rolls. I will hang up my high-waisted jeans in the wardrobe.
This approach isn’t for everyone and someday it won’t be for me.
But for now, it’s enough for me.
Featured Image Credit: Ciara Tait/Spirit of Photography
Beautiful 😍