Tuesday, October 28, 2008

No, I do NOT have to like my body!

Just reading an article in WHO magazine entitled "The Body Issue - stars open up about the pressure to be perfect and learning to love their bodies". You know what? Great! if you are happy with your body I applaude you. If you are a size 16 and love your curves that's totally wonderful. But I'm not. And why should I be? My body is a symptom of an extremely unhealthy lifestyle. A lifestyle of eating whatever I want, whenever I want and sitting around on my ass instead of getting out there and active. Why on earth would I want to be happy with it?

I have a right to not like my body. I was given a perfectly good body by nature and I've used and abused it. This is not how it should look or how it should work. Sometimes I think people forget what "normal" is. People's ideal of what is normal size has expanded, along with our waistlines until suddenly size 14 is normal. No, size 14 isn't normal it has merely become "average".

I've had to battle all sorts of comments from people while I've tried to lose this weight. Many of the people hadn't known me before I put on these 20kg so they don't know that I was always, until about 4 years ago, naturally slim and lanky. But everyone seems to have an opinion when they hear I am trying to lose weight. My "favourite" is "oh you look fine, why would you want to lose weight?" or "you're at that age, why can't you just be happy with your body". Well...I will tell you why not...

I have a waist measurement at my belly button of 100cm.. that's 1 metre. No that's not my smallest part - which is 84cm - but right there in the middle where all that internal fat lies. Now the government recommendations for belly button measurements for women is that it should be under 80cm : a full 20cm less than me. So, by having this 100cm "waist" and between 45-50% bodyfat I am classed as obese, almost morbidly obese. Now you wouldn't think that looking at my photos but that's the situation. And what does the 100cm waist mean for me? It means I am at extremely high risk of developing chronic illness such as diabetes, heart, kidney or liver disease, cancer and stroke - and I'm only size 16.

I feel very worried for those sizes 14, 16, 18 and above who are having the notion of "being happy with their curves" shoved down their throats by would be "do-gooders". Bugger that! I'd rather live.

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