I have just returned from a blissful break in France where I bared my pallid flesh in shorts and vests. It felt great to have the sun on my winter-weary skin and I wallowed in the relaxing ambience.
Oh if only it were the same in real life! I confess I blanched when I first considered a mini break in France in May. My first thought was for my lumps and bumps. Expose them? No thank you. I lost a bit of weight and started doing some exercises and felt a bit more confident when the moment came.
But this is what I want to discuss. A very good customer and friend was shopping with us recently. Commenting on how great her bust looked in a dress, I was shocked to hear her shriek with horror and claim it as her worst feature. It turned out that some wrinkly old doctor had judged her boobs too big for her frame as a tender teenager and she was scarred for life.
What a waste.
This beautiful lady is not only blessed with a fantastic figure, she is smart, funny, warm and genuine. How sad that she should have suffered her entire life because of the throwaway comment of an insensitive surgeon.
And I feel it more keenly because I know how she feels. It is only within the last year or so, and because of the unwavering love of my husband, that I can now accept the body I have. I look back in sorrow at the wasted years of misery I spent hating my body.
The way I finally conquered my demons was by considering just what this same body had done for me over the last 45 years. Despite the neglect and abuse levied at it, my dear body still carried on (95% healthily) allowing me to live my life as I chose.
My husband kept telling me: "You have a lovely body for your age. You're not 18 any more Laura." And he's right. I now look at my body as a tapestry of my life. Every scar and stretch mark and wrinkle tells a story. And I'm proud of that story - proud that I've got this far.
I've been in retail now for 21 years and it still makes me gasp when I hear women denigrating their bodies. And this despite the fact that I have done the same to mine. I'm considering how I can do something to improve this terrible view we have of ourselves.
It's all very well selling beautiful, flattering clothes, but surely we should be addressing our fundamental attitudes to our bodies? Isn't it sad that we should reach 'the youth of old age' and still be uncomfortable in our own skin?
I haven't considered yet just how I can address this through Therapy. So if you have any ideas then please let me know.
Laura x
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