I’m not going to blog about recovery, because quite frankly,
it’s sh*t. I don’t know when it will be fixed nor when I will be able to boulder
and lead. I sincerely hope that there won’t be more surgery. Not having a timescale
sucks. But to be honest, there are ways to enjoy climbing safely and that’s all
that matters, besides recovery. So it’s ok, mostly.
And yes, as the title implies, this is another blog, by a
woman, about what the right shape of a woman is. If this bores you, please do
skip to the end where there is a picture of my biceps. If you’re wondering why this
is not about how men should look, it’s because I am not a man. I will update
the blog if this changes.
As I eat pasta with bacon and Gorgonzola (yes, it’s f*king
good), I’m pondering on something which has been in the back of my mind for
quite some time. A friend re-posted a cartoon on the subject on Facebook a few months ago, and it struck a chord. The situation is this:
Since I broke my leg, a number of friends have commented on my weight. (My mother
and my boyfriend’s mother did too, but in an altogether more “I should feed you”
sort of way). Lots of people said that I looked “thinner”, or “slimmer”, or had
thinner legs, or wondered “how I didn’t get fat while sitting around”. Well
actually, here’s how:
I broke my leg. I spent a week in LGI eating very little
because I was either
a) about to have surgery,
b) having surgery
or
c) crying.
I then went home (and by home, I mean to someone else’s house because it was
nicer than my student box) where I took diclofenac for too long and spent some
more time unable to eat. A total of about 2-3 weeks was spent eating less than
is required to maintain the same weight. I then wasn’t that hungry because
opiates made me feel sick. Some kilograms were lost. A total of about four
months was spent not walking. Some leg muscle wasted.
Mmmmm…. Healthy.
A lot of people complimented me on looking lighter, several
said it must be good for my climbing. The problem is, I quite liked it. It made
me wonder though, if they’d thought I was fat before. Would they think I was
fat when I resumed normal activity and presumably put some of whatever it was
that was there before back on?
I then ditched the opiates. I started to walk. I ate more. I
trained more. I gained some weight.
Over the next few month months, I gained back almost exactly
the same weight as I’d lost, and some of the lost leg muscle. The difference is
negligible. I changed shape slightly, more Fingerboarding, less walking. But I
weigh the same. Yet this is apparently a positive state of affairs.
Now I know ‘you look slimmer’ is meant as a compliment. I certainly
don’t mind the people who said it, saying it. They meant well. But it is no
longer something I’m pleased to be told, either. It no longer flatters me.
Because it’s somewhat irrelevant. According to NHS guidelines, I wasn’t under
or overweight before, and I’m not now.
I can honestly say I don’t really tell other people they
look thinner or fatter because- shockingly- I rarely notice. For me I think
that sort of thing actually encouraged me to question whether I looked right. A
couple of friends said “Lisa, you look stronger since breaking your leg”. Now
that, to me, is a compliment. That is an achievement. That is something I am
proud of. If someone needs to lose weight for health reasons, then by all means
do compliment them on achieving this. But if someone’s weight slightly changes
because they got very broken, it probably isn’t a good thing.
I will never be skinny. Nor am I overweight. At 5’7” I weigh
somewhere between 60 and 70 kilograms. I don’t actually know, nor do I want to.
I have perhaps less muscle definition than I could, but I also have boobs. I
like them. That’s not to say any other girls look wrong, it’s just that the
lifestyle choices required to be thinner than I am now (i.e. no biscuits) would
not make me happy.
That’s not to say I don’t have insecurities- who doesn’t? It’s
just that whereas my teenage self used to act on these, I’m able to objectively
see that for my body, eating significantly less would not be optimal for
climbing gains. I would like more cardiovascular fitness, but that took a bit
of a hit when I broke my leg. So I look thinner but am actually more unfit. I
don’t actually think it’s the good thing people seem to think it is. What I’d actually like, is to keep getting stronger. I imagine
that this will not coincide with suddenly becoming an unhealthy weight. I will
continue to whine to my boyfriend when I feel insecure. He will continue to
have the good sense never to comment on my weight.
People like different shapes and sizes of course. But I wish
my teenage self had spent a little less time trying to be thinner. I would have
looked at the way I look now and thought “Oh my goodness, I got so fat!” Well that’s bullshit.
That’s awful! It’s not even unusual for girls to feel like that! Weight isn’t
even fixed! It changes all the time. Bits of us are different densities to
others! Muscle, fat, titanium. Oh wait, you don’t have titanium? Guess you’re
heavier then. So unless it’s a health concern, I’ll focus on getting stronger
and fitter thanks, and keep letting my body do its thing.
 |
| As promised in the introduction. |
p.s. I don’t know whether the people who complimented my on looking thinner said it because they thing it looks better, or because they thought it would be what I wanted to hear. Either way, I appreciate the sentiment but it wasn’t totally healthy.
