Community: Real Life

Dress size distress


Chloe Taylor

Chloe, 17, adores clothes and fashion magazines, but wishes the media would stop telling us only smaller sizes are sexy.

Chloe is keen for her friends to feel more comfortable in their own skin and be free from pressure to fit into a certain clothes size.

As a lover of fashion, I think it's important to present yourself well on every occasion. I love to keep up with trends and play about with outfits and I think fashion is a beautiful thing because it allows us to express ourselves. But the attention we give to dress sizes is ruining all the fun for me.

Having the right figure has way too much importance in our culture, for men and women alike. All I hear are other girls my age worrying about how fat and ugly they are. There's even been a point where Ive even looked at myself and wondered Am I too big? Do I need to lose weight? then luckily - I realised how ridiculous I was being.

It's tragic that we care so much about size. Being a fashion lover myself it pains me to say this, but its obvious the fashion world contributes to people getting eating disorders. Somehow, we need to change that. Statistics show that anorexia is on the rise. In 1996-97, 419 people suffered from anorexia, while in 2005-06, 620 people suffered from the same condition. In my opinion, the press coverage of our bodies is to blame for eating disorders. Im sick of seeing celebrities mocked for eating a take-away or wearing a tracksuit. Theyre just humans, not super humans. Maybe if appearance wasn't such an overly-discussed topic, people wouldn't care so much about fitting into tiny clothing?

"There's no perfect in between, because everyone is different, from our personalities all the way to our bones."

What people dont seem to realise is that weight is a scale, with anorexia at one end and obesity at the other. There's no perfect in between, because everyone is different, from our personalities all the way to our bones. What's important, especially for young people, is that we focus on being healthy - not on being too fat or too thin. Healthy means eating a balanced diet and regular meals and exercise, not starving ourselves, binge eating or cutting out certain aspects of our diet just because the media says we should.

One person who demonstrated a great attitude to fashion and lifestyle was Sophie Dahl, a plus sized model who inspired many people because she was stunning but didnt have the perfect body. Sadly these days even Sophie is much thinner and has conformed to the supposed perfect body image the media pressurises us to have. We can no longer look to her to be a role model.

On the other hand, there are a few glimmers of hope things might be changing. I was pleased to find out that some fashion magazines are beginning to recognise the need to show  differently sized women are beautiful and are using a range of different models, including plus size. Designer Mark Fast shocked the fashion empire at London Fashion Week when he presented designs using size 12-14 models.

 I believe being too thin or too fat is not important. Each of us, with our different sizes, can buy and wear beautiful clothes. We neednt try and conform to an image, just because the media tells us to.

Updated: 06/08/2010


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