What would you tell your 16 year old self? - Body Issues

My first challenge of 2012 was to read more. I didn’t want to read a gushy novel that ended happily ever after, I wanted a book that would educate me. After trawling the book shelves of a well-known book store, I came across a paperback lodged in with the diet books. The book was called ‘Living Dolls The Return of sexism’ by Natalie Walters. I know people say ‘never judge a book by its cover’ but this cover just appealed to me, It was clever, naughty and bold all at the same time.  As I began to read this book  alarm bells rang ‘This is a feminist book…’ but I couldn’t put it down.  It intrigued me how the author was entwining so many powerful subjects all into one little book.  Gender discrimination, the glamorisation of the sex industry, sexual abuse, prostitution, sexualisation of young women and pornography are only a handful of the subjects the author Walters touches upon. The book was so enlightening, detailed and truthful.

One subject discussed and seemed to crop up a lot throughout the book was how ‘…artificial images of feminine beauty are held up as the ideal to which women should aspire’ pg 3  as a body conscious girl this subject really stood out to me.  We see it every day in today’s culture young girls and women aiming to be like their celebrity ‘role-models’.  The thing that shocked me the most was Walter describing how these fascinations of ‘aspiring’ to be like an artificial representation of femininity start at a young age. Starting with their Barbie dolls to the female heroines of the silver screen.  I nearly spluttered my tea when it went on to talk about the ‘sexualisation of Disney Princesses’ and how our little girls are being made to look ‘sexy’( but that topic can be for another day). 

It made me realise most of us from a young age are tied into an over vigilant regime of dieting and grooming to fit in with these ‘artificial role models’. But why?  We should be concentrating on more important things with our bodies and getting to ‘know them’ not plaster them in fake tan, hair extensions and cosmetic surgery and create this ‘plastic disguises’ to ‘fit in’. Girls (and guys) , can you honestly hold up your hand and say you know your own body? Do you know every lump and bump?

Just recently a colleague of mine has just been diagnosed with melanoma and she has created a blog to share with others about her battle ( click here to visit her blog http://www.lynnmasson.blogspot.co.uk/ ). While reading Lynns inspiring blog I came across a video that’s called ‘Dear 16 year old me’ It is a moving video to help teenagers become aware of skin cancer and how to potentially avoid it.

You might think I am going off on a tangent first talking about my book about feminism and now talking about skin cancer but bare with me. Combining Walters ideas of women starting at a young age ‘aspiring’ to be like artificial representations of femininity and this video on Lynns blog brings home a sense of realisation. We shouldn't focus on these artificial images of beauty like celebrities/glamour models because there's more important body related issues to educated ourselves with. We should concentrate on our 'natural' body, get to know it, not 'conform' our bodies to look just like these 'fake' representations. Young girls and guys should be encouraged to know their bodies, celebrate them and not plaster and hide them in cosmetics. If I was to tell my 16 year old self something I would say 'Don't be upset that you don't look like the skinny girls in the magazines, your body is beautiful, look after it. There are much worse things in life than worrying about your body hang ups. If your that worried talk and ask questions about them, don't cover it up and pretend its all fine. xx PS Use liquid eyeliner... it lasts longer'


So that's it... from a new years resolution developing into a reality check I have come to the conclusion that we should 'get to know' our bodies, give them regular checks, ignore the airbrushed size 0's in the media and celebrate our natural bodies because at the end of the day you only get one.  

Food for thought... what would you tell your 16 year old self?? 

The only way is LYYB

For our April articles LYYB has decided to tackle some of your body quarrels, as ever our LYYB co-founders are game to try anything, talk about everything and experiment on your behalf. Our ladies and gents at LYYB are concerned by an ever growing epidemic of orange skin, false body parts and strange hair, this look combined as we understand it is something that originates from a TV mock drama called ‘The Only Way Is Essex’, if you are unfamiliar with this program it consists of some almost wealthy people from Essex telling each other to ‘shut up’ and fall out, then make-up and then probably fall out again.

LYYB wanted to investigate how programs such as TOWIE have affected people's body issues, when the people on these shows have all had plastic surgery, are all head to toe in fakery and seem more bothered about what they look like than what’s on the news.

Emma and Gemma are as per usual our Guinea-pigs in this experiment, we gave them a TOWIE make-over that neither will forget in a hurry, we’ve asked them to document; how much, how long and how they felt during the fake-over, we’ve supplied some wonderful photographic evidence and we want our readers to decide which is best... The Only Way Is Essex? Or The Only Way Is LYYB?

Has fakery taken over or can natural beauty still prevail...

Emma: Gemma and I spent a total of about £30 each on; tan, fake hair and fake lashes, now spending £30 on that doesn’t sound a lot and we by no means bought expensive, the scary part about the cost is that would be £30 for one night, you couldn’t reuse most of the products we purchased because they simply wouldn’t last, I don’t even want to think about the cost if you went to a salon and got all this fakery done professionally! In total the time it took me to get tanned up to my eyeballs, apply the buckets of make-up and slap those eyelashes on was 2 hours, I couldn’t spend every Saturday night getting ready for that long, the terrifying thing is that people wear this stuff everyday... how much time are they wasting on looking like an umpa lumpa. Now the truly horrendous part of the experience was how I felt all tantastic... I felt like I wouldn’t be able to behave like myself almost like i’d stepped into another person’s shoes, maybe it’s something you get used to, but I certainly couldn’t go out and have chats with people about what books i’m reading or the economic crisis, people would think i’d banged my head. Maybe that makes me a terribly shallow person that I see someone dressed like that and instantly think ‘well she hasn’t got much between the ears’, but surely there is an element of an intelligent human being thinking ‘I don’t want to spend this much money or this much time looking like this.’ I do like looking good, I am notoriously bad for spending all my money on clothes and shoes, however I am intelligent enough to say no to some simply ridiculous trends. I also can’t help but think what picture these people paint for the younger generation, that we should all be tanned, toned and spend time worrying over what we look like to enth degree? When the simple fact in my mind is that yes you should take care of yourself, you should take pride in your appearance whatever that means to the individual but I don’t think promoting this look that can only really be achieved successfully if you have buckets of spare time and cash is healthy.

Gemma: I was quite excited about this little challenge. Having a performing arts background I always jump at the chance to ‘dress up’. My initial thoughts were dressing up TOWIE was going to be easy... I was wrong. Not only did we spend the majority of saturday shopping for all our TOWIE supplies it took us god knows how many hours to prep and ‘apply’ until we had achieved the full look. I do take my hats off to the girls who have this crazy beauty regime, the amount of time and effort that goes into this ritual is epic!! I know as girls we should celebrate our natural beauty but while applying my fake tan I enjoyed the feeling of creating a persona. The fake tan acted like another layer of skin which made me feel a little less shy about my body. Maybe the girls who dress TOWIE do it to mask their inner body issues!? Maybe caking their bodies in fakeness allows them to create a persona that makes them feel confident?! hmmm. I did enjoy the ‘dress up’ but I am not sure it would make me feel ‘confident’ on a night out. Yes the fake tan made me feel a little less self conscious but combined with the mountains of make-up, fake hair and tight dresses it just made me feel a little bit silly. I would be too busy worrying if my hair piece/ eyelashes/ boobs have fallen out or if all my make-up is still on instead of just enjoying my night out.

So will Essex win your votes or will LYYB’s natural looking lovelies win in what can only be described as the ultimate face off... it’s up to you to decide...

To cast your vote simply comment below the post TOWIE or LYYB and we’ll collate the votes and share your views at the end of the month.

The Only Way Is LYYB x