I read with interest a recent article by Polly Vernon for the Sunday Times in which she tells of how she loses approximately fifty followers whenever she shares a picture of herself in a bikini. More specifically, she loses female followers.
Discussions around women and body image are not new. But Vernon is 50 years old. She has told in articles before of discovering exercise at the age of 40 and marvelling at the ways in which it changed her body. It is understandable then that she might want to share a picture of herself smouldering in a tiny bikini in a spirit of marvel, a sort of look-what-I-did. Or you could call it showing off, something that previous generations of parents were all too keen to warn their children against regularly. Less so nowadays because we are more careful with the concept of self-esteem; we are aware that this is something that our children might just need. The young girl who does not like her body may be susceptible to eating disorders, the woman who is not comfortable in her skin may not push herself forward in the work place like she should. Except, when it actually comes down to it, we do not appear to like the reality of women revelling in their bodies.
As a teenager, I did not like my body. Or rather, I was not comfortable inside it. It felt like the wrong type of body. I wanted a supermodel's body. I did not want my hips or my bottom and ironically, I did not want quite such buoyant breasts. Of course there is a sad irony that it is at the time when our skin is peachy and our curves pert that we often are least comfortable in our bodies. Still, I was saved from indulging this particular form of inhibition by having children when I was very young. Oh the relief, to find that your body only needed to be useful. And it was. For over fifteen years it gave birth to and then nourished five children. My body had purpose. I could withdraw from any silly notions of liking it. It did not have to bring me pleasure, only to serve others. I had risen above vanity!
I remember one summer's day, when the youngest was tiny enough to be in a sling, and we had visited a National Trust property for the afternoon, noticing a group of elderly friends seated at the cafe table next to ours. I watched their careful and considered movements, the slowness of their actions and the effort that it took to get out of a chair. And all of a sudden, I wanted to climb a mountain for no other reason than that I could. It seemed like a vision sent to remind me of the brevity of what we take for granted. Our wonderful, fit, healthy bodies can do so much but not forever. And to be blunt, we are dying all the time. From then on, knowing that I would not have more children, my relationship with my body began to change. Unlike Vernon, I was no stranger to exercise but from then on it took on a greater intensity; I enjoyed pushing myself beyond self-imposed limits and gradually I began to see that so much of what our bodies can give us comes from our own positive regard. Because, if not now, when?
If not now, when? I think this is the mantra that starts to reverberate in women's minds around the age of 40. If not now, when? If you have spent your whole life caring for others or doing the things that you were told were right, without much consideration for your own needs, you will wake up at 40 with change on the horizon and you will ask yourself, if not now, when?
I will never have a supermodel's body. I will only ever have this body. And this body is not going to look better in two, four, eight years time. So I have a simple choice: To like it or not. It is a choice. If I choose to like it then I can enjoy it. If I choose to dislike it then I will live only half a life. So I can, it seems, look at the excess skin on my belly, my softly sagging, dimpled arse and even the pocket of fat on the inside of my thighs that will never disappear even if I become emaciated, and I can look on it all and like it. Because life is better that way. So if you look on my bikini selfies with, what? Disgust, embarrassment, whatever, you can fuck right off. My children would say you're lucky I'm wearing a bikini. I would say, if not now, when?
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