It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking we’d be astronomically happier if we could juuuust tweak one aspect of our lives.
Relationships might be at the crux of this belief — “When I find a boyfriend/get married, I’ll be so much happier” — or it might be finances, possessions, a certain career path, or the way you look. We all have our perceived hurdles.
For Chrissie Swan, like many women, it was her body. In a poignant Instagram post last night, the radio host recalled coming to the realisation five years ago that she’d been waiting “to be thin” in order to be happy.
From an outsider’s perspective, this is hard to imagine — Swan is easily one of the most effervescent media personalities in Australia, and rarely seen without that lovely, warm smile on her face.
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I can't help but agree with her. As another woman who has struggled with my weight, I went through my entire teenage years and 20s not socialising, not having fun and just working the entire time, because I didn't think I was attractive, or loveable enough at the size I was. I had massive body issues and was always trying to lose the weight and had a lot of emotional issues that came along with that. Until I met a counselor who managed to persuade me to take a giant leap of faith in myself and just go out and enjoy myself, go to a club, dinner with friends, etc. Talk to that man who wants to get to know me (something I would have never done). I wished I'd met this counselor so much sooner, I would have avoided so much heartache.
I guess my point is, we (as big folk) are so ingrained to accepting society's judgement about our bodies, that we also place a massive burden on ourselves. When did having a socially-acceptable body shape become more important than loving yourself, being kind to yourself, being happy? In a world that seems to be drowning in people with mental health issues, surely coming to some acceptance, or PEACE with oneself is not such a bad thing? Or at least, loving ourselves while we're on our journey to a healthier body? Let's not forget there are many large people out there who are in the middle of losing weight, or improving our lifestyles, but it seems we can't celebrate that til we get to a "magic number" that society has deemed is appropriate to be happy.
I'm a Big Brother fan (and proud of it) and I remember that series that Chrissie Swan was on - and that incident. Swan was constantly deriding the appearance of the men in the house, saying she didn't find them attractive, and far worse. This was over and over. Yet the moment she overheard someone - a crew member - whisper something negative about her appearance, it was WWIII.
Jesus it was over 10 (?) years ago, give her a break! she was pretty young, and it was probably before this great realisation she had about her body. Perhaps she was incredibly self conscious and used that as a defence mechanism...
Well, Swan is the one who brought it up. Even being that long ago, I still remember the way she spoke about the men in the house, and me at the time being very affronted - and that was before Swan said she overheard one crew member whisper to another 'I know you like big women'. "Perhaps she ... used that as a defence mechanism". Oh, so that makes it all fine then.
(As an aside, this reminded me of the BB contestant 'Hot Dogs'. When a guy asked him what he thought of the females in the house, he said:
"....None of them are at the ... 'Dog' standard", while putting his hand flat and up to indicate 'top level'.)
Nah, it doesn't make it fine, it's a shitty thing to do but we've all done shitty things, and stuff from that long ago seems a little irrelevant, it could just be good PR but I don't think she's like that now? Putting other people down? Trust me, the big woman comment she heard would not have been the first time she heard something like that, if you're bigger and not happy with it it can be pretty much be a constant stream of negative talk from your own head. It's not a nice place to be in, hating yourself.