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A weighty issue

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So there I was at a braai, having a drink with close friends, when us girls started chatting.

“I need to lose at least 20kg,” said the skinniest one there.

My other friend’s jaw hit the floor and my drink, held in a shaking hand, sloshed around in the glass just waiting to spill onto my polkadot dress. Even the men stopped talking and looked at her as if she grew a second nose and furry ears.

 She’s skinny. No flabby bits anywhere. Most women would pay good money to have a body like her. She can wear very short shorts and miniskirts and look sexy – and I mean really sexy.

She, of course, doesn’t see it.

To prove a point, she grabbed what little loose skin she has on her tummy between thumb and pinky and exlaimed: “Look at all the fat…all my rolls!”

I rolled my eyes, sighed and shook my head. I’ve talked to her about her imaginary weight issues in the past.

Her boyfriend has on numerous occasions, in front of me and others, told her how hot she is. Hell, even my boyfriend asked me to please tell her what the first thing was he said after seeing her the first time – something along the lines of, “what a body. Damn, she’s hot”.

Now, I know most women have issues with their weight. But I think the joke that a woman will never be happy with her weight or her boobs or her nose or anything else attached to her, is everything but a laughing matter.

My problem is when a skinny woman, in the presence of plumper, rounder, heavier, or the IT word at the moment, “plus-sized” women, says she wants/needs to lose 20kg or even 10kg when she clearly is perfect. It’s been the cause of me almost choking to death on my own spit quite a few times.

Seriously, if you, a super sexy woman, see 20kg extra on yourself, I can’t help but ask how you see me, someone who actually has 20kg (maybe 30kg) to lose.

Women have a lot of self-esteem issues. It starts in school, stalks you until university, moves in with you when you’re in a relationship and keeps you company in the coffin. It takes a lot of work to fix it or get it to where it doesn’t haunt you daily.

The problem is when women who haven’t yet got their issues under control bring the ones around them down. We owe it to each other to work on our own body issues so that we can help combat eating disorders and other psychological problems associated with looks.

I was completely horrified when I saw the likes of Jill Scott, Christina Aguilera, Khloe Kardashian and Robyn Lawley featured as Plus-Sized Women We Love. They’re considered plus-sized now? Really?

Back in the day you could easily get a size 18 in all clothing stores – it wasn’t part of a special clothing range for big-boned ladies. Nowadays size 16, never mind 18, falls in the plus-size section. When will it stop? Will size 14 next be seen as plus-size?

We women have the power – we CAN stop this. It will take time but we can get it back to where looking healthy is considered sexy – where you’re not considered plus-sized when you wear sizes 16 or 18.

We buy the magazines and read the articles.

If we decide we don’t like what we read or see and stop supporting magazines that promote unhealthily thin bodies they will have to change their approach, and slowly but surely we’ll get back to being healthy, physically and psychologically.

Miss_Muse is a Women24 reader and blogs on Women24's blogging platform. You can read more on her blog here.

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