it's hard sometimes but pretty much it's alright

[hawkwing_lb]

I met a friend on the train home last night, and somehow we ended up talking about body image and associated crap. (Our conclusion: society is screwed up, and people who make "Women's Clothes" obviously believe women come only shaped like skinny big-breasted aliens with drainpipe legs, or very, very round.)

But it got me thinking.

I'm 5'8 or 5'9, depending on who's doing the measuring. I weigh between 93 and 95 kilograms - 14 stone, or thereabouts. And thinking about the shape of my body last night - carrying the amount of muscle I do right now, I suspect if I weighed in at under 90kg, I'd be borderline unhealthy. Under 85kg, and I would be downright unhealthy.

The Body Mass Index test thinks I'm obese. (BMI of 31.74) Which is a test that is clearly, and demonstrably, flawed, and yet it is used as an indicator of obesity on a global scale by the WHO.

All the advertising that is directed at women's bodies encourages dieting and weight loss, as opposed to exercise and muscle gain - a far healthier, for those who can sustain an exercise program, option. I gave up trying to buy clothes that fit and flattered in the women's section of shops years ago, even before I started climbing. I have thighs like tree-trunks, thanks to years of first hockey, then running, and when I could find trousers that fit my thighs? The waist freaking gaped. So I started buying men's trousers instead: too much fabric in the crotch is a small price to pay.

These days I have the same problem with shirts. Women's tops and blouses come equipped with this problem at the upper arm and shoulder, you see: when I flex my arm, the seams protest. Apparently women can have breasts but not shoulders, and in the clothes which are capacious enough about the shoulder? Billowing fabric around the midrift is not my idea of fun. So when I need a shirt, I buy in the men's department, and get one loose enough to still button in front.

It makes me quite angry, this.

You see, I climb for two hours at least twice a week. I run at least a mile, sometimes two, about twice a week. Maybe once a week I'll do weightwork for an hour or so. This keeps me healthy and relatively sane. So I have the muscle of an amateur athlete (six to eight hours of dedicated exercise is enough in one week, seriously: I do have other things to do as well) and the bones of my ancestors, who have generally been big, broad-shouldered people as far back as family memory goes.

(I've got my mother's shoulders. Plus some muscle that's all my own.)

Which means finding clothes is a bugger. And don't even get me started on the disjoint between my flesh and frame and the female bodytype that seems to be so popular in the media, and just how poisonous that is even for people who recognise the absurdity inherent within this construct.

Comments

[naomikritzer]

I gave up years ago and started shopping for shirts, sweaters, coats, etc. nearly exclusively in the men's department. However, in addition to being broad-shouldered, I'm small-breasted, so men's shirts generally fit me quite well. (I'm not muscular or athletic, though. Just broad-shouldered.)

I also buy most of my shoes in the men's department; I have enormous feet (U.S. women's 11 / men's 9.5 or 10) and since many women's shoe brands only run up to size 10, it's easier to find what I need in men's. As a bonus, men's shoes are usually cheaper, better made, and more comfortable. It's not an option if I need something to wear with a dress, though.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

I find it just a little bit annoying, the state of women's clothes. (And I hear you on the shoes. Especially if one has long broad feet.)

Less annoying than the barrage of social messages and advertising about weight and shape, but still. It is not fun.

[jennygadget.livejournal.com]

oh. even just broad feet overall is generally difficult. (although, yes, I can see how long broad feet would be especially trying, in terms of trying to find shoes.) My feet are tiny, but wide. I wear a perfect boys/mens size 4*, but a women's size 6 1/2 wide - and they don't make many women's size 6 1/2 wide. (US sizes) While I being at the smaller end means I can at least find shoes that I fit into, women's shoes always either pinch (unless they have some give to them) or fit badly and tend to slip off.

*size 4 men's - as size 4 boys would technically be toddler shoes - but size 4 men's are worn by boys are found in the boys sections.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

I'm not that wide. I haven't bought a shoe that wasn't for running, climbing or hiking in... bugger, is it really ten years? The last pair of dress shoes I bought were to comply with the uniform code at school, when I was thirteen, and they fit so well they lasted all six years. Haven't bought dress shoes since. Still, if I didn't go for reasonably high-end running shoes - I go to a dedicated sports training place to get mine, and generally try them on their test treadmill - I'd be in trouble.

(I'm fussy about what I wear on my feet. Which means that I average one pair of new shoes a year, because spending a hundred-plus quid on runners is often almost more than the budget can bear. Although I was able to splash out this December and get really nice hiking/walking boots, which was a)fabulous and b)caused the sales people in the outdoor activities shop to look upon me with frustration.) :P

[jennygadget.livejournal.com]

(it would help if I took the time to read, yes?)

"I'm fussy about what I wear on my feet."

heh. That reminds me of my favorite line from Clueless. :)

"Although I was able to splash out this December and get really nice hiking/walking boots, which was a)fabulous and b)caused the sales people in the outdoor activities shop to look upon me with frustration.) :P"

Sounds much like my trip to Title9 to buy sports bras.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

:)

[clarentine]

it's hard sometimes but pretty much it's alright

I'm wrestling with that thing about not giving advice and not talking down, lalala....

I think I'll settle for just saying, in case it helps, that you're not alone in this very specific intersection of personality and body.

And not that it says particularly good things about modern society, but as you get out of the years where a woman is generally expected to look like a model and into the years where a woman is generally expected to carry a bit more about her frame, the stress to conform should lessen. (At least, it did for me, and I'm not appreciably a different shape now than I was at 18. It wasn't me that changed.)

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'm not stressed to conform. (Although I would like boys to stop assuming that because I don't conform I must like girls, and not boys. :P ) (And I have self-confidence and image issues, but hey, who the hell doesn't? Too much of that is related to perfectionism.)

The clothing thing pisses me off, and the advertising thing pisses me off on behalf of people who didn't, maybe, get the kind of countervailing messages I got. Because it is poisonous.

[clarentine]

I keep hoping that the girl soccer player generation will make those who pay advertising budgets see that fact. I keep hoping.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

If we haven't got hope, what have we got? :P

[jennygadget.livejournal.com]

(Our conclusion:....people who make "Women's Clothes" obviously believe women come only shaped like skinny big-breasted aliens with drainpipe legs, or very, very round.)

As someone who has large breasts and could, at one time, have been considered to be both skinny and large breasted, I have to disagree. They think women only come as skinny C cup* wearing aliens with drainpipe legs (or, as you say, very very round). Large breasted women (E cup and above - for some of them, even D cup) do not exist in their world-view either.

Or maybe it's just that they think all large breasted, skinny women are tall? That's possible. All I know is that tops and dresses were just as impossible to shop for when I was at my skinniest (size 8 pants, size 14 top) as they are to find now (size 14 pants, size 16/18 top).

*I realize that whether C cup is considered big or not is largely a matter of perception and personal experience. But, as was pointed out in a similar conversation at Shapely Prose - by myself and others - phrasing that just uses "big" or "large" (with regard to breasts) - without being more specific as to exactly how large you are talking about - suggests to those of us that are larger than a C or a D cup that either we are included when you say "big" or that we simply don't exist in your world-view at all. As I know the latter certainly wasn't your intent, I just thought I'd point it out.

*******

I'm 5'8 or 5'9, depending on who's doing the measuring. I weigh between 93 and 95 kilograms - 14 stone, or thereabouts. And thinking about the shape of my body last night - carrying the amount of muscle I do right now, I suspect if I weighed in at under 90kg, I'd be borderline unhealthy. Under 85kg, and I would be downright unhealthy.

Yeah. Back when I was...not exactly skinny, but certainly skinnier than now and definitely very healthy (due to having the time to walk several miles every day)...I weighed about 115 to 125 pounds. Probably the least I could weigh while still being healthy. And, you know, able to walk for miles on end and not be exhausted. At 5'1" , that makes me just barely small enough to be considered healthy by BMI standards. At what I'm guessing is my "normal" weight (about 135) I would be considered overweight. In order to be considered "underweight" by BMI standards, I would have to weigh less than 100 lbs.

Now, I know people who are my height who would not be underweight until they weighed less than 100 lbs. But they do not have my body type.

BMI does not account for overall shape or muscle to fat ratio at all. Yes, I tend to carry a lot of weight for my size frame. A certain amount of that is fat that I can't make go away short of surgery: my breasts and (as gravity requires balance) my butt. A certain amount of it is muscle that you can't alway see because I'm curvy and short and tend to carry a certain amount of fat too, but trust me is definitely there.

And BMI certainly doesn't account for fitness. As annoyed as I am by my Wii Fit's insistence on lecturing me about my BMI and what horrible things I may have done in the past few days to cause a 1 lb weight increase (um, this is just a guess, but Wii Fit strength training exercises perhaps?**) I am endlessly amused that at the same time my Wii Fit age is fairly consistently either close to or less than my real age.

And well, word to everything else as well.

**sadly, that is not an option. Neither is "CHEESE! REALLY GOOD CHEESE!" nor "well, see, when you're a girl, and you reach a certain age, certain things start to happen to your body. Like bloating at certain times of the month." nor "well, you know how you, yourself, just noticed that I'm measuring myself at a different time of day than yesterday? And how you, yourself, just informed me that weight can fluctuate up to 2lbs in one day? I think that may have something to do with it."

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

Or maybe it's just that they think all large breasted, skinny women are tall?

Possibly. I am somewhere between B and C cups depending on the generosity of the manufacturer, and well, let's just say the front part was never quite as hard to fit as the back part, but, well. In general it was either too small or too giant, so I do not know what horror women of a larger cup size must suffer.

BMI is a crazy measurement. At best, of very limited use as a rough diagnostic tool at the extremes of the scale. But seriously? In common use and in common parlance, so fucked up.

[jennygadget.livejournal.com]

and well, let's just say the front part was never quite as hard to fit as the back part, but, well. In general it was either too small or too giant, so I do not know what horror women of a larger cup size must suffer.


Ah, yes. As you said earlier, they do seem to think that women don't have shoulders. Part of this is also assuming that all women have willowy frames overall - as if our backs are never broad or muscular the same way that our shoulders are always petite.

Just as as women are assumed to be at least moderately generously breasted - but not too large breasted - women are assumed to be tall, but not too tall and certainly not broad (unless by broad you mean fat, and even then clothes are hard to find).

*smash*

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

*HULK SMASH* even.

I'm never going to be skinny. I'm the wrong shape for it. (I could maybe swing emaciated, if you locked me in a concentration camp for a few months.) But! Clothing does not acknowledge this! And manymany women report similar problems, so you would think there might be profit in rectifying this!

(One day I'll probably have to dress in an office-environment manner. I'm not looking forward to finding clothes for that day.)

Ah, society. I shake my fist, I really do.