Can you be *too* couply?

Having been in a relationship for nearly two and a half years, I am constantly surprised by other couples behaviour, and find it an amusing topic to discuss with others. I have always been taught that there are certain elements of being a couple that are inappropriate in a group setting, and I am begging the question of whether you can be too couply?

I always find it interesting to compare the little habits that couples have, but I often find it quite nauseating when you have a couple’s relationship literally thrust in your face with absolutely no shame. I witnessed this recently, and I’m not going to name names, but we were in a large group setting, there were three couples, and I was one of them. My boyfriend and I don’t act overly couply – we hold hands, we sit next to each other and we chat, but we don’t exclude everybody else in the process. The other couples were a lot more open about their affection, regardless of the others having to endure this too. Sitting together is fine, but when you can’t exist without your other half being there, it’s becoming a problem. These couples were touchy-feely, they were draped over their partners, stroking their hair, kissing them constantly, and generally making the room feel a lot more romantic than is necessary at lunchtime. Personally, I feel sorry for the single people in the room. They had to endure this horrific show of affection constantly for a matter of hours, and I’m worried they might think this is normal.

I’m a great believer of the saying “get a room”, and think that certain displays of affection are generally inappropriate for a group setting and may lead to members of the group feeling excluded and nauseated. I also can’t help but think that if you spend your whole courtship stuck to each other, whispering sweet nothings in each others ear and fawning over them, then if you eventually get married, you’re going to be sadly let down. If your partner eventually tires of spending every minute petting you, you will definitely cease to exist as a couple. I was more disturbed that these couples are acting like they are in the first exciting throes of a relationship, yet have been together for years. Have they always been like this? That must be exhausting…

At some point, the relationship is going to have to mature into something that exists on different levels than just touching them up everywhere they go, and if you don’t have anything deeper than that, it’s not going to work out. Whilst discussing the issue with a friend of mine, she was equally as freaked out as I was, and she made a good point. She said “I feel like couples who spend all of their time together doing that are destined for failure – there’s no foundation to the relationship; no guts!” It might be forgiven if it was just the female part petting her man, but it was the men showing all of the affection. Resting your head on your girlfriends shoulder isn’t manly, nor is stroking her hair and kissing her cheek, forehead, hand, shoulder…etc. It’s definitely nice, but not something that should be displayed in public. That’s something for when you have a quiet night in watching a movie, or when you’re celebrating an anniversary or something. I just found it all a bit soppy and alien to me. Okay, they might be the “sensitive type”, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that most witnesses are gagging by your girly behaviour.

If these couples are fuelled solely by their need to show affection all of the time, it’s eventually going to fizzle out. As my friend stated, “If one of them gets a cold sore and can’t kiss for a day or two, the whole thing will just fall apart!”

I can safely declare that I’m not a bitter onlooker – I don’t crave this kind of attention, and I know my partner is keen on me without him having to drape himself over me to show it. I’ve been through the honeymoon stage of the relationship, endured the highs and the lows, and come out at the other end with a better understanding of what’s necessary in a relationship and what’s realistic. Life isn’t a romantic movie; we know you’re a couple, and we don’t need to see it all the time. There should definitely be a boundary line for couple behaviour when you’re in a group setting. Nobody wants to have to avert their eyes because you’ve decided to have an impromptu make-out session on your partners lap, and we don’t want to have to awkwardly sit next to you while you snuggle cozily. If you snuggle too much, you’re going to end up suffocated, and one of you will be gasping for freedom and the ability to sit on the couch without being tackled. I just wish you the best of luck when you have to test your relationship in the real world by living together or getting married, and the constant attention slowly starts to die. You have to learn that if you focus all your attention on one person, you’re going to alienate people, and set your bar far too high. You won’t be able to compete with your own affections in a number of years, and it’s all going to go belly-up.

Can weight weigh down a relationship?

I’ve had to ask the dreaded question “does my bum look big in this” to my partner before, and I’ve always received the same response – “no, of course not!” It’s not that a preposterous idea that my bum would look big in something, it often has those tendencies, but his reassuring response calmed my nerves, although I was somewhat dubious about whether he actually meant it. Now, I’m an average size – I normally weigh from 9 ½ stone through to 10 stone, and I carry my weight on my hips and thighs, which means that I’m a size 8 on top, and a size 10-12 on bottom. I’m not “fat”, but I definitely carry more weight that I’d like to.

About a month ago, my partner gleefully suggested we both weigh ourselves – this is not a bonding experience, nor is it a happy moment of realisation when you discover that your boyfriend weighs just a few pounds more than you, or worse, less.

I don’t have this problem, but my partner is definitely skinny all over and has legs that I would kill to have. Not that I’m desperate for hairy legs; they’re just really skinny.

In the past, I went out with a guy who was a lot skinnier than I was, and it only became embarrassing when he attempted to give me a piggyback, and dropped me because he couldn’t manage my weight. I was only about 9 stone at the time, so I was quite offended, but I’m wondering whether weight can really affect a relationship?

I have friends who have boyfriends skinnier than they are, and it’s no wonder they’re self-conscious. If you go to borrow a hoodie or a teeshirt from your guy and you can’t fit into it, it’s not as romantic as you might think. The little comments that can be uttered once from a man and remembered forever by a woman can make a break how a woman feels about herself.

Now, even men who are overweight seem to assume that women should look like the photoshopped Twiggy-esque models on the covers of the magazines. Forgive me for sneering, but practice what you preach – if you’re already overweight, don’t make comments about other people’s weight. You’re just going to bring them down and enforce the stereotypes that women are “meant” to fill.

If you feel like you weigh too much and your partner won’t want to witness such a travesty, don’t be too hasty. You need to just take a step back – you didn’t begin a relationship with someone because they were skinny, did you? Chances are they didn’t pick you out of a crowd because they thought you’d slim down well! In that case, it would be safe to assume that weight doesn’t matter.

If you are both overweight, it might be something where you can both find a common ground. If you feel the need to lose some weight, you can encourage your partner to support you and to join in. Maybe couples who work out together, work out? You know that it’s satisfying to lose weight after a gruelling few months of effort and dieting, so having somebody to share and experience that satisfaction with would be awesome.

I purchased the Wii Active set recently, and embarked on a 30 day challenge where my ultimate goal was to tone up and notice a difference, body-wise. As well as my trainer being disappointed in me for skipping days, my partner decided to join in and scold me for skiving and generally being a lazy bum. That didn’t do much for my self-esteem. Being constantly told that I should work out more just emphasized the feeling that I really should be working out more, and that I wasn’t in good enough shape right now. I’m going to state here that my partner wouldn’t understand weight gain if it hit him in the face – he could eat anything he wanted constantly, and still wouldn’t put any weight on. As for myself, if I have a particularly binge-y week/month, I definitely see the effects. I don’t feel good about myself and I need him to put extra effort in to make me feel good about the way I look. Of course, I have to tell him this, but he just pokes my stomach fat and tells me I look fine.

I can definitely understand why weight would be an issue for women – it’s a huge deal, because how we look can make or break our confidence. Some women don’t feel comfortable enough in their body to strip off in a changing room, let alone with their spouse, so I can imagine that would have some serious repercussions on their relationship.

That’s not to say that men don’t come with these problems too. Some men feel scrawny and inadequate if they don’t have abdominals equal or greater to a bodybuilder. Men want to feel like they’re able to protect their women (it’s a pre-installed feature), and they can only do this if they have a body that screams “I’m buff, back off.”

So men are trained to be Apollo-like Greek gods with a body like an athlete, and women are to be stick thin frail bodies. This just isn’t realistic, and we’d all be exhausted. Women who’ve had children aren’t going to spring back into their size 6 jeans, so men, be nice about it. Love and accept their curves and appreciate their body for the pure fact that it belongs to the person you want to be with. Women, not all men are destined to look like Daniel Craig when they exit the pool, so just make do. If you’re happy with your body, that’s what counts. If your boyfriend is thinner than you, don’t worry about it. Nobody else cares, it’s normally just you. Get rid of your paranoia, because the chances are high that he doesn’t care either. Men, if your girlfriend weighs more than you, appreciate it – its much more comfortable, there’s less tantrums about how you’re eating a curry and she can only eat a yoghurt, and if she’s confident, she’ll be beautiful no matter what size she is.

Does age really matter in a relationship?

Age differences in relationships have long been the victim of public scrutiny, deeming the older male as a pervert, and the older female as a cougar. Dependent on just how severe the age difference is can determine how people perceive you and your entire relationship. If there is an age difference, there must be a motive behind the coupling, right? We assume the woman just wants a baby before her time runs out, or the man wants to feel young again.

I know personally that large age differences can work out within a relationship – it just depends on the individuals involved. My parents met and started dating when my mother was sixteen and my father was twenty-seven, and they married three years later. For all of you recoiling in horror, it worked out fine – they’ve been married for twenty-six years now, and the age doesn’t affect them whatsoever. At the time, my grandparents weren’t even fussed – my mother was mature, and my dad was immature. They balanced each other perfectly and met in the middle.

I think one of the major problems that seem to hit these mis-aged couples is that both people are in completely different stages of life. I currently have this – I’m a student, my partner is in full-time employment. Whilst I am technically striving to achieve a decent job and a good future, I’m still a lazy student with a part-time job. I don’t do as much as he does, and thus technically don’t understand his life. When I complain about classes or homework, I get scoffed at and told to wait until I’m in the “real world”. That’s support for you. He’s older than I am by four years, which is a pretty standard age gap. It doesn’t affect us that much, except when I’m on summer holidays and he has to endure four months of me breezing through life with no cares in the world.

Now, if the woman is the older in the relationship, she is generally perceived as being the dominant one, luring the vulnerable young man into her trap. Is this really the case? Don’t men prefer older women? They’re more independent, have a life of their own, have a career and can offer life experience as well as companionship. However, on the downside, we can’t ignore the fact that women have been given a ticking clock, and it might come into play that the older woman is just desperately trying to have a family and settle down before it’s “too late” and she’s on the metaphorical shelf.

It’s obvious that the age differences between a man and a woman are talked about more by people who know them and aren’t actually in the relationship than they are by the couple themselves. It’s something that instantly defines the couple for everybody else, whether we determine the woman as a “cradle-snatcher”, or the man as probably having bought his girlfriend. This is completely unnecessary – love isn’t age-specific, and you can’t choose who you fall in love with. Your parents and friends might have some concerns about the intentions of the older, and thus dominant person, but you don’t have to prove yourself to anybody. If you don’t see a problem with picking your girlfriend up from school, or taking your boyfriend back to his nursing home after a date, then nobody else should either. It’s all individual to the relationship, and whilst it may be the butt of some people’s jokes, they’re generally the people who are jealous and unhappy with going through a mid-life crisis at the same time as their partner – that’s got to be stressful.

Do children need sex ed at age 5?

When I was five years old, I was innocent and free – I climbed trees, rode my bicycle, baked with my grandparents and played with my puppy. Gender roles in such activities are limited, thus boys weren’t really something of a big deal. When I was ten years old, boys were only necessary for a decent game of kiss, cuddle or torture. And, dependent on the aesthetics of the boy in question, it wasn’t rare to have to suffer the torture. When I was fifteen years old, I learnt how to put a condom onto a rubber penis in a room full of giggling girls. Childhood personified.

As England has made the move to enforce compulsory sex education lessons on children as young as five, we’re forced to ask ourselves whether learning about the birds and the bees so early will actually affect the way they handle relationships in future life.

Most people agree that five years old is just too early to be emotionally ready to absorb learning about relationships, whether civil partnerships (now compulsory education) or marriage. Some think that being able to correctly identify body parts in the lower regions will lead to actually using these newly found body parts. But if nobody actually sits you down and explains what’s going on down there, you’re never really going to be faced with it until you’re face-to-face with it.

Gone are the days when sex was kept sacred until marriage, a sad change in our society, but one that we have to accept. Children are growing up at an incredible rate nowadays, and we can see how when we look at their role models. Celebrities like Jordan, Hannah Montana and Amy Winehouse (heaven forbid!) set the bar for young girls, encouraging early use of fake tan and makeup so much that our younger generation look like a cluster of miniature prostitutes.

One of the positives about these lessons has to be that if a child is brought up in an environment where there is a parent missing, or it’s abusive, they may be conditioned into believing that is the norm for a relationship. But within the lessons, they will learn how to expand their knowledge of love in a positive way – gender roles will be explained, and the kids will learn that there are many ways to have a communicative, functioning relationship.

Of course, we can’t ignore the fact that the UK has one of the highest rates of teen pregnancies in the Western World. Personally, I don’t believe this is because nobody explained where people’s parts were when they were five years old. I think this is because all around us are provocative images and sexual references and nobody offers any other kind of recreation. We’re constantly being told about STI’s, STD’s and pregnancy, but it hasn’t deterred a vast number of people ignoring the use of the condom. But then, this begs the question – if condoms were handed out willy-nilly, would this be encouraging sex? Is that what we want to do? Or is it better to keep the condoms hush and hope for the best?

But I’m getting distracted. Children are about to be learning to tell the difference between their scrotum and their spermatogenesis, and I am questioning whether this will only further the fact that everywhere we look, sex is being broadcast. If they start learning the function of these body parts so young, it’s only understandable that they won’t wait for 11 years to legally be allowed to use them, and if they aren’t taught about responsible sexual activity, it will just lead to more and more teenage pregnancies. Everybody knows that there’s a lot of peer pressure about sex and who’s had it, and these lessons are only going to throw sex into the limelight constantly. Kids don’t need to know these things until they’re emotionally ready to put them to use, and learning them so early will only push them in the direction of using them. Sex used to be something that was deemed special, but it’s not anymore. People don’t care – children are having children due to irresponsible sex, and nobody is tackling the real issues. Nobody is learning that you don’t have to have sex to have a relationship or that you should wait, not necessarily until marriage, but until you’re emotionally ready. And legally, that should be at least sixteen. But if boys and girls are chatting about their bits and pieces from the age of five onwards, doesn’t it just seem like a matter of time until they use them, purely because they’ve now been conditioned into it? If sex is on everybody’s minds, people will start having sex, whether they’re ten years old or twelve years old. And because our society believes that they are tackling the teenage pregnancy epidemic, they won’t be able to handle this – are they going to teach eleven years old about sex and then hand them condoms? No, of course not. And thus, we will see yet another generation full of children pushing prams, because nobody thought through the fact that if you talk about sex, you need to think about the consequences.

(These articles are written by me and thus owned by me...don't use them without my permission!)

What is love?

I think everybody has their own definition of what love truly is, but can it be contained to a mere definition? Personally, the main technical requirements of love would be trust, respect and communication. But love isn’t a technical thing – it’s an emotional thing and we can’t express linguistically how we truly feel; it’s not possible.

I suppose your basic understanding of love would come from your childhood and the love that you receive from your parents. This love is supposed to be the only unconditional love, a love that will remain constant whatever you do. If you have a normal childhood experience, you’ll probably experience a very basic type of love. This is a love that wants the best for you, wants to look after and protect you, and will always love you. It is a love that makes them spend time with you, want to know about your life and to really just strive for the best for you and your future. You might not recognise it as these things, but basically if you were sheltered, fed and watered, given an education and kept safe, then you have experienced a basic form of love. True, there will be fights, arguments and door-slamming, but this does not take away the love. The love will still be there when you resolve the argument. The typical family relationship relies on the three technical requirements of love in order to function in this way. You need to be able to trust your parents and siblings, otherwise it wouldn’t work. Your love would be dependent on whether they follow through on what they say or not, and this isn’t a constant love. You need to be able to respect your parents, to respect what they say and to accept their authority over you until you become an adult or move out. If you don’t respect them, there won’t be a mutual understanding of boundaries, and you will lose their trust and respect if you break these boundaries. Finally, communication is pretty vital in most relationships, and this is true in a family sense. If you never speak to your parents, then you won’t trust or respect them fully, and you’ll never really know them or what kind of people they are. They won’t know you either unless you open up to them and share your life with them. This opens the door for respect and trust.

This might seem like a fairly scientific approach to what love is, but trust me; I’m no more a scientist than Barbie is. Love is a very complicated matter, and cannot be expressed with mere words. If you were to ‘Wikipedia’ the definition of “love”, you would encounter a very complex definition – “Love is any of a number of emotions and experiences related to a sense of strong affection and attachment. The word love can refer to a variety of different feelings, states, and attitudes, ranging from generic pleasure to intense interpersonal attraction. This diversity of uses and meanings, combined with the complexity of the feelings involved, makes love unusually difficult to consistently define, even compared to other emotional states.”

And thus, love cannot really be defined. It cannot be compared to other emotional states, although we try. It has been said that people who are in love display signs of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder when it comes to their significant other, rendering us obsessive about them. This would probably define a “crush” or fancying someone, too. We feel attached to somebody, and a sense of bonding and unity is formed, hence it is so hard to stop loving somebody – it feels like you are missing a part of yourself – the part that they filled.

When people talk about their loved one, they can sometimes be seen to be wearing “rose-tinted glasses”, ignoring the blatant flaws and loving them anyway. That’s what love is – you see the flaw, you accept it and you appreciate it. When you realize that you love them regardless of everything you hate about them, you know that it’s love. Imagining yourself sitting side-by-side with your partner on rocking chairs in your mid-nineties is another aspect; long-term love. Love isn’t just a fling; it isn’t hopping into bed with somebody. It’s not a whirlwind romance. Love is about really getting to know somebody, learning everything about them and appreciating that. It’s not about how long you’ve been together or how much money they have to offer. It doesn’t even matter how fertile they are – it’s all about your connection and whether you work as a couple and could work for a long time. Love isn’t always exciting and adventurous – it’s sustaining the feelings during the mundane and boring times. I’m proud that my parents have managed to remain fully in love for twenty-five years, and I can vouch for the fact that their life isn’t always exciting. They have kids to look after, so don’t always get a chance to spend time alone, but they’re still in love even when doing the dishes, walking the dog or making dinner.

So love is sustainable, with care and attention. Communication, respect and trust make up the perfect foundations for a strong relationship, but don’t get swept along by all of the things that love is portrayed to be. Love isn’t always perfect, it’s not always easy and it doesn’t always work out – but it is something that only you can feel and only you can know when it’s right and when it’s wrong. But when it’s right, love has the ability to overwhelm, to blind and to create magic – it’s not a force to be reckoned with. As Nicholas Sparks says, “"Love is more than three words mumbled before bedtime. Love is sustained by action, a pattern of devotion in the things we do for each other every day."

(These articles are written by me and thus owned by me...don't use them without my permission!)

The pro's of Facebook.

A long time ago, the words “I’ll Facebook you” wouldn’t really come up in conversation. Nowadays, however, it seems almost as popular to spend time on somebody’s profile than actually in their company. Social networking sites were born between 2002 and 2004 with the first three being Friendster, Myspace and finally, Bebo. After the success of these sites, 2004 witnessed the birth of Facebook, something a little bit different and a little bit better. Users of Facebook can join networks organised by city, workplace, school and region in order to connect with each other, and primarily, interact. You can add friends, send messages, upload photos and update your profile to keep others in the loop. It seems understandable that there are over one hundred million users worldwide today. And the worldwide is the main part here – you can connect with anyone, anywhere. It means that you can find lost friends from the gap year you took twenty years ago, or the teacher that inspired you at school. You can talk to people around the globe in a matter of seconds; there are no hidden costs, no time limits, and no restrictions.

Connection and interaction are the main reasons why so many loyal followers have flocked to these sites. Friendships that would have dwindled had they relied on phone calls are now flourishing with the ability to speak freely. These sites mean that you are kept knowledgeable about everything your friends are doing – who’s going out with who, what they *really* did last summer, and what they’re feeling. It’s not really stalking, it’s perusing. It’s the ability to see what people are doing, to witness their life and to give conversation starters, even if it means admitting that you’ve been following all of their wall-to-walls with people you don’t even know.

I took the liberty of starting a discussion on Facebook to find out why people are still clinging to the bandwagon of social networking sites and why it seems they’re going to be around for a while. One of the reasons appears to be that in terms of security, Facebook is miles ahead of the others. You choose who sees your profile, you can deny any unwanted friendships, and the more advanced settings mean that it significantly reduces the problems with sexual predators that other such sites had. Even when it comes to photographs, you can select which photos you want certain people to see, meaning that your little cousin will never see the drunken photos of you from that party, and your classmates don’t have to see the impromptu fashion show you put on in Asda.

It’s also a very useful tool for groups, allowing you to get in touch with everybody in the group at once. You can plan dinner parties, track RSVP’s, or just show your appreciation for something great.

As well as rekindling past friendships, social networking sites can sometimes start new relationships. It’s true – you can find love (or at least some fun) on the sites. I heard a story about a guy who received a friend suggestion over Facebook, he accepted, and to cut a long story short, he ended up climbing out of her bedroom window when her parents unexpectedly came home.

Having personally lived both abroad and in a number of UK locations, I use social networking sites to keep up with friends left behind. It allows me the freedom to keep in touch more so than usual, with the visual advantage of being able to see the person in question. Facebook has a “chat” function which mimicks MSN, meaning that you can speak to whomever you are friends with who happens to be on Facebook at the same time as you. It’s quick, easy and free – three elements that combine to be vastly positive in our society of savings. Facebook overtook Myspace as the top networking site in April of 2008 and is currently ranked as the 5^th most accessed website in the world. As many as 14 million photos are uploaded daily, as well as the millions of pokes, shoves and messages that are sent. So, if you’re bored, lonely, nostalgic or just want to chat, log on and you’ll be able to keep in touch with everybody. As they say, the world is at your fingertips, and with social networking, you can be sure that it’s true.

(These articles are written by me and thus owned by me...don't use them without my permission!)

How far will we go to achieve perfection?

When Jessica Simpson gained a measly couple of pounds recently, it sparked a national outrage. The President commented on it, and Perez Hilton didn’t look on it too kindly, either. Soon, everybody was talking about it. When reading the most recent ‘National Enquirer’, I was startled to find that within the section on “Hollywood’s 20 Fattest Stars”, two average-sized women graced the pages. Of course, the stars new scapegoat, Jessica Simpson, was on the list at a whopping ten stone. It claims that she “ballooned to her curviest”, which is the weight she is at now. Ten stone. Next to her, Janet Jackson covers her excessive nine stone five with an oversized hoodie. Her blurb tells me that she “had shrunk to a super-sexy 108lb last May”, but that poor Janet has now “packed on 23 pounds”, taking her up to her current weight. For all of us who are unaware of the conversion between pounds and stone, Janet’s “super-sexy” weight was seven stone seven. Forgive me for thinking this, but that seems awfully unhealthy. Janet is of average height, thus making her previous weight ridiculous.

We, as a society, have shrunk. Physically, and mentally. We have decided that people who aren’t as thin as a select few are ugly and unattractive. Programs like “Ugly Betty” portray women who carry some extra junk in the trunk as ugly, and those who have glasses, braces and frizzy hair end up as lost causes.

Models on the catwalk are getting skinnier and skinnier, as they are designed to be the hangers on which clothes fall. You aren’t supposed to focus on the people wearing the clothes, but you can’t help but gaze at the skeletal frames that float down the catwalks. If these are the women that appear in fashion magazines as being the ideal, then all of the women who don’t look like them are going to feel like something is wrong with them.

What the magazines fail to mention is that it’s incredibly unhealthy to be so skinny, and that the ones that aren’t perfect get Photoshopped beyond recognition. Now, if the only images we are presented with are of seemingly “perfect” women, surely we’re only going to feel worse about ourselves and strive to look like them, regardless of the impact it would have on our health.

Commercial sharks have decided to prey on the vulnerable among us and ply us with adverts promising “miracle diets”, guaranteed to help us lose enough weight to fit in. “The Pink Patch” regularly appears on my Facebook page, telling me that I’ll lose stones if I wear it. It tells me that it’ll curb my appetite, subtly saying that it will stop me eating. But is this an anorexia advert? Saying that not eating is the best way to lose weight, alongside lots of exercise, of course. What people fail to observe about anorexia, which is often beautified for the television and movie industry, is that it kills you off slowly. It is literally starvation, but self-inflicted. Your body starts to freak out, and all of your major organs stop being able to function. You might think that you look great, but the truth is, your body now equals that of a dilapidated OAP. Even though you can squeeze into a UK4 pair of skinny jeans, are you truly happy? Your skin won’t be getting the vitamins it craves, leaving you grey and emaciated. Very attractive.

And the worst thing about it is that the people who are being targeted by these “icons” are getting younger. I work in a clothing boutique, and we stock clothing from a US size 0 to a UK size 26. More frequently now than ever before, primary schools are hosting proms, and we’ve seen an influx of ten and eleven year-olds trying to grab the latest garb. Their comments? “It makes me look fat.” I understand that we live in an obesity-fuelled society, but these children aren’t fat. They’re child-sized. They can go into Mothercare and still be able to fit into something!

I’m possibly bitter, because my Wii fit told me that I had gained a stone this week. I didn’t stop eating, nor did I wallow in the fact that I could possibly be mistaken for a whale. Instead, I ate my lunch, and I got on with my life. Now, I’m not fat. I’m ten stone. I carry a “burden” of child-bearing hips, which essentially means that I have thighs. But what I found out is that I weigh more than two of the celebrities named on the “Fattest Stars” page, and this makes me angry. How thin do we have to be to be recognised as being perfect? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, not in the magazines we read. They cannot and should not dictate to us what we know is unachievable. We will never look like the models they use, no matter how little we eat or how much we work out. We need to realize that we are beautiful no matter what size we are. We’ve reached a point where we are judging people on their size, ignoring all of their other attributes. If a model has a beautiful face but she weighs more than the other waifs, will she be ignored?

And so, I ask you – how far will we go? When the next anorexic model dies because of her plight for perfection, will we sit up and take notice? No, because there will be twenty other starved and decrepit models waiting to take her place. If we continue portraying the ideal woman as something that comes with a side-order of death, then that is what we will continue to celebrate. If, however, we put real women in magazines and beauty campaigns, we might realize that we have more to offer the world than a protruding collar-bone and a lack of individuality.

(these articles are written and thus owned by me...don't use them without my permission!)