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The Change Room

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MickRidem

Well-Known Member
Joined
Mar 14, 2006
Messages
231
Location
Canada
Essay

The Change Room
by Chillaxin

(An exceptional post originally in the Weight Board forum)​

The old, too tight jeans are still barely okay for pub night, but not for client visits. (My idea of “too tight” is when a folded-once $20 bill in the back pocket can be seen, and lipstick in the front pocket looks like a leg protrusion. LOL!).

With many Saturday afternoons of What Not To Wear education, I went to the mall. I needed jeans and jean shorts, as the present ones are from 1980 and battle with my belly ring. Um, too high for me. I was heading for the Change Room.

I thought about calling Friend #1 and figured it was too short notice. I considered Friend #2 but they might have been concerned about my lack of choice in clothing and she would be nervous for me. No way! I could have called Friend #3, but when thinking about going alone I opted for the quiet time to myself. There was more to it than just shopping.

Denim is a funny animal. Cuts, lengths, rises, rinses, washes... Sigh... I just wanted some damn pants. As it turns out, 98% of all denim now sold look like my jeans from the 80’s – ripped. Oh suuuuuuure, now that I have to be “respectable” my favourite style comes back “in” and I can’t buy them. (At least WE ripped them ourselves good and proper.) I shake my fist at the gods of trends!!

I looked through the rack of dark blue, straight basic jeans without rips, sequins, flowers, and whatever other funky stuff they’re doing these days. Knowing the size of the big old granny jeans I had on I looked on the rack to the right, to the right more, and more... yes, there are girls that are a size 0, and they’re 13 years old. More to the right... ah ha! I took a few to try on because I don’t know my size anymore, not really.

The first pair was low-rise. They were too small and squished a bit into my hips, but I am used to pulling jeans UP when I put them on. They didn’t really go up as much as just around. So I’m looking at these things and realizing, they’re not even the super-low rise and I thought to myself, “Well that’s just obscene!” Then I heard that voice, that old voice, “If I had a daughter there’s NO WAY I’d ever let her wear...” I took the ridiculous things off.

Pairs two and three were the same size, just different styles – pocket stitching and so forth. They fit. Yay! I looked at the size number on the hangers again. 33's. Yup, they fit.

I looked at how they did not hide/camouflage/disguise my little belly. None of the jeans were going to “hide” me. I stood there staring. I didn’t want to hide in my clothes. I don’t need to hide what others might consider an imperfection. This is my body and I’m very happy with it, there was no need to be ashamed. I did the sitting test and no plumbers were born so I stood and stared again. I thought about an article I'd read recently about a real life invisibility cloak being made. (Yeah, really.) BUT I don’t want to be invisible. I want to look good. As me.

So, therefore, I should find clothes that enhance my body, not hide it, and buy clothes that fit well and look nice. I switched between the two pairs again, and once more. My eyes changed. I wasn’t looking in the mirror in horror and picking myself apart as I’ve done all my life, I was looking at which jeans were more suited for ME and my body, not how I should fit into and be small enough to suit a rack of denim.

I chose the pair where the legs are loose and a little room to grow if need be (and like all of my pants, they had to be shortened), put my old shorts back on and realized that the woman in the mirror was not the young and intimidated girl that would have left the store empty handed and upset.

I passed right on by the teenie-bopper T’s with glitter and sarcastic sayings, and went to the nicer tops at the back. I ran into Friend #3, an avid shopper. LOL! She tried to help me find tops and guessed my size. 8? 10? Um, nope. Not any more. She had to go before she could find something for me, she was with a friend and her little girl. I walked to the right on the rack, to the right more... and found a nice purple-ish summer top that I can wear to see clients. I’m really trying to stay away from all BLACK in my closet.

The belt I bought when I was 19 is gone now. I went to a belt vendor in the mall and pulled out different styles and sizes. When I went to pull one out to see the style I didn’t check the size (it was a 48) and wrapped it around me when the little guy came over to “help me.”

“Don’t humiliate yourself like that! That belt is way too big for you! Put that down, I’ll find one for you.” He tried to compliment me?

Thinking about this afterwards I wasn’t sure what was worse, the fact that he thought being bigger was so bad that it was "humiliating," or the fact that he thought I was such an idiot I couldn’t find a belt on my own. I don’t know why I didn’t say anything, possibly because I was so shocked. He did find a style I liked better, but pulled out a smaller size. 34. I told him it would not fit. He said it would.

I wrapped it around my hips (where the jeans fit) and I have an hourglass shape, so the belt did not fit as it might around my waist. He pulled out a size up, 36, and guaranteed me it would fit – and really, I couldn’t tell over the bulky old things I was wearing. I bought two, black and brown. Turns out I had to go back and exchange them the next day anyway for some 40s. Sigh... Hips, Little man! Women have hips!

I kept on truckin’ since I was not done yet and the mall was still open for an hour. I ran into Friend #3 again in Winners where I went to find jean shorts. She likes girly things with flowers and prints (unlike myself), and even when we found plain jean stuff, she pulled out smaller sizes as we hunted the racks. Nope, I moved to the right again and she told me I wasn’t that big. Last year when I worked with her I wasn’t, and that’s what she still had in her head.

I dropped what I was doing and hunted for tops with her. I found a nice green summer top on sale and ... yeah, a funky little black top. (I couldn’t resist it.) She went to change and I went back to the shorts and took them into the Change Room.

Dear Clothes: It’s not my job to fit into you, it’s your job to make me look good.

They fit, and they passed the sitting test. The tops fit, not so loose to hide me and not tight, I looked at my new self. I looked strong, solid, happy. I saw a woman. Not in a 20 jean (or whatever they were) and 8 top, but in a 33 jean and a 12 top.

When I walked out of the Change Room, I saw some girls. Young teens with tiny frames and I know by the high school kilt I kept, that I was that small once. Pfft - no longer! I put on the counter what I would have once considered “huge” shorts and pulled out the plastic to pay. I was smiling.

Feeling good, looks good. Feeling sexy, is sexy. Having confidence looks beautiful at any size. You couldn’t pay me enough to go back to being that teenager looking for clothes and taking on the evil and terrifying Change Room that exists only to show you your faults and failures.

I wore the jeans rolled up with the black top to the bar on Saturday and the new shorts and green top yesterday around town. I took a few pictures. I didn’t suck in my tummy as I usually would in front of a camera, I just relaxed. I’m looking at those pictures now. That’s a new person. I like what I see.

Hubby said I’ve never looked better and that I look sooo happy. He also said that if anyone ever said anything or tried to take that away from me, they are not worth my time. I agree.

Dear Change Room: I win.
 

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