"You've lost weight," he says

No, I haven't. How to respond?

Photo by Graphic Node on Unsplash

“You’ve lost weight,” my handyman says, as I prop open the shed door so he can rummage for a spare piece of wood to reinforce a chest I use as a coffee table.

It’s a comment that I don’t think is meant as a compliment, more a slightly concerned older man type remark that could have surfaced because of a combination of my outfit and the fact that I’m wearing no makeup and therefore look a bit peaky.

Standing by the shed, I’m wearing relaxed-style sleeveless tank top tucked into a long, loose skirt. It’s the kind of outfit that emphasises the slimmer parts of my body - my long arms and small waist. But it hides my slightly chunky thighs: had I been wearing tight jeans and a clingy t-shirt, I would have appeared curvier - of course, this is what clothes do.

Do I say this, or do I explain that my weight has barely changed in 15 years?

I know this because I weigh myself from time to time on my the scales at my mother’s house and because of how my clothes fit. I had a stomach bug last month and lost my mini belly but my appetite for cheese and chocolate has returned so I’m back to ‘normal’ now. I know my body extremely well, I think to myself.

Or do I say I’d rather not have comments made about my appearance?

Summertime makes me much more aware of my body - in ways both positive and negative. I went to the lido on Wednesday – the hottest day of the year in the UK so far – where hundreds of people lounged on the paved area around a 60m pool with several swimming lanes.

Teenage girls posed in complicated bikinis, teenage boys attempted dives to impress them, tanned, lean strutters in sporty togs smoothly entered the fast lane, groups of younger women lay face-down in a row, older regulars chatted to the lifeguards.

There were bottoms wobbling out of wedgy bikinis, nipples in triangular tops, taught bellies and jiggly bellies and smooth chests and side boobs and stretch marks. There were bodies, bodies, bodies, and among them my own. Alone in a sea of limbs I felt anonymous, unselfconscious.

Like many things in my life, I am a bundle of contradictions about my body. On one hand, I’m the person who suggests sitting nude in the hot tub on a girls’ weekend (we don’t), and the one who is comfortable trying the clothing-optional beach in Barcelona (my friend K and I happily did this a few years ago).

As I do my laps in the lido pool, I dream about swimming naked, and I strip off my bikini in the communal shower without a second thought. But these activities aren’t so much about exhibitionism, they’re more about the freeing feeling of air or water on my skin – it is delightful – which far outweighs any worries about what someone thinks of my behind.

But later, in front of the mirror, after a 10pm Gail’s pastry and several Kipling mini apple pies my flatmate left out, I’m bloated, and wishing I hadn’t eaten them. I don’t know if I dislike the bloat because of how it looks or because of what it represents: a lack of self-control, a worry that it’ll only increase as I get older.

While I can be critical about how I look, I love my body because of what it can do and how it feels when I move.

After months off exercise, I went back to yoga and the gym a couple of weeks ago. It was hard to experience what I can’t do - my body moves about an inch during a wide-legged seated forward bend, while others get their elbows on the floor - and I can only push about half the weight I used to on the leg press.

But on the flipside, I’m so happy to be moving again, to be in a familiar environment where I know that keeping going yields results, and to remember how weights and machines once felt like a foreign world, and now I can do them.

I say nothing but “hmm,” in response to my handyman’s comment, deciding that to try to explain all of this is unnecessary. I am still frustrated that people think it’s OK to judge others’ bodies, but also angry that this comment has triggered self-scrutiny.

Next time I see him, I might just wear those tight jeans.

If you enjoyed this, you might like these: