When ‘my best’ becomes ‘my smallest’.
What if you didn’t make changing your body the price of feeling beautiful on your wedding day?
Your wedding is one of those occasions where suddenly, there’s this expectation that you should look your absolute best.
And somehow, ‘my best’ can become code for ‘my smallest’.
You want your arms to be smaller. Your waist to be smaller. Your stomach to be flatter.
I see it so often in the women I work with. One of the happiest times of their life slowly becomes a project to change their body. So let’s talk about where that pressure comes from, and what you can do instead.
The engagement becomes a countdown
You said yes. You’ told everyone. You couldn’t stop looking at the ring.’re so excited. And then the pressure for your big day mounts.
Somewhere along the way, ‘I’m getting married!’ became ‘I’ve got eight months’.
Eight months to lose weight.
Eight months to get into a smaller dress.
Eight months to look my best.
Because there’s a date in the diary, it can feel like a good reason to push harder than you ever normally would. The wedding becomes a body deadline.
Before you’ve chosen a venue or a dress, the first thing you say is ‘I need to lose weight before the big day’. Your body becomes the first thing on the to do list.
And it’s worth asking why we assume a bride needs to change before she’s allowed to feel beautiful.
Wedding dress shopping and the sample size problem
Wedding dress shopping is meant to be one of the most exciting parts of planning. Your mum and best friends on the sofa, champagne, your moment.
But for a lot of brides, it can be one of the biggest body image triggers at what should be a joyous occasion.
Many bridal shops have sample dresses in one size, and it’s often a small one. So you try on a dress and it doesn’t do up. The consultant clips it at the back and asks you to imagine how it will look.
And instead of thinking ‘this isn’t my size’, you think ‘my body is the problem’.
The sample was made to fit a rail. Your dress will be made to fit you. Wedding dresses are often structured, fitted and unlike anything you usually wear. A sample that doesn’t fit tells you very little about how beautiful you’ll look in the dress that’s made for you. It tells you nothing at all about your body.
Why does your body need to be smaller for you to feel beautiful?
The size on the label has nothing to do with how beautiful you look, how happy you are, how loved you are or how memorable your day will be. It’s a number sewn into a seam. Your wedding is so much bigger than that.
There is nothing wrong with the body you have right now.
Your fiancé fell in love with you as you are now. Not a smaller version of you. Not the version of you that you hope to become before you walk down the aisle.
The body they’re holding. The body they’re kissing. The body they’ve chosen to spend their life with.
The body that will walk you down the aisle, dance with your friends and hug every person you love on the day.
You!
Find a dress that celebrates you
When you go wedding dress shopping, think about finding a dress that makes your body feel amazing, rather than how you need to change your body to fit the dress.
Choose the dress you love, in the size that fits you beautifully. Eat the food you chose. Dance, laugh, and be present for every moment.
Your wedding is a day to celebrate you, your love and the life you’re starting together.
You deserve to look back at your wedding photographs and see a woman who was completely herself, enjoying one of the most important days of her life.
Just you.
