Have you ever seen a drained ballsack?

Like…a testicle fully devoid of semen? Well lemme tell you, during my years of working at a Pathology lab, I saw several of them, and whenever I look down at my boobs, they are the first thing I am reminded of.

Okay, that’s the funny opener out of the way. Let’s get down to why I’m really here! Before I begin, I want to make sure that I write this in a way that doesn’t come across as annoying, ‘woe is me’ or pitying in any way. As someone who was a bit bigger, I absolutely know how incredibly annoying it can be to read the perspective of someone considered ‘smaller fat/midsize’ and feel a sense of frustration due to the tone-deafness of it all. However as someone who was larger fat and is now a smaller fat, I hope that my perspective below takes on a more balanced, nuanced take.

In a world where Semaglutide injections and other weight loss procedures reign supreme within the fat communities; where former fat models and influencers are celebrating their weight losses and proudly posting their internalised fatphobic takes, before-and-after photos and videos scolding their audience for not ‘being like them and taking action’, I hope my experience below can sorta, cut through the noise.

I’m very aware that I have lost weight. Why? Because of all the people who have made it their mission to alert me as such. Despite me using my platform to encourage discourse on not speaking on the appearance of others, and despite me not mentioning or alerting to my bodily changes in any way, shape or form, some people have still insisted to make my body the most important thing about me, which is frankly, incredibly infuriating, so for a while now I’ve felt the need to just dive into it.

2023.

The end of 2022 and beginning of 2023 was a terrible time for me. Infact, after 2017, 2023 was probably one of the worst years of my life, although you probably wouldn’t have picked up on it based on my social media feeds (and the fact that I wanted to keep my depression private). It was a combination of things:

• I was incredibly burnt out.
• My mental health was in the gutter, triggering my depression which I refused to go back on antidepressants for (authors’ note: terrible decision).
• I received some unfortunate medical news which sent me spiralling.
• Work was incredibly slow to the point where I nearly decided to give up and go back to full time work.
• As a result of this, I lost my self-esteem (as it pertained to my work, my book and career). I constantly compared myself to others and overall it just wasn’t a good time.
• First Daughter Syndrome & the pressures of being the main breadwinner of the whole family had begun to take its toll emotionally and mentally.

Because of this, I knew that I needed to do something to counter this. During lockdown, I started going on walks in the early morning in the park opposite me at my old flat, and I found that this routine helped me and my mental health in the midst of a pandemic (while living alone), a lot. So, I decided to start doing that again. Since January 2023, I have been going on three miles walks 3-5 a week. On top of this, I started going to the gym to strength train because I wanted to improve the weakness in my ankle (I had broken it previously) and I also wanted to gain weight on my butt okay?! FINE. I wanted a shelf for an ass. I wanted to twerk and have my cheeks actually move! Sue me.

Anyhoo, I started going to the gym three times a week. Once I started to see improvements in my strength, I increased this to five times a week. Then six times. By July/August 2023, I had developed an obsession with going to the gym daily and I realised I had developed a problem. It wasn’t the fat loss for me – like I said, I only went to build muscle, and I never do cardio – but moreso, I became addicted to how much weight I was lifting each week. I started the gym lifting 8kg dumbell deadlifts and by July, I could do 60kg deadlifts. I felt strong. I felt powerful. I felt my stamina and strength increase, but it was at this point that I realised I had to cool it with the gym a little bit, because I did not want to enter into a cycle of obsessive behavior. Behaviors that echoed previous eating disorders of yore.

From August 2023 onwards, I decreased my gym attendance to 3-4 times a week. At that point, I still hadn’t really seen any significant changes in my body outside of the fact that a few of my size 24 clothes were looser fitting. I started incorporating a lot more protein into my food intake in order to help build more muscle for the gym, and for the most part…didn’t really think too much into it.

Cut to now

Cut to October 2024. I’m a bit smaller than I was, and if I’m having an honest moment with you all, I’m not the biggest fan of it. I’m mourning my body. And there are a couple of reasons why, which I’ll break down below.

I miss my bigger body.

Which sounds strange to me because you’d think I was a size 8 with the way I’m carrying on about missing ‘the bigger me’, but in reality, I have gone down from a UK size 24 to a UK size 20. The reason I probably look smaller is because I have no hips and no bum – something I’ve been trying to gain by going to the gym in the bloody first place! #SpongebobSquareBody But we love it anyway. But let me explain:

It took me the best part of 20 years to come to terms with; and love my body the way it was. I worked incredibly hard to improve my self-esteem and confidence, to proudly say I loved my fat body. I spent years involving myself with the various body positive/fat acceptance communities to unpack trauma, unlearn toxic, fatphobic thoughts and narratives, and to help challenge societies’ perception of what it means to be an awesome fat babe. I’ve done the work, and have tried to help educate others on doing the work. I was and am proud of the body I had. My fat body was my safe space, a place I was privileged enough to call ‘home’.

I did all this work, only to get smaller and feel as if i’ve betrayed myself, my body and my audience, and it sickens me. I loved my bigger arms. I loved my stomach and my side fat. And my boobs – although incredibly saggy – had a plumpless to them that made them look WONDERFUL in bras. Don’t get me wrong, the arms and the tummy etc are still there, they are just a little smaller but I miss it. I miss how my face looked when it was a little plumper. I looked like a CHILD lol. When I look in the mirror, I still see me, but I feel like a traitor. Not only that, but I feel as if I’ve lost some of my confidence. My spark. My pizazz.

It’s a weird one because in my pre-body positivity days back when I was full of internalised fatphobia and self-hatred, I would always dream of the day when I would eventually lose weight, and how happy I would be. Well, that day has come and I feel absolutely nothing. Because I’ve worked so hard to diminish those fatphobic narratives we all grew up with years ago, I no longer connect my worth or beauty to my weight, so when I look at my smaller body, I don’t see myself as ‘more desirable’ or ‘more attractive’. I see exactly the same person, just in a body that can now wear Damson Madder (something i’ll touch on later).

Loose Skin

Let me take you guys back to the ‘drained ballsack’ example I opened with above! When you lose weight in a short-ish period of time, you can develop loose skin, even if you strength train. Now, looking in the mirror and seeing this skin has been….an adjustment. My aforementioned WONDERFUL boobs? Gone. GARRRRN. Deflated. Withered, like a raisin in the sun. Drained ballsacks on my chest. You get where I’m going with this. My loose skin under my arms now rub against my side fat skin pockets, which cause painful sores and scabs. That’s not fun. It’s excruciating, and is something I may do something about surgically at some point in the distant future. My eyes are a lot more sunken which – considering i have Steve Buscemi eyes – isn’t ideal. But! We move. For the most part, it is what it is, I’ve grown to accept it, but the boobage does hurt a little, as it means I cannot fit bras in the way I used to due to having no volume in the top halves of my breast tissue. Meh. *shrugs*.

The Bloody Timing of it All

Chile….everybody and their mama seems to be on the Semiglutides now, aren’t they? We’ve all noticed it. Body image activists, influencers, models, celebrities etc etc are shooting up. In the year or so that injections such as WeGovy and Ozempic have been made available for mass use, we’ve seen the girlies slimming down. Because everyone has been doing it at the same time, naturally people have assumed that I have been taking it too, which I haven’t. I’ve spent the last year and a bit posting consistent workouts on my Instagram feed so…no.

I’ve also been very vocal about how anti-semiglutide I am (when taken by non-diabetics and people who haven’t been prescribed it due to serious medical issues). Not only does it promote the toxic ‘skinny’ culture we’ve all been trying to disassemble for the last however many years, but according to many studies, it could have terrible side effects for people who don’t ‘necessarily’ need it, including thyroid cancer, a paralysed stomach, kidney/gallbladder problems, and a host of other gastro issues.

There aren’t enough studies to show the negative effects due of long-time use, because it’s relatively new, and as someone whose health has always been okay, I’m never going to voluntarily take a drug that could cause so many terrible issues for the sake of being thin. You must be crazy. Not only that, but you have to take it once a week for the rest of your life in order to maintain your weight loss. If you go off it, it’s a huge chance that you’ll regain the weight (and then some). What kind of life is that?

Now, I don’t mean to shame anyone who has chosen to dope up with Ozenny, but I know the vast majority of people who *are* on it, aren’t diabetic, and aren’t taking it *for their health*, it’s just something to add to the conversation. At the end of the day, it’s no one’s business.

‘Ok but have you noticed any differences since getting smaller?’

This is a question I’ve been asked a few times over the last few months, and since existing in a smaller body, I have noticed the following:

• I’m able to wear clothing from a bigger pool of brands than before.
• People now seem to feel comfortable sitting next to me on public transport
• I can walk for longer periods of time
• I no longer use an extended seatbelt when flying
• People I haven’t seen in a long time ‘complimenting’ my appearance.

That’s it. People still try and take the piss with me at the gym. Men do not flirt or check for me (I mean, I have a BF but you get what I mean!). The hospitals still do not take my queries seriously, blaming any pain I have on my weight. This isn’t to be all ‘woe-is-me’ because it’s not, but for me personally, I haven’t noticed any huge differences in how I feel, or how society treats me – based on losing two dress sizes.

I’ve always had issues with being complimented in general, however now more so than ever, I do hate the comments I can sometimes get from people who haven’t seen me in a while. I hate that people feel the need to now tell me that I’m ‘glowing’ or that I ‘look good’, because why didn’t size 24 Steph deserve those same compliments? Why am I only worthy of ‘looking good’ now? They make me feel sad. They make feel like size 24-Steph was undeserving of acknowledgement due to her weight. If you didn’t think my beauty was worth complimenting me back then, I don’t want your compliments now.

I think the biggest benefit this body change has had for me has been seeing how little I care about the change. I’m never going to be one of those influencers/public figures who starts flaunting their before and after images (both in public and in close friends stories), or talking shit about my bigger body. I’m not going to get on Instagram and talk about how my audience should consider losing weight for their health. I’m not going to start using fatphobic language in any way when it comes to my content. I don’t talk about my body. I don’t like talking about my body. I don’t care that it currently looks this way, and I’m 100% okay with going back to a size 24 if my body fluctuates again next year. Why? Because I looked fucking great at a size 24, and at a size 26 a couple of years before that.

I know the 21 year old Stephanie would be seething to hear this, considering she would have given her right lung to even be a size smaller, but the simple fact is I do not care.

Am I happy that I can fit into more clothes? Of course! I’m a fashion girl. Give me all the clothes. But why weren’t we afforded this before? Why can’t bigger bodies have the same access to clothing? I’m going to continue to use my platform as a content creator and writer to advocate for inclusivity in these areas, as well as in general. Now that I’m in a smaller body, I’m very aware of the space I take up in these areas, and so want to try as much as possible not to centre myself in spaces that should absolutely be chaired by someone in a bigger body than me now. So if it looks like i’m not as vocal in the body image spaces, it’s not because I’m not a part of them anymore, it’s more-so that I’ve passed the names of people I love onto brands and companies who I think would be better suited for certain opportunities.

Anyway, I say all this to say, I know that there are a lot of changes going on in the plus size world at the moment. The fatphobia is rife. Our faves are shrinking. Clothing stores hate us. Our Prime Minister wants to put fat people in Ozempic labs in order to go back to work. It feels as if we’re transitioning back into the Bad Place again (not that it ever left tbh…). And maybe this means nothing coming from me now, but there are still so many of us fighting the good fight to try and normalise all bodies. To incite discourse on normalising fatness and trying to dismantle the systemic fatphobia at every turn. Regardless of how I show up in this ever fluctuating body, that’s one thing that’ll never change.