Navigating body changes with compassion
On getting dressed without judgment
Welcome to the Esther Studio newsletter! I’m Carly, PhD, a marketing professor and artist living in the Midwest. I like talking about personal style, and I spend a lot of time making jewelry. Keep reading and consider subscribing so we can see more of each other!
Autumn is my favorite season for getting dressed. When the temperature outside starts dropping, as it finally is now in Illinois, one of my most cherished rituals is switching over my closet for the season. I always love rediscovering my cold-weather staples that I’ve been quietly missing for months.
Last weekend, on one of my trips to the sweater-stuffed tubs in my basement, I came upon one of the oldest items in my closet - a faux shearling vest I can trace back to about 2016. At that time, I was 28 and midway through my PhD program, so this vest has really seen some things. Over the years, it has become a closet staple that I can wear casually or even on more subdued workdays in my chilly office.
Holding this vest last weekend, I anticipated all of the cozy outfits I was going to style with it. I experienced genuine comfort at the thought of having it in my rotation again. But sliding my arms through the holes and letting the vest’s smooth lining fall over my t-shirt, I instantly felt wrong. The vest was digging into my armpits and stretching uncomfortably across my back. Too small.
This is a familiar experience for me over the past five years, which is why most of the items in my closet are only a couple of years old. I’ve had to replace my old standbys with new ones in larger sizes. I’d thought my vest was exempt from this process, but… apparently not.
There’s lots to think about here.
Reckoning with body changes
One of the coolest and cruelest things about bodies is that they are constantly changing. While I can intellectually get behind this simple biological fact, it’s a bit harder to reckon with it on a practical level. For me, the reckoning always takes time. It needs hindsight, or breathing room.
A variety of factors in my life have seen my body change in big and little ways since I graduated from my PhD program, moved to the States, and started my professor job. Normal aging, I’m sure, but there’s also the fact that I spent my grad school years under extreme stress that manifested as anxiety and depression, which affected my appetite. During this time, I also ran incredibly long distances. I was mentally and physically drained, and quite slim in a way I didn’t fully recognize at the time.
When I started gaining weight in the first couple of years of my professor job, I was similarly oblivious to the fact that I was probably just in a better headspace overall. I had work stress, yes, but nothing compared to grad school. I had also sworn off the kind of intense running I’d been doing in previous years because I just didn’t want to do it anymore. If my body was a bit bigger, I now see it was because I was more emotionally stable. I had a normal appetite because I wasn’t depressed, and I burned a normal amount of calories because I wasn’t running for hours at a time.
We don’t talk enough, as a society, about why weight gain can be good — or even just neutral. Or, conversely, why weight loss isn’t necessarily something to celebrate. I wouldn’t go back to my grad school weight if it meant I also had to endure that mental space again. To me, my slim body - that I now see in photos and feel tenderly towards - is not something to long for. It represents a somewhat painful, or at least overly stressful, period of my life that I’m so happy to have emerged from.
Throughout these post-PhD years, I’ve had so much fun reworking my relationship to hobbies. When it comes to fitness, I’ve returned to strength training after a couple years’ hiatus. To complement my now more subdued running routine, I visit a high-intensity interval training (HIIT) studio down the street from my house about three times a week. This studio has given me not only a new routine, but a new social circle. I cherish my time with my fitness friends, so I keep going back. And as a result, my body has changed yet again.
I’ve always been a sturdy girl, but as a 36-year-old, my muscles are feature on my frame. We hear a lot about how “strong is the new sexy,” but I don’t even really want to go there. My muscles just are. When I see them in the mirror at the studio, I like the way they look, and I’m proud to be strong, but I’m starting to understand that this is just another era of my body. This era doesn’t define me, and it will make way for another one in due time. For now, I’ll simply try to enjoy traveling wherever this body takes me - seeing the world from this vantage point.
Clothing for a new era
When I tried on my trusty vest and it was too small, there was an old voice in the back of my head that scolded me for being bigger than I once was. But I soon scolded her right back. I know that for me right now, losing weight isn’t a great idea. It would mean making changes I’m just not willing to make, and possibly threatening a delicate mental equilibrium I’m happy to have found.
Still, I’m a problem solver. Never one to turn down a shopportunity, I took to Poshmark to find… the exact same vest in a bigger size.
My new-to-me vest arrived within a few days. When I slipped it on, I felt a familiar hug from the weighty fabric. The bigger size drapes differently and hits my body at a different point, so the new styling options were exciting to me. This is a new vest for a new era. Please join me in admiring it in the photos below!
Learning to view body changes and clothing sizes through a neutral lens took me years. I’m not perfect - I can be quite hard on myself - but I’m getting better. I think something that underscores this gradual change has been the recognition that my body is my home, and my body is me. I deserve the same compassion I would offer anyone else.
In a body-obsessed world, this is a big task. And I’m conscious that I’m still a straight-sized person. My body does not make me the target of size-based discrimination, and I can shop wherever I want. I also have the financial means to “size up” my clothing as needed. Still, resisting the urge to vilify myself for daring to take up more space over the years feels radical in a cultural moment marked by weight-loss drugs and the return of “heroin chic.” I can’t control what makes the news, or how people around me are thinking or acting, but I can be gentle with myself, and that’s enough.
If you recognize yourself in any of my words, I see you. If you’re struggling with body changes, I see you. In the coming weeks, I’m going to keep writing about this topic as it relates personal style. In the meantime, please know that - no matter your size - you deserve to feel at peace in your body just as much as you deserve clothes that fit.