When Your Body Changes Shape: Love From the Rev. Dr. Honeycrisp

There is nothing like the living, moving camera footage to tell you quite honestly what shape you’re at. I am in rehearsals right now for “Cabaret,” and my wonderful director takes rehearsal footage so we can review our scenes and numbers at home. I tend to wear fairly fitted garments when rehearsing so I can move comfortably and be aware of my limbs and what I’m doing with them, and my stance, and my posture, and everything about my presence. I rehearse in shoes similar to those I am going to wear so that I can feel how my character stands. Last week I was doing my big act one number while wearing some snug heels and I almost tipped over when doing one gesture, so that was good to know. My character is a very solid, grounded lady and it wouldn’t do to be falling off my feet.

So anyway, although I see myself on video footage preaching, I am generally wearing robes so I haven’t fully seen what the Snacking Ravages of the Winter have contributed to my apple shape. Well, now I have seen it. My clothes still fit and my weight hasn’t gone up much, but that doesn’t mean a lot. As they say, you can go up a good 20 lbs. in most modern clothes and not bust buttons because today’s cuts and fabrics tend to have a lot of give. I may have put on only four or five lbs., but you know how a pregnant woman will suddenly *pop* at about her third or fourth month and suddenly the baby bump is super evident? These last lbs. have definitely brought me full circle to total apple shape. I am an apple on legs. And the legs – well, they’re moving from chicken leg to turkey drumstick comparisons.

I have said this many times : I don’t hate fat and I don’t hate my body and I don’t think fat bodies (including mine) are ugly or immoral. Fat is just fat. I am fat like I have brown hair and tiny hands. I can change my hair color, I can change my body shape. That’s not what this post is about.

This post is about the way I hope you look at yourself when your body shape changes, however it changes and for whatever reasons. I hope you will be honest about it, kind and appreciative of it (after all, it is your body and it tells your story) and strategic about how you want to dress and adorn it for whatever its real shape is at this time.

Most people do not stay the same shape all their lives. Even if your weight is stable, the weight shifts as muscle mass changes. So this is not just for people who gain or lose weight.
This is about bosoms that droop, or waistlines that disappear, or ankles that suddenly become quite thick and not to your personal liking, or biceps and pecs that soften and create a surprising new form that makes yous self-conscious in the golf shirts you’ve always felt served you perfectly well as day attire. What to do now?

Please do not dress to hide your body. Do assure that your clothing fits you well.
Please do not hide from your body changes or ignore them. They’re there, it’s okay, you’re who you are and worthy and wonderful. You’re here. You have important things to do and love to dispense. You are a leader. Step out and show up, but bring your body along in honesty. This means that you may have to visit a tailor or engage the services of a stylist to help you find outfits that make you feel good and suit you in your current form.

Please do not hold off on beauty because of a future goal. This is a vicious thing to do to yourself. Don’t say, “I’ll get a suit when I lose weight.” What, and walk around now busting out of your sports jackets? Appear at events in trousers that pool around your tushie and ankles because you’re hoping to put on some of the weight you lost when you were receiving chemo treatments? Squeeze into your pre-pregnancy or pre-Winter of 2015 summer office hours dresses as a way of “motivating” yourself to stick to your diet?

Posh and tiddle. Piddle and twosh, or whatever they say in England. Tosh. I think it’s tosh. Twosh and poddle.

LOOK YOUR BEST NOW, AS YOU ARE.

I am an apple. I am a round Cortland apple, or maybe a Pink Lady apple or a Macoun. Call me Rev. Honeycrisp. My fore and aft are round all the way around and topped by an ample bosom, all balanced on tiny feet. So that’s what it is now. Maybe always. I never speak for a someday I can’t see and may never know. I can’t only live for today with the body I am in now, and grateful for. This is the body that propels me through these beautiful spring days. This is the body that is on stage every night falling in love and singing beautiful duets and dancing and having her heart broken. This is the body that will travel with me on summer adventures. This is the body through which I pray and think and live and experience the living God. This is the body that wears the pants and shirts and skirts and dresses that fit a bit differently and surprise me and sometimes don’t fit. Those items will be stored in the closet on the left side for now, because I don’t think it will be impossible to make the apple a little bit smaller and fit back into them. But if a year goes by and the apple that is me is still this round, I will send those clothes off to someone else and not allow them to torment me with guilt or regret.

Life is hard and demanding. Sometimes pizza and buttered popcorn seem like friends on another blizzardy night. And then you emerge into the sunshine of the summer and say, “My, my, that pizza definitely was my friend at the time but right now these walking shoes and this dog leash and that path by the beach is a better friend. Let me spend my time with them today.”

You can be, and are, beautiful as you are now.
Find the beauty and show it off.

Kiss of peace, PB

8 Replies to “When Your Body Changes Shape: Love From the Rev. Dr. Honeycrisp”

  1. Sigh. Thank you. I *know* this stuff in my head and yet it’s so hard to resist getting hung up on the actual clothing in my closet. I’m moving this summer and getting rid of things, and I just finally got rid of the gorgeous pinstriped Banana Republic pants I wore in my seminary internship days, because they haven’t fit me for years and there’s no way I’m going to fit into them anytime soon. That felt like such a big deal, and thank you for this affirmation. [You are so welcome. Good luck with your move! – PB]

  2. Your musings are exactly why I love my yoga teacher. She always says at some point “every…body” is unique – modify any pose to suit your body. It’s so affirming.

  3. Such an important post. Particularly for women. Of all sizes and shapes. Even when I weigh the same (OK that was last year), my density and other stuff was different in spite of how much I worked out and how well I ate.

  4. God bless you for this. Over the winter I gained 25 lbs. Some of that was because of inactivity after surgery. Most of it was inactivity because of depression. The crazy thing is, while I’m changing up my wardrobe I’m having so much fun. I’m buying the cute sleeveless sundresses and tights (to ward off chub rub with my thighs). I would not wear these things on Sunday morning, but for pastoral visiting or an informal meeting they are great and comfortable.

    Most of my blazers still fit me. But those that don’t will be going away. I likely will lose some weight and shape shift again, but I do truly believe, holding on to something because it used to fit is part of what is keeping me from losing that weight. Does that make sense?

    Anyway, thank you for the reminder that every body is beautiful. I used to be an hourglass, now I’m an apple. I like Pink Lady apples and Honey Crisp. So, if you are Rev’d Honeycrisp, can I be Rev’d Pinklady? [YES! SMOOCH! – PB]

    Kiss of peace xo

  5. When blazers don’t close (whether because of bellies or boobs) do we have to get rid of them? [I don’t, necessarily. It depends if they’re nipped at the waist. It really depends how they hang, and if the arms feel too tight. I think if you can move your arms freely and the thing isn’t squeezing you too much, and if it hangs nicely, keep it! – PB]

  6. If I got rid of all the blazers / jackets that don’t button right I wouldn’t have any blazers at all.

    I know, I know, I need a tailor and a budget for buying “mid-grade” clothes and having them altered to fit. Someday, after seminary, I will have an income again and maybe I will be able to worry about that sort of thing.

    What actually happens, though, is that I keep the jackets that look presentable when worn open, tucked back on the side of the closet. It’s not 100% knife-edge interview-grade sharp, but when it’s the only jacket in the room and I’m the person not wearing sneakers? It’ll do.

  7. I’ve finally gotten very intentional about chiropractic for my scoliosis, and what I discovered was that Dr. Frank’s work shifted my body shape as well–my thoracic cavity expanded and dresses that used to zip just won’t anymore. He verified this change and I yelled at him for not telling me it might (not really yelled–but I was startled!).

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