I was tired of being tired, tired of having no money, no social life, no certainty and never feeling good enough. I also knew I was never going to recover from my eating disorders if I kept allowing myself to follow the beauty advice of people whose ideals were so far-fetched you might as well be reading a fairy tale.
I sat on this news for a day or so. Don’t get me wrong – my anxiety was awful, but only because I was thinking about what I’d do now that my dreams were over. My media course finished in a couple of days, and I was well and truly back to the beginning.
There was one thing I was certain about, though.
There suddenly seemed to be a lot more to life than being thin.
I’d written the Facebook post on the Tube home, after my sadness had turned to anger. Who the hell did these people think they were?! It was easy for these bookers to sit there and judge me from their office desks, not realizing just how much work I was putting in every day.
This is what it said.
Here’s a big F*CK YOU to my (now ex) model agency, for saying that at 5’ 8” tall and a UK size 6–8, I’m “too big” and “out of shape” to work in the fashion industry.
I will no longer allow you to dictate to me what’s wrong with my looks and what I need to change in order to be “beautiful” (like losing one f***ing inch off my hips), in the hope it might force you to find me work.
I refuse to feel ashamed and upset on a daily basis for not meeting your ridiculous, unattainable beauty standards, whilst you sit at a desk all day, shovelling cakes and biscuits down your throats and slagging me and my friends off about our appearance. The more you force us to lose weight and be small, the more designers have to make clothes to fit our sizes, and the more young girls are being made ill. It’s no longer an image I choose to represent.
In case you hadn’t realized, I am a woman. I am human. I cannot miraculously shave my hip bones down, just to fit into a sample size piece of clothing or to meet “agency standards”. I have fought nature for a long time, because you’ve deemed my body shape too “curvaceous”, but I have recently began to love my shape. I don’t have big boobs, but my bum is ok :) plus, a large majority of my clients are ok with this.
And anyway, let’s face the facts: when I was 7 and a half stone, I still wasn’t thin enough for you. When I went to the gym 5 hours a week, you still weren’t finding me work. I can’t win.
Ironically, I do love modelling – the people I’ve met, the places I’ve visited and I am proud of the jobs I’ve done. I will continue to do it, but only on my terms. My mental and physical health is of more importance than a number on a scale, however much you wish to emphasize this.
If an agency wishes to represent me for myself, my body & the WOMAN I’ve become, give me a call. Until then, I’m off to Nando’s.
It wasn’t just aimed at them, either: it was aimed at everyone who had ever made me feel fat or worthless. I was done. I never wanted to model again. And then I clicked ‘post’.
My phone was blowing up left, right and centre. People were calling me, either to tell me how funny what I’d written was, or that I should take it down. But I refused to. I’d finally had enough.
My post began getting shared. By that evening alone it had been shared about two hundred times. I hadn’t realized how many women, models or not, had felt the pressures of trying to become thin. This was a problem that had affected women the world over. Although my eating disorders had frequently made me feel alone, I saw how so many of us had struggled.
Suddenly, now I didn’t have an agency, I was everywhere: daytime telly, The Times, the Daily Mail. It must’ve been a slow news day. My Facebook post had gone viral. People saw me across the world, from Italy to Pakistan.
I thought I could handle this attention, but I was finding it hard to. It was like I was having an out-of-body experience. I was contacted by hundreds of journalists to give a statement. I went from having 6,000 followers on Instagram to 20,000 in a week.
I was too scared to go on TV, but the woman who ran my course said I should do it to help other people. And so I did. More and more messages flooded in from girls who’d all been through the same thing: girls who were literally on their death beds from anorexia being told to diet; girls who, like me, bought fashion magazines and who became ill trying to emulate the models. I wasn’t alone. People were on my side.
This attention lasted for about a week. On day two, I was contacted by an agency in New York, Muse, asking if I could call them. No way, I thought. I’m not going down that route again.
But out of interest I decided to google this agency and was surprised by what I saw. They were huge, yes, representing some of the world’s biggest fashion models, but they also had a curve division – beautiful girls who were landing huge jobs, but who had tits and an arse. I’d always been a bit snooty towards curve models – I never considered them ‘real models’ – but the jobs these girls were getting in New York proved me wrong.
Within a few days, I signed a contract and they flew me out there. My new life had begun.
13
My Fairy-tale Ending
(For Real, This Time)
I had been in New York for a week and a half and I was anxious as hell, swamped by such a huge city. Although this was a massive deal for me, Scott and his parents were putting pressure on me to fly back to London earlier than I wanted for a family birthday party, so I didn’t feel I could relax. This was my fresh start, and yet it felt Scott didn’t want it for me. (Turns out I was right – he didn’t.)
I was totally overcome that an agency as wonderful as Muse wanted to represent me. I expected them to drop me at any moment, coming to their senses. They had girls shooting campaigns for the likes of Chloe, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Marc Jacobs, and shooting spreads for Vogue, Elle and all the other major magazines. It all seemed too good to be true. Too good for me, anyhow.
I was completely overwhelmed with how my life had taken such a sudden turn. I’d gone from being dropped by an agency in London to being flown out to New York – the one place they told me I’d never make it – within two weeks. What the hell was happening?!
The day I stepped into my New York agency for the first time, I came across a small section of model cards hanging on the wall in the curve division. I’d met a couple of curve models back in England, but – and I’m ashamed to say it – I never took them seriously. Well, why would I? No one took me seriously if I gained so much as an inch. And so, rather ignorantly, I’d always assumed any models who had a bit of extra flesh weren’t model material, either.
Except these girls were modelling. The jobs they were booking spoke for themselves: they’d modelled for the world’s biggest brands and magazines, and their photos were high-end and high fashion. It seemed ludicrous to me that some of these girls were considered plus-size when they were smaller than most girls you saw in the street. Although they were bigger than me, I didn’t think they were any less attractive than I was. They were a million times more beautiful – their bodies were so sexy and womanly. And despite what I’d been led to believe my entire modelling career, their curves weren’t a deterrent, but a selling point.
What also stood out to me was the fact these girls were smiling on their comp cards – not in a cheesy kind of way, but in a natural way because they weren’t starving themselves, which I suppose makes everyone cheery. Everyone is happier when they’re allowed a pizza or two, aren’t they? And here these girls were, getting to model, while actually ENJOYING it. What a dream! I couldn’t help but feel envious.
But I wasn’t here in New York as a curve model – I was here to, once again, work as a ‘straight-sized’ model. And this time, the competition would be harder than ever before: I would truly be up against the elite. New York is the biggest and most competitive market for models, and if you can make it there, you can make it anywhere.
The thought of having to maintain a small body size again stressed me out. My mind began racing, repeatedly telling me I’d be dr
opped if I gained the teeniest bit of weight. And I was so desperate not to let anyone down that I felt the stress more than ever.
Remember how I said I didn’t remember the first time I’d made myself sick? Well, I certainly remember the last. The Brain Deviant had been bombarding me with stressful thoughts, from navigating a new city to being pressured to fly back early by Scott, worrying I was morbidly obese, and having no money. The second week into my stay, I’d been invited out for dinner by an old school friend from Hamburg, who’d offered to show me around New York. That’s one good thing about moving a lot, I suppose – you have friends across the world to call on.
He took me to a lovely restaurant in an expensive neighbourhood, and on the way there I walked past a pet shop with puppies in the window. Oh God, how cruel! Were they all right in there?! It broke my heart seeing them pawing at the glass. One more worry to add to my list.
With the thought of these puppies fresh on my mind, I sat down and ordered a burger and chips, which I thought would be culturally appropriate in the land of fried food. I wanted this old friend to see I could enjoy food like a normal human being, except of course my mind was calculating all the calories in the dishes. No alcohol; I stuck to water. (I couldn’t risk any more calories being digested, could I?)
When the burger came I took a huge bite into it. OH MY GOD. It was delicious. I’d go so far to say it was the best burger I’d ever had in my life, but this was coming from someone who hadn’t eaten a burger or bread in over two years, so perhaps I wasn’t the best person to judge.
But then, right on cue, the Brain Deviant kicked in.
‘CONGRATULATIONS, YOU FAT F*CK!!!’ it yelled. ‘YOU WILL HAVE GAINED A STONE FROM THAT BURGER!!! WHERE’S YOUR WILLPOWER?! WHY WOULD YOU HAVE A BURGER, WHEN YOU’VE BEEN OFFERED THE BIGGEST OPPORTUNITY OF YOUR LIFE TO MODEL IN NEW YORK?!!’
‘Are you OK?’ my friend asked. ‘You seem a bit quiet.’
‘Yeah, fine!’ I lied.
In actual fact I’d begun to internally panic, my hands dripping with sweat. The Brain Deviant was right. I’d been given this amazing opportunity, and when I next went in to Muse they were bound to drop me for the overnight weight gain. All because I couldn’t control my cravings.
I finished the burger in record time, racing it down until I could barely breathe, then excused myself to go to the loo. God, even the toilets looked like something out of The Ritz – perfect navy blue octagonal tiles everywhere and gold finishings. Not that it mattered: it would be splattered with my sick within minutes.
My throat hurt as I kept ramming two fingers down my throat. My nails were sharp. Images of the puppies in the window kept flashing up, then images of me looking fat, fat, fat from that stupid-but-oh-so-delicious burger. I imagined how great I’d feel once the sick had left my system; how clean and pure I’d feel …
Mascara ran down my face as though I’d dunked my head underwater. My eyes were red and bloodshot. I grabbed toilet paper and scrubbed the surfaces ferociously, feeling bad for spoiling such a beautiful interior. God, what must people think?
As I walked back to the table I hoped the dim light in the restaurant would somehow hide the abysmal physical state I was now in. We got the bill, my eyes not reaching my friend’s in the hope he wouldn’t notice anything different. Experience taught me the bloodshot eyes would fade in a few minutes anyway.
As we said our goodbyes and I headed home the usual relaxed feeling I’d get after being sick hadn’t arrived. I held my head in my hands on the subway. This wasn’t normal. Throwing up a lovely (and expensive) meal wasn’t normal. This way of dealing with stress WAS NOT NORMAL.
I knew I needed help. I didn’t want to be this way any more. But you can’t just shake off eating disorders or low self-esteem. They don’t just disappear. My fairy-tale ending had come … and yet it didn’t feel like it. Why didn’t I feel calm? Why didn’t I feel content with the opportunity I’d been given?
When I got home, I started crying. I cried that night and I cried in the morning. Once I’d calmed down and stopped being so irrational, I decided to do what I should have done a long time ago – call my parents and tell them I had a problem.
There were two reasons why I’d never sought help for my bulimia before. First, I thought people would think I was attention-seeking, especially my parents, and being referred to as bulimic would’ve been mortifying to me. Secondly, I’d always maintained what I was doing was OK, because it was my secret.
The sentence ‘I’ve been making myself sick since I was fourteen’ blurted out of my mouth like … well … word vomit. This sense of relief was like nothing I’d ever experienced before. And you know what? Rather than yell at me or call me attention-seeking, which is what the Brain Deviant made me believe would happen, my parents were AMAZING. I explained how I’d been doing this in secret for ten years now, and how I did it as a means of stress relief because of my nerves. I’d been so good at hiding it that they never knew I’d been struggling.
The following March, I moved to New York for good. What was supposed to be a three-month stay ended up being permanent, as Scott and I broke up. That was a fun time! I’d only been in New York a few weeks when he told me he’d met someone else. Don’t worry, though – once I stopped crying I realized what a blessing in disguise that was. He was holding me back from achieving my dreams, happy to live an average life, and now I was ready to put myself, my health and my career first.
Having said that, it wasn’t easy pretending I didn’t have an eating disorder. I still very much did. People kept calling me ‘brave’ for talking about my treatment by my ex-agency, asking me if I’d ever had an eating disorder, and suddenly I felt on the spot and ashamed. I wasn’t ready to talk about it yet. I hoped that if I didn’t speak about it, people might stop asking.
As much as I wanted to model I desperately wanted to be free from my demons, too. After years of battling food I was finally ready to get better. That’s the thing with eating disorders – you need to want to get better yourself. No one can make that decision for you. Besides, I was happy in New York. I didn’t want a repeat of Paris, where I ate nothing for days. I wanted to enjoy myself. I was jealous of other people having social lives and going out with friends, eating and drinking like normal people did. Why couldn’t I be the same?
I’d gradually come to the realization that I wasn’t as fat as I thought. Or that I was, but deep down I actually knew that I wasn’t. Does that make sense? No, of course it doesn’t, but that’s anorexia for you. You’re completely delusional. One minute your body looks thin, the next it’s morbidly obese. I would close my eyes and mutter, ‘I am not fat, I am not fat,’ as though that would somehow change the distorted view I saw in the mirror … and yet it didn’t. But something told me that if I kept telling myself I wasn’t fat, eventually I’d believe it.
Becoming a curvy model did not happen overnight. Nor did getting better. But I knew I couldn’t throw up any more. Instead, if I got the overwhelming urge to ‘clean myself’ (as I liked to call it), I would do something else to distract from those thoughts. A ten-minute shower was all I needed for the thoughts to drift away. I was stronger than this illness. I just knew it.
Meanwhile, the curve board at Muse was doing better and better. I watched intently as the fashion industry began taking notice of curvier girls. They were landing bigger campaigns and magazine editorials, and gradually the board was getting bigger. Becca, the head of the curve division, genuinely believes in fashion being more diverse, and listening to her talk about the change needed was truly refreshing to hear.
Between moving to America and trying to battle my demons, without realizing, I’d slowly begun putting on weight. This now left me in a tricky spot. My body didn’t seem to fit in either of the markets. As I put on weight, I now faced the problem of being too big to work as a straight-sized model, and too small to fit the curve. I would turn up to castings and people would question why the hell I was there, or not even see me at all.
I didn’t fit in anywhere. I’d be on hold for jobs that would fall through last minute – so near, yet so far. That first year, I only worked a couple of times, and yet despite my concerns Muse said they weren’t going to drop me. They believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself, refusing to let go.
Despite the lack of work, day by day, my happiness was growing. This might sound a bit dramatic, but the last time I’d ever felt this content was as an eight-year-old at my dodgy primary. So much of this new-found happiness came from food and the fact I was upping my calorie intake. Nothing bad happened if I ate a few potatoes at dinner or cereal in the morning. Nothing bad happened if I didn’t exercise that day, or if I had an afternoon snack. I was starting to see food as a friend, as nourishing, and not my worst enemy.
Towards the end of that first year in New York, I landed a make-up campaign with one of the world’s biggest brands. It was a dream come true to see my face splashed across the New York subways and the internet. By this stage, I was a UK size ten and, after having thrown away my measuring tapes, weird calorie-counting notebooks and scales, I hadn’t been taking note of my weight.
It was lovely seeing how supportive Muse were. And then I noticed Becca, who wasn’t my direct agent at the time, had shared my new campaign online.
Her caption read something along the lines of how great it was that curve girls can also land make-up campaigns. My heart stopped. Me? Curvy?! All the negative connotations I had with that word suddenly came to the forefront of my mind. Damn, I must’ve gained weight – noticeably.
But when I studied the video properly, I was curvy. She was right. I had a tummy. My thighs were bigger. And so what? What was so bad about that? It didn’t make me any more or less attractive. The make-up brand clearly didn’t think I resembled Shrek, hence why they’d booked me for the campaign. Besides, I’d spent the last year envying the careers and lives of the models on the curve board, so why was I worried?! It was a compliment, if anything. I’d kill to look like some of the models on there.
Misfit Page 19
