New member introduction: Kathleen
Hi All
I thought it would be good to post a bio before I start inserting my very opinionated two cents.
I found 3FCD via my google alert set for "vanity sizing". The topic arises here enough that I come in a couple of times a week. I have a professional interest in the topic -no, I don't have anything to sell, call it a special research project. I've never contributed before now but after a year of this, I figure it's time I participate to present another side of this complex issue. To put it simply, if it were so easy to define and explain vanity sizing (as it is commonly understood), we would have solved it by now. In my comments, you'll see just how complex and difficult to understand the mechanisms of sizing can be.
I've been a pattern maker in the apparel industry for almost 3 decades. If anyone understands sizing, it's pattern makers. That's our job.
I'm not here to sell anything. My problem is that most of what I've written about vanity sizing is on my commercial site (B2B for clothing designers and manufacturers). I will probably have to light a fire under my butt and post that content on another site. Probably vanitysizing.com -I own the url.
On a personal level, I used to be morbidly obese so I understand the issues more than you might suspect a "skinny" person would and probably explains why I'm obsessed with body sizing. I grew up morbidly obese at a time when few did. I weighed more when I was 10 than I do now. I lost over 150 lbs @ 30 years ago and have kept it off. I don't have a diet to sell you either. The "secret" to my weight loss was that I was so desperate to lose weight that I sold my car and bought a bicycle. Seriously, that is the extent of it. I've been a vegetarian for many years now which probably contributes to weight maintenance.
I can also tell you that in retrospect, losing the weight wasn't the hardest part (for me). After growing up fat, it was recalibrating my self image (brain, internal talk) to become congruent with my new body and to create a new life for myself I couldn't have imagined or even fantasized about. I do not pretend for an instant to speak for anyone else but I blamed my weight as the cause of all my problems. I was very narcissistic and defensive in that I thought the first thing anyone would think about me was that I was obese and that they didn't like me because of it (once I didn't have obesity to blame it on, I had to come to terms that people didn't like me because I was an a$$). I had very low self esteem because of it and never attempted to excel or accomplish anything. I admire people who have never let their weight (or self talk) get in the way of going to college or building a career and life like I had done.
I'm very direct (I have a communication disorder) and hope I will not offend anyone. If I do, it is not intentional. Thanks for reading my bio.
Last edited by kathleen fasanella; 01-26-2011 at 11:45 AM.
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