What is beautiful in your mind?

 

What exactly is beautiful?!  Glamour Magazine, one of the nation’s leading beauty and fashion magazines is in an uproar over the semi-nude pictures of  plus size model Lizzie Miller in it’s newly dropped September issue.  A “plus-size” model by modeling industry standards even though she is a  size 12 – 14.

 

  

For this post, I am going to get on my soapbox.   This is very personal to me since I am a  beautiful plus-size woman.  I have gone up and down in my weight all of my life, also doing some so-called plus size modeling in my 20’s at size 10 – 12! 

 

With obesity rates for US females ranking us 8^th in the world, I am well aware of this problem.  Is this good news?  Heck no!  Many of us are trying to adopt new healthy eating habits and incorporate exercise into our daily lives to live long and productive lives.  But the reality, which is my reality and most of the women in the US today is that we are not a size 0,2, 4, 6 or even 10.  The average size of the American woman is a size 14 in this country!  

 

What I am truly tired of is the constant barrage of thin, thin women being made this country’s beauty symbols through popular beauty publications, television, movies, internet and print advertising.  Too many of our young women who are not these thin model like people are becoming self-loathing, habitual dieters, diet pill popping, some even becoming anorexic and bulimic in their desperate attempts to become these unrealistic symbols of beauty! 

 

The outcry that has resulted from Glamour Magazine’s pictorial of Lizzie Miller is a standing ovation from average sized women around the country.  They are thrilled to see someone that looks like them and is happy in her own skin!  Beauty is said to be in the eye of the beholder but I say that Beauty is how you see yourself! 

 

I applaud Glamour magazine for their bravery in rocking the status quo.  To read Glamour Magazine’s blog post regarding Lizzie Miller’s pictorial, click on “Glamour”.

 

In keeping with this topic, Rene’John Designs will be featuring a future blog category called  “Botticelli Brides”.  This is a specialty section for brides with curves.  A pictorial spread of beautiful curvaceous woman who are proud of themselves, who they are at whatever size they my presently be.  This section will provide on-line and local resources for the shapely “Botticelli Bride”.   Watch for it and Enjoy Beauty!  (That’s you)