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Refinery29
  • 3 hours ago
For a lot of women, the feeling that you (and your body) don't belong at the beach exists before their feet even touch the sand. More often than not, it begins in swimsuit dressing rooms. Described as everything from a "mild disaster," to flat-out "torture," bathing suit shopping is a major source of anxiety.

Watch as these women sound off on how swimsuit shopping makes them feel, and how to deal.
Transcript
00:12Going bathing suit shopping is like kind of a mild disaster, constantly.
00:17Why is there nothing that fits me?
00:20Why is the lighting in here so bad?
00:23Oh my god, I have cellulite.
00:25I mean, I know I have cellulite, but like I'm really good at forgetting that I have
00:29cellulite.
00:30My internal monologue when I'm trying on bathing suits is unfortunately pretty negative.
00:35Ah, damn it.
00:37And like pulling and like trying to get something and then like realizing, oh, it's too small.
00:42I'm like, I look stupid and my stomach's big and fat.
00:45And then you're just tired and then you leave with nothing and then you just feel like you
00:48wasted your life.
00:51It's like, I guess I'm going to the beach someday.
00:53That's what I was preparing for.
00:55That was supposed to be fun.
00:56And then this made me want to vomit.
01:01When I hear the phrase beach body, I mean, I don't think of me.
01:06Tall, probably like tan, no body fat.
01:09Like, you know what I mean?
01:11Like everything's like sucked and perfect.
01:15Some days you wake up and you're like, oh my God, I am banging.
01:19Like, thank God.
01:20And then some days you wake up and you're like, well, turns out I'm a monster piece of garbage.
01:25And I didn't realize that.
01:28It can be definitely a way for me to torture myself.
01:33You learn from a young age that weight matters, dude.
01:36Wow, it looks like you have no chest.
01:40All of these images and ideas that you have about what other women look like, supposedly.
01:46You will never be what you want to be.
01:49Sorry.
01:51I'm going to get emotional because my mom is so great.
01:55She would talk to me about how she felt when she was younger.
01:58If I had a daughter, I would just want to make sure that she felt confident in herself and
02:04not apologize and feel great about who she is and not think that being a woman or being
02:11a girl is somehow less than.
02:13Don't be afraid to desexualize yourself if that's how you feel.
02:22I think what we could do to make women have a better body image is stop telling women that
02:29their worth is how they look.
02:31Representing the fact that there are so many types of women.
02:35That's why plus size bloggers and us girls, we've got to be out here like, girl, love your
02:39body.
02:41I like my skin color.
02:45I love my hips.
02:47I am an embodiment of Kate Bosworth.
02:51I don't know if I necessarily have a beach body, but I'm going to be on that beach.
02:56Yeah.
02:57Oh, that's like a nice little apple pie right there.
03:01But also wear sunscreen because I mean, beach is very dangerous.

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