Last week was the first week of chilly weather of the season. I was getting ready for work when I realized “I DON’T 
HAVE A THING TO WEAR!” From time to time I go crazy and throw away or donate everything, and that must have happened sometime between spring and now. Lucky for me, I know a professional stylist, Candace, and sent her a message. I’ve worked with her before and she is fantastic so I’ll be working with her again. Now, it’s helpful to give a stylist all of the pertinent info about what help is needed so as preparation for our meeting I decided to look up fashion advice online regarding how to dress an apple shaped body. Lawdamercy, I had no idea what I was in for!
Now a little background about my body if you don’t already know me: I am an apple shape, as a result of genetics. All the women on the maternal side of my family have some variation of this shape. We have rounded midsections, broad backs, and heavier on top. If we were to completely let ourselves go we could turn into Jabba the Hutt. My biggest complaint is that people ask me if I’m pregnant thanks to my disproportionately rotund tummy. I generally wear size 10 and am average height 5’6″, which makes me slightly overweight but certainly not a plus size. I suppose my breast size is average and my arms and legs are fairly fit looking.
Where am I going with all this? Well, some of the “advice” I found online contained chillingly negative messages about my sweet, juicy apple shape. Truth be told, I would have preferred almost any other body type to the apple shape for myself. Sure, I wish I were an hourglass, and have tried everything, including things I’m not particularly proud of, to change my shape. Still, even though I didn’t particularly LIKE my shape, I didn’t HATE my whole body, geez! There is a huge gap here. I generally avoid all of the advice that purports to hide flaws, camouflage, disguise, conceal, or otherwise standardize my shape. I also skipped sites that assume that women with this shape are all obese and unattractive but I still managed to run across this nonsense:
My best friend loves apples and is really fond of them. But unfortunately due to health issues and her love for food has actually turned her into an apple shaped figure…Please don’t despair if you are shaped like an apple. It does not mean the end of the world, trust me you too can walk through life in style. Simply follow these top fashion tips for apple shaped women and you can easily hide your problematic areas.~random website.
WTH kind of thing is that to say? Who thinks apples are the end of the world? The whole world? Really now? I bet the writer is really talking about herself and her miserably bad body image. What was she trying to accomplish? Her advice wasn’t even that good. Other sites advised the juicy apples to dress in monochromatic colors–for what? Or dilute ourselves in some dark murky colors so as not to draw attention to our jacked up shape–that’s always desirable, right?
I just wanted to look well put together, balanced, and proportioned and be comfortable in some non-fussy clothes that don’t make me feel like a sausage in the microwave about to bust out of its casing when I sit down. If I hated my figure then I wouldn’t bother to take the time and effort to dress it up nice. And then I guess it would be the end of the world.
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