The Body Issue: In-betweeners. Plus Gifs.

                                                        Photo by Couvercle

The problem with titles and boxes, especially when it comes to body issues, beauty and fashion is that it's seldom exhaustively inclusive of all the factors across the spectrum.

Let me explain.

On the runway, a model of say size 4 will showcase a fab outfit and it'll hit her body in wonderful places and it'll be amazing.
Then, a size 4 woman in Port-Harcourt who is not a model, buys the same outfit and it doesn't fit the same way.
Aside from the fact that one woman is a model and the other is not, why the different results?
One answer - shape.
I mean, proportions. Statistics, if you will. Or a quirk of creation that underlines the point that our existence is one built to show-off, embrace and even celebrate differences and variety.
The model is a straight-ish figure with a particular set of statistics, while the woman is curvy and has a different set.
No problem.
Was the outfit created for the model or the woman? Or does it even matter?
After years of calling my body size 'average', i stumbled across a thing in the fashion industry called in-betweeners. Yes.
'They' say that in-betweeners are people whose body size don't fall into either the slim or plus size. Like sizes 10 and 12, or so.
Their shapes are a lot of times, not really relevant.
They are not thin, no. They are not fat either. What are they? plump? average? real?
They have to be called something, because, reasons, so, in-betweeners.
Children of god, i am an in-betweener.
A size 10 to 12 who is most comfortable in a size 12 top due to my mile-wide shoulders and a size 14 bottom, as i don't really love tight-fitting things.
A regular hour-glass-ish shape but without the snatched small waist (*evil stare*).
One good thing about this body of mine though (in the spirit of loving your body) is explained with this gif-

Just a little 'girdle', contour, sucking-belle and nice baffs, and i can look fab.
Speaking of 'girdles' and photoshopping bodyshopping, one time i wanted to buy a waist-trainer in Balogun market, some women i met in the store had varying reactions to my purchase request.
One said "Which waist do you want to train?! This small thing?! *pointing to my stomach*.
Another just stared at me and then scoffed.
The third woman smiled at me in understanding and then told me about her own experience with waist-training..
The shop owner just swiftly brought out two types of the stuff for me to choose from, her face a completely neutral mask. She didn't care about my emotions.
I didn't buy the waist trainer. End of story.
If you ask a lot of people to describe me, you'll most likely hear "not tall, not short. not big, not small. not fat, not slim. not too dark, not too fair, etc.
It's a very odd thing to be, an in-betweener.
On social media slim people are #goals, plus-sized people are #boldandfierce and #bodypositive, in-betweeners are... what?
I say #fluid, #versatile, #bestofbothworlds, #etc, Beyonce, basically.

I'll share more about this in-betweeness matter in the part 2 of this post, looking at styling and owning this size.
Hard as it might be to believe, this body size can be a quite tricky to style, as you can easily get tipped into some other body size/category with your choice of outfit color or cut.
One key truth is that at the end of the day, no matter your size or shape, if your mind is right and your 'packaging' is tight, then you'll be fine. Cliche but solid.


Also, WHY HAVEN'T I BEEN POSTING GIFs?? seeing as i'm obsessed with them??

You can read up on this in-betweeners matter from these articles at Pop Sugar & Refinery29 .

Please share your thoughts in the comments section!