May 13th - 19th is #MentalHealthAwareness week and this year, the theme is body image. Every day this week we'll have a new guest blog from a handful of our Brastop Babes, and today it's Linzi's turn:
I’m never really sure how to introduce myself and I think that’s because I spent so many years not really knowing who I was, but here we go. I am Linzi, I am mid-thirties, I have 3 children and I love bras, boobs & empowering women. I have been lingerie blogging since 2017 and, if I’m honest, I kind of felt a bit alone in that whole blogger world at first, being a UK size 22ish and I wear a 36J/38HH bra. I didn’t come across many lingerie bloggers who looked like me.
My squishy, stretch marked tummy was visible to all and I didn’t care.
It didn’t take long for my confidence to grow though because the more I “got my kit off” the more other women reached out to me with amazing positive comments. I started wearing pieces that I wouldn’t have even looked at before and I noticed that sharing images of my plus size body was, in fact, helping me to battle my own body demons. I was looking at parts of me that I previously loathed and I realised that I felt ok with what I saw. I remember sharing a picture of myself sat down in nothing but lingerie. My squishy, stretch marked tummy was visible to all and I didn’t care. I had never felt that before.
It’s important to me that I note that this confident feeling isn’t linear though and I still have dips and slumps. Most recently I’ve been diagnosed with fibromyalgia which has meant I’ve been angry that my body has somehow betrayed me by not working properly and it’s left me feeling quite down and made me view my body very differently. I have been almost mourning the “old me”. This will pass though, I recognise this more and more, these feelings are not permanent.
You don’t need to love every single bit of yourself every single minute of the day.
Linzi wears Flirtelle Millie Navy
You don’t need to love every single bit of yourself every single minute of the day but try to make the good feelings outweigh the bad.
One of the best things I did for my mental health and body image was to do a social media cleanse and any account that made me feel bad about myself was unfollowed. If you are struggling I urge you to do the same. Open your feed, scroll and if any image you see makes you insecure or anxious, just press that unfollow button. Fill your feeds with positive content and you will see such a change in your mindset.
Linzi wears Flirtelle Riviera Black Stripe
I love to follow absolute babes like Georgina Horne because she is like the queen of fuller bust lingerie but I also love my feeds to be filled with the women I consider to be my friends, @ana_houghton, @thelingerieprincess & @lauren_dungey to name just a few because they make me feel like as beautiful and fierce as Beyonce during Homecoming - and that is something every girl should have.
