For years I dressed like I needed to hide myself. Nothing tight, nothing that “drew attention”, always one size that could float over whatever I’d decided was the problem that morning. I thought I was being smart. I was following rules a fashion magazine wrote for me, and those rules had one job: make me look as slim as possible, as invisible as possible.
Here is the thing I want to sit with you today. Nobody gets to decide what you are allowed to wear based on your figure. Not a magazine, not a “10 mistakes bigger women make” listicle, not the voice in your head that learned to quote them. Let me walk you through the myths I believed, and what I think about them now.
“Dark colours are slimming, so stick to black”
Let me be clear, because I love a good black outfit. Gothic, alternative, all-black-everything can be stunning, sharp, full of personality. Black is not the problem.
The question is why you’re reaching for it. There is a difference between choosing black because that is your style and you build something cool and deliberate out of it, and hiding in black because you’ve been told the rest of the colour wheel isn’t for a body like yours. One is expression. The other is a smaller version of you playing it safe.
So if you’re a Goth, be the best-dressed Goth in the room. That’s a real, intentional aesthetic and it’s yours. Just make sure it’s a decision, not a hiding place.
“Patterns and stripes make you look bigger”
Horizontal stripes will apparently ruin your life. Big prints are “not for you”. Who decided this, and why did we all nod along?
The honest answer is that these rules exist to keep the eye from landing on you. That’s the whole logic underneath most plus-size fashion advice: shrink, blend, don’t be noticed. I find that a bit sad, and mostly just wrong. A print you love pulls attention because it is beautiful and it suits you, not because your body is a flaw someone forgot to hide.
This isn’t me telling you to go kunterbunt, head to toe rainbow, if that’s not you. That’s just swapping one costume for another. It’s about daring to try something you’ve talked yourself out of. One print. One colour you always admired on other people. See how it feels.
“Wait until you lose weight, then buy the nice stuff”
This one is the quiet killer. The good dress lives at the back of the closet with the tags on, waiting for a smaller you who may never arrive and definitely shouldn’t be the only version of you allowed to feel good.
I treated my body as a before-photo for years. Every nice thing was postponed until I earned it by shrinking. Here’s what I know now: the body you have on a normal Tuesday is the one that gets to wear the good stuff. Not a hypothetical future one. Dress for who you are today.
Let’s question “flattering”
Here’s the myth underneath all the others. “Flattering” almost always translates to “makes you look as thin as possible.” A cut is “unflattering” if it makes you look bigger than you are. An outfit is “wrong” if a skin roll shows through, if your belly has a shape, if the fabric sits on your actual body instead of some imagined smoother one.
I want you to really ask why. Why is looking bigger than you are a failure? Why is a visible roll a problem to be engineered away? Your body has rolls and curves and soft parts because it’s a body, not because you dressed incorrectly. The clothes didn’t fail. The standard is just built on the idea that thinner is always better, and I don’t accept that standard.
For me it’s not about looking slim. It’s about harmony and aesthetics. Do the colours sing together, does the shape feel like me, do I look like a person who made a choice she likes? That’s the question. Fashion is expression and creativity, and that right doesn’t belong only to conventionally, norm-beautiful bodies. It’s yours too.
And yes, we’re allowed to dress sexy
If dressing for expression counts, then sexy counts too. You are allowed to want to look hot. Not for anyone else, not once you’ve shrunk into some approved shape, right now, in the body you have.
This is where materials come in. Part of getting braver is letting yourself experiment, satin, leather, mesh, lace, and my great love, latex. Different fabrics do different things against a body, and you don’t find out which ones feel like you until you try them.
Latex is the boss level for a lot of people, whatever their gender. It’s tight. It shows every line. There is no floating over anything, no hiding a roll, no imagined smoother version underneath. It sits on your actual body and says here I am. That terrifies a lot of people, and I get it, because it terrified me too. For the longest time I was sure it would just look doof on someone my size. My first piece wasn’t a catsuit, it was a simple latex skater dress, and the first time I zipped into something that clung to me instead of hiding me, something clicked. The material I was most scared of turned out to be the one that made me feel most like myself.
You don’t have to start with latex. Start with whatever material makes you a little nervous in a good way. The point is the same: a fabric that shows your shape is not exposing a flaw. It’s just showing you. If you want a soft place to try that, my workshops exist for exactly this.
So how do you actually get braver?
Wanting to be bolder and feeling terrified at the same time is completely normal. You don’t have to wait for the fear to leave. You move while it’s there.
A few things that worked for me:
- Start one notch outside comfortable. Not the wildest thing in the shop, the next step up from what you already own.
- Wear the scary thing at home first. Cook dinner in it. Let your nervous system learn that nothing bad happens.
- Take the photo. For you, not anyone else. You almost always look better than the voice in your head insists.
- Notice who the “rules” protect. Usually not you. That alone makes them easier to break.
- Chase harmony, not thinness. Ask “do I like this?”, not “does this hide me?”
You are allowed to take up space, in colour or in black, in print or in something quiet, in fabric that touches your actual body. There is nothing to hide because there was never anything wrong. Nothing to fix, nothing to shrink, nothing to earn first.
Do it scared. Do it with doubt. Do it anyway.
Your body is not a problem to dress around. It’s the whole point.
All bodies deserve to shine.
If you want more of this, my journal is full of it.
PS: Quick movie recommendation: make sure to check out the movie empire waist!