Pass me a Big Mac

Yesterday I was in a well-known shop (just browsing, honestly) when I spotted a woman looking at some trousers. I don’t normally look at women in shops but I couldn’t help but stare at this particular woman because she was so damn thin. She was about 35 but had the body of an 11 year old girl. It was horrible. When she asked a sales assistant if she could help her find the trousers she wanted in a size 00 I wanted to run over and shove a chocolate bar in her mouth. A 00, it’s just horrible. Why would anyone choose to be that thin? The only way you could get to that size would be to eat nothing but lettuce leaves and sticks of celery.

I know this debate has been raging in the media for ages, but I had never seen someone that thin who wasn’t ‘ill’. My mum was very ill in 2005 and she was extremely thin but that’s because she had a major operation and was in hospital for two weeks. She hated being thin.

Back to the woman in the shop. She was obviously really proud of the fact that she was so thin because she practically shouted out her dress size to the rest of the store. What’s even more scary is the fact that this particular store’s sizes run really small. I’m a size L in there and often that’s too small. I feel like an elephant sometimes. But hey, at least I’m healthy.

New Yorkers take fitness and healthy eating very seriously. There’s a gym on every corner and countless ads for weight loss programmes on TV. And there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s normal to want to be healthy. But sometimes it’s taken to the extreme. Woman in shop being a case in point. Compared to Londoners who are generally unfit, binge drinkers (OK, a gross stereotype but you know what I mean!) New Yorkers are fit, healthy and slim. You see people jogging everywhere – sometimes with their dogs, sometimes pushing prams. You don’t see that as often in London.

I agree that there are far too many images of thin women in magazines, on TV and in films and I also agree that this needs to stop. But I also think that women themselves need to take some responsibility and start remembering that being too thin can be just as detrimental as being to fat. It’s just as bad for your health.

Why would you want your periods to stop, your hair to fall out and your bones to become brittle? Its common knowledge that this is what happens when you stop eating.

I know people who have suffered from anorexia and I know that it’s a horrible disease but I would question whether some of these 00 women are actually anorexic. This might be controversial but I think vanity plays a big part. Some of these women know full well what they are doing and that’s not the same as being anorexic.

Being a size 20 is unhealthy and so is being a size 00. Perhaps they should rename it a -2 or age 11. Maybe that would make these women take notice.