Ah, the old shredding for the wedding malarkey. I’ve sat on this draft title almost from the moment we got engaged. I toyed with the idea of starting to shred for our big day, but then it hit me. Do I actually want to put myself through even more stress – just to be a tiny bit smaller?
The answer is no.
There is more than enough stress involved with a wedding, even with my wedding planning experience. Trust me when I say, being on the other side is a whole other world.
After heading wedding dress shopping a couple of weeks ago and finding the dress of my dreams, it dawned on me even more that although I want to look and feel the best I can on my big day, James will still want to marry me (I hope), regardless of whether I’m the same size I am now, a bit bigger or a bit smaller, so what’s the point?
The point is, there is so much pressure on women to look unreal on their wedding day. Whether this is ingrained on us all when diet culture is, or through the strain of social media – wherever you want to attribute it to, it’s not good.
So, what is my plan?
My plan is simple. Continue doing what I’m doing. In fact at the moment, I’m trying to put on weight. *Insert horrified gasps and shocked expressions*
Yes you read that correctly. If you follow me over on Instagram, you’ll know that at the moment I’m embarking on a mini bulk. This involves me eating in a calorie surplus for a set number of weeks before heading on a cut (eating in a calorie deficit).
I’ll be increasing my calories gradually in the hopes not to put on too much fat. By continuing to train hard, this should, in theory, help me build up some lean muscle mass.
This is my first bulk but we’ll see how it goes. The idea is that I’m going to do this a couple of times in the run up to the wedding, before I carry on as normal and simply maintain my body as it is now so that I don’t fluctuate too much before I try my dress on again at my first fitting!
It’s taken me some time to change my mentality a bit around putting weight on, and the fact that I’m actually happy and confident with where I am right now.
Trust me if I’d have been getting married to James a couple of years ago, I would have 100% been shredding for the wedding!
Learning to be happy in the skin you’re in
That right there. Now that is a challenge. It’s really easy to preach being body confident and saying you’re extremely happy with where you are on social media, while secretly crying in your bedroom eating a tub of ice cream (we’ve all been there, am I right?!). But actually learning to be body confident, learning to love yourself again and appreciating your body for everything it does for you is tough guys!
I promise you though, if you’re working your way towards this – it’s tough, but it’s totally worth it in the end.
