Your Body, Your Self… Claiming Back Your Life

A series of articles by Dara McNaught

Part One - Your body, your self - claiming back your life
Part Two - The Golden Rule for Shopping and Know Your Personal Body Design
Part Three - Frame Your Face

'A diagnosis of breast cancer begins a sequence of events that has an unstoppable momentum. You feel as though you no longer have control over your body, your treatment, or the outcome. Well, to a large extent that’s true – you don’t... One of the key issues is regaining control of your body, your physical self, and claiming back your life.'

So begins part one of a series of articles by Dara McNaught. Dara is a freelance writer and former style consultant. BCAC is delighted to present her articles which offer advice and guidance that may help some women regain self confidence lost after surgery and treatment for breast cancer.

Part one introduces us to some basic design principles and over the following weeks, Dara will write about other aspects of style, colour and accessorising.

BCAC thanks Dara for her kind donation of time and expertise and we hope you will enjoy reading these articles as much as we did!

Your body, your self - claiming back your life
A series of articles by Dara McNaught

Part One
A diagnosis of breast cancer begins a sequence of events that has an unstoppable momentum. You feel as though you no longer have control over your body, your treatment, or the outcome. Well, to a large extent that’s true – you don’t. No matter how considerate the medical, nursing and support staff (and your family members) are, from that moment of initial shock you’re on a well trodden pathway that feels inexorable.
You hope that when the journey’s over you’ll get back to some kind of ‘normal’, but it doesn’t happen just like that. You find yourself instead at a way station, not quite sure of the way ahead.

• You’ve been through a profoundly life-changing experience.
•  Your body has changed, both in appearance and internally.
• You’ve been through an intense emotional experience that’s a different one from those who love you and who have traveled their own path alongside you.
• Your relationships with family and friends have changed (hopefully they’re stronger) though some people have fallen away and there are some new ones in your life.
• You’ve discovered that you want a different quality for your life and your relationships: a different way of living.

…and you’re facing a different and sometimes uncertain future.

Whew!

It can take time, sometimes days or even a few years (like me!), to work out quite who you are now, what you want, and to re-discover yourself as an attractive, feminine woman. Although you’ve been consulted and kept informed, the real decisions are actually being made by doctors and other specialists. Things are being done to your body that normally you would strenuously resist – radical surgery, poisons from chemotherapy, radiation burns, hormone therapy – and you’ve had very little choice about what or when this will be done to you.

One of the key issues is regaining control of your body, your physical self, and claiming back your life.

We interact with the world through our bodies. Make no mistake: our appearance is important. It not only reflects who we are and the image we want to project; the way we look also affects how people respond to us.

Over time (usually by trial and error) we’ve evolved a personal style that suits us. But now, after a cancer diagnosis, everything has changed. We try on a familiar garment and even if it still fits us we says doubtfully: “It just isn’t me anymore!”

So what to do?

What follows are some guidelines for women (and many of the same principles can be adapted for men) that have helped many – myself included – to gain back confidence in selecting clothes and accessories that can help you to deal more successfully with the world. And yes, they make you feel good about yourself.

And guess what? When you feel good about yourself you project that feeling of success and confidence on to other people and they feel good about themselves and about you too!

There are three components to developing your personal style. You can use any of them to flatter your own shape and draw attention towards or away from different parts of your body – we all want to do that.

To achieve this we need to be aware of three factors:

• Body shape and clothing lines
• Accessories - these act like arrows to direct the eye.
• Colours - they can enhance your skin and eyes, or make you look tired and plain.

Personally, when someone’s talking to me I want them to be looking at my face and eyes, not having their gaze wandering around my body, distracted by different colours or ambushed by unwary accessories. This series of notes will be geared towards focusing attention on your face and eyes, which are generally agreed to be the most interesting part of a person.
Where to begin?

Over the next few weeks we’ll be looking at the 10 Rules for Looking Good:

• The Golden Rule for Shopping, and Know Your Personal Body Design.
• Frame Your Face – face shapes and necklines
• Celebrate Your Life - the magic Y, your best Jackets and hemlines
• Having fun with accessories
• Colour yourself beautiful

© Dara McNaught 2008

Part Two: The Golden Rule for Shopping and Know Your Personal Body Design
We may well agree that the most fascinating part of a person’s appearance is your face and eyes, but there’s no denying you have to take serious account of your body’s presence in your life!

So let’s look at your overall body design before we go into details about making you look gorgeous. Before we begin there is one absolutely golden rule you may already have discovered for yourself.

Rule Number One: The golden rule for shopping
Never, ever go shopping for clothes when you’re looking less than your best!

If you know you’re looking good, then whatever you buy has to make you look as good or better in that mirror than what you’re already wearing. If you wear worn or even sloppy clothes then just about anything you try on is going to look better than what you’ve already got on! And when you get it home chances are you’re going to be disappointed.

How many clothes do you have that you hardly ever wear?

If you’re looking for a top, wear pants or a skirt that you’ll want to wear it with. If you’re looking for shoes, wear the skirt length or pants style you’ll be wearing them with. It’s true! – sometimes you need to dress up to go shopping!

Rule Number Two: Know your body design
Take a good look at your body shape. There are six basic types: Triangle or pear, inverted triangle or T, rectangle, thin, hourglass and oval. Which are you?

How to find out: Ask a friend to take three measurements of you from edge to edge across your back: across your shoulders, your waist, and your hips.

Triangle: When your hips are wider than your shoulders by just an inch of more, you’re a triangle  - that’s most of us! Most women are triangle or pear shaped – in fact that’s what our society regards as the normal, healthy shape for women to be.  It simply means that your hips are wider than your shoulders. Just a good one inch difference between shoulders and hips will tell you.

Key fashion tip: Wear darker colours on your lower half and lighter shades on top. 

We’ll talk about how to widen shoulder lines to balance your hips, and how to make yourself look taller and slimmer, in a later session.

Inverted triangle: When your shoulders are wider than your hips the inverted triangle is your shape. It’s the model’s shape – think Elle, Claudia, Naomi, Giselle, Kate Moss. Shoulders are one inch or more wider than the hips. This is also the ideal men’s body shape (hint – most major fashion designers are men). Plus when you put on weight it tends sit around your midriff not your tummy and thighs.

Key fashion tip: Take care that you don’t make your hips and legs look too lean in proportion to your shoulders. How? One way is to reverse the usual colour balance and use lighter colours on your lower half rather than on top. Remember dark colours tend to slim your outline while light colours and shiny fabrics can increase your size. Or try a fitting bodice but loose midriff cut in a top.

Rectangle: This is when your shoulders are the same width as your hips and you have almost no waist. Think Princess Diana; it was clever dressing that gave her that lovely waist and stunning style.

Key fashion tip: Use shaped (not straight cut) jackets and shirts to give yourself a waist. Crossover shirt styles are good.

Hourglass: The look many wanna-be celebs strive for. Think Pamela Anderson. Your shoulders and hips are the same width and of course there’s a smaller waist measurement with a full bust.

Key fashion tip: Emphasise your lovely waist.

And there are two more:

Thin: Some people are naturally thin, and envious though others of us may be, it can create health problems under stress or when radical treatments are needed. Think Callista Flockhart (Ally McBeal).

Key fashion tip: Go for a softer, looser fit – avoid body hugging clothes. Layers are good.

Oval: A curvy version of the rectangle, when your waist is at least the same measurement as your shoulders and hips. Think of Kelly Osborne, or the wonderful Oprah Winfrey – even when she’s thin(ish) she struggles to have a waist.

Key fashion tip: Use accessories to draw attention to where you want the focus to be. Especially use a pretty, well cut neckline and take care not to narrow your shoulders with halter or raglan styles.

And there’s another little-known aspect to body design that can be a real vexation to many people.

Are you a High hip or Low hip design?
Of course there are as many variations in body shape as there are people. But there are two other main features to add in to the mix: whether you are low hipped or high hipped.

What’s that?

To find out which you are: Place your thumb on your waist and your forefinger on the top of your hip bone.  Is there a small gap?

Low hipped people (most of us) have at least a one-inch gap between their waist and the top of their hip-bone.

High hipped people have their hip bone sitting right on their waist.

When low hipped people carry extra weight it goes on their hips and thighs. For skirts, A-line, kick pleat, flared or gored skirts are flattering. For pants, go for a well fitted cut – bootleg if you have the height – they‘re the most flattering. Wear lighter colours on top. Jackets worn to hip length or the top of the thighs can look best if you’re carrying a few extra pounds (or a lot!).

High hipped people have their hip bone sitting right on their waist. There’s no gap between thumb and forefinger. Result: they don’t have a waist!

What they do have is a flat bottom, lean hips and slim legs. Before you get too envious, just note that any extra weight is carried around their upper abdomen and torso, which is a greater health risk than extra pounds on the hips and thighs. If this is you, you suit flared, full, straight or tight skirts from mini to knee or ankle length; slim cut but not tight pants as they could make you look top heavy. Try deeper colours on your top half. Straight jackets, and often short jackets that sit on the top of the hips, usually work well.

Next time I’ll talk about face shape and neck and shoulder lines, and the importance of
Rule No. 3: Invest in a good haircut!

Dara McNaught© 2007

Part Three: Frame your face
It helps, when you’re reclaiming autonomy over yourself, to think of your body as ‘she’ rather than ‘it’.

Medical personnel, bless them, tend to treat your body as an ‘it.’ “How does it feel?” they ask.  An Auckland counselor has found that when she’s working with people who need to change their thinking about their body image it’s more useful to think of ‘she.’

She – your body – has, after all, done her very best to take care of you. She’s tried to contain the disease – cancer – as much as possible, even though you may feel she’s betrayed you. Well, there are things beyond her control, too. She’s continued to try and take care of you during your treatment, even though the treatments have been very hard on her. She’ll respond well if you think of her with respect and affection and, yes, gratitude. She has enabled you to come this far in your life and you have a way yet to travel together.

So she deserves to have you care for her, to your mutual benefit. Finding your confidence through how you present her, and yourself, to the world is one way of doing this. Let’s work from the top down.

Rule Number Three: Invest in a good haircut
This is the single most important feature you have. Don’t skimp! Or go too long between cuts! It’s the most significant investment you can make in your confidence. Your hair frames your face, and a good cut will enhance your face shape and draw attention to your eyes.

Hot tip: Don’t stay with your hairdresser just because of loyalty, or habit, or because you enjoy talking to her (or him), or you don’t want to hurt her feelings by leaving. If you’re not getting the very best haircut you can, find another hairdresser – one who’s committed to being as good as they know how to be. That’ll be good for you too.         

Rule Number Four: How to choose necklines that flatter you
Along with your hair style, the necklines you wear should frame your face in a way that enhances it and keeps the focus on your face. Remember, you don’t want peoples’ eyes wandering up and down your body looking at your waist or hips or feet unless you want them to!

There are about eight basic face shapes – and of course an infinite variation of combinations on the basic theme! They’re all particularly relevant for makeup application, but for our purposes we’re looking at overall shapes and especially jaw or chin lines. So the main ones I’ll talk about here are the oblong, oval, round, and square or angular shapes.

Hot Tip: If you can’t work out what face shape you have – and many of us do have a ‘mixed’ shape – stop at a makeup counter in a big store and ask a make-up artist. It’s part of their training. Many of us have a ‘mixed’ face shape – perhaps wide cheekbones with a pointed chin, for example – so ask the makeup specialist to tell you what they see, and why. And if you wear makeup, even if it’s just lipstick, why not go for a professional makeover and lesson - you’ll pick up some useful makeup tips that will be great for your confidence.

Oval: The ‘ideal’ face shape for our society’s concept of beauty is the oval, and much of the time and effort spent on haircuts and makeup by celebrities is devoted to creating the illusion of an oval face. A natural oval face – such as our own TV personality Carolyn Robinson - is certainly the most versatile when it comes to hairstyles and necklines.

The rule of thumb regarding face shapes and necklines is to choose a style that will frame your face, and everyone has several of these choices. In fact, there’s only one basic no-no that applies as a general rule, and that is: don’t duplicate your face shape with your neckline.

Instead, you choose a different style that will frame your face.

For example, if you have a long face and wear a deep V neckline you’ll accentuate the length of your face.

How do you tell what necklines to wear for your face shape?

Take a good look at photos of celebrities and compare their face shapes with their necklines. If their jawline matches their neckline, whether it’s high or low, they missed their aim. With all that money and advice they still don’t always get it right.

Oblong: For example, if you have a long (oblong) face (Beyonce) with a pointed chin (a V shape like Reese Witherspoon or Jennifer Anniston) and you wear a V neck top, you’re going to be emphasizing the long face and pointed chin. (If you’re after a Jennifer Anniston look, and your single aim is to do everything possible to look as thin as you can, then wear long straight hair and necklines with a deep V and long dangly earrings.)

Hot tip: Most other necklines, especially rounded ones or boat necks or wide scoops, will frame you better.

Round: But if you have a sweet round face like Kelly Osborne a V neck will be flattering, whereas a round neckline only makes her face look even more round.

Hot Tip: Beware of T-shirts! Most of them have a round neckline, which is fine for an oblong face, a pointed chin, a square or angular jaw, but not for a round or oval face. You could try a boat neck or a V neck for those shapes. Be creative – it’s part of developing your own signature style.

Square or angular: The square shape has a broad jaw (think Sarah Ferguson), and the angular has sharp angles (Anjelica Huston) or broad cheekbones, like the lovely Carol Hirschfeld. Avoid square necklines and sharp angles in necklines and jewellery.

Hot tip: Go for a softened line, such as a rounded scoop or boat necklines.

And what of shirts with collars? There are shirt styles to suit just about every face shape and the same guidelines apply. If your face is on the round side rather than oblong, go for a deeper V in the shirt with narrow rather than wide lapels, but if your face seems longer rather than round keep it a shallower V with wider lapels.

Concerned about having a short neck? Avoid collars when you can. Enjoy using a range of V necklines. Depending on your face shape, try square or keyhole necklines. Go for a slim collar-less cut on your jacket or waistcoat.

Long neck? Polo necks, high round necklines, wide collars, and chokers are yours to play with.   

Rule Number Five: How to use shoulder lines to balance your body
Shoulder lines also frame your face as well as helping to balance your body proportions.
There are three shoulder types:  normal, sloping and straight.

Normal shoulders – that’s most of us – have a slight slope to them. If you have slightly sloping shoulders, chances are you’ll want to make them look a bit wider and straighter to balance up your hips. There’s a simple way to do this.

Hot tip: Make sure the seamline for the sleeves at the top of each shoulder sits on the outer edge or even marginally over the outside of your shoulder rather than inside it. That will make your shoulders look ever so slightly wider, and that’s all you need. Drop shoulders can work for the same reason.

Sloping shoulders are distinctly sloping downwards. Avoid drop shoulders as they’ll accentuate the slope. Avoid raglan sleeves too as they’re a version of halter necks.

Hot tip: Yes, you can always wear shoulder pads, whether they’re in fashion or not.

Straight shoulders are, well, straight (you never need shoulder pads). Lucky you! Shoulder bags sit well too, whereas on others the straps always slide off. You often have the inverted triangle body design.

Hot tip: You can wear cut away sleeves, raglans and halter necks. They pull the eye inwards and can balance up wide shoulders, whereas for people with wider hips they’ll make your shoulders look narrower.           

Next time: Your most useful wardrobe item: how to choose the most flattering jackets for your shape; and all you need to know about hemlines for skirts and pants.

Dara McNaught© 2007

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