The “summer body.”
It’s the elusive figure that many of us train towards, eat around and think about in the months before our kits are off and we’re waist-deep in waves.
I told a friend I was going for a run in hopes of gaining my summer bod and she visibly recoiled.
“You can’t say that!” she said.
I laughed but soon realised she was serious.
“It’s fat shaming.”
As somebody who is currently slender (thin, skinny, noodle-like), the phrase ‘fat shaming’ should send me into an armadillo ball of fear of offending.
But nope. I was fat (overweight, pudgy, dumpling-like) all through schooling and the idea of the ‘summer bod’ sat in the back of my mind like a seasonal motivator.
It made me pay closer attention to food — types, portion sizes, and ideas around it.
It gave me a goal and it made me work bloody hard for it.
Let’s not forget that your idea of a ‘summer bod’ will be different to my idea, and that of the girl next to me and the guy next to her.
The idea of the ‘summer body’ is often placed beside the idea of the ‘bikini body’, as though the two are synonymous.
In my opinion, the term “bikini body” projects a lot of commercial ideas of beauty onto a figure that may or may not be in a bikini.
The summer bod is kinder in the sense it is a more ambiguous aspiration. It allows for somebody to aspire to all kinds of body types and swimwear.
