Please don’t look at Kevin

I had my very first photoshoot a month ago, and it brought up some feelings. Not all of them good. In fact, most of them were bad. But I’m working through them, and I thought I’d share them – consider this the emotional version of having a peek at my homework. You can see what I’ve learned and if it can help you. So let’s talk about how looking at pictures of myself made me feel fat! Yay! Body positivity!

I chose to do this photoshoot. No one asked me to do it, it wasn’t a brand deal or a modeling job or anything. I’d had my first single ready to release, and I knew I needed decent photos to start setting up streaming accounts, and to revitalise my online platforms.

The only time I’d done anything like this was thirteen years ago. I was 21, and I lived across the road from a photographer. One evening he knocked on my door, and when I opened it he said, “oh good, you’re still a brunette. What dress size are you?” Turns out his booked model for an upcoming bridal dress and hair shoot was sick and he needed a last minute replacement. So, I got my first modelling gig!

But in that case, none of it was about me. It was about being a coat hanger. This time, it was all about me, and that was bloody terrifying. The experience itself was incredibly positive, I will say that. I worked with Cal from Lens Head, and he is brilliant. His studio is wheelchair-accessible, and he made everything work for me. My wheelchair was never an obstacle to getting a fantastic shot. He definitely believes that everything and everyone can look amazing, given the right angle and the right lighting. I was very nervous and uncomfortable in the beginning, trying to pose and make it look natural, but I slowly grew in confidence, and I almost forgot that I had been so self-conscious.

Until I received the photos, and saw how I looked in those clothes.

I’d bought new clothes for the shoot, things I’d always wanted to own but had never been able to justify buying. And, as luck would have it, Dangerfield was having a massive sale at the exact time I was looking at buying (I don’t usually credit things to luck, being a God-believer, but I don’t think God had any interest in me owning a red tartan corset. So, we’ll say luck.).

The thing with Dangerfield clothing, though, is that a lot of their shirts are cropped. I don’t do that. I cover my stomach. I have a very lumpy, bumpy body. I’m fine with my upper lumps, if they’re noticed and displayed nicely in a shirt, that’s cool. Probably because society tells me it’s okay. Society tells me it’s okay to have lumps and bumps if those lumps and bumps are breasts.

But those upper lumps and bumps of mine are so large, in the way that’s celebrated by society, because I’m fat. When I was thin, I still had a nice body shape, with everything in proportion. When I started gaining weight, due to taking a lot of medication with that specific side effect and being unable to be very active, everything got bigger. The boobs got bigger, sure, but the butt got bigger as well (although it got flattened like a pancake because I was sitting on it all the damn time) and the belly got bigger.

A few years ago, when I was becoming more active in online advocacy, I started a public Instagram account, and I would share selfies. I’d always been good at taking selfies, knowing my looks and my angles. When I gained weight, I learned the looks and angles that hid the things I wanted to hide.

But then, I started following other wheelchair-using influencers on Instagram, and I saw them posting full body shots of them and their wheelchairs, and I thought, that is beautiful. I can be attractive and show off my whole self, as someone who is disabled. I followed people who are plus-sized, and I thought, that is beautiful. I can be attractive and show off my whole self, as someone who is fat.

I realised I wanted to be a part of this movement that normalises disabled people and bigger people feeling and looking beautiful and handsome and showing themselves off. Because if seeing those photos encourages me, then maybe I can share photos that encourage others.

But still, I had a lot of control. I could take many photos and then choose the best. I could cover what I thought was ‘unacceptable’. If I wore something that accentuated my stomach, that didn’t get a full body shot. That got a boobs-up shot. That wasn’t to be seen.

So when I tried on these things from Dangerfield, and I saw that they were somewhat cropped and would show the shape of my stomach, I thought, shit. No getting away from it now. In many pictures I was able to cover it up with a guitar. But in the ones with the corset and jeans, there’s lumps and bumps on display. My big, round stomach is there to be noticed. Not covered by the folds of a shirt, or the angle of a camera.

And when I received the photos, I looked at them and my first thought was, what will people think? Will people think it’s gross? Will people zone into that one feature? Then I had to stop and ask myself what I thought. And I thought I looked amazing – except for my stomach.

I even spent an embarrassing amount of time Googling what people thought about fat people, I looked at photos of fat models and asked myself what I thought, I Googled, “can people with big bellies be attractive?” The answer is, like everything, yes and no depending on the person, obviously, Nell.

And part of why I was doing this photoshoot was beyond just how I felt. I didn’t want to feel like a babe for my own sake, but I wanted this to be for others, to be part of the movement that’s allowing plus-sized wheelchair babes to see a body like theirs presented in this way, celebrated, accepted, showed off, the lumps and bumps being acknowledged.

I was feeling uncertain if I would be celebrated and accepted, if I was ‘allowed’ to look the way I do. I don’t like that that’s the way I felt, but that’s the truth. And if I feel like that, I know other people will too. So I want to add to the positive influences, of seeing differences, of seeing different bodies looking wonderful, having the right to look wonderful.

I’m also becoming aware that I won’t always have control over my image, or rather my images. At the moment, if I look cute, I strike a pose, at home, I take a few photos, at home, I pick the best one, at home, and I post it, from home.

I’m starting to take myself out of my home more. And I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but I need to be aware that photos might be taken of me and with me that I don’t have that same control and veto power over.

If I’m onstage performing and someone takes a photo of me, I can’t stop that performance, ask to see that photo and tell them to move to get a better angle. If they’re a professional, I have to trust them, and if they’re an audience member, that’s in the Lord’s hands. If I get photos taken at an event, or someone meets me at a gig and wants to take a photo with me, I can’t tell them we need to take six so that I can pick the best one. I need to be happy and confident with a one and done – not only of my face, but of my body too.

I can no longer have ‘good’ and ‘bad’ bits of my body. They all need to be good bits, otherwise I am going to constantly criticize and hate photos of myself taken in situations I can’t control. I’ll still have preferred parts of my body, or poses I know look better for me or make me feel good. But, for my mental health, I can no longer demonise parts of my body as ‘wrong’ or ‘ugly’, or the bit that ruins the rest of it.

And part of the struggle is that, if I could change my body, I would. If I could lose some weight, I would. It’s not healthy for me to have this amount of bulk around my organs, organs that already struggle to function, especially when I’m not active. But the ‘not active’ part means that losing weight is extremely difficult, and the reason I gained weight isn’t just because of that inactivity, it’s because I’m on a shitload of medication that I can’t stop.

So I guess sometimes I struggle looking at my stomach because it’s a symbol of my lack of control. I became severely ill and a bunch of doctors put me on a bunch of medication that made me gain 60kg in five years. It doesn’t feel like it’s a part of me, like it should be there, it’s a symbol of my illness journey. My boobs, on the other hand, are the compensation payout for that journey.

But why do I see them so differently? Why is one a curse and the other a reward? That’s what I’m trying to change, my internal rhetoric. I might never say, “these tight jeans are showing how round my stomach is – I love it!” But I want to, I need to get to the point where, if those jeans show the shape of my stomach, that’s not a barrier, either to me wearing them or to me feeling good in pictures with them.

I spoke to my therapist about this, and she likened my attitude to my stomach to that of an unloved child. Let’s take, “I looked great in that photo, except for my stomach.” Now let’s hear, “Everyone looked great in the family photo, except for Kevin.” Or maybe Kevin was forgotten in the family photo entirely. Or they tried to hide him behind a pot plant. No one really wants Kevin to be there, he brings down the vibe the family is going for. He’s not like the rest of us. He’s a little odd. So we’ll just hide him away and pretend he’s not here. And if he does show himself, we’ll make it clear that he’s not wanted.

My stomach is Kevin. The unloved child. It’s as much a part of me as everything else. It hasn’t done anything wrong by me to deserve this dismissal, except not live up to society’s expectations. Honestly, it’s gone through some of the worst of my illness, the amount of damage it’s gone through it insane. It processes all of my medication. It does its best to process food, to sort through toxins. It’s taken the brunt of a lot of my health issues. It’s done a lot for me, to be honest. But I don’t want it in photos, because people tell me it doesn’t look nice.

We need to appreciate Kevin. We all have one. It might not be your stomach, it might be another body part that you don’t want to include in the family photo. But think of what it does for you. If it was no longer there, not just in the family photo, but in the overall makeup of your body, if you woke up and your Kevin wasn’t there, what would the impact be?

I’m going to start appreciating my Kevin. He can be in the family photo. Why shouldn’t he be? My body, every part of it, is a family, and the whole lot of it looks amazing.

Go stream Wheelchair Babe on your streaming service of choice. It was written by a real wheelchair babe, with help from their Kevin.

Bless.

Nell