Top tips to feel more body confident on your holiday
Holidays have a strange ability to bring every body insecurity you’ve ever had bubbling to the surface. You can spend months looking forward to going away, choosing where to stay and planning everything you want to do, only to find yourself standing in front of a mirror a few days before you leave, wondering why on earth you thought buying shorts was a good idea.
I’ve certainly done it. I’ve worried about how I’ll look in summer clothes, whether I’ll feel comfortable around the pool and what I’ll think when I see the photographs afterwards. When I’ve been trying to lose weight, I’ve also fallen into the trap of seeing the holiday as a deadline, mentally calculating how much weight I could possibly lose before I went away and imagining that I’d somehow enjoy myself more if I arrived several stone lighter.
Having lost around 10 stone in the past and subsequently regained weight, I’ve experienced holidays at very different sizes. One of the things that’s taught me is that body confidence doesn’t necessarily arrive automatically when your body reaches the size you thought would make you confident.
I don’t think the answer is forcing yourself to love everything about your body either. You can feel self-conscious about your stomach, wish your thighs were smaller or dislike yourself in photographs and still have an absolutely brilliant holiday. For me, that’s a much more realistic goal than trying to transform years of body-image worries before the airport taxi arrives.
Don’t make your holiday a weight-loss deadline
If you’ve booked a summer holiday, it can feel as though you’ve simultaneously signed up for some sort of compulsory weight-loss challenge.
Suddenly there are holiday countdown diets everywhere, clothes being bought in smaller sizes for motivation and conversations about getting your body “beach ready”. I’ve definitely been guilty of attaching dates and events to weight-loss targets, but I’ve learned that putting yourself under enormous pressure to lose a certain amount before you go away can make the weeks before a holiday far less enjoyable than they should be.
There’s nothing wrong with wanting to lose weight before your holiday if that’s something you genuinely want to do. What I’d avoid is convincing yourself that the success of the holiday depends on achieving it.
If you lose weight before you go, you’re still going to take your body with you. If you don’t lose the amount you’d hoped, you’re still going to take your body with you. Either way, you’ve paid for the flights, accommodation and probably an alarming amount of airport parking, so you might as well let yourself enjoy it.
Buy holiday clothes for the body you’re taking with you
This is something I feel much more strongly about now than I used to.
Buying clothes slightly too small because you’re definitely going to lose weight before your holiday sounds motivating until it’s two days before you fly and half your suitcase doesn’t fit comfortably.
I’ve had clothes in my wardrobe for practically every version of my body, and I’ve realised how miserable it can be trying to squeeze yourself into something simply because the number on its label is the number you think you should be wearing.
For holidays especially, comfort makes an enormous difference. If you’re somewhere hot, the last thing you want is a waistband digging into you all day or a dress you’re constantly adjusting because you’re conscious of your stomach.
Try your holiday clothes on properly before you go, preferably when you’re not already hot, stressed and trying to pack at midnight. Sit down in them, walk around and make sure you can actually move comfortably.
I also think it’s worth questioning some of the rules we’ve somehow created about which bodies are allowed to wear particular things. I’ve avoided shorts at various points because I didn’t like my legs, but covering myself in long trousers when it’s 30°C doesn’t magically make my legs disappear. It just makes me hot while disliking them.
You don’t have to suddenly become incredibly brave and wear something that makes you miserable, but equally you don’t have to hide every part of your body you aren’t completely happy with.
The swimming pool can feel like the biggest hurdle
Swimwear is probably where body confidence becomes most difficult for many of us because there’s simply less fabric available to hide behind.
I think we sometimes imagine everyone around the pool is paying far more attention to us than they actually are. Most people are thinking about themselves, their children, where they’ve put the suncream, whether they can justify another cocktail at 11am and why somebody has apparently reserved twelve sunbeds with three towels.
They’re probably not conducting a detailed assessment of your thighs.
That doesn’t mean you can simply switch off feeling self-conscious. What you can do is make things easier for yourself by choosing swimwear that feels secure and comfortable rather than whatever you think somebody with your body shape is supposed to wear.
If you prefer a swimsuit, wear one. If you feel better in a bikini, wear that. If you want a cover-up for walking between your room and the pool, take one. Body confidence doesn’t have to mean deliberately putting yourself in the outfit that makes you feel most exposed to prove some sort of point.
The aim is being comfortable enough to actually get into the pool rather than spending the entire holiday sitting beside it wishing you felt differently about yourself.
Think about comfort as well as confidence
Some things we blame on our bodies are actually practical problems with practical solutions.
Thigh chafing is a perfect example. If walking around sightseeing in a dress leaves the inside of your thighs feeling as though somebody has attacked them with sandpaper, you’re hardly going to feel fabulous by lunchtime. Anti-chafing shorts, suitable underwear or an anti-chafing product can make an enormous difference.
The same applies to supportive footwear, breathable clothes and a decent bra. Sometimes feeling more confident isn’t about changing how you think about your body at all; it’s simply about making your body more physically comfortable.
If you’re worried about getting hot and sweaty, choose fabrics and outfits that help rather than spending your holiday worrying that everyone else somehow manages to look immaculate in the heat. I assure you they don’t.
Planning for comfort isn’t admitting there’s something wrong with your body. It’s recognising that holidays can involve a lot of heat, walking and sitting around in unfamiliar places and dressing accordingly.
Holiday photographs can be difficult
This is one I’ve struggled with over the years.
It’s very easy to take a photograph, look at yourself rather than everything else in it and immediately decide you hate it. I’ve deleted photographs because I thought I looked fat without really considering that I’d also deleted a memory.
I’m trying to be much better at separating the two.
I don’t have to think I look fantastic in every photograph to want the photograph. Sometimes it’s a picture of me with people I love, somewhere I may never visit again, doing something I want to remember. In ten or twenty years, I doubt I’ll care whether my stomach looked slightly bigger than I’d have preferred.
That doesn’t mean you have to enthusiastically pose for hundreds of photographs if you genuinely hate having your picture taken. You can find poses you feel comfortable with, ask whoever is taking the photo not to post it publicly without checking with you and take plenty of pictures where you’re actually doing something rather than standing awkwardly wondering where to put your arms.
I’d just encourage you to be in some of them.
If you’re always the person behind the camera because you don’t like your body, you can eventually end up with an entire collection of holidays from which you appear to have been mysteriously absent.
Other people’s photographs are harder to control
There’s something particularly unsettling about discovering somebody has taken a photograph of you that you didn’t know was being taken. At least when I’m taking a selfie, I can choose the angle, take another seventeen and pretend the other sixteen never existed.
Holiday photographs taken by other people don’t always offer that luxury.
I’ve had to remind myself that the version of me caught laughing, eating, swimming or walking around isn’t somehow less real because I wouldn’t have chosen that particular photograph myself. Bodies also look different when we’re moving, sitting and relaxing than they do when we’re deliberately posing.
If somebody shares photographs online and that makes you uncomfortable, it’s perfectly reasonable to ask friends or family to check with you before posting pictures you’re in. That’s not the same as insisting nobody ever photographs you.
There can be a middle ground where you allow yourself to be part of the memories without feeling as though every photograph automatically belongs on Facebook.
Eating on holiday doesn’t need to become another body-image battle
Food can become surprisingly tangled up with holiday body confidence, particularly if you’ve been dieting beforehand.
You might spend weeks trying to lose weight for your holiday and then arrive feeling guilty every time you eat something you wouldn’t normally have at home. Alternatively, you might decide you’ve already “ruined” your diet and spend the week eating far beyond what you actually want because you’ll start again when you get back.
I’ve experienced enough complicated thinking around food and weight over the years to know that neither extreme makes holidays particularly relaxing.
I prefer thinking about holiday food as part of the experience. I want to try local dishes, go out for meals and have things I genuinely enjoy, but I don’t need to eat everything simply because I’m away.
Some days that might mean a huge restaurant meal and dessert. Another day I might fancy something much lighter. Your appetite doesn’t suddenly stop existing just because you’re on holiday, and listening to it can be considerably more enjoyable than trying to follow either strict diet rules or a compulsory week-long blowout.
And yes, your weight may be different when you come home. Some of that can be influenced by changes in food, salt, carbohydrates, alcohol, hydration and even travel itself, so I wouldn’t let one post-holiday weigh-in determine whether you’ve somehow failed.
Try not to spend the holiday comparing bodies
A swimming pool or beach can feel like an enormous live-action version of social media when you’re already conscious of your body.
There will probably be people who are thinner than you, younger than you, more toned than you or wearing something you wish you felt confident enough to wear.
There will also be people older, younger, taller, shorter, larger and smaller than you who are probably having exactly the same kinds of thoughts about themselves.
I’ve found that comparison becomes particularly unhelpful when I start imagining what somebody else’s body says about their life. I don’t know how healthy they are, whether they’re happy with their appearance or what they’ve gone through to look the way they do.
All I really know is that we’re both beside the same swimming pool.
If you notice yourself repeatedly comparing, try deliberately moving your attention back to what you’re actually doing. Look at where you are, talk to the people you’re with, get into the water, read your book or decide where you’re going for dinner.
You’ve travelled all that way. It seems a shame to spend the week mentally measuring yourself against strangers.
What if you’re worried about flying because of your size?
For some people, holiday body anxiety starts long before the beach because they’re worried about fitting comfortably into an aeroplane seat.
I think this deserves acknowledging because telling somebody to simply “be confident” isn’t particularly helpful when their worry is practical.
Airline seats vary, and if you’re concerned about seat width or seatbelt length, checking the airline’s information before you travel can help you know what to expect. Seatbelt extenders are available on aircraft if needed, and cabin crew deal with requests for them regularly.
If you’re particularly worried, researching the aircraft and seating options beforehand can remove some of the uncertainty. Depending on your budget and the airline, choosing a particular seat or paying for additional space may also make the journey more comfortable.
You don’t need to spend the entire flight making yourself as small as physically possible because you feel as though you’re taking up more space than you’re entitled to.
You don’t need a different body to have a good holiday
I’ve been much thinner than I am now and I’ve been much heavier, and I’ve learned that there isn’t one particular weight at which you’re finally issued with permission to enjoy holidays.
Body confidence can certainly affect how you feel when you’re away, and I wouldn’t dismiss that by telling anyone to simply stop worrying about what they look like. I know it isn’t always that easy.
What I can do is question how much of my holiday I’m prepared to hand over to those worries.
I don’t have to love my legs to wear shorts when I’m hot, and I don’t have to think I look amazing in a swimming costume before I’m allowed in the pool. I can dislike a photograph of myself without deleting the memory it represents, just as I can want to lose weight without making a future holiday dependent on whether I manage it.
My body will probably continue changing, just as it already has many times.
I don’t want to look back and realise I spent the best bits of my life waiting for it to become the version I thought was acceptable enough to enjoy them.
