I’ve noticed a personal trend lately that maybe you have been experiencing as well. It seems that many things in my life “expand to fit”. Whether it is the size of my purse, the length of my to-do list, or the amount of extra storage space available in my house, it seems that I somehow manage to expand to fit a roomier expanse. I fill a larger purse with essentials, continue to add items to my to-do list until my days are full, and even though I purge our storage room each year, it somehow manages to fill again with things I can’t throw away. Unfortunately, the thing that brought this trend to my attention was the impact that the recent fashion trend towards stretchy leggings and long sweaters is having on my physical body – to be blunt, I seem to be “expanding to fit”.
Looking back, I can see that fashion has played a part in my body size throughout many passing trends. As a teenager in the late 70’s/early 80’s, the trend was designer jeans such as Gloria Vanderbilt (yes, they were actually considered high end designer at the time and couldn’t be purchased at Kohls), Calvin Kleins, and Vidal Sasson (apparently he made jeans too – not just hair products); but more important than the fancy name was the fit, the designer jeans had to be tight. Not just form fitting or body skimming, I’m talking about “lay on your bed and inhale deeply just in order to zip them up”. Once you managed to get into these jeans, there really wasn’t room for anything else – such as anything crazy and decadent like a bite of carrot or snip of celery – so it made it quite a bit easier to manage your weight.
The designer jean trend was soon followed by the first phase of the leggings trend. As you probably already know, if you live long enough, you will see most trends come around once or twice and this was the first appearance of stretchy leggings in my fashion history. They were set apart from today’s legging styles only in the fact that they had stirrups on the bottom, for what reason I can’t even imagine. In any case, with sudden room allowed for strenuous movements (like breathing), these pants allowed me the comfort to expand my food intake. And as a result, my body expanded to fit the leggings.
I’ve been through more of these trends than I can tell you over the last 30 years. Tight, baggy, thinner, heavier. It seems to be a very circular and repeating path. And now I find myself once again in a world where the current fashion is based on comfort and warmth – black leggings paired with layers of tunics or long knit sweaters. Cute? Yes. Good for my tendency to expand to fit? Not so much.
So in the spirit of New Year’s, I’m going to make a resolution (or several). Sure…I’ll try to eat better and try to get more exercise because I want to be healthy and I want to be around for a long time to enjoy all the moments ahead of me. But I’m also going to resolve to balance my leggings wardrobe with a fair amount of fitted clothing that, while definitely less stretchy and comfortable, will also help me fight the trend to expand!
As a side note, the trend to expand isn’t always such a bad thing. I’ve noticed the concept in other areas of my life as well. Just when I think my heart is full with the love for family and friends, someone new comes along – a new baby is born or a new friend comes into our life, and wouldn’t you know, our hearts expand to fit. I’ve also noticed that sometimes the bigger you set your goals and your dreams, somehow your life seems to expand to make room for them. Maybe that’s the trade-off for having to deal with an occasional expanding body and if so, count me in. My body will continue to change – expanding and contracting - for the rest of my life but as long as my heart and dreams always continue to grow, I think that I can be happy in a world that is sometimes expanding to fit.
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