We're in this together
WOMAN'S OWN|September 28, 2020
Steph Aburrow, 32, learnt that a little help from a friend can go a long way
EMMA ROSSITER
We're in this together

Opening another bottle of wine and grabbing the box of chocolates from the fridge, I headed back to the living room. ‘We really shouldn’t have any more,’ protested my best friend Debra, then 27, spying the treats in my hand. I rolled my eyes and tutted at her. ‘Come on, we’re celebrating! It’s not every year you get married!’ With that, we polished off the lot – but, as always, the guilt soon set in when talk turned to Debra’s wedding in just seven months’ time.

‘I don’t want to feel fat on my wedding day,’ Debra sighed. I knew how she felt because I was dreading squeezing into my royal-blue maid-of-honour dress, too. But I’d tried to lose weight before and had failed miserably after I piled it all back on again shortly after. Willpower was not my strong point.

Growing up, I was always one of the bigger girls in my friendship circle. As a teenager, my friends were all size 8s and, next to them, I felt huge in my size 12-14 jeans. I always tried to eat healthily but I was never happy with my size. Then, shortly after turning 18, I fell pregnant with my daughter Lillie – and it was during one of my antenatal classes that I met Debra, then 17.

Like me, she didn’t want to be seen as a stereotypical teenage mum – we both wanted to continue studying at university, get good jobs and give our children the best lives possible – and we soon became inseparable. We even gave birth just five days apart. But even with a great friend like her by my side, my confidence when it came to my body was low.

هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة September 28, 2020 من WOMAN'S OWN.

ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.

هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة September 28, 2020 من WOMAN'S OWN.

ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.