I'm sharing something very personal with you today...

I'm sharing something very personal with you today... (and I'm still afraid to go public with it)

But maybe you are also one of those who have never really felt comfortable in your own body and my story makes you feel that you are not alone. 

I am the one who has not been able to accept her body since childhood.

At the age of 9, a wrong sentence at the wrong time had a lasting effect on my body image. 

While other girls were partying on the beach in a bikini at 16, I hid my thighs - because I already had severe cellulite back then. Apparently my gene for firm connective tissue was simply forgotten.

Instead of being proud of my body, there was only shame - and a deep desire to look different. And it didn't get any better... I was a size 34 on top and 42 on the bottom - and I hated my body for it. Cellulite, teasing at school, panic before swimming lessons. 

Even as an adult I avoided situations where you had to show your legs (beach, lake, sauna, shorts...), even with my own children I hardly went swimming because the shame was so powerful.  

I hid my legs, hid myself.

I was there - but I wasn't free.

Just a year ago I was walking around in long pants at 36 degrees - because I thought nobody should see my legs! I would have loved to chop them off!  

And then... came this little jar. A cream. Sounds banal, doesn't it? But what if I told you that it was the beginning of something big for me? 

I tried them out - without great expectations. And then something changed. Not just my skin. Also my feeling. My look. My courage.

Today - almost four months later - I have done something that I have denied myself for years:

• I have booked a beach vacation(!)
• I bought myself skirts
• I have booked a diving course
• I am going back to life

This little pot didn't give me a new me - But the old me is back.

The one that loves the sun The one that dances The one that wants to be free.

P.S. Of course I know that you can only find true love for yourself on the inside, but I can tell you that this change has had a profound effect on the way I look at myself and my body.

And:

There are things that perhaps nobody sees.
But we see and feel them ourselves - every day.

Cellulite, for example. For some, just dents. For others: a lifetime of shame. Jokes in the school playground, looks on the beach, the constant feeling of having to hide.

And then someone says to you: 'Just love yourself as you are'. Sounds nice. But what if this 'simple' was never simple for you?

What if you want to love your body - but there's this quiet voice that remembers all the moments when you didn't feel loved?

I think it's okay if you want to change something. Not because you have to. But because you are finally making the decision yourself. Because maybe, like me, you've found something that helps you feel better.

No miracles. No Photoshop promises. But a real difference that you can see and feel. Self-love does not mean: 'Everything stays as it is'.

Self-love means: you can choose what is good for you. Without having to justify yourself. Even if that means treating yourself to a cream that finally gives you the feeling that you no longer have to hide.

- Nadine S.