I am guilty for overindulging in snack foods and sweet treats with the burden of Finals hanging over me. I have used the “I deserve it” excuse one two many times that it led me to that OMG moment. In just over a week, I will be home and out bathing in the sun, but I soo don’t feel ready for the big reveal. Letting my mind drift off during my study breaks one day, I decided to look up Victoria Secret models’ diets. At some point, every girl has wished that they looked like one of them, especially come time of the annual Victoria Secret Fashion Show in December. I’ll admit that I fell victim to wanting to know the ‘real’ secret. Well I sure found out…
As a huge Adriana Lima fan, I looked into her diet with the hopes of finding out just how I can follow her ways. That all changed, however, once I actually read through it. Nine days prior to the fashion show, she goes on a liquid-only diet. The concoctions are protein shakes usually containing powdered egg. On top of this, she consumes a gallon of water. I will say that the large amounts of water are the only healthy part of her regimen. In combination with this, she will do two-a-day workout sessions (way too much for how little energy she is getting). Then two days prior, she stops drinking a gallon and consumes a “normal” amount of water. Lastly, 12 hours prior to the show, she will stop drinking entirely. Now call me crazy, but this is way too extreme and not worth the deterioration of her health. Lima argues that she only does this prior to the big fashion show and does not always take such drastic measures. Though she has an argument, it really does nothing to help her when you think of her and media’s effect on body image.
Every December, I watch both guys and girls with their eyes glued to the television, salivating over the models strutting up the runway. The guys are wishing that they could score a girl of those looks, and girls take note of that. This can’t help but contribute to girls believing that that is what all guys want a girl to look like. On the other hand, girls are wishing that they had the model’s bodies and/or that they were skinnier. In reality, Lima’s defense is anything but an actual case. What people see on TV or in magazines are the models’ bodies AFTER outrageous dieting. We are not seeing Lima’s body on a regular basis when she isn’t intensively dieting. Why don’t we see what her body typically looks like? Hmmm, maybe it is because models really do not look like that on a regular basis. In that sense, their bodies are “fake.” Now, I am not saying that models do not work hard for their bodies nor am I saying that all models go to such extremes. Put simply, I think that people only see one side of things.
This really put things into perspective for me. There is nothing wrong with healthily dieting. However, next time you are wishing that you looked like a VS model or want to take the “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels” approach, I would stop and think twice.