Who wants to be a skinny malinky?

Who wants to be a skinny malinky?
ACCORDING TO one of the many slightly cheesy celebrity filled magazines I buy every week Desperate Housewives actress Teri Hatcher has now slimmed down to a shocking size four.

Try as I might, I just can't say the woman looks good for it. Her arms look as though they might break with a mere pinch and her face is almost skeletal. Superman wouldn't dare try and whisk the former Lois Lane actress off now for fear she would float away on the breeze somewhere over Metropolis, never to be seen again.
It's sad for me because, as a teenager, Teri Hatcher was my idol. I thought she looked amazing, had a great sense of style but she still looked like a real woman. Admittedly she was probably never more than a size 10, but at least then she look well.
The same cheesy magazine has told me that Bridget Jones actress Rene Zellwegger, a comfortable size 14 when she reprised her roll in last year's "Edge of Reason" is now a size 6 and quite frankly the woman would not look out of place in a depiction of the Holocaust.
But, in the pictures, Teri and Rene are smiling. They are wearing the latest designer clothes and you realise they must actually think they look better for the their skinniness.
The truth is they look ill, as if ravaged from some nasty disease that only a force feeding of stew and turnovers from Doherty's Bakery would sort out. Their gauntness also serves to make them look older than their years- so hardly the look you would think a celebrity would like to go for.
And yet, the cheesy weekly glossies that I have a strange addiction to are literally crammed with celebrities who are on some mad crazy diet or other. One claimed that Victoria Beckham slimmed down to a size six to "punish" her husband for not spending more time at home.
This week we hear that Kerry McFadden/ Katona/ whatever she calls herself these days may have an addiction to slimming pills. Remarkably her boobs are still ginormous but the rest of herself is eeny. It is not a good look and I fear she may topple over if so much as nudged.
I've never been a fan of the waif look- mostly because it is a look that I will never achieve, even if I contract a bad dose of cholera and lose half my bodyweight down the nearest toilet.
But I also just don't like it. I grew up watching films where the women were tanned and gorgeous and most of all had curves and they weren't ashamed of them. I was a fan of Doris Day, Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell and even in the 80s women like Carrie Fisher (Star Wars) and Jennifer Grey (Dirty Dancing) showed that real femininity existed in curves and looking, well to be honest, like a woman.
I could be drawn into lengthy debates about whether or not the media encourage young women to go on drastic weight loss plans, or I could defend whether or not it is simply my own insecurities that make me hate these super thin women so much but I do think then I really would be skirting the issue!

Women should be women
I just think, and perhaps I'm mad at thinking this, that women should look like women. It baffles me why we spend so much time and effort trying to change who we are.
Now don't get me wrong, I don't believe that we should just allow ourselves to go to pot. As someone who has battled with her weight all her adult life, and especially since pregnancy and the birth of my son, I know that being overweight is good for neither body or soul.
The current hot spell combined with putting my back out has reminded me once again of my need to slim down and shape up. I can tell you now there is nothing as unattractive as the site of me, sweating like a goodun, pushing a buggy with an impatient child up Fountain Hill on a sunny day.
And when my back went out, and I was forced to spend a considerable amount of time lying on the floor staring at ceilings, I realise it is in my own interest to improve my muscle tone and fitness levels.
But, I'm realistic about my goals and I'm not one of these women who believes that if I'm not a size 10 or 12 the world will come to an end. I've been almost every size in the book over the last 10 years and I know now that while my current girth isn't for me, anything under a 14 or 16 also makes me look like I need a good feeding.
I have a significant number of friends who moan about their size. They long for a model-like figure and I have to wonder are they really seeing a true reflection of themselves when they look in the mirror? The majority of my muckers range between a 12 and a 16 (They will love me for spilling that wee gem of information in the paper!) and none of them look overweight, fat or ugly.
They look comfortable in their bodies. Sure their tummies may not be flat, but then having babies will do that for you- and yes they might not like their saggy bingo wings- but hey old age comes to us all.
I just wish they could see that they at least look healthy and better- more womanly- than the lollipop headed celebrities on the pages of my magazines.