Everything I Learnt About My Body Through Playing Sport

Big does not mean bad.

Hi. This is me. I'm a 5-foot-8-inch, 16-stone human being and this is what I look like.

Rebecca Hendin/Iona St Joseph/BuzzFeed

I've always had things I want to achieve, and until fairly recently there was always some kind of weight-related goal on there. My diet and exercise knowledge was severely limited, but I did know one thing, and that was that I wanted to be 10 stone.

I haven't been 10 stone since 1999. I know that because when I was 11 years old, we had a science lesson where we had to weigh and measure ourselves, and then write the results on the board. I was happy enough to write up my height, but I lied about my weight. When the scales said 10 stone, I wrote 9 stone on the board, because I didn't want to be heavier than my female classmates. Despite the fact that I was one of the tallest in my year, a fact I was proud of, I didn't want my weight to be up there with the boys. At 11 years old that is not something I should've been concerned about.

I don't think anyone ever told me I should be skinny, and I certainly wasn't fat, but I had this feeling of embarrassment when it came to admitting my weight.

But I've recently joined a local women's rugby team, and despite almost 20 years of playing competitive sport throughout school, university, and in the big wide world of adulthood, it has already changed the relationship I have with my body. Being good at sport has always made me feel slightly better about myself, but taking up rugby has really made me feel differently towards my body. All 5 feet 8 inches, 16 stone of it.

1. Big does not mean bad.

Rebecca Hendin / Thinkstock / BuzzFeed

Guys. Newsflash. We're not all the same size. Like, you know how some people are taller than others and we don't really lose our shit over that? It's perfectly logical that some people might just be wider than others. It's not shoulder fat that stops a fitted blazer stretching across my back.

I spent so long wishing that I was smaller and skinnier, but I'm so over that now. I'm not bashing skinny people at all, I mean that's the way you are. I've come to accept that I'm never going to be a size 8 and that's OK. My size means I can do things other people can't do. I can hold my own on the rugby pitch, I can make a decent interception in lacrosse, and I make a good goal defence in netball, all because of my size.

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