Liz Jones's Diary: In which I realise: I am good enough
'I’ve never allowed a man to see me naked. I feel too hideous'
It’s Friday morning, and I’m in Studio 12 at Pineapple Dance Studios, Covent Garden. I’m here for a shoot for work, but as I’m early (I once read that legendary Daily Mail columnist Lynda Lee-Potter always turned up an hour before an interview), I have time to reminisce. There is plinky-plonky music from the class next door. Girls running around in tights. That strange, evocative smell of old sweat. Mirrors everywhere. When I used to come here, three, four times a week for most of the 80s (pilates on the top floor, body conditioning on the ground, leg warmers on both legs and arms), I had a rule never to look up at my own reflection.
This worked. It gave me the illusion I was better than I am.
I hated myself so profoundly, I even told my teacher a different name: Libby. I didn’t want to be Liz; I still don’t. Unfortunately, my rule of never looking in the mirror was broken one day when I caught a glimpse by accident. A stick figure in pink tights, pink ballet slippers, black leotard. I was so shocked I looked so thin that I booked to see my GP. I was prescribed steroids, which distorted my body. So I continued to punish it when I should have relished being young. No one told me I was beautiful or talented or even a nice person. So I believed I was hideous.
The make-up artist arrives for the shoot. ‘You have a good neck,’ she says, and in the next breath, ‘Is that an eyebrow tattoo?’
‘No, it’s not! It’s a £6,000 transplant.’ Honestly. She has brought hairpieces, as I imagine she found out I’ve lost so much of my hair.
When you’re young, with zero self-esteem, a single sentence can derail you. Aged 11, it was a sister saying, ‘Do you know how many calories are in toast and marmalade?’
Aged 19, which is when I moved to London, Pamela Dillman, a beautiful American student at Rada, looked me up and down and said, ‘You should do pilates. I go to The Place on Euston Road.’
You see? Just one sentence. I duly started going every week, despite the fact the changing rooms were infested with cockroaches. I became so addicted to exercise it became the only thing people remember about me. At my sister-in-law’s funeral in Edinburgh, her friends said, ‘You used to run round Leith Links whenever you came to stay.’ My mum was always disappointed that, home for the holidays, I would miss get-togethers because I was compelled to run up and down hills instead.
Aged 25, I moved out of London to a cottage in Saffron Walden, Essex, with my sister. Classes after work – I was knitting patterns editor – meant I never got home until gone 11pm. Even today, the closing theme tune of EastEnders brings back memories of running down the studio stairs, past the telly in reception, worried I’d miss my train. My sister hated me exercising in the lounge to my Michael Jackson tape – she was a nurse on night shifts – so I hired a studio on the high street. The owners thought this odd.
‘Are you a dancer?’ they asked.
No. It wasn’t about dance, or even enjoyment. It was about trying to flatten my tummy. Erase the pad of fat on my knees, which makes them look knobbly and means I never wear a bikini. I’ve never allowed a man to see me naked. I feel too hideous with my collapsed old lady buttocks and bingo wings that no amount of exercise will shift.
The photographer tells me he’s ready for my close-up. I smile, if only to lift the hammocks at the side of my mouth. A friend knows I’m on a shoot, so I break the habit of a lifetime and sidle over to look at the images on the laptop. I take a photo, press send. ‘You look like a Miss World contestant!’
If only I’d known her when I was 11. If only I could have bumped into my 25-year-old self, hurrying home from Covent Garden, and told her she was good enough.
Contact Liz at lizjonesgoddess.com and stalk her @lizjonesgoddess
★ Everyone’s talking about Liz Jones’s Diary: The Podcast! ★
Join Liz and her trusty (long-suffering) assistant Nicola as they dissect her weekly YOU magazine diary and delve into the archives to relive the bust-ups, betrayals, bullets… and much more in this brilliant podcast. They’re outspoken, outrageous and utterly hilarious. Listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and mailplus.co.uk
