Ok, so let's go back to before I even became a Dietitian or a Stylist. Let's say around high school. My parents gave me the amazing opportunity of studying abroad. First came boarding school in England (so posh, I know), later on in Florence, Italy, and finally Victoria, Canada. Sounds like the dream right? Well, it was, but imagine my eating habits. Initially, in boarding school, food was surprisingly good so of course my weight went up. Got back home and I had to educate myself about diets. Later on, came Florence. I stayed in a house with 4 other girls and Maria Pia, the lovely Nonna who would cook pasta for us daily. So here I was in a super artistic place, full of fashion and the things I adore but my mind was always worrying about my weight. Of course, coming back home, I wanted to lose all the pasta weight and even more because, who’s happy with their bodies anyways? I thought no one was. Finally comes Canada and here you could say I was perfect. From afar I seemed happy and you could even say I had mastered the “eating well abroad” madness that I had been trying to master for several years now, but of course, it was the opposite. I was not eating at all, I was living with a family who treated me horribly, and of course, I developed an eating disorder. I guess we all knew I was building up to this right? Too many ups and downs related to food in my life and that’s all I’ve been talking about in this blog. Honestly, that’s what my life felt like, I was living around food and life was just passing by. Fashion has always been an incredibly important part of my life but it was always overshadowed. Not even I knew to what extent food had taken over my life.
What I developed is called orthorexia. You probably haven’t heard of this because it has made its way into our society without even noticing. Basically what it means is, I needed to have absolute control over what I ate, I had to know every ingredient in my dishes, and of course, never ate a gram over my recommended amount. So it's 90 grams, not 91 or 89 because it had to be perfect. Sounds horrible right? Or does it sound like just dieting? Honestly one of the hardest things about this eating disorder is that we’ve all come so used to these extreme diets that we don’t notice anymore how dramatic and life-altering they can be. 98% of people who diet fail by going back to the original weight. Surprisingly out of those, 1/3 gains even more weight. That’s horrible!!! Why do we keep trying to starve ourselves? Anyways this isn’t an eating disorder Ted Talk, let's continue.
I ended up studying dietetics in university, hating it all the way through and going to all the therapists and experts on the topic. Even one rehab center. Finally, I got through it but it was too late to change courses, plus I had no idea what I liked right? Because I had never paid attention to myself outside of food. Psychology of Eating was the next step I took and it helped me so much and I was able to help so many patients. It felt great being able to touch so many lives but how about mine? I want to follow my dreams too, not only tell my patients to follow theirs. So finally what you were waiting for, fashion styling comes in!!!
I know everything about ourselves makes us who we are, acknowledging my journey through what I went thorough gave me a new perspective of how I envision fashion. This is why I created holistic fashion. An inclusive way of allowing you to love what you see in the mirror every morning. Personalized wardrobe styling while we work on your relationship with yourself. No more "ugh im so ugly" or "look at this fat arm" because that's so 2000´s. Now-a-days the trend is to thrive and encourage ourselves to be as awesome as we already are.
I want to encourage people to love themselves, love their bodies, to have a great relationship with themselves so everything they wear looks amazing. Have you ever seen that girl that enters a room and everyone looks at her? She has an outfit on point, great hair and she’s probably gorgeous too. I want that to be you because it's not all about what's on the outside. The way you present yourself and the way you treat yourself is what's going to achieve that.
Your incredible smile and that “je ne sais quoi” are a reflection of what's within.
Feny
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