{"id":544323,"date":"2026-07-11T10:52:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T10:52:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/544323\/"},"modified":"2026-07-11T10:52:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-11T10:52:15","slug":"roisin-ingle-this-is-your-annual-reminder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/544323\/","title":{"rendered":"R\u00f3is\u00edn Ingle: This is your annual reminder"},"content":{"rendered":"

Are you bikini ready? Speedo ready? Shorts ready? Generous, 1950s-style polka-dot togs ready? Are you ready to lie on the beach, recline on a lounger, splash about on your holidays? Are you ready for it?<\/p>\n

These are all trick questions. As if careful preparation is required in order to wear swimming togs. As if there is body maintenance to be done before you go swimming or sunbathing with ease and joy on your holliers. This is your annual reminder: when it comes to togs of all types, we were born ready.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Summer bodies: Your body is not a \u2018before\u2019. It\u2019s not a problem to be solvedOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Of course, I can only say this now after years of angst regarding those many and varied garments that are designed to be worn in or beside water. I can only say this after decades of feeling as though I was doing the world a disservice by exposing myself and my body in togs. The shame was deep. The shame was real. I had failed in my job as a girl and then as a woman by owning a body that did not conform to what was deemed attractive. <\/p>\n

I did not wear bikinis. I was not allowed. Or at least I told myself that. Magazines told me that. Boys who shouted \u201cfatty\u201d at me in the street told me that. Well-meaning women who declared I had a pretty face and implied that if I would only make myself smaller then everything would be so much better, told me that. <\/p>\n

My mother, by her deeds rather than her words, told me that. Ann Ingle, who turns 87 in August, won\u2019t mind me partly blaming her. She is equal portions self-aware, wise and generous. I am lucky to have her. <\/p>\n

I grew up, as many of us did, in a home where extreme diets were extremely normal. My mother tried and talked about them all. The one where you could only eat cabbage soup. The one where you could only eat 1,000 calories a day. The one where you were only allowed to eat Ryvita and cottage cheese with maybe a bit of tinned pineapple for colour. The one where you ascribed points to food, as though eating was a contest, with winners and losers. If you lost then you won but it was never a fair fight. Like the drugs in that song by The Verve, these diets didn\u2019t work, they just made it worse. And like a dutiful daughter I followed the same pattern for years trying and failing to conform in an endless loop. Hating my body. Hating my body in swimwear most of all. <\/p>\n

And now? At 54 I just don\u2019t care. Let me take you on a tour of my beach-ready body. I will start with my toenails. They are chunky, misshapen and in some cases ingrown. They are not, some would say, flip-flop ready but they are the only toes I own.<\/p>\n

Moving up, there is an unsightly cavity on the front of my lower right leg following a fall and an operation. It\u2019s a long story. My legs are unshaven, which is a shorter story \u2013 I\u2019m lazy. Moving up, my thighs are meaty and flabby, like my belly. They are pocked with cellulite and stretch marks. Further up, further on, we arrive at my arms. They are not toned \u00e0 la Michelle Obama. But I am sure the former First Lady would agree I still have the right to bare arms. I will bare my arms. <\/p>\n

Because so what? Is under-arm skin that wobbles when you wave a crime? It is not. And anyway, who cares? Nobody on my impending holiday in Spain I am nearly certain. As we all know by now, what everybody else is thinking about is mostly themselves. Their own bodies. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0I don\u2019t care so much about Taylor Swift\u2019s life decisions these days. I have bigger questionsOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

I have committed many parenting fails in my time but if I did one thing right, I never spoke badly of my body in front of my children even when, especially when, I felt badly about my body. I never talked about diets or trying to make myself smaller or commented on the size of my children\u2019s bodies. <\/p>\n

Last week one of my daughters accompanied my mother to a studio where she was recording the audio version of her latest book (it\u2019s a memoir about ageing called Still Here, available from all good bookshops from October). In the studio, my daughter listened to my mother reading the chapter about her lifelong battle with her body. <\/p>\n

It made my daughter feel confused and sad. She didn\u2019t understand. \u201cI love my body,\u201d my 17-year-old told my mother in the taxi on the way home. And then she recounted a mantra I drummed into her over the years: \u201cIt\u2019s not what your body looks like, it\u2019s what your body can do.\u201d I was deeply moved when my mother told me this. Happy for my daughter, sad for myself and my mum. <\/p>\n

And now I am ready. I don\u2019t have to love myself in swimming togs. I just have to not hate myself. What I am really striving for, though, and what I\u2019ve mostly achieved, is a kind of body neutrality. <\/p>\n

I am ready. Ready for the gorgeous green, halter-neck one-piece swimming costume given to me by a lovely friend. Ready for the sea. Ready for the swimming pool. Ready for the sun lounger. I was born ready, you see. We all were.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Are you bikini ready? Speedo ready? Shorts ready? Generous, 1950s-style polka-dot togs ready? Are you ready to lie…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":544324,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[321,93,631,61,60,709,45578],"class_list":["post-544323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-for-you","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-magazine","tag-roisin-ingle"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/544323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=544323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/544323\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/544324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=544323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=544323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=544323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}