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Feeling the pressure to be size zero
There nothing new about women's obsession with cutting down their size – the Duchess of Windsor said you could never be too rich or too thin. But what is the price to be paid in trying to match up to the latest fashion contour?
Louise Redknapp discovers first hand the dangers of the obsession with being stick-thin.
She undertakes an extreme crash diet and exercise regime in an attempt to drop to a US dress size zero in 30 days. In The Truth about Size Zero, Louise undergoes a punishing plan to dramatically lose her trademark curves and attempt to drop two dress sizes. The television presenter, who was once voted by the lads' magazine FHM as the Sexiest Woman of the Decade, is usually a size eight. Here she sets about trying to get down to a UK size four.
Half of young women say they're unhappy with their figures, but there's been something of a reaction recently to the gaunt, almost cocaine-addict look that designers seem to want on the catwalk. One fashion chain has launched its swimwear shots featuring a size 12 model and for London Fashion Week the British Fashion Council asked designers to use only healthy-looking, not "size zero", models.
After 17 years in the spotlight, Louise Redknapp is well aware of the pressure to be thin and she agrees to put normal life on hold to find out more about the size zero trend and expose it for what it really is.
"I grew up in the entertainment industry," she says, "I went to stage school and I always wanted to be in entertainment and I have always felt even at a size eight that I have never quite been skinny enough.
There was always the feeling that if I could have lost half a stone, it would have been better. It is such a lot of pressure on a young woman and if I was feeling that, I know a lot of other young women were also feeling that." She finds out what "lollypop ladies" really do to gain their size zero status and at what cost during the month-long experiment. Throughout this process, Louise is closely monitored by nutritionist Dr Adam Carey who warns her of the dangers of crash dieting. He says: "The current vogue is macabre. It is obscene and it is very unhealthy."
After her first consultation with Dr Carey, Louise says: "Everything he said shocked me. It's a shame. If every woman in the country, or every woman in the world, who wants to lose weight and become really skinny, if they could all just have half-an hour sitting with a doctor telling them exactly what's going to happen to them, I think you'd get very few of them who would carry on with it." But Louise is convinced that she can only be really qualified to speak out about the tyranny of thin by going through the experience first hand.
To kickstart the regime, Louise travels to LA where she enrols with Bootcamp Barry, a military-style fitness and diet guru to people such as Teri Hatcher, Katie Holmes and Jenny McCarthy. She takes part in his fitness boot camp and also trawls the boutiques to shop for a size zero dress as her "thinspiration".
She also meets up with an old friend, Denise Van Outen, who tells her about how she was told to lose weight when she first moved to LA.
Bootcamp Barry sets out Louise's diet and exercise plan for the next 30 days. She has to run three miles a day before completing a further punishing hour of cardio and weights in her home basement gym.
Back in the UK she also talks to Mel C who suffered from anorexia throughout her time as a Spice Girl and was cruelly labelled Sumo Spice when she subsequently resorted to binge eating. Louise also visits patients at the Rhodes Farm Clinic for eating disorders in north London and is moved to tears when she sees just where the size zero trend hits the hardest. Just a few days into the plan, Louise begins to struggle with her busy life as a working mother on only 800 calories a day. And the time-consuming exercise regime also impacts on family life.
"I completely underestimated how hard this would be," she says. Two weeks into the diet, Louise goes for her mid-way appointment with Dr Carey. The diet is taking its toll. She has a cold, can't sleep, is tired, bored, irritable and hungry. Dr Carey urges her to quit.
Louise also visits her old stage school, the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts, to warn the pupils about the true horrors of crash dieting. It is gruelling to watch. On the final lap of the course, Louise returns to LA where she goes on a mad-dash tour of weird and wonderful alternative routes to size zero. And it's back to Barry's Bootcamp for one last time. On the last day of the diet, Louise returns to Dr Carey for her final check-up to see how the regime has impacted on her health. Her 30-day fast is now over and she can fit into the size zero dress. Two months on, Louise makes a full recovery. She is once again enjoying her food and loving her curves.
The Truth About Size Zero, ITV1, Wednesday, 9pm.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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