Chapter 2
WHAT’S YOUR STYLE STORY?
Fashion you can buy, but style you possess. The key to style is learning who you are, which takes years. There’s no how-to road map to style. It’s about self-expression and, above all, attitude.
—Iris Apfel
When did clothes first start to matter to you? If I had to pinpoint a moment when I “woke up” to fashion, it would be my freshman year of high school, in the walk-in closet of a cousin around my age. My cousin and her mom were very into labels. She wore brands like Tommy Hilfiger, Guess?, the Gap, even Valentino head to toe. I remember thinking she was so privileged. My mom, by contrast, would take me vintage shopping at Goodwill or thrift shops. She was all about finding unique things, as opposed to the most expensive brand, which dovetailed nicely with my dad’s insistence that labels were a rip-off anyway. I can still hear him railing against Polo shirts in his Jamaican accent: “You’re buying these t-shirts with the horse on them when you could buy the same one at Value City and it costs much less!” Every season, my cousin would bring over several huge Hefty bags full of hand-me-downs for me. If it was winter, I would get her old fall stuff. If it was summer, I’d get spring.
One day I wore a Tommy Hilfiger purse she had given me to school. As I walked in late to algebra class, I passed by the desk of my bully (let’s call her Sabrina*). I heard Sabrina and her sidekick (we’ll call him Dave*) whispering: “Oh, that must be a fake Tommy bag.” Sabrina persuaded Dave to come over and examine my bag, to check the logo for authenticity. I was humiliated. But then something interesting happened. I was still relatively new to the school and had initially been pegged as an awkward loner. But by tenth grade, thanks to my cousin’s generosity, I began to become known as the girl with the labels. I was devastated when Sabrina and Dave examined my purse, in large part because I knew it wasn’t truly mine. In order for me to feel cool or accepted, I thought I needed these labels. And yet I felt like a fraud because they had been passed down to me. It was my first lesson in Fashion Incongruence.
As my stress around this issue built, I found myself back in my cousin’s bedroom, where, one afternoon, she casually said, “Oh, here, you can have this,” and tossed some article of clothing at me. I don’t think she intended to shame me, but in that moment I felt subservient to her. I went home and told my mom, “I am never taking her clothes again.” I can’t control the students at school, I decided, but I can control this situation.
Looking back, I realize that was the moment when I began to consciously incorporate my parents’ philosophies into my own point of view. I concluded labels don’t count, but your own sense of style does. It’s not about how much clothes cost; it’s about how you uniquely wear them. And yet, to this day, even in my most casual sweats, I’ll always make sure I’m carrying a nice handbag. It has to be a nice bag. No matter what. I can trace that need, that insecurity, directly back to Sabrina and Dave in algebra class.
When I refused to take my cousin’s hand-me-downs, I drew a line in the sand, and it made me stronger. I was beginning to assert my style identity. I deemphasized external value markers in favor of my own creativity. I put more stock into how I styled my clothes than into which fashion house made them. I used to cut up old Hanes t-shirts, fold the shredded seam inside to create an off-the-shoulder neckline, and secure it with safety pins, transforming a Walmart staple into a punk rock statement. And then, to my surprise, lots of other girls in my grade started wearing off-the-shoulder shirts. I began to see myself as a trendsetter. I realized my power lay not in how I conformed but in how I individuated. If I feel good about myself, I discovered, people will be attracted to my confidence. This became a point of pride. As time went on, I tapped into my rebellious nature more and more, shaking up style norms, and never looked back. Unless of course I’m in therapy, in which case I rake over the past with a fine-tooth comb (LOL).
WHAT TYPE OF DRESSER ARE YOU?
Okay, your turn. Now it’s time for you to look at your past and ask yourself, Why do I wear what I wear? I’m here to help you make sense of your own style history and label your behaviors. Once you understand what you’re doing when you get dressed and how you formed those habits, it will be easier to change them, should you choose to. Are you an emotional dresser, a Fashion Identification Assimilator, a Situational Code Switcher, someone with a Repetitious Wardrobe Complex or Fashion Incongruence? Maybe you have traits from a few different categories. I will help you zoom in on the why behind what you wear, which is typically rooted in emotion. Then we’ll spend the rest of the book getting into exactly what you can do about it.
You see, after years of working with all kinds of clients, I’ve begun to notice certain patterns or recurring modes of behavior. When people get stuck in style ruts, their stories tend to follow a formula. Each of these Fashion Psychology behaviors can be recognized and diagnosed. I am not in the business of prescribing blanket “cures.” My advice to every individual is customized. But I can facilitate bringing your issues to consciousness by drawing what’s buried to the surface. If your style behavior is impeding your emotional well-being, I have solutions to explore.
First, let’s get you familiar with some terminology you’ll notice me using throughout the book. In psychiatry (the medical treatment of mental illness), there is something called the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, or the DSM (now in its fifth iteration). As defined by the American Psychiatric Association, the DSM-V is “the authoritative guide to the diagnosis of mental disorders.”
Here, in a similar vein, I have outlined a Fashion Psychology Glossary of terms. To be clear, I am not equating style behaviors with mental disorders. I merely think it would be helpful for everyone to have universal definitions, so we can all help ourselves.
FASHION PSYCHOLOGY GLOSSARY
Decision Fatigue Also known as the paradox of choice, this occurs when you are faced with too many options for what to wear or buy. It often results in feeling overwhelmed and paralyzed, and in making decisions you later regret (buyer’s remorse, discomfort with your outfit).
Fashion Identification Assimilation When you use style to fit in with or blend into a cultural or social group.
Fashion Incongruence When your ideal dress and perceived dress are incompatible.
Fashion Situational Code Switching When you alternate between different styles, depending on your cultural and social situations. You may dress a certain way with one group or in one context, and a different way with/in another.
Focal Accessory An item that holds psychological value and may be worn repeatedly.
Mood Enhancement Dress Dressing to modify your mood for the better. Doing so optimizes or elevates your current emotional state.
Mood Illustration Dress Dressing in a way that expresses and perpetuates your current emotional state.
Repetitious Wardrobe Complex Wearing the same clothes—or versions of the same clothes—over and over again.
HELP ME HELP YOU
When it comes to style, the possibilities are endless (and, yes, that in itself can feel paralyzing). The only one-size-fits-all thing about clothes is that we’ve all got issues. Everyone—everyone—is grappling with some sort of fashion pathology. No one is immune. That awful feeling of having a closet full of clothes but nothing to wear? The outfit regret that hits you midway through your morning commute? Simply feeling uncomfortable in your own skin as you go about your business, counting the hours till you can go home to your pajamas and Netflix? These feelings do not discriminate. And you are not alone. In fact, these style hang-ups are so common as to be ubiquitous. Like wallpaper. Or the traffic noise I hear outside my window. They’re so universal that we all just accept them as something we have to live with. We don’t!
I believe Fashion Psychology is having a moment because it helps us define or diagnose behaviors we’re all performing every day but don’t have names for. Don’t get me wrong. Tons of airtime, blog posts, and glossy magazine features have already been devoted to teaching us “How to break out of your style rut once and for all!” But style ruts—aka Repetitious Wardrobe Complex—are rarely resolved with escapist infotainment. You’ll have to dig a little deeper than that.
Here is a quiz designed to help you identify your Fashion Psychology behaviors, followed by my advice on how you might change up your look to change your life.
Let’s get started.
PARENTS, PEERS, AND POP CULTURE: HOW OUR FASHION IDENTITIES FORM
I hope by now you have a better idea of your style behaviors. But along with the “dead dresses” in your closet (i.e., the items that haunt you because you never wear them), you’ve got to clean out the skeletons! To look forward to a better-dressed future, you need to understand—not be defined by—your past. Only once you confront any issues that are bothering you can you grow beyond them with grace.
How did your upbringing teach you style lessons that still impact your life today? Did you watch in awe as your mom got glammed up to go out at night? I wonder if you now associate intense emotion with looking “fancy”? Did you decide you’re a real grown-up only if you wear a dress, jewelry, and full makeup? Can you still smell your mom’s perfume? What was she wearing? Do you own anything like it?
Do you still have vivid memories of wanting to buy whatever it took to be accepted by the popular kids? Do you still shop with a certain squad in mind? Did you recently buy something because everybody else was wearing it? When we talk about your personal style, what we’re really talking about is your identity. Even though your looks, needs, desires, and priorities evolve with age, you may still be hanging on to style biases, habits, and beliefs you picked up when you were much younger. These predilections can be good! For example, someone with a big, dynamic personality may have always loved flamboyant colors and campy prints to reflect her sassy, brassy sense of humor. Or someone nostalgic for her ’90s glory days can nod to them with the skinny sunglasses or choker necklace trend. No harm done. But often, old habits die hard, and they can hold you back. Raise your hand if you still have jeans from high school in your closet. It may be time to let them go, along with the style myths you adopted when you first wore them.
Let’s take a walk down memory lane, back to your childhood.
What stories did loved ones tell you about your looks or style? Were you always a princess? Always a rough-and-tumble tree-climbing tomboy with skinned knees? How were you labeled growing up?
How did clothes play a role in the way you separated from your parents as an independent individual? Did you have a rebellious fashion phase?
How have you used clothes to cement (dressing to fit in) or disrupt (dressing to stand out) your relationships with others?
Do you still wear any of these “important” types of clothes today?
As Kate Spade once said, “Playing dress-up begins at age five and never really ends.”3 When I meet with clients, I ask about how their relationship to fashion began to help me understand where it is now. When I inquire about a client’s past, it’s sort of like Fashion Psychology’s spin on the classic analyst’s question: “So, tell me about your mother…” (More on mothers in a minute.) How do we begin to use this particular form of communication—style—in our lives? When do we first start to “read” the messages other people’s clothes send out? And when do we start to craft those messages ourselves? Who teaches us to “speak” with our appearance—to ourselves, to others? And once we’ve learned to do so, can we learn to speak differently?
Let’s listen in on a session I had with a client (a black college student we’ll call Lisa*) that powerfully demonstrates how our families influence our self-perception—and how we can rise above that influence. She came to me with the goal of building up her confidence. During our conversation, I helped her begin to see herself as remarkably resilient. It turned out she didn’t want or need to change a thing about her style (so you won’t see a Style Rx below). She just needed some light shined on her strength.
CASE STUDY: AVATAR
Dawnn: You started to say something about your hair?
Lisa: When I was younger, chemically straightened hair was a big deal. Everyone got their hair straightened and my mom was one of those people. She was like, You have great hair and it’s really long, but it would look even better straight. The thing is, I never liked heat in my hair because I’m tender-headed. My [scalp] is just really sensitive. So I would always cry when I got treatments. My sister always had better hair than me because hers was straight. My hair was so thick and curly that even when I got it professionally done, it would frizz up two hours later. I had so many insecurities about this as a child. I remember being so upset on picture day. I’d be like, Why can’t my hair be like my sister’s? So when I finally got control of my hair as a teenager and stopped getting it straightened, I was so happy. Things were bumpy at first, because I didn’t know how to deal with my hair. But then once I figured it out, it got fun.
Dawnn: And now natural hair is in! Has the natural hair movement helped you accept yourself more?
Lisa: Right! Yeah, when natural hair started to become more accepted, I just smacked tradition to its side. My mom is really traditional. She’s the authoritarian parent, so anything she says goes. She’s just strict like that. She doesn’t want me to date outside my race. But I’m a free spirit. I’m like, Eh, I kind of don’t care what you think. We clash because of that. It’s funny how it all comes back to hair. Ever since the natural hair movement caught on, I kind of stopped caring about beauty norms in general. I’m like, One day, someone’s going to think I’m cool regardless of whether we are different races. So I just push away all those old-school beliefs. You’ve just got to find out what you like about yourself.
Dawnn: And have you always known what you like about yourself?
Lisa: No. When I was younger, I was bullied because I have a birthmark. I would be called “Avatar” [a reference to the blue aliens in the James Cameron movie]. My mom and my other family members would joke around and call me names too. They’d be like, We’re just preparing you for the future so you heard it already. If you hear it from us, it’s not going to hurt as much when other people say it. And I was like, Okay, well, that’s kind of true. But still, I’m sensitive. So when I would get name-called or made fun of for my skin discoloration, I’d be like, Okay, that’s interesting. Besides having straighter hair, my sister also has a more curvy figure. People close to me would also joke around about that. They’d be like, Why does she have more boobs than you? And I’d joke back and be like, Because she stole my boobs. I just kind of got over all that with time. I got some distance from it.
Dawnn: So you used humor to stay positive, as a coping mechanism, as self-defense?
Lisa: Yeah.
Dawnn: It’s interesting because in these situations, your family members are the ones evaluating you. They are absorbing our culture’s beauty norms about straight hair, about curvy bodies, about “perfect” skin, and then teaching them to you, enforcing those standards. This isn’t coming from magazines or movies. The criticism is coming from those closest to you.
Lisa: Yeah. We’re all following the same trends. We’re all just following that hype train.
Did your heart ache when you read how Lisa’s own mother made fun of her looks, under the guise of toughening her up? It reminds me of that horror movie line: “The call is coming from inside the house!” Did you relate? What’s the takeaway for you? No matter what scars you bear from your past, it is within your power to accept and embrace the things about yourself that make you different and therefore special. Once you feel worthy inside, you’ll feel deserving of looking your best on the outside. Lisa hits the nail on the head: “You’ve just got to find out what you like about yourself.”
OKAY, NOW TELL ME ABOUT YOUR MOTHER
Not surprisingly, our very first fashion role models tend to be our moms. One of my earliest, happiest memories is my mother allowing me to cut up an old t-shirt to design clothes for my Barbie and Melanie’s Mall dolls. (Once a fashionista, always a fashionista.) London College of Fashion psychologist and consumer behavior expert Kate Nightingale emphasizes the role our mothers play in shaping our style. As she told Grazia, our mothers are often with us—unconsciously—when we shop. We are more inclined to buy clothes in shapes, colors, and fabrics we were exposed to as children, because they will inspire positive feelings when we encounter them, even decades later. We will think we like something because it feels familiar, confusing memory with preference, nostalgia with good taste. “For example, if your [mother] was wearing a particular shape of jacket, you’ll have a higher inclination towards it,” explains Nightingale. “There’s an element of attaching emotional security to old representations of the times when you felt comfortable and secure.”4
Fascinatingly, this works both ways. As daughters grow up, the shoe is on the other foot, and they begin to strongly influence their mother’s style. A study in the Journal of Consumer Behavior demonstrates how mothers become their teen daughters’ “consumer doppelgangers.” Researchers theorized that because middle-aged moms are spread so thin with family and work obligations, they don’t have time to stay on top of what’s hip in youth culture. So they copy their daughters’ style as a sort of shortcut to coolness. (If you’re fifty-five going on fifteen, this may be news you can use!) The study also illuminates the concept of “cognitive age”—i.e., the age we feel we are as opposed to the age we actually are. (Incongruence alert!) Researchers discovered that their subjects’ cognitive ages tended to be ten years younger than their actual ages. The moms interviewed “sought to project a more youthful identity through their possessions.”5
What does this mean for you?
1. It may be time to reexamine the myths and messages your family members conveyed to you about your style or appearance. Maybe with the best of intentions, someone important to you told you “ladies wear skirts” when you’d really prefer pants. Maybe someone mentioned you look great in red, and you hate it but keep buying it. Maybe it’s time for you to break some rules.
2. As you grow older, it’s worth noting these concepts of cognitive age and youth doppelganging. You don’t need to dress ten years younger to be attractive. Doing so may even create feelings of disharmony and insecurity (more incongruence!). Just look at Michelle Obama, Iman, Lauren Hutton, Helen Mirren, Yoko Ono, and the slew of Instagram influencers over fifty (my fave? @iconaccidental): Nothing is more modern than dressing like a grown-up.
KEEPING IT OLD-SCHOOL? TIME TO HEAL YOUR TEENAGE STYLE SCARS
Roland Barthes called wearing clothes “a profoundly social act.”6 It follows, then, that what you wear has a profound effect on your social relationships. Any middle schooler can tell you that. In fact, middle school is usually when it all begins. It’s when we reach a new level of self-consciousness, and it’s usually when we are first free to express our self-identity through clothes (i.e., when Mom can’t tell us what to wear anymore). It’s also when we suffer our first fashion fails. And so clothes become a huge emotional deal. “Artsy” tweens wear t-shirts depicting their favorite bands, while their “sporty” peers wear Under Armour or Adidas. And they all sit together at cafeteria tables grouped by their style uniforms. “On Wednesdays we wear pink,” declare “The Plastics” in Mean Girls. Using money I saved from waiting tables, I once disobeyed my father and bought a Coach bag to fit in with the label-conscious clique at my high school. We affirm or defy our relationships with what we choose to wear. As a result, style is an ever-present factor as we pick up emotional baggage.
Adolescence is a fraught time at the crossroads of style and identity. This explains why some of our adult beliefs about clothes can be traced back to adaptive behaviors we developed during our emotionally turbulent formative years. “Girls use clothes, accessories, and fashion to define themselves, make statements about their choice of peer group, and to establish their psychological identities,” writes New York City psychologist Dr. Stephanie Newman in Psychology Today. She describes the processes of “mirroring” and “twinning.” (No, it’s not just an Internet buzzword!) That’s when young people dress almost exactly like their peers in order to solidify both social relationships and their own fledgling identities. A girl’s clothing choices, Newman writes, can be a fast track to the in crowd or a vehicle for “opting out of her school community entirely.”7
Now you might suppose that in the digital age, social media stars have the most influence over a young person’s style identity. After all, we’re always reading about how much cash the Kar-Jenners pull in for a single promotional product post. But this is not the case. Kids’ peers are actually the most influential of all. One consumer research firm asked teens what factors they consider when choosing styles and brands. They ranked the opinions of friends at 45.2 percent—significantly higher than social media (35.1 percent) and celebrity styles (27.5 percent).8 When you’re young, your friends (and frenemies) hold sway over your fashion preferences and developing identity—for better or for worse. But it doesn’t have to be this way for the rest of your life.
What’s the takeaway for you? Whether you are parenting an image-obsessed tween or you’re an adult still working through your damage from high school, I want you to know there’s a legitimate psychological reason for all the intense emotion. I am here to validate you. Those years—and those peers—actually matter a lot. They tend to leave their mark.
But here’s the good news about fashion and identity. It is healthy to change and evolve. If you are still dressing at forty the way you did at twenty, I want to know why. Could you still be dressing like your teenage “twin”? Are you denying yourself a certain color, print, or shape you’re drawn to because someone once made you feel like crap when you wore it—or even when you took a style risk, period? Do you still ask yourself Will my squad think this is cool? before you buy or wear something? It’s time to figure out what you like to wear—not your mom, not your daughter, not your friends. After all, one of the best perks of being a fully realized adult is dressing for your own pleasure rather than for someone else’s approval.
HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT
Our clothes tell our stories—including the tragic parts. In my practice I’ve seen clothes used as an emotional Band-Aid, even an unconscious cry for help. According to a 2012 study conducted by psychologist Karen Pine of the University of Hertfordshire in Britain, 57 percent of women will put on a baggy top when depressed, compared with 2 percent who select one when they feel happy. (She surveyed one hundred women to gather these figures.) Conversely, her subjects would be ten times more likely to put on a favorite dress when happy (62 percent) than when depressed (6 percent).9 So from this we can conclude that in general, drab, oversize, or unkempt clothes can be a tell. (Remember Jim in chapter 1?) If I notice a client is consistently looking disheveled or hiding herself in her clothes, I might use that visual information as a way in. Her clothing choices may be the first clue I follow to help her identify an emotional wall she’s built to insulate herself from pain.
It makes sense that people use clothes for emotional protection: This turns out to be a very effective defense mechanism! Clinical psychologist Nadene van der Linden writes about what she calls “The Grey Rock Method.” It’s a strategy for dealing with toxic people by basically turning yourself into a gray rock—acting emotionally flat, disengaged, unstimulating in order to repel the undesired social contact. “The idea is that you keep your head down like a grey rock and blend into the landscape,” she writes.10 It’s even been suggested that we may dress in dull, neutral clothing, without makeup, accessories, or other flourishes, in order to bore the aggressor into moving on to a more exciting target. But avoiding conflict is just one reason someone might dress to disappear.
Let’s listen in on a counseling session I had with a different college student client we’ll call Sonal.* I chose to include her case here because she exhibits many of the behaviors I just defined in the Fashion Psychology Glossary (so I highlighted those in bold). Notice how her family impacts her self-image and style choices. Maybe, like this client, you don’t love your body. Maybe your self-esteem is also so low that you feel like you don’t deserve to look good in your clothes. Maybe you got lots of C’s and D’s in the quiz you just took, and you recognize yourself as a fashion avoider or repeat offender. If you relate, read on to learn how clothes might make her—and you—happier.
CASE STUDY: THE VANISHING GIRL
Dawnn: Tell me about your body image, and how that affects your shopping habits.
Sonal: To be honest, I only really shop once in a while. I’m insecure about how thin I am. So I try to buy pants that are kind of loose so no one will see how skinny my legs are. In the past few years, I’ve been to visit my mom’s family in India three times, and everyone there said I look sick, like I have some kind of disease. They said American doctors don’t know shit. So my mom’s relatives actually got me tested in India to see if maybe I have a thyroid problem.
Dawnn: How did that make you feel?
Sonal: Bad. I told my mom and she was like, I get you tested regularly here! You’re fine. You just need to gain a little weight. I can eat anything I want, I just have a small belly. More recently, I ended up going to see a US doctor, and she said, based on the blood tests she took, that everything is fine. She said I’m just a little bit underweight but that that’s very common.
Dawnn: So you’re not sick?
Sonal: No. But [in India] they said I look really sickly. My mom’s sister made fun of me for being skinny. Her daughter is curvaceous. So my aunt would say, “Why is it that my daughter is the perfect size and you’re so skinny?”
Dawnn: That kind of comparison coming from your own family. How does that make you feel?
Sonal: Well, I don’t know. It did give me another perspective on how I look. And I became more insecure about my clothes. My aunt said I’m so skinny, it doesn’t even look like I’m wearing any clothes. She was so proud that her daughter is va-va-va-voom.
Dawnn: So when you buy clothes, you buy them bigger than your size? Does that make you feel more comfortable?
Sonal: Yes, exactly. Usually I buy long-sleeve shirts to hide my arms. I’m so skinny I avoid skinny jeans and try to buy straight pants. I wear sweats.
Dawnn: To hide your body?
Sonal: Yeah.
Dawnn: Here in America, especially in the modeling industry, the beauty ideal is to be thin. And you’re here now. So does that have an effect on you?
Sonal: Okay, well, here the beauty ideal is to be thin, but most guys still like a girl with a little junk. Everyone who’s considered beautiful in India has some kind of boobs or booty.
Dawnn: But again, here in the New York fashion world, where thin is in, you would be considered very beautiful. Do you see how our standards of beauty can shift depending on our cultures and contexts, on who is deciding what’s beautiful?
Sonal: Yeah. But you’re a female, so of course you’re going to say something positive to try to make me feel better. I mean, we all try to empower each other. I have never had a guy come up to me and say, “Oh, you’re so skinny and beautiful.”
Dawnn: So if I think you’re beautiful, that doesn’t hold much weight. But if a guy said it…
Sonal: It would validate it.
Dawnn: You said you wear sweats. Do you choose stylish sweats, or dress them up with heels? Or are you just like, I don’t care.
Sonal: I just don’t care. The only time I unleash it all is when I have to dress up, like for a wedding. But that’s once in a blue moon.
Dawnn: So when you do dress up for a special occasion and “unleash it all,” as you say, you’re not wearing oversize clothes, you’re wearing clothes that fit you. Do you feel beautiful then?
Sonal: I mean, I’m all dolled up wearing makeup, so I feel like my face makes up for it.
Dawnn: So your face and pretty clothes compensate for your body? And when you’re dressed up, it doesn’t feel like it’s actually you?
Sonal: Exactly. With formal Indian clothes, even if the sleeves are long, they’re made out of net, so it still showcases how thin my arms are, unfortunately. The good thing is, you’re not really allowed to wear tight clothes there, so…
Dawnn: Do you have hope you will overcome this insecurity someday?
Sonal: My mom told me that she was skinny like me too when she was young. She has a little bit of junk now, because she gained weight after she gave birth to me and my brother.
Dawnn: So your body type is hereditary. You don’t have a disease. There’s nothing wrong with you.
Sonal: That’s what I told my aunt and uncle, but they were like, “Nah. We remember our sister. She was never that thin!” Once I have kids, I’m pretty sure it’ll make me feel womanly. I’m pretty sure by then I’ll have a guy who will love me for who I am instead of for my body. It is possible.
Dawnn: Let’s go back to the oversize clothes. Would you be willing to wear ones that are cute and trendy?
Sonal: I mean, how would I even do that?
Dawnn: That’s where I come in. I’m going to research some styles that are still the oversize look, but cute.
Sonal: Wow. Okay!
Dawnn: Then, the next time we meet, I’ll show you some pictures of options. My thinking is, you can definitely still cover up your figure, but maybe put a bow on it. If you’re going to wear these oversize clothes, we can jazz them up. That might help with your confidence.
Sonal: Oh my God, okay!
Dawnn: I think it’s about being comfortable with yourself, and that includes being comfortable with your insecurities. You can deemphasize what makes you insecure and still look good doing it. Does that make sense? How does that make you feel?
Sonal: Thank you! So much better.
Okay, guys. Lots to unpack here. There are cross-cultural issues at play (Fashion Identification Assimilation, Fashion Situational Code Switching) that inform Sonal’s self-perception. She is also clearly buying into some romantic rescue fantasies. But primarily and most urgently, she is wrestling with body image concerns. The goal is to help her find self-acceptance, to embrace who she is, insecurities and all. It is not my intention to rob her of her protective armor—her baggy clothes—as her sense of self is currently quite delicate.
Thanks to the athleisure explosion, there are tons of style options available to Sonal. She can try a trendy long-sleeve sweatshirt cut in a modern silhouette, to give the illusion of a crop top. She can push up the sleeves to just below the elbows to reveal only her wrists; showing skin strategically will offset the sense that her clothes are swallowing her up. Joggers or harem-style sweats will similarly offer coverage but still feel fresh. This type of outfit ticks all the boxes: It is modest, modern, and comforting. Another option could be a boilersuit that covers her entire body, limbs included, unbuttoned to just above her navel, with a crop top underneath. Once again, she’d be strategically showing just peeks of skin at the clavicle and rib cage. Overalls with a chunky sweater underneath would create a similar vibe but leave her completely covered. As she’s petite, wearing ankle boots with built-in wedges could give her a lift, physically and emotionally.
Above all, we’ve got to honor Sonal’s feelings of wanting to cover herself. Remember: She thinks she’s unattractive. Her family members have convinced her she looks ill. Sure, we could get a glam squad to transform her—she is sample size, after all—but oversexualizing her with body-con clothes would only add to her problems from both a psychological and cultural perspective, given her community’s modest style conventions. We don’t want to dishonor her culture or her feelings and put her in a situation that exposes her to more scrutiny or criticism. This would risk worsening her family relationships and further damaging her self-esteem. Once again, this is why the makeover trope doesn’t work, because it rarely takes into consideration cultural norms and sensitivities. If I were to push her too far, too fast, into a new look, she would say, This is not me. It would only perpetuate the inauthenticity and incongruence she feels when she dresses up for weddings. Any dramatic new look would be antithetical to her current emotional state. We would be creating misalignment, exacerbating her feelings of gloom. Instead, my plan is to encourage her initially to Mood Illustrate with baggy basics. Then I’ll introduce small doses of funkier fashions (clothes that offer coverage but in more stylish cuts, like the boilersuit or overalls) including Focal Accessories to ultimately Mood Enhance.
Here’s what I’ve learned in my practice: You have to allow people to feel their feelings, even wallow in them. Some people get comfortable wallowing; at least then they know what to expect. Eventually they may get tired of wallowing. Given her age, Sonal may be on the cusp of self-discovery and self-definition. My role is not to drag her kicking and screaming out of the pit where she’s wallowing, but—with a bit of style advice—to help her take one toe out, then another toe. And then, lo and behold, she’s blossomed.
A NOTE ABOUT SELF-DISCLOSURE
As you read more Case Studies throughout this book, you may notice that I occasionally share something about myself with clients. If you are familiar with Freudian analysis, in which the mental health practitioner acts as a blank slate upon which the patient projects her feelings, you may have questions about my methods. What I’m practicing is called self-disclosure.
It is a therapeutic method wherein the counselor reveals a relevant piece of information about herself to the client, in an effort to aid or enhance the therapeutic process. Often substance abuse counselors disclose stories of their own sobriety, for example. As clinical psychologist Alexis Conason explains in Psychology Today, those who argue against self-disclosure posit that it takes much-needed attention away from the patient. But “others believe that therapist self-disclosure could help demystify the therapeutic alliance, model disclosure for the patient, normalize their experience, and challenge negative beliefs the patient might hold about their impact on others.”11 I am in the latter camp.
Some studies—including one conducted with eating disorder patients in the UK—have shown that relevant self-disclosure can benefit patients if it is perceived as helpful. Those researchers found that the therapist’s self-disclosure was associated with a stronger therapeutic alliance, greater patient self-disclosure, and reduced shame.12 I have seen similar results in my practice. We all want to feel less alone, less embarrassed, more understood and accepted.
It is important to clarify that I think very carefully about what to disclose about myself, and even then, I do so sparingly. I also do not disclose anything that is not directly related to the issues the client brings up. I methodically consider each personal revelation, disclosing only what I believe will be helpful to the client. In a paper titled “More Than a Mirror: The Ethics of Therapist Self-Disclosure” published in the journal Psychotherapy: Theory, Research, Practice, Training, Zoe D. Peterson, director of the Kinsey Institute Sexual Assault Research Initiative, writes, “The ethicality of a particular self-disclosure is likely to depend on the content of the disclosure, the therapist’s rationale for the disclosure, the personality traits of the client… and the specific circumstances surrounding the disclosure.”13 I always consider these factors before self-disclosing. I believe the mirror metaphor is an apt one: I am holding up a mirror to the client, echoing and validating her experience by revealing a fragment of my own.
I find this particularly helpful when humanizing issues around fashion. Let’s just pause for a second and think about the word “fashion.” You hear that word and what images come to mind? Runway models? Vogue covers? Larger-than-life billboards starring semi-cyborgs with bleached eyebrows, buzz cuts, and shockingly expensive purses? No one we know IRL actually looks remotely like that. The way we experience Fashion (with a capital F) as a culture is inherently exclusive and alienating. It offers a very limited range of emotion. Fashion is artificial, surreal—almost like a caricature of the average person’s experience. Thinking back to my modeling days, I can see that the emotional range I was taught to express was completely detached from reality: a smile for elation, a grimace for seriousness, a pout for sensuality. And that’s pretty much it! I was taught to negate my own emotions so that the clothes could evoke whatever emotions the designer sought to evoke.
Fashion is inaccessible. Roped off. It can make you feel desperately left out.
Through self-disclosure, I hope to reveal humanity behind the image. When I am able to create intimacy and trust, it helps my clients open up and rid themselves of shame.
THE BOTTOM LINE
KEY TIPS AND TAKEAWAYS FROM CHAPTER 2
Define yourself. Everyone has style behaviors that can be labeled, demystified, and worked on. See the Fashion Psychology Glossary on here.
What lies beneath? Your clothing choices are rooted in emotion. Style problems (ruts, risk aversion, shopping addiction, to name a few) are outward expressions of underlying emotions. Understanding your issues is the first step toward improving your look.
Look back and move on. Style identity generally forms during childhood and adolescence. Your family of origin and adolescent peers likely had a lasting impact on how you think about clothes as an adult. Examine your long-held beliefs about what you’re “supposed” to wear. Bust those myths!