Have you successfully changed your style?

[StickyFloor]

I had a major wobble last year about turning 40, I suddenly felt fat and frumpy and old and decided to change everything about myself.

So, I cut and bleached my hair, lost 5 stone and bought new clothes in a younger edgier style that I have never worn before. I really want to look and feel young and hip and a bit sort of rock-chick.

Everyone is complimenting me on my new look and I do like what I see in the mirror too, but after a few months of the new me I feel like a fraud, like I am playing at dressing up but the real me is actually still a Primark leggings and t-shirt girl with scraped back mousy hair.

I don't want to give up and go back to dowdy mumsy clothes because I don't think that is me, but then this doesn't feel like me either. Has anyone managed a complete overhaul?

Maybe there's a middle ground for you?

I'm trying to overhaul myself, also lost 5 stone and trying to be more "grown up" and polished than just jeans and a tshirt all the time.

My neighbour made a massive style change.

Like both of you she lost a lot of weight and ditched the frumpy clothes wearing a lot more dresses tunics and leggins etc she looks fab and she's 59.

She says she wishes she did it 10 years ago as she has wasted her 50s looking older ad more frumpy than she does now.

Yes, maybe I was a bit drastic!

I have only bought a few items of clothing as I want to lose more weight this year - but whenever I open my wardrobe I tend to flinch at the new lovely rock chick clothes and keep on wearing the couple of safer boring options that I bought too.

So I wear the same plain things nearly everyday and the lovely clothes rarely get an airing!

I'm attempting a style change once I've lost the baby weight, so no experience yet, but if you've had a new look for a few months, compared to years of the old look, it probably will seem strange for a while!

Your new look sins really great, I think you should give yourself time to get used to the new you :)

*sounds really great

Sticky if you are changing, it often takes a longer time before your self-image catches up with what you actually look like. (People who lose weight often experience this.) That does not make you a fraud and of course you deserve nice clothes.

I overdid my style overhaul and have retreated a bit to the middle ground. If you approach your personal style as a process it's easier - I can dress like people in fashion magazines but currently feel no need to do so. (Prefer to do other things.) Finding who you are and what works best for your lifestyle is the key. Give it some time...

Oh and mousy hair seems to be fashionable atm

I think I fell into that classic trap of thinking that once I lost weight and looked better I would feel so wonderful and great - and of course people who are being kind say things like "ooh wow you must feel so much better now" ................. and actually I don't feel any different at all; I am the same person with the same life, problems and issues, I don't even feel physically better which is odd.

I just feel exactly the same inside but in different packaging, and I don't recognise what I see in the mirror at all. It is very disconcerting.

I do take the point that having been fat and frumpy for about 15 years, the "new me" is very new and recent so I need to settle in a bit more.

After years of following fashion I have found that for me it is most important that I feel like myself and comfortable in what I wear. And when is say comfortable I don't mean 'comfortable' I mean, if you've the right clothes for you you should be able to just be yourself and not even think about what you are wearing ifyswim.
So maybe you need to find a middle ground and really that can only come from you accepting yrself. Looking good is all about how you feel in yrself, not what you wear, that should almost fade into the background I think.
For example..,,I am very unconfident at the moment as since be I Ming pregnant with dc3 I have awful skin, so when talking to people I feel very self conscious of my spotty skin,, and of wearing too much makeup! I could be wearing he nicest clothes, but all I'm thinking about is how awful I look.

I had my first baby in 2009 and another in 2011 and gained about a stone and a half plus in the meantime, the style scene seemed to have totally shifted and I found myself feeling old, frumpy and worse, at a complete loss in the shops.

Since then I've lost that baby weight plus a bit and have bought and love a whole new wardrobe/look. Took a while to feel comfortable in the new rags, i think when you buy something, you really have to just put it on. For me, if I dno't wear it a bit fairly quickly, I lose my nerve.

Also, I try not to keep stuff for "good" wear as then it just doesn't get worn v much!

I feel v happy though in my new clothes, much more "me" than in the frumpiness that was enveloping me about 18m ago! Good luck with your own makeover and well done on losing the weight! For em the biggest pleasure of losing the weight was being able to just go into a shop and find clothes that fit nicely! Bliss

Congratulations on losing all that weight. My situation wasn't quite the same - I changed my style gradually after coming out of the menopause with a different body shape. But I do remember looking at my new clothes and feeling really nervous about wearing them and wondering what people might say. As it turned out, I don't think most people even noticed. It's only now, a few years later that I get compliments.

I'm going to disagree with some posters and say don't compromise your style - life is too short. You've got a clear idea about the sort of look you want so I say take a deep breath, put on your lovely new clothes and go out somewhere. Maybe the first couple of times, choose some place where you don't know anyone e.g. go out for coffee in them until you feel more confident. But just wear them.

Maybe figure out a capsule that works for you but add rock chick elements such a scarf/boots. That way if you get bored you can change your accessories and work something like a Jean Seberg look. I know it a cliche but a good Breton and jeans is a good starting place.

What stuff do you gravitate towards?

I saw this today and thought it was well thought out

into-mind.com/2013/03/19/building-a-capsule-wardrobe-from-scratch-an-example/

I suspect you may find all the attention your weight loss and new look gets a bit overwhelming - sometimes its easier to just hide or merge into the background.

A 5 stone loss is amazing - well done! Just have fun with your style - its just clothes after all

Perhaps wear some of your newer more out there stuff with your older stuff although its probably all to big for you.

What type of thing are you wearing now that makes you feel a bit uncomfortable?

I didn't reinvent myself as such, just went back to me before children. I found too much weight and small toddlers left me looking like crap and living in jeans and bad tops for three years.

I bought a uniform/ capsule wardrobe of dresses, skirts, blouses..everything I wore pre children. I binned everything else. So I'm forced to wear the nice clothes.

I felt like a fraud for weeks, everyone commented. Now I feel like me again, no one comments and i look nice again.

I did this when I turned 30, I didn't lose weight but I decided to embrace it and if people will stare at me for being fat they might as well stare at me for being fat and fabulous. I'd always loved rockabilly and 50's music and the fashions but hadn't dared to wear them, now I only own clothes that fit in with the look and as a family we have immersed ourselves in the scene. I've never felt better or more confident even as a size 10 pre dc's.

I think it was tricky because of the weight loss, obviously I had to buy a totally new set of clothes, not one item I had before still fits me, and over the time I lost the weight I only bought the bare minimum as I knew I would shrink further. So now all my wardrobe is brand new which is pretty odd.

The attention is totally overwhelming. Everyone is very kind and complimentary but I am still bumping into people who haven't seen me for ages who are quite shocked at the change and so it is hard to just move on and be normal. Nobody is commenting on the new look as such, just a general "don't you look different" - always very sweet and positive, but it is making me feel self-conscious.

I haven't bought anything very crazy at all - everything I have is:

skinny jeans in black, grey and blue
3 oversized t-shirts from All Saints which fall off one shoulder a bit
2 regular fit t-shirts from AS
2 sheer silk tunics from AS which I wear with a tight black cami underneath and with black leggings
2 sloppy AS jumpers worn over a cami top
2 cashmere cardigans which I wear over sleeveless tight fitting vest tops and with a scarf of some sort

That is literally it, but I have kept a couple of massive old polo necks too supposedly for wearing at home when I am cold and have found myself wearing them out too, with leggings. Big jumpers and leggings were my uniform for years and I still drift towards that. And I definitely keep going for the cardi and vest option mostly which looks nice enough, but I WANT to wear the trendier t-shirts but just feel self-conscious in it.

There is also a definite feeling of saving things for best too which is mad - if I put on a sloppy t-shirt and skinny jeans and it looks quite sexy (blush) I have literally then taken it all off again for fear of spoiling it ??

I have bought 2 pairs of high heeled boots which I adore and feel great in, and recently I have been wearing Uggs all the time instead as I started to feel self-conscious in the heels suddenly.

Maybe you need to throw out those old polo necks - or cut a hole in them so you really can only wear them at home?
Please, please, please wear your new clothes. They sound lovely and you are so going to kick yourself if you don't.

So today I met some friends for coffee and wore sloppy off the shoulder tshirt, skinny jeans and high heel boots. Nobody said anything and I felt great!

I also have thrown away the old big polo necks so literally have none of my old clothes left.

Thanks for all the encouragement, goodness knows what I will do when we get to summer and I may think about exposing my knees and calves ( gasp )

Good for you sticky! The clothes sound fab and I'm glad you threw out the old, sometimes we cling to being comfortble without really appreciating how awful on us the "comfortable" clothes are!