Brief 2: Body Image Responses

As I have set my deadline for the end of this month and have had a new turn on how I will produce the collages, whilst also seeing that my posts/messages will perhaps not gain any more responses, I want to pick out responses in which I can begin responding to. I learnt from a project last year in which I used surveymonkey, that I love working from people's responses as I think its so important to represent those you wish to address and help through awareness.

my skin colour (due to experiencing racism growing up). Now i couldn’t be prouder of my ethnicity and heritageAs I was growing up I was quite scrawny. Very slight- skinny and bony. I was often told to eat more, even though I devoured food and loved every mouthful. Being constantly reminded that you don't look a certain way can be damaging to a young girl. I would wear super padded bras and leggings under my jeans to make me seem fuller than I was. But now I'm a woman. I'm tall and slim and I love it.
I find self image hard too embrace especially at my age being the younger generation with pressure from social media and magazines
My hair colour - growing up, everyone bullied me about it so I felt self-conscious, but now I realise it's a part of me and who I am, and I'd rather be different and appreciate the parts of me that make me that way.
My stretch marks are a sign of my growth as a person and no longer make me ashamed to be a growing woman

.People always pointed out how thin I was in school. I used to be teased and called anorexic when I was actually a really healthy weight and it wasn’t something I could control. However, as my body is now caught up with my eating habits I’ve actually come to realise I was really healthy, not too thin and aspire to be that way and show it off.

I'd say my torso. I'm carrying a bit of extra weight around there which in my childhood got me a lot of stick from other people around me. Now I've grown up a bit I've realised that the 'ideal' body shape is slowly crumbling through the media and that all bodies, shapes, sizes are a lot more widely accepted in the media through advertising with such companies like 'Dove'. Embracing the pot belly from now on.My figure. I always thought I was too fat, and that curves bumps and lumps made you fat. When all it is , is a figure, not a personality. All is beautiful.
My boob's, when I was younger they were underdeveloped and still are due to me having a medical condition but now I have a loving boyfriend that accepts them, which has made me realise that they are perfect just they way they are and every women has different breasts and I shouldn't compare them.
I used to have a 'friend', growing up, that would always mention how massive my hips are (cheers, 'friend') - looking back this is pretty bad, but she used to play Shakiras song 'hips don't lie' to me all the time thinking it was funny  I was pretty self conscious about it while at school. When I went into 6th form and uni and didn't see her anymore... No one mentioned it anymore and actually I just completely forgot about it. I'm laughing looking back at it!
I overcame that by just focusing on other things (life's too short!!!!) and I realised over time there was and is absolutely nothing wrong with my hips 

These are all anonymous responses collected through surveymonkey and the mix forum boards which I feel so grateful and honoured to have such personal stories shared with me for this project so this needs to be distributed on a platform and in a style that can empower and help those with body image struggles.