How bad outfit photos taught me to stop fearing the camera

Two years ago, I'd never shared a photograph of myself online (no, not even on Facebook. They existed on there, but only because other people had tagged me). Today I'm going to share the very worst pictures of me that exist. That's what I call progress.

1. I have no idea. And no words
2. Demonstrating the section of my midriff that I want photographed

3. It cracks me up how much like a stroppy toddler I look here

One of the main reasons I started doing outfit posts was to force myself to become more comfortable both in front of the camera and with looking at photographs of myself. I know there aren't many people who actively like being photographed but for years I had something akin to a phobia. At the mere sight of a camera, I'd tense up. Often I'd try to leave the room or move out of range, occasionally I'd end up in tears. I have so few photographs of myself between the ages of 14 and 34, because I either avoided having them taken or destroyed them afterwards.

It's a weird fact of life that we can never know what we truly look like. We become used to the mirror-us and seeing the 'real' us in a photograph can come as a shock. In our minds, we don't really look like that at all. And of course, because I was so terrified of the camera, what I saw in photos probably wasn't how I actually looked: it was the most tense and freaked out version of myself. I talk when I'm nervous, so in a lot of those pictures I also had my mouth hanging open like a simpleton. I never really hated myself, I just hated how I looked in photos.

I'd read lots of fatshion bloggers talking about how taking photos of themselves had been a huge contributing factor in their journey to self-love and body acceptance, and it was something I wanted to try. And when a handy volunteer came along - in the shape of my partner - to take photographs, it seemed as good a time as any to begin.

And you know what? It's been a success so far. I even volunteered to be in some photobooth shots at a wedding recently, which is massive progress for me. However, that doesn't mean the process of actually taking the photographs always goes smoothly.

1. The 'Single Ladies' dance? An attempt at flamenco? 

2. The ever-popular 'going paddling' fashion model pose

3. Really not convinced by the 'bend one knee and tilt head' fashion blogger pose

For every outfit The Boy generally snaps off 20-30 pictures of which, if we're very lucky, I'll deem two or three usable (usually, you may have already noticed, ones in which I'm covering my face or at least my mouth and chin, which are my most hated body parts). I'm terrible at posing, so generally The Boy and I chat while I move around a bit, and he snaps away hoping that he'll capture something vaguely decent. Luckily he always does, but there are usually also some stunningly bad outtakes, which I'm (against my better judgement) sharing with you today.

It turns out that what people had said was true: appear in enough photographs, take enough versions of each one, and eventually you'll learn to cope. Even to like it. I can look at these terrible photographs and just laugh; two years ago I would have cried and felt like crawling into a hole to die.

Even better, becoming more comfortable in front of the camera means that The Boy and I now have a record of our time together and the trips we take. I used to refuse to appear in photos, now I'm the one encouraging him to snap a selfie of us when we're out and about. And that is what I call a very happy outcome.

1. A very Italian pose 
2. & 3. I love that pretty much every outfit has a version of this pose, best described as, 'I don't know what the hell else to do so I'll stare at the sky as if it's done me wrong'