Cankles
One of my resolutions for this year was to never mention IT again, but as we are barely a week or two into the new year, here I am breaking it already. I made a few resolutions which everyone does (work out everyday, loose weight, not eat so many carbs, etc.), and those are not outrageous by any means. It's also not outrageous to break any of them after a few days either. Still, this is something that has lingered within my mind for a long time. When I got down to my high school weight in 06, I no longer suffered from the condition. However, the only way in my case that I can completely keep the condition under control is to not eat any more than 800 calories a day, which is nearly impossible for anyone to do. Someone brought it up recently, and I think I have been obsessing about it ever since. I am far from the only one who suffers from this condition, so if someone else is out there who happens to read this, know that I feel the pain of having to live with cankles.
"Cankles", according to the Urban Language Dictionary, are the area in affected female legs where the calf meets the foot in an abrupt, non tapering terminus; medical cause: adipose tissue surrounding the soleus tendon, probably congenital, worsened by weight gain and improved in appearance only by boots. From the English "calf" meaning wide portion of the lower leg, and "ankle" meaning slender joint of leg with foot. It came into the lexicon of language officially with the 2002 movie Shallow Hal, where Jason Alexander tells his obliviously happy friend, Jack Black, that his new, wonderful girlfriend has cankles (among his far from delicate hinting that his friend is either blind or suffering from a deep seeded self esteem problem for not seeing that the girlfriend is morbidly obese, but that's another story).
Looking at old photos of myself from childhood on, I can see that this is a condition that I was born with. Even before puberty was achieved and while going through various growth spurts, my legs were always a bit on the odd side. Instead of lean, dainty or delicate, they looked thick, undefined, or odd. Someone tried to be a bit nicer about it and said they looked like fence posts, but even my legs were not that. Having two strait lines implies a shape that the average person can visualize in a stick figure, yet mine are something far more odd. There is really no such thing as a "nice cankle" to have. Even at age 5 or 6, I see these cankles in my childlike body - no definition from my knee to my ankle, just a solid leg going strait down into the foot.
Cankles are not in fashion nor have they ever been. For those of you who have never had this problem, this will limit one's shoe choices. As a woman, it's rather disconcerting to try on certain kinds of shoes and find yourself on the edge of crying or being totally revolted with yourself, hoping to get them off before someone else sees this abomination. According to Oprah's stylists as well as experimentation on your own time, if one has cankles they must avoid certain types of shoes which include kitten heels, flats, ankle straps and stilettos, all of which draw the eye to the ankle area. This leaves your choice of shoes to tall boots, clod hoppers and herring boxes without tops. This will at the very least cover up or draw attention away from the ankle area. This is very generalized information, as in my and other cankle situation, it does not take into consideration the possibility that not only are one's ankles oddly shaped but so are one's calves which are even more thick and oddly shaped than the ankle portion. Attempt to wear tall boots, one can't even zip them closed because their cankles are so huge. Some clod hoppers also have a slight heel on them which would make them a modified kitten heel, and some would even argue that because one's cankles are so huge, one has no choice but to wear flats at all times.
Options are not only limited to one's choice of shoes, but clothing as well. When one has cankles, one dreads the warmer months because it means the exposure of one's cankles when winter clothing can cover it up so much more easily. Mini skirts, dresses, skirts that hit anywhere between the ankle and knee, shorts of any length, bathing suits and the most dreaded of them all, capris, make one feel like every pair of eyes that they encounter are staring at them and the abomination that is below the belt. This is one of the few moments that I find myself sad that leg warmers were a passing fad rather than a permanent fixture.
Although these things are purely based in vanity, it does give me pause as to what the future will or will not hold. One's weight can and will change over time, and due to some moderate to extreme physical activity, my cankles make me look like I am constantly bloated. When I wear socks, I always have imprints of the stitch work pattern on me, and it will always cause casual observers to tell me that my legs are swelling. I assure them that they have always been like that and it's not a sign of a medical condition left untreated or ignored. Try to avoid salty or sweet foods that would make one bloat, it doesn't change. I hear that if and when one is pregnant your ankles will swell as well. It makes me think that should this happen to me, I just might have two cankles that would make me look like I am walking on top of two overturned buckets. Preoccupation lingers as it makes one hate to dress in certain clothes, and think about how one can and will position themselves in photographs.
Try researching on what can and can't be done about cankles and the answers are rather extreme. Exercises are always recommended for everything, and I have tried it all, from swimming to yoga, as well as simply lying on my back and keeping my feet elevated against a wall, or even standing on the balls of my feet for an extended period of time while doing something stationary (ex. washing dishes). None of them seem to help. There are also plastic surgeries, no doubt than an ambitious if not somewhat snarky plastic surgeon can do in order to reduce the appearance of cankles, but that seems out of the question. My DNA simply says that I am to have these chunks of farmer flesh on the bottom and dainty wrists on the top. I awaken each morning trying not to think of the horror story which is down there, the ankles which are better suited to Olympic speed skaters and resemble large Johnsonville summer sausages stuffed into white tube socks and shoes.
Others try to reassure you that there is nothing wrong with your appearance. Even if Morten himself were to say to me that he found my legs to be slender, dainty or elegant, I would still wish that I were a mermaid so I would have no legs at all. There are no true answers to how to solve it, it's just a genetic fat deposit or mass of solids. Plastic surgeries can make a difference to an extent, but I would put these up with cellulite creams, miracle weight loss tactics, and devices made by RonCo which promise to solve which do not really. It's just another body issue that we have to accept and know that all of the models in fashion magazines are airbrushed or Photoshop creation. Someone told me not too long ago that I am an old maid with cankles. I had no idea what to say to this observation. Scream and roar like a lion, I would look crazy, say nothing and act surprised or break down in tears, I would look weak. One can say many things when talking about their cankles or body issue, but you can only say it loud and say it proud (as you have no choice but to do so):
Yes, I have cankles.
"Cankles", according to the Urban Language Dictionary, are the area in affected female legs where the calf meets the foot in an abrupt, non tapering terminus; medical cause: adipose tissue surrounding the soleus tendon, probably congenital, worsened by weight gain and improved in appearance only by boots. From the English "calf" meaning wide portion of the lower leg, and "ankle" meaning slender joint of leg with foot. It came into the lexicon of language officially with the 2002 movie Shallow Hal, where Jason Alexander tells his obliviously happy friend, Jack Black, that his new, wonderful girlfriend has cankles (among his far from delicate hinting that his friend is either blind or suffering from a deep seeded self esteem problem for not seeing that the girlfriend is morbidly obese, but that's another story).
Looking at old photos of myself from childhood on, I can see that this is a condition that I was born with. Even before puberty was achieved and while going through various growth spurts, my legs were always a bit on the odd side. Instead of lean, dainty or delicate, they looked thick, undefined, or odd. Someone tried to be a bit nicer about it and said they looked like fence posts, but even my legs were not that. Having two strait lines implies a shape that the average person can visualize in a stick figure, yet mine are something far more odd. There is really no such thing as a "nice cankle" to have. Even at age 5 or 6, I see these cankles in my childlike body - no definition from my knee to my ankle, just a solid leg going strait down into the foot.
Cankles are not in fashion nor have they ever been. For those of you who have never had this problem, this will limit one's shoe choices. As a woman, it's rather disconcerting to try on certain kinds of shoes and find yourself on the edge of crying or being totally revolted with yourself, hoping to get them off before someone else sees this abomination. According to Oprah's stylists as well as experimentation on your own time, if one has cankles they must avoid certain types of shoes which include kitten heels, flats, ankle straps and stilettos, all of which draw the eye to the ankle area. This leaves your choice of shoes to tall boots, clod hoppers and herring boxes without tops. This will at the very least cover up or draw attention away from the ankle area. This is very generalized information, as in my and other cankle situation, it does not take into consideration the possibility that not only are one's ankles oddly shaped but so are one's calves which are even more thick and oddly shaped than the ankle portion. Attempt to wear tall boots, one can't even zip them closed because their cankles are so huge. Some clod hoppers also have a slight heel on them which would make them a modified kitten heel, and some would even argue that because one's cankles are so huge, one has no choice but to wear flats at all times.
Options are not only limited to one's choice of shoes, but clothing as well. When one has cankles, one dreads the warmer months because it means the exposure of one's cankles when winter clothing can cover it up so much more easily. Mini skirts, dresses, skirts that hit anywhere between the ankle and knee, shorts of any length, bathing suits and the most dreaded of them all, capris, make one feel like every pair of eyes that they encounter are staring at them and the abomination that is below the belt. This is one of the few moments that I find myself sad that leg warmers were a passing fad rather than a permanent fixture.
Although these things are purely based in vanity, it does give me pause as to what the future will or will not hold. One's weight can and will change over time, and due to some moderate to extreme physical activity, my cankles make me look like I am constantly bloated. When I wear socks, I always have imprints of the stitch work pattern on me, and it will always cause casual observers to tell me that my legs are swelling. I assure them that they have always been like that and it's not a sign of a medical condition left untreated or ignored. Try to avoid salty or sweet foods that would make one bloat, it doesn't change. I hear that if and when one is pregnant your ankles will swell as well. It makes me think that should this happen to me, I just might have two cankles that would make me look like I am walking on top of two overturned buckets. Preoccupation lingers as it makes one hate to dress in certain clothes, and think about how one can and will position themselves in photographs.
Try researching on what can and can't be done about cankles and the answers are rather extreme. Exercises are always recommended for everything, and I have tried it all, from swimming to yoga, as well as simply lying on my back and keeping my feet elevated against a wall, or even standing on the balls of my feet for an extended period of time while doing something stationary (ex. washing dishes). None of them seem to help. There are also plastic surgeries, no doubt than an ambitious if not somewhat snarky plastic surgeon can do in order to reduce the appearance of cankles, but that seems out of the question. My DNA simply says that I am to have these chunks of farmer flesh on the bottom and dainty wrists on the top. I awaken each morning trying not to think of the horror story which is down there, the ankles which are better suited to Olympic speed skaters and resemble large Johnsonville summer sausages stuffed into white tube socks and shoes.
Others try to reassure you that there is nothing wrong with your appearance. Even if Morten himself were to say to me that he found my legs to be slender, dainty or elegant, I would still wish that I were a mermaid so I would have no legs at all. There are no true answers to how to solve it, it's just a genetic fat deposit or mass of solids. Plastic surgeries can make a difference to an extent, but I would put these up with cellulite creams, miracle weight loss tactics, and devices made by RonCo which promise to solve which do not really. It's just another body issue that we have to accept and know that all of the models in fashion magazines are airbrushed or Photoshop creation. Someone told me not too long ago that I am an old maid with cankles. I had no idea what to say to this observation. Scream and roar like a lion, I would look crazy, say nothing and act surprised or break down in tears, I would look weak. One can say many things when talking about their cankles or body issue, but you can only say it loud and say it proud (as you have no choice but to do so):
Yes, I have cankles.
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