Susie Orbach

Our idea of a healthy body is so destabilised that insecure people have come to bolster their own bodies by deeming others - those with fat bodies - less worthy, less capable and less employable.

There are so many young women who tip over into being a facsimile: they don't really inhabit their lives or their bodies.

Fat is a way of saying no to powerlessness and self-denial.

The scene changes but the aspirations of men of good will persist.

Recently, I was in Bernalda, my dad's ancestral home town in Italy. He has just refurbished a palazzo and turned it into a hotel, so we had my sister's wedding there. It was beautiful.

I've always been very determined, ever since I was a little girl, to make my way.