Rachel Quinn is the brains behind the British blog Curvy Goddess, and she's here to tell us that the clothes don't make the woman, which is good to hear, because we're wearing flannel pajamas today. If you have a story about your body and your relationship to it that you want to share in One From The Vault, e-mail us!

All you have to do is look at my blog. Despite the dire state of British plus-size clothing, I can find anything I want in a plus size. I might have to get from the States, pay a hefty price, or get it custom-made, but whatever it is, I’ll get it.

During school and college I had no fashion sense. At college, I was glad of my grungy and metaller friends because I could stomp around in my combats and strappy vests and I blended in with everyone else.

At university I realised that I wasn’t really gothy enough to blend in with the gothy girls; and being at a university that had a 70 percent female population, there just weren't enough boys for a metal clique…so I became statement T-shirt girl. Everywhere I went I always had a cartoon character or saying emblazoned across my chest.

Unfortunately, on a rare night out in Brighton my "Barbie is a slut" T-shirt, I caught the attention of an environmental scientist who was hoping to save the world. But he hated people. I never did figure out how he hoped to save the world without diplomacy skills. Anyway, in addition to hating people, he also enjoyed belittling them and he loved to belittle me. He told me that we were meant to be together, it was logistics, and my fat, squashy body suited his skinny, bony one. I believed him, and I put up with his bullying for a year and a half. Leaving him was hard because I was so broken, weak and scared, but when I did leave it was such a liberation and relief I didn’t really realise quite how much damage he had done to my self-esteem.

After leaving him, I got a job in a central London university and, as I was living at home with my parents, I had quite a bit of spare cash. Central London is a plus-size clothing wet dream! Everything is big; all the shops with normally tiny plus-size ranges are huge; there are boutiques, and the shops dedicated to plus sizes are massive. So I soothed my battered self-esteem with shopping in my lunch breaks. I bought everything I wanted, even if I didn’t have the cash. But for the first time in my life I had my own style and it was what made me feel good, what I understood about clothes suiting my shape and it didn’t make me blend in.

However, three years on I was still shopping trying to buy back my self-esteem. During that time I had moved to Brighton and a lack of cash had mainly forced my shopping attentions onto eBay. Buying online obviously has its pitfalls, but I believed myself to be such a master of eBay I thought everything I bought would look great on me. Until I was proved wrong.

I’d spotted this amazing plus-size find on eBay. It was a black and floral velvet top, scoop neckline, great for my big boobs. Short puff sleeves with a lace trim (the lace would detract from my flabby arms).  And best of all it had a mock lace up corset front.  On eBay it looked great and I wasn’t disappointed either when I opened the parcel.

Despite fitting me and being the right sort of cut for my shape, it looked terrible on me. It made me look fat. My mirage and clever dressing was not going to work this time. 

Storming around my room in a close-fitting velvet top in the summer was uncomfortable and added to my upset. Pulling out other clothes from my dirty laundry, trying to find something else to wear to ease my hurt, I realised then that I would never be happy with myself as I was at that moment. No amount of clothing would change the fact that I hated my body; that in my head,I am fat. Clothes were just providing me with a short-term fix to my own self-loathing.

All I can do is change. It is not necessarily right or fair, but I have to lose weight or I am seriously going to run the risk of becoming bankrupt. You can’t buy self-esteem. —Rachel Quinn