“You looked better before”: the chronic inflammation behind a body that “seems healthy”
“You looked better before.”
I’ve been hearing it for years.
They’ve written it to me in comments. In DMs. By email. If they had my phone number, I think they’d even call (and hang up on me 🤣).
But I’m sure they’ve said it to you too; or they will, if you’re working on your body.
And the truth is that behind that “before” everyone liked so much, there was a body doing much, much worse than it looked.
Do you know what that “before” everyone loved actually was?
A body with insulin resistance. A body with terrible lymphatic drainage. A body with hormonal acne. A body with joint pain every single day.
A body that needed the physical therapist every week.
Constant anxiety in the morning, pounding temples, trips to the cardiologist to figure out what it was.
But from the outside I looked “fine.”
“You had such beautiful feminine curves!” So as far as everyone else was concerned, everything was fine.
All of this, summed up in one phrase, has a name: chronic inflammation.
A chronically inflamed body doesn’t show from the outside, at least not right away. But the person living in it feels it every single day: in the tiredness that never lifts, the constant bloating, the pain that keeps coming back, the anxiety that wakes you up.
Why people only judge the surface
The problem is this: people judge your body by looking only at the surface.
They don’t know how you feel when you wake up.
They don’t know your legs feel heavy every evening and are painful to the touch.
They don’t know about the migraines.
The pain when you work out.
The skin that keeps “breaking out.”
They only see the shape. And if the shape changes, they tell you that “you looked better before.”
But you know what was behind that “before.”
When I stopped working on my appearance
When I started truly working on my body (not just its appearance, but its health and how it works inside), everything changed.
The drainage. The inflammation. My skin. My energy. The pain. And yes, the cellulite too.
I haven’t been to the physical therapist since 2023. And I used to go several times a month. She even texted me to ask what had become of me (I’m not joking 😅).
My body started working the way it was supposed to.
And my appearance changed too. But as a consequence, not as the goal.
This is a mindset shift I want you to understand, because it truly changes things.
For years, like so many other women, I focused on aesthetics: “I want more toned legs,” “I want a flat stomach,” “I want less cellulite,” “I want rounder glutes” (I was obsessed with growing my glutes for several years, which on a small frame like mine doesn’t make much sense).
There’s nothing wrong with that in itself.
But when aesthetics (and not health) is the only goal, you end up chasing one trend after another without ever looking at the foundations. Choices made to have a more toned body, while “inside” that body grows more tired, more inflamed, more “broken.”
What Pilates Linfodrenante® does (and what it doesn’t do)
This is what Pilates Linfodrenante® does. I won’t tell you it’s miraculous. Simply because it isn’t.
But it is a scientific method, combining the foundations of Pilates (a focus on breathing, on exercise technique, on control, on mobility) with lymphatic drainage.
It works beneath the surface: it reduces inflammation, improves venous and lymphatic circulation, restores drainage, and increases joint mobility.
And when you work on these factors, the body changes. From the inside out.
It’s not a promise that “you’ll lose 5 kg in 30 days.” It’s not “you’ll lose your cellulite in two weeks.”
It’s something different: it’s your body, once you remove the chronic inflammation that’s been blocking and exhausting it, going back to working the way it should.
And when a body works well, it slims down in the most stubborn areas. It tones muscles you didn’t even know you had. It debloats where it was weighed down. It lets go of tension and knots.
The next time someone says it to you
The next time someone tells you “you looked better before,” remember:
That person is watching you and judging you, often out of their own discomfort. You are the one living in your body.
And only you know how you feel now compared to before.
You know how your self-esteem has changed.
How you smile at the mirror.
How you sleep at night.
How you wake up in the morning.
Those are the things that count. And no comment from someone who doesn’t know your story can take away your awareness of what you’ve built.
In the app you’ll find my Pilates Linfodrenante®. The method I designed for myself and then made available to everyone. Training, drainage, lifestyle, nutrition. Everything you need to truly change, not just on the surface.
To finally feel like yourself.