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is something deeply primeval about pouring hot water
over our heads; it is as comforting and uplifting as being
wrapped in a hug. The water was cold by the time it reached
my ankles but it didn't matter. I poured each container in
turn over my head and shoulders until the water pooled
around my feet. I eked out the last drenching for as long
as possible, relishing every last drop, but when it was over
I was quick to hop back into the shelter of the tent where
I had left myself a fresh clean sock with which to dry off. I
zipped up the doors of the Hilleberg and pulled the roaring
stove inside the small sleeping compartment so that it was
soon as hot as a dry sauna.
Only then did I truly look at myself and what I saw was
shocking. It wasn't so much that I had lost weight, it was the
fact that my entire body shape had changed. I didn't recognise
my own limbs. My knees were bony protruding lumps above
razor-sharp shins that were wrapped near the ankle by pouches
of firm muscle. My thighs were the size my calves used to be
and my bum had all but disappeared. As I strained to look
behind me I could see that each buttock caved in at my hip
rather than the usually over-generous curve outward. But it
was perhaps my arms that were most unfamiliar; they seemed
to be lumpy in all the wrong places. The skin was stretched
over new muscle as tightly as an overstuffed suitcase. I took
out my tiny palm-sized mirror that I used for checking my face
for signs of cold injury and tried to take in my new figure.
I caught a glimpse of my back, as unattractively lumpy with
muscle as my arms, and I noticed that my head appeared to be
ludicrously large in relation to my limbs, as if it might fall off
my neck when shaking my head. As the shock of the change
wore off, I strained to look behind me again and felt a smile
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