Lymphedema is swelling that typically occurs in one of the arms or legs. According to the Mayo Clinic, it can be caused by the removal or injury of lymph nodes.
For Megan Barnard, lymphedema began at age 15. She felt abnormal, alone and desperate, unwilling to talk about it with family or friends.
She hid her swollen leg under baggy clothes and avoided dresses and skirts for more than a decade. She was teased, and once someone at school even shouted: “I didn’t know the Michelin Man was in our school!”
Megan felt so bad that she even wrote a suicide letter to her father at one point – she just didn’t believe she could cope with it.
Her left leg accumulates up to three liters of excess fluid, and one day, when she was 24, her leg swelled so much that it became twice the size of her right leg.
Over time, Megan began dating a guy named Robert Neidenfair. According to the NZ Herald , she hid her lymphedema from him for two years before deciding to show it to the world in a photo shoot.
Robert claims he didn’t even notice her swollen leg, even in their most intimate moments. 👇🏻
“She was incredibly careful, but I didn’t really notice anything. There were a lot of closed doors, lights out, things like that,” he said.
Because of the condition of her leg, which can hold up to three litres of excess fluid, she has been given a number of derogatory nicknames, including the “Michelin Man” . For years, she hid her leg under a pillow or loose clothing.
But one day…
A few years ago, Megan showed her legs publicly for the first time in a decade. She decided to be honest about her lymphedema in the hopes that other young girls suffering from the same condition wouldn’t have to go through it alone.
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Megan Barnard now shows off her leg in glamorous photo shoots, and her pictures are so impressive that she has even been offered to become a model. By showing off her body, Megan wants to help girls accept themselves for who they are.
