Monday, 18 October 2010
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Trying to Help My Daughter with Body Image
It seems every time I think I have done something right, in regards to parenting, something happens to put me in my place. Reminding me not to be too proud nor too confident. This time it’s about body image.
After some rough early years (you know the teens and early twenties) I finally reached a place of body/food/exercise acceptance. And interestingly enough at 37 years old I’m the same size I was at 17. I have a few more stretch marks and my boobs aren’t quite as perky but my pants fit and I feel good.
As soon as I knew I was having a girl I was determined to get my head on straight about my own food and weight issues. I figured I needed to deal with things and build myself some honest and realistic self-confidence. So, that’s exactly what I’ve done.
I eat when I’m hungry. I don’t when I’m not. I watch my portion sizes and I’m mindful of what it is I’m actually eating. While I don’t exercise regularly, what I do is…I’ll take the stairs vs. the elevator. I’ll park at the far end of the parking lot and walk. I’ll stretch everywhere and anywhere. I might sprint for no reason or sword fight with my sons.
It took me long enough but it’s all good because I’m there. I’m really there.
The problem seems to be I convinced myself that if I just modeled (and talked/listened openly/honestly about) good self confidence, modesty, healthy eating habits and a positive attitude about movement/exercise then my daughter would just naturally be/have all of those things. That way she could skip all the messy self-conscience crap. I was going to be the perfect example of modest confidence for her.
Well, if my head wasn’t in the clouds on that one.
Zoe is going to be 13 next month and she’s having a hard time. You wouldn’t know it from all the photos I take of her but she’s even starting to shy away from the camera (just a little bit). She is only two inches shorter than me…maybe three…she can wear my clothes but they are mostly still a little big for her. She weighs the same as I do, I’m guessing and I’m pretty small…but not too small.
Last week we were at a family gathering and one of her cousins poked her belly and called her fat and said she had a jelly belly. Zoe told me normally it wouldn’t have bothered her all that much but this particular girl is super skinny and really tall (in comparison to Zoe). She is also two years older and out of that unpleasant awkward phase Zoe seems to be smack dab in the middle of.
A few days later we were at friends’ home and Zoe went for a piece of fudge and a younger boy said, No wonder you’re so fat! She was devastated. Instantly tears flooded down her cheeks. It was heartbreaking.
The thing is she is well within a healthy weight range. If anything it’s her body changing and the little weight she does have being carried oddly until it finds it’s new more permanent home. I find myself getting angry for even having to deal with any of this. I feel like I’ve done all the right things and still she is suffering…and to top it off the suffering is completely unwarranted. She is well within a healthy weight range. She is well within a healthy weight range. I just can’t say that enough.
I don’t really have a resolution on this one. Not yet anyway. I think in the end Zoe will be just fine. I think she will grow into to her own. I think she will be confident. I think she will get to that place I’m at but it doesn’t look like I’ll be able to spare her all the messy parts.
She’s gonna have to fumble her way through it just like the rest of us. I’m just do my best to be there to hug her, love her and hold her hand through the crap.
Did you struggle with body image issues growing up? How is your child dealing with their body image and changes in their body? Have you had to help them through any difficult times?
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Comments (33)
i did have anorexia. i call myself a recovering anorexic because i liken it to alcoholism. i have a young daughter. she has other issues, not weight, but issues nonetheless. it seems girls suffer more from one type of body image issue or another. but she's pretty healthy, psychologically. i try to provide a good role model, as best as i can. i am not perfect by any means. anyway, daughters are high maintenance, i've realized. they need us to remind them that looks aren't very important in the huger scheme of things. but sometimes, it's not up to us, the parents. our children don't live in a vacuum. all we can do is provide them with love and information and support.
My daughter has helped me with this. She is only 4 though. She tells me all the time that I'm beautiful. People always tell her she's beautiful, and she believes it. Once she heard me tell my husband that I don't always feel very beautiful and she gasped. She really couldn't believe it, and told me "of course you're beautiful, Mommy, you always are."
My plan of attack is to make sure she knows that beauty starts on the inside. And expose her to beauty of all kinds and all colors. When I see someone who looks different on tv or in real life, I make sure she looks. And we talk about it. I think the biggest thing is that you can maintain communication with your daughter (or your son for that matter who might not be the best at sports, or is a "nerd" etc). If what is presented is varied, then the definition of beauty won't be so closely tied to one current magazine cover or most popular runway model or tv actress etc.
It sounds like you are doing a GREAT job as far as helping your daughter with her body image, but ultimately, there is only so much you can do because this is HER battle, not yours. All you can do is equip her as best you can to handle the onslaught on the teenage years and pray that she pulls through. At 13, her body will still change so much in the next few years (and months). So keep up the good work but remember that it is ultimately HER battle and you are not a bad mom is she struggles with this anyway.
Here is an example of a bad mom when it comes to weight issues. When my mother first met my boyfriend (now husband), one of the first things out of her mouth was, "You know, Karen is always going to struggle with her weight." She said the same thing to my college roommates. When my sister went off to college as a size 0 and gained the freshman 15, pushing her up to a size 3/5, my mom called her sloppy fat. Really?!?! If a size 3/5 is fat, than I am morbidly obese.
If ever your daughter truly does struggle her with her weight, enable her to take control of her eating/exercise habits in a healthy way, while constantly reinforcing the fact that she is beautiful just as she is. I wish my mom had loved me enough to do what you are doing.
I think if I were in this situation (thankfully I have 10 more years) I would explain what your body does during puberty -- that yes you put on a little weight, but as long as you eat healthy and stay active that the extra chub will come off in 2-3 years. Just be honest with her without calling her fat
@sarahsmurfette@xanga - I feel the same way about my daughter;)
Children are so cruel :( I never really noticed my body and had any issues with it till I was midway through my freshmen year of highschool when I dropped a lot of weight (in a not-healthy way, I was sick for a long period of time) After that it was hard to adjust when my weight fluctuated but I've gotten to a point where I've accepted myself. Hopefully as your daughter grows older she'll begin to reach that point too, especially with you as such a good example.
You know, growing up, I was never called pretty, cute, etc. Maybe it's just the way my family is but it's definitely something that affects me even now. I've only had two guys (or rather, two people) to ever tell me that I was attractive. I've lost and gained weight since high school. And honestly, if I had someone (a parent, a family member) tell me I was attractive, I think I'd have more self esteem about myself.
Honestly, I think if you talk to her and you tell her the truth without calling her anything negative, this situation can have a very empowering and impacting effect on her that she could carry for the rest of her life.
heeeey, don't ever go thinking 'oh, she'll be okay.' that was my mom's mentality, and when i was 12 i fell face-first into anorexia nervosa. i thik you really do need to face this head on, and not shun the topic of bodyimage.
Sounds like you're doing a great job as a parent. Definitely keep conversation open and constantly remind her how beautiful she is. Trust me, she needs to hear it, even if she rolls her eyes at you. You won't make her full of herself or conceited, especially if she's hearing the opposite from all her peers. I don't really remember if my mom said I was pretty or not growing up. It wasn't a huge deal for me, although I certainly had those moments where I felt ugly and awkward. I didn't have the weight issue to battle with though-I had the opposite insults, if anything. "You're too skinny" etc. But I do know that my sister in law was deeply affected by her mother never telling her she was beautiful. She made some bad choices in life because she clamped on to the first people to ever tell her she was pretty. Her self esteem was low and they boosted it slightly so she went with them. I have other friends who have done this as well. This particular girl blames her mother for never compplimenting her. Ultimately, I think we can be the most perfect parents ever but we're going to screw up our kids SOME HOW and they will blame us for SOMETHING when they get older. It's just life. Even if we're perfect they will somehow blame us for being too perfect
i'm invovled with something on my college campus: operationbeautiful.com
the site is truly inspiring and uplifting! enjoy!
Show her how photoshop works. Here's a link for one. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYhCn0jf46U If somone can change a face that much just imagine how much they can change a person's body.
Aw that is so sad. I really hope that she will over come those comments and look past them. You sound like a good mom, so I am sure she will continue to be healthy.
I've always been lanky and considered skinny by some, but I'm well within the healthy range of the BMI index, so that's frankly all I care about. If what other people say goes against reason, then why care for what they say? Most of those who call me skinny are overweight, and probably just want me to join them so they feel better about themselves. I'm not even boney either, but rather fleshy and muscle-toned. Only time I looked remotely gaunt was when I returned from a 6 month trip in a sub-arctic environment, where my body was chewing up a lot of energy keeping warm. As long as your child is eating healthy, and exercising, and keeping an eye on her BMI from time to time (as opposed to obsessively), then she'll be right. I am also against plastic surgery unless something is deformed or what not. The parts of me that aren't exactly ideal, which I had been teased about in my youth, I'm not too particularly worried about.
yeah, i struggled with body image growing up but i also became bulimic at the age of eleven and not even on purpose. it was more of an impulse. i still do it every now and then but i've mostly overcome it.
One thing that will make her feel more confident (even if she's not overweight) is if you get her to a gym. If she sees herself becoming stronger and starts liking what she sees, then the problems go away. I have very bad self confidence, and I'm very thin. Whenever I go to the gym and I get those endorphins, I feel stronger and like I can do just about anything. With the gym it's not about getting fit for me, it's about looking in the mirror and liking what I see. Okay, maybe it's a little bit about getting fit. When I can run three miles at six miles per hour I start to feel pretty darn good about myself. Also, the gym experience isn't about comparing yourself to others, it's about comparing yourself to you. It takes a while (a month) to get into it, but once you're into it there's no going back. I got a boy to get into the gym once. He was overweight but very cute. We broke up but he still goes every day because he needs it for his self confidence. I swear by it. Whatever you decide to do, good luck. Self confidence is a hard thing to deal with.
When I was 10 years old I was 5'3 and under 90 pounds but the kids at school and in my neighborhood still told me I was fat. As a parent there's nothing you can do to prevent this from happening; the little buggers are going to be vicious to their peers because they're just plain rotten. I would be worried less about your daughter because if you spend too much time comforting her it will only reinforce the idea that there's something wrong with her. I would spend more time smacking these children that are bullying her or confronting their parents so that they can smack some sense into their children for you.
I agree with @PianoPunk92@xanga . You need to get these little assholes in trouble with their parents. The 15-year-old girl should know better.
THIS is why I'm so scared to have a daughter. I refuse to have a girl if I can't get my stuff together first. The last thing I want is for her to go through what I have. No woman should hate her body, or herself.
My mother had weight problems her whole life and although she always praised my body, the media and her habits still got the worst of me.
Good luck I know it's hard. Just keep doing what you're doing and do the best you can.
Clearly the problem is NOT with your or your daughter-- it's with the cruel, cruel world and other parents who don't teach their kids how to think and talk about their own or others' bodies. It would be difficult to find a woman out there who has not, at one point in her life or another, strugged with body image. Mean comments hurt, though,they jsut do, and it's hard not to think about them or to forget about them. Likely, at least the one made by the cousin, was made as a defense mechanism because she's probably struggling too-- and finding an unhealthy outlet by picking on someone else. Maybe if your daughter understood that, it would make it easier for her.
When I was younger, maybe 2nd or 3rd grade, I was always the tallest girl in my class. I was always at the back of the line, and while other girls were paired with boys, I had to be on the boys' side of the line paired up with another tall girl.
I was constantly teased, and I have serious self esteem issues. I will never ever forget the girls who made me feel like that even now in college. It hurt me so much that I quit ballet after 7 years b/c those girls were all petite and dainty and I was the big one. I wasn't even fat.
I think its the cruelty of the other kids. The know exactly that they are being hurtful and they do it because they can get away with it. Teach your daughter how to stick up for herself and try to bring out her confidence. Always make her feel amazing about herself, not just her body, but any of her accomplishments. So, next time someone calls her a name, she knows exactly how to respond to them.
You know, I find little kids' remarks to be the most hurtful when it comes to commenting about how big/small a person is..
All I can really say is that this is something that most teenagers will have to face in one form or another. :|As long she has a mommy to hug and know she'll be okay in the end, I think that's all there is to it. :)
my daughter is too young for any of that but i still kinda have those issues now cuz my one friend can eat all the junk food and not gaind one pound well i gain one or two. granted im happy with my pudge cuz everyone says im cuddlely like a teddy bear bbut i dont like it to much even though im tall and my fram hides some of my weight. all i can say to help u out is to tell her that not everyone is bult the same and if u could line up a hundred people the same weight as u that some will look skinyer and some will look heavyer but that doesnt mean that u r fat or should be self-concihes. if that dont work i dont mind talking to her
i remember being chubby in middle school. one of my friends and i got in a fight and she called me fat. it didn't really hurt at the time but i can remember exactly what happened. my family would always tell me that i had had enough to eat and that i should stop at dinners. i was in middle school! i was growing! once i started swimming i lost a lot of weight. i was 110 and 5'5. my family would almost force me to eat. i didn't even have an eating disorder. 9th grade i started to put on the weight i lost, and my mom told me i need to start excersizing. i'm sure she meant well, but i took it as "you're fat, get off your butt and do something." so that was the first time i started starving myself. it's been on and off ever since.
i work in a doctor's office where the ladies there (who are all older than i am) are always on diets and talking about food. it makes me really insecure. it's to the point now where if i eat even one piece of chocolate or anything that is "bad" for me, i will think about it for days afterwords. i can name all the bad things i have had in the past week.
my point is, you daughter is growing. she's going through puberty and her body will become porportioned again. it happens to all of us. maybe you should talk to that older girl who called her fat and tell her that zoe is going through puberty, just like she did. and that she should know better than to call a little girl fat.
You have done a good job! Maybe you guys should get into running together? Tell her you have noticed how she is feeling and were wondering what you could do. I have body image problems mostly because I have really small friends and my mom constantly talks about my weight and how I have a belly. I don't know if any of them mean harm when they say certain things to me, but sometimes it just hurts. A make over always helps? Take her to get her hair done, new clothes, and make up maybe to make her feel a bit better.. hope this helps!
My mom raised me to be extremely confident- just like you're doing with your daughter. Just keep it up!
And maybe let her skate junior roller derby, or do kick boxing... Let her doing something that makes me feel strong and powerful. In juniorhigh/highschool I played soccer and did some kick boxing. Now I'm in college, I skate roller derby.
Nothing stands in my way, ever. Even if people call me fat. I embrace what I have and how I'm shaped because in derby, that's what you have to do. You have a huge ass? Awesome! Work those curves! You're super tiny? Turns out derby has great places for tiny girls, too. (Which by the way, I still remember people in grade school calling me fat... Just tell your daughter that in the end- those kids get theirs when they get married and get super fat.)
:) Just keep doing what you're doing. You're a good mommy.