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New York, 9:23 AM
Tue Dec 1
67 posts in the last 24 hours
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11/25/09
In addition, it doesn't help when your parents are weight obsessed which is how my daughter was raised. I stopped being anorexic when I was pregnant with her. She grew up under my emotional eating disorders, so it's not surprising that she has had to face her own weight and body image with a Mom who would never say she (my daughter) was fat (she wasn't and isn't) but who would constantly worry and complain about her (my) own weight and body image issues.
Kids who are overweight with overweight parents, they must feel it is hopeless to try to change or be healthy.
So I wonder how many of these kids' weight and body image problems just start as mimicry.
11/25/09
11/24/09
It breaks my heart to know that other girls will have to go through this, and at an even earlier age. It's not a burden that little girls or boys should have to shoulder.
11/24/09
I actually want this stuff, because I want to work out more and maybe do some 5Ks, but I know why she's getting it for me. It disturbs me that the little bit of normal pudge I've been carrying around lately bothers her more than it does me. It's not that I should be more concerned, but that she doesn't realize that me being OK with it should be all that matters.
FWIW, my boyfriend, who gets a better view of me sans clothes than I do usually, says my body's slamming.
11/24/09
11/24/09
11/24/09
(You know, like how all the medical residents are supposed to do their 72-hour shifts on double strength Adderall and self-medicate with oxycodone.)
That said? IMO Mom is not helping by doing that.
11/25/09
But yeah, she just made me feel bad about myself. Like "Whoa, hey, it's not enough that for the past three years I've gone to law school, worked part time, worked even more for free at a legal aid clinic and edited a law journal?" She's always complimented me on my achievements, too, but there's always been something raw between us about weight. She's taller, a former beauty queen who's stayed the same weight since her twenties. She and I are built identically - big hips, tiny waist, small boobs - but she denies that we have the same shape. It's so insulting... she claims I got it from my dad's side. My dad's mom was a stick-skinny lady with no hips or butt to speak of.
11/25/09
Of course, if you did get some other trait from dad that mom has learned to hate, but that, say, actually helps you cope with the professional world, they don't want to know from that either. (Which also works vice versa, but I teeter on the edge of TMI territory.)
Yeah, denial. Not just a river in Egypt anymore.
11/24/09
11/24/09
"But the girls ALWAYS get to go first!" "You NEVER start on this side of the room!" etc.
11/25/09
You read them a story about two kids, and in the pictures, one is fat and one is skinny. Line drawings. And you ask the kids questions throughout the story to gauge their opinions about the characters. (Then, with another group of kids, you read the same story but switch the roles of the kids to be sure it isn't the characters the kids are reacting to.) Inevitably, the kids like the skinny character better. Like, if the two children in the story are offered two toys and one is a better toy, the kids think the skinny kid should get the better toy, because the skinny kid is nicer.
11/24/09
When I was very young I was mostly self-conscious about being too skinny, since I was shy and didn't like having any attention drawn to me. But I grew up naturally slim and never paid much attention to Disney movies or barbies, (we never really played with them), so I don't know where I got the notion that I was overweight, and it's something I still struggle with today, even though I'm 25 and STILL seeing a doctor and nutritionist and am "technically underweight." I think I am fairly smart and educated, so I can't figure out why I can't reconcile reality with my own crazy issues. Sorry for the long maybe off-top ramble...but this is something I think about often. Trying to figure out where the body image problems really begin in girls.
11/24/09
Sorry, but when I read this book to the little ballerinas in my dance class (long story) I ALWAYS emphasized that just because you were pretty didn't mean you were nice. It is what is in your heart and how you treat people that is the most important thing.
Of course, in the end the Beast is a beautiful prince, so that kind of screws up the whole message a bit...but he is also NICE.
11/24/09
So, I think it's great that you do that, and obviously I know the film isn't trying to undermine any girls self-esteem. It just makes sense that they'd ask that because it's relevant.
11/24/09
... it's what counts if you're male, that is. The Beast didn't fall in love with a plain or unsightly girl, after all, but with a Beauty.
There are many, many stories in popular culture that involve a girl/woman learning to look past a boy's/man's disfigurement (Mask, Edward Scissorhands, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame... there are scores of family movies alone) to love who he is on the inside. I can't think of any that go the other way.
I'm not trying to argue with you or put you down, by the way, I've just noticed that these "ugly on the outside, but a beautiful soul" tales are very gendered.
11/24/09
THAT. Beauty and the Geek? Belushi and Thorne-Smith?
Kevin James (though I think he's cute) and Leah Remini AND Amber Valetta (in Hitch)?
Zach Braff and ... anyone?
Hate the trope. Haaaaate the trope.
HAAAAAAAATE.
11/24/09
Okay, yeah, I give you all that. Yes, ugly male pretty female is overdone. The movie Penelope had a nice twist on that, and I like the Shrek resolution.
I'm not saying let's hold this up as the best story out there, by any means. But to pick Beauty, the one darned movie with a character that READS and has self-esteem and a mind of her own, as the one crushing kids? No. Come on, what about freaking Sleeping Beauty? Twelve Dancing Princesses---the worst of the genre, once the hero stalks and crashes the princesses awesome party-time then gets to pick his bride? SO MANY WORSE movies out there. At least leave Belle and Ariel, who have a bit of moxie and self-determination, alone when there are much worst fish to fry.
And yes, I was bummed when he turned into a prince, too. I liked him beastly.
11/25/09
11/25/09
It's not the physiognomy so much as the character attitude.
Like so many other things in life, YMMV.
11/24/09
Example I have in mind: my goddaughter is adopted from China. She looks very different than her sister, and around age 4 went through a really hard period where she talked about hating her skin, hating her hair, and then finally busted out with, "How can you love me the same if we don't share the same blood?!" to her mother, who was floored, obviously. And this was on the Upper West Side of Manhattan where she has dozens of adopted Chinese friends. Did it need to be addressed? Absolutely. But none of us have any doubts that she's going to grow up and be able to understand her adoption and hopefully make peace with it.
Similarly, all those of us who were too fat or too skinny or too frizzy or too dark have mostly, as adults, come to terms with who we are and what we look like. Is it fair that children have to hurt? No, it would be nice if they didn't. But I do believe that it's a natural part of growing up and carving out your place in the world. Media literacy education helps, reinforcing your children's self esteem helps, limiting television helps, all of these things help and should be done--but ultimately, I just hate the panic that gets released with each one of these studies. The kids are all right.
11/24/09
i dunno... that kid in the picture does look a little chubbier than Julia Roberts in the EXACT SAME OUTFIT. it's probably the barbie toe though. i mean jeez kid, everyone knows that mary janes with white socks is soooo 1932 3-year-old...
11/25/09
11/24/09
i had been a gymnast since age 5. elite since 10. so, i'd always been aware of my body, but the awareness always focused on the power, strength, and freedom it granted me. i wasn't training to look a certain way, i was training to advance my abilities (trust me, gymnasts' bodies are awkward in appearance).
that being said, i never felt fat until girl scout camp (circa ages 11-12) when one of my friends, after surveying our group, said, "oh good, none of are fat because none of our thighs touch between our legs."
i, then, looked around and realized my thighs (the thighs of a young, elite gymnast) came the closest to committing this (f)atrocity. it was the first day of my life i felt fat.
needless to say, after my girl scout camp fat-outting, i valued gymnastics (and my other interests) for their latent and/or expilict ability to change/maintain my appearance.
long story short-- the findings of the study don't really shock me. i had known that girl-scout-lagerfeldesque-friend since we were five: she could have put my thighs to the test at a much earlier age.
11/24/09
(That same aunt also told me that the injury I sustained that ended my career was a "blessing" because my neck was looking a little large. Needless to say, she's not my favorite aunt.)
11/24/09
I was naturally thin, so was my mom, so was my dad.
We never, ever talked about weight or dieting, or talk about people being "fat" or whatever.
We were pretty happy to have three meals a day regardless of what they were. Yes, lots of it was crap that we shouldn't eat, but it was cheap and easy to prepare.
I feel sorry for big people mainly because I know they are bombarded by messages telling them how bad they are and how much they have failed. I could care less how big they are.
There are thousands of reasons someone might be overweight and who am I to presume that someone could lose weight if they just ate less and exercised more?
I'm overweight now (probably 50 lbs). I blame it mostly on the anti-depressants I've been on for the last decade. I'm not about to stop taking them as my quality has improved dramatically thanks to them.
My wife has hypothyroidism and a tumor on her pituitary gland. And she's anemic. And arthritis in one of her knees. And asthma.
Makes it hard to get the exercise she needs. We go walk around the mall or Target or something. Department stores with carts she can lean on are best.
For me to look at someone who is large and think that I am better than that person is criminal and sinful. I have no idea what their situation is or what their circumstances are.
If I really care about strangers, I can pray about them and hope that God takes care of them.
If you aren't religious, maybe you can do what someone in the mall did to us one day and run up to us with a business card and tell us that you can "fix our weight problems." No thanks.
11/24/09
anyway, i remember being about 7 or 8 and having a woman stop my mom and i in the middle of a department store and she said LOOK AT THOSE THIGHS! IS SHE A TAP DANCER? my mom said that i was a swimmer (not competitive, i just swam a shit ton in the summers) and the woman went on about how muscular i was for being so young and how great i looked. i used to get made fun of a lot by other girls for having huge thighs when i was little, so having this random woman compliment me like that was A) crazy and B) a huge boost to my tiny self esteem. from then on, i was all "fuck yeah, you can't mess with my muscular thighs, bitches."
11/24/09
Breaks my damn heart.
11/24/09
11/24/09
11/24/09
Anyway, the message I give to my pre-schooler is that we eat healthy foods and exercise to be well and strong. I think that it is important that the emphasis is on health, NOT appearance. I would hate to send the message that there is only one standard of beauty, for weight or anything else, or to make her feel bad about herself the way my mother did to me. I use the same message for tv watching- too much tv isn't healthy for the brain or body.
But she is young now and I am her main influence, once peer pressure sets in, I can only hope the messages I hammer into her stick, even if it's just in the back of her head.
11/24/09
11/24/09
When you're 11, and taller and/or bigger than the other girls in gymnastics, maybe because of a growth spurt, and trying to do what more petite girls do, and not having any idea that it might have something to do with your center of gravity being higher because your legs are longer, or because your legs are longer your transverse abdominus has to be proportionately stronger in order to do what shorter, more petite girls do more easily -- and the gym teachers take one look at you and you know from the look that crosses their faces that they don't think it's "worth it to bother" teaching you any of that.
Hate it.
(Of course, that assumes that the gym instructors were smart enough and sufficiently educated to know what a transverse abdominus muscle is in the first place, and how to properly support it, and/or that an 11 year old would have enough presence of mind to ask them if they knew. But that is a different rant, for a different day.)
*sigh*