Today was the Purim carnival and that meant today there was a cake walk. Because we have two children who like cake and are willing to commit a large number of carnival tickets to the cause, we came home with two cakes and so today we ate cake, two kinds.
Also today we were tired because that’s what a Purim carnival will do to a person and so Madison and I spent some time snuggling in bed recovering from the noise and the crowd and the sugar. Madison is a fiddler by nature — she is soothed by fiddling with the seams on our clothes — and so she was fiddling with my collar and she sighed.
“When I grow up,” she told me. “I hope I grow up skinny.”
Now here’s the deal about Madison: her body type is not skinny. There is no way she is going to grow up skinny, which is what I told her. I said, “Hmmm. I think your body will be just right but I don’t think it will be a skinny body.”
She found this assertion annoying.
“Listen,” I told her. “Bodies are not just skinny or fat. They are much more complicated than that. Most bodies are skinny in some ways and fat in other ways and all different. You don’t have the type of body that will be all skinny because that’s just the way your body is and that is fine.”
I told her that she is built a lot like Pennie and Pennie is, as you know, gorgeous but she is not skinny and it would be weird on her frame if she were. She does not have a skinny body. She has a lovely body, mind you. I hasten to say this because we have this unfortunate habit of equating skinny with pretty even when we know that’s not necessarily true.
I said, “I think when you grow up you will be built a lot like Pennie. I don’t think you will be all-over skinny like [insert name here].”
She said, “Well, I would like to be skinny. I would just like to.”
Are you disturbed yet? I was but I also felt like it was a great opportunity to discuss body image yet again. Because here’s the thing — my girl isn’t going to be skinny and that’s no tragedy. But it will be if she isn’t able to accept that about herself and love the self she is. She wouldn’t say but obviously she believes skinny is better than not skinny because she is not immune to the whole damn world telling her that this is so. So I talked some more.
“People get confused about skinny,” I told her. “They think skinny is the thing to be because we only really get to see one kind of body on tv and in a lot of magazines. We really see mostly skinny all of the time. That is just WRONG and it is silly. And then sometimes women think they HAVE to be skinny even if that’s not the type of body they have. I know a lot of unhappy women who spend all of their time trying to be skinny and it’s a sad sad thing. Those women have been fooled into thinking that it’s all about skinny. They believe those lies and it makes them hurt and it makes them sad. I don’t want you to do that.”
She rolled her eyes and said, “I know it! I know it!”
“Then listen up because this is important,” I told her. “If you want people to see the prettiness in you, you have to see it first. You have to walk around knowing how awesome you are and that’s how pretty happens — when all that love shines through, that love you have for yourself. You don’t want to try to be another person, Madison, because then all the people who are meant to love MADISON might miss you because they won’t see YOU. They’ll get all confused seeing the person you think you have to be instead of the person you are supposed to be. You will not grow up to be a skinny woman, Madison, but don’t waste your time regretting THAT. You know you are beautiful and perfectly Madison-sized. You just keep on being fabulous.”
I know this is part of what will be an on-going conversation. I know that even in my fat-friendly life with my husband who has never ever ever said, “Hey, honey, haven’t you let yourself go?” but very clearly worships the ground I tread upon, I know that Madison is up against steep odds. But I also have faith in her.
I started this post off with us having cake because people do eat cake in the world. People do have cake walks and they eat cake, even people who are not skinny. Even people who are skinny. Today we ate cake because we get drunk on sugar on Purim instead of alcohol. I want to raise a strong, healthy daughter who can eat cake on Purim without regrets (and most especially without feeling like she has to stick her finger down her throat after) and who grows up to say, “I love my Madison-sized self!” But it sure ain’t gonna be easy.
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Today my white child told my white mother that she wanted to have black skin when she grows up. I haven’t addressed it yet because it was a crazy day and her ears weren’t open, but I want to have a conversation about her wishes. I’ll ask her why she wants to have black skin and I’m guessing it’s because she thinks black skin is pretty. I’ll agree and point out that our skin color is beautiful too. Then I’ll have to address what she can and cannot change about her body which is a tighter line to walk. It’s amazing what our children observe and dream about.
You know Rose’s in Portland? On 23rd? The giant slices of cake Roses? Well, we have some friends who went to Portland last year on spring break. We gave them a bunch of food recommendations, among them Rose’s. When they returned they said how much they loved everywhere we sent them. I asked them if they had cake. They said no, that the wife really wanted to, the kids really wanted to, but the husband said no because it was unhealthy. I asked not even one slice to split among them? And the wife said no, her husband didn’t want them to think food like that was okay.
On vacation.
For thin children who could stand the calories frankly.
Aargh.
Life is about enjoying it. It’s about being appropriate. We don’t enjoy a martini at work, and we don’t eat cake every day, but we enjoy them when it’s right.
Madison is lucky to have you and Pennie. She’ll be okay in the end, but I hate the years she’ll have to mentally wrestle with it. I say this as someone who has been there, and sometimes continues to be there mentally.
I do not know Rose’s in Portland but it sounds like I should!!! I really struggle with junk food eating and rely on Brett for a reality check. I know I’ve made the kids more paranoid than I should about eating stuff on the “bad list” and I regret it. I don’t think it’s served them well. I’m trying to retrain myself to say that it is FINE to eat cake on Purim because we eat well on all those NOT Purim days but it is HARD for me. And it’s not like demonizing food has made ME skinny or even very healthy in my food mindset so I don’t know why I cling to this misguided way of thinking.
I am a naturally fairly narrow person due to bone structure and metabolism, and my daughter is clearly the same. While I’m sure my daughter will have some struggles and feelings of inadequacy about how she looks — unfortunately, I think all women do one way or another — it is not fair that body image stuff is so much easier for us because of this genetic roll of the dice.
Sounds like you’re doing a great job helping Madison with this, Dawn, as always.
Shelley, it sucks that women get pitted against each other so that you and your daughter might ever need to feel defensive about what is your natural body type. You know, that, “OH I hate you! You’re so skinny!” bullshit. You know what I mean?
Another awesome Dawn-mom talk. I’m so glad we get to my flies on your wall.
Thanks for sharing this. I have a just-turned-13-year-old niece and sometimes the “I’m fat,” thing comes up (she actually *is* skinny) and I don’t want to just say, “You’re not fat,” thing. It’s frustrating. Good on you.
Theoretically I’m grown but I could use a mama like you.
Thank you! I am saving this post. I am someone who has always been relatively slender, just through the luck of the draw. I suspect my daughter will not be thin; I don’t know what her father is built like, but her mother has a round sort of build, and at 2 years old, Valkyrie already has thick thighs and a curvy butt. I can’t really model fat acceptance for her, but I want to make sure she feels (and is) strong and healthy in her body,
A couple of teachers at her day care center referenced their own weight — X said something about ice cream, and Y said something like, “Oh, if there’s ice cream, I’m there — the fat girl will find the desserts!” Then X commented that Valkyrie “has some thighs on her.” At first I thought maybe I should say something, but then I thought, 1) she *does* have some thighs on her, and there’s nothing wrong with that, 2) it seemed like X was mentioning it in an inclusive way, making Valkyrie part of a club with the two of them, and 3) X and Y have the kind of bodies Valkyrie is likely to have, and I don’t, so maybe I should be following *their* lead on this.
But (in the same way that well-meaning white people often think they aren’t supposed to notice race) I have this knee-jerk reaction that I’m not supposed to notice weight.
I know what you mean, re., not noticing weight. Madison is very interested in talking about MY weight (because she’s processing this stuff, I know) and I am working to not flinch. Not always easy! She asked the other day if I was skinny when Brett asked me to marry him. (I think she’s working through this idea about men only being attracted to thin women.)
It’s a struggle for me, too, because Madison LOVES The (skinny) Frog Princess and she LOVES Barbies and she LOVES all of these stereotypical girl things. She LOVES them and I’ve tried to hold ‘em off but you know, she’s her own person with her own likes and dislikes. And so I know this is hitting her harder than it did me at her age because when I was her age, I liked trucks. Trucks and books. Also the marketing wasn’t as aggressive as it is now so even things our family avoids are unavoidable in other people’s homes and on other people’s tvs.
It is so dang hard.
I am always sorry when the Olympics are over, because all the women with muscular thighs and no breasts suddenly leave the arena again. (Did you SEE how they photoshopping Lindsey Vonn for Sports Illustrated? But left some of the non-photoshopped photos in the spread, so you caught yourself saying, WAIT, why do this super-muscular woman’s breasts and thighs change size every three photos?) These are hard conversations, the conversations about our bodies and how to love them in a world where even the skinny girls on the cover aren’t that skinny, and I struggle with them all the time.
My FIVE year old used to fret because her thighs spread out when she sat down. WTF?
Jody, I’d love some insight into how you handled it (the thighs). I didn’t worry about that until I was in middle school? High school? But the times they are a’changing.
Dawn, I think I talked about how strong and large those muscles have to be, and how everything changes when you push on it (we might have pushed on our cheeks), and just in general blabbed too much.
I know that both of my daughters think about this stuff, and their thinking is affected by the fact that I was a beanpole as a kid, and now I’m fat. There have been questions about how and why that happened, which I suspect I fumble (I mean, I gained 25 pounds in my mid-twenties while walking 5 miles a day and living on beans and rice, which is SCARY — who wants to hear that sometimes your body chemistry is unstoppable? especially when _I_ know, even if they don’t, that PCOS is partly heritable?), and there have been questions about which body I liked better. I spend a lot of time semi-lying, in the sense that I would LOVE to still be a beanpole, and do wish this body were differently shaped, but instead I say that this body has climbed mountains and birthed triplets and cuddled children, and I love it right now.
Like I said, sort of a lie (I want back my 18-year old stomach and breasts) but I’m going to keep faking it until I make it.
My kid isn’t likely to be thin, either. If she’s crazy about fitness, she might be trim-ish in a curvy way, but really, she’s got round genes from all sides of her family. We’ve had several similar conversations prompted by her saying the same thing, “I want to be thin when I’m a teenager.” I’ve tried talking to her about it, gosh it’s hard! She does NOT want to hear about it from me! It’s been a good challenge for me, though, forcing me to deal with my own feelings about being fat. I like to show Rebecca those things on the ‘net, where they show how a model/actress/whoever has been photoshopped, so she can see that even the skinny people aren’t so skinny/perfect/whatever.
Oh jeez. Right now i’m totally overwhelmed with how much being a parent means putting on the big girl pants (and I mean emotionally, not physically, to be clear)… so, can you come over to my house and do it for me? I feel like Madison really lets you talk to her about this stuff; how do you do it with a kid (my son, for example) who shuts down around any sticky topic. (well, one in particular). Please advise. I mean it.
Cynthia, Noah is a shut downer. He takes after his FATHER. Argh. He will talk to me when we’re doing something else (he is and always has been way more likely to talk if we’re driving somewhere and he’s in the back seat) but if I push too far or say too much he puts a total kibosh on the conversation. That is HARD for me. Sometimes I’d use Brett as a proxy, talking about something I wanted Noah to overhear. He’s always got his ears pricked. He does talk to me and he does listen but he’s nowhere near as open as Madison is. I’d be interested in hearing how other people handle kids like ours.
F’ing boys. Uh, I mean… yeah, people do process things differently, don’t they? I know there are major lessons here for me, though. If I can just figure out what they are. Thanks for responding- and on my blog, too. It helps. A lot.
I have no idea if this is even accurate, but it seems like you have a lot of friends with fairly small builds. I remember distinctly feeling large at the bar mitzvah, which could have been totally a misapprehension on my part or it could have been the one day in my cycle when this always happens, but I do remember being struck by that and having to sort of remind myself that it didn’t mean your friends were all better than I am just because they’re thinner. And I really don’t think that way, except sometimes it slips through and I do. It’s not generally something I notice when I’m in a group, but that particular grouping did seem to have a lot of women with small frames and their lean and wiry daughters. And Madison, who has big bones and a body that goes with her lovely round face and who would not look her best as a beanpole.
I’m so glad she’s getting so much feedback about her size and shape and color, but even though she’s one of the world’s most adorable children she’s got those characteristics that our culture doesn’t prize. I’m glad she has good examples of beauty in both you and Pennie and that you’re giving her the tools she’ll need to fight back against the beauty standards that constrain her.
Thorn, I do have a lot of friends with small builds and I’d classify you as one of them! Isn’t it funny how we see ourselves? I have friends with other builds, too, but it can be hard to see it when we’re having one of THOSE days!!! While my friends are big and small and tall and short, their little girls all tend to be skinny and Madison definitely notes it because they play dress up a lot and clothes that fit them (and that she covets) don’t fit her. I make a HUGE effort to keep her well stocked in fancy dress-up clothes because of this. I want her to ALWAYS feel pretty even if she outgrew the fairy princess outfits at the toy stores a couple of years ago. (Although I’ve been luckier online — Halloween clearance at Crazy 8 netted us a nice big girl princess costume!)
Yeah, I think it was more that I saw how thin all the girls were and then looked at the moms and could sort of see why! I think of myself as mediumish, though I just got back from a bellydance class where I was far on the smaller end. Context matters!! I’m just so glad Madison keeps getting this message so much it annoys her, because that’s NOT the problem most girls have.
Thanks for writing about this in such a constructive way. I suffered and disliked my own body for years and years. I had negative role models in a mom and aunts who obsessed about their weights, made endless comparisons between the girls in our family and liked to say I was “big boned”… whatever the hell that meant My daughter will be a big girl .. long legs and a big bottom. It’s obvious even now. Already her 9 year old cousin has made a “it’s too big” comment about her butt (she isn’t yet two). I need to be on top of this with both of them … I need pictures of Queen Latifah everywhere
I need to read more posts like this and continue to work on my own baggage around this … because those negative messages are coming for my girl… our culture is so hostile to us if we don’t fit the ideal. Really? the Princess Frog character is “ideal” thin? I have it ordered but have not seen it yet… how annoying.
this is something i struggle with, both for myself, and my daughter (who is 12, not fat, but not skinny, but had been called fat in school)
thanks for writing about it – we all have those conversations and it is good to hear what other people are thinking/talking about.
oh – and happy belated purim!
I find it interesting that the subject of health hasn’t made it into this discussion at all. Isn’t it important to tell/model for our kids that one way of loving ourselves and our bodies to take good care of our bodies?
Patti, you’re making two mistaken assumptions here. The first is that the sum of my discussions with my kids about health and nutrition are in this single entry. The second is that having cake on Purim somehow is NOT taking good care of our bodies. If you read back through my archives (and I absolutely understand because who has time to read through a bunch of blog archives? so I’ll just tell you) you’ll see that I talk about nutrition and exercise with my kids regularly. And then the POINT of this blog entry is to say that eating cake on a holiday IS part of nutrition and taking care of our bodies because we, of course, need to know how to manage special occasions appropriately and how to make sweets a part of our lives in healthy ways.
I really didn’t assume this entry was the sum of your discussions with your kids about health and nutrition. And re: the assumption about cake on Purim is not taking good care of our bodies? That really confuses me because your conversation with M didn’t mention cake much at all, either. So, my comment had more to do with talking with our kids about body types and images than about the cake. I probably should have elaborated a little more
Of course I don’t think eating cake one day = not taking care of our bodies.
What I meant was, when a daughter gives her mother such a fantastic opportunity to teach about body types and image, it seems like health would become a natural part of the conversation. Then, there were so many comments and people sharing their experiences/struggles/approaches, that I was truly just surprised that the subject of health hadn’t come up.
Well, you brought it up. And I’m saying that this is one piece of a whole discussion and you’re wanting this one piece to contain the whole discussion and that’s not what THIS piece (blog post) was about. And clearly the people commenting were wanting to talk about the piece that it WAS about. So if you want to talk about health in this context, go ahead and bring the comments to that but this feels a little bit like a drive by.
oops, I hit the wrong “reply”. See # 16
I hear what you are saying : I could have brought the subject of health into the discussion in a more constructive way. (If that is wrong, correct me.) I certainly wasn’t trying to be ‘drive by’. I guess I was more or less ‘thinking out loud’. Ack, I really didn’t mean to offend, and I apologize if I did.
Thanks Patti. And I really do think the discussion is worth bringing into this. I am reacting (over reacting) lately to the internet because I am on pins and needles re., grad school and it’s making me jumpy. I appreciate your understanding!