Don’t Pass Down Your Food & Body Image Baggage: 5 Rules To Raise Your Kids By
Me in a self-conscious teenage phase with my mom and our family cat, Spooky.
Like most moms, mine occasionally gives me unsolicited advice about my appearance.
Over the years, she has politely questioned the black lug-sole loafers I wore with nice dresses, my four-sizes-too-big blazer, and the extra-messy bun I put my hair in for a family wedding.
Hey, it was the 90’s! But for the record, she was right on all three accounts.
But my mom never mentioned my weight.
She never eyed my hips and suggested a smaller helping of pasta, even when I returned home from Freshman year of college with 15 extra pounds on my 5’1” frame.
She never talked about her weight either.
She has always been petite, so maybe it’s no surprise she never griped about it. But as we know, plenty of people in all sizes of bodies agonize over goal weights, deny themselves enough food, and complain about their belly.
But in my house, weight was never mentioned. No one was on a diet. While so many of the girls I knew were counting calories and calling themselves fat, home was a safe haven away from that kind of self-loathing.
