Pink Ginger Lingerie

Kids Learn Too Much From Us

I have been given a beautiful gift. I actually accept and like my body (most of the time). Do I feel a bit badly when I am interviewed by a size zero tv host? Of course I do, but the fact of the matter is that I have been given this body and need to enjoy my life. When I allow myself to be consumed by the fact that I am not a size zero (and haven’t been since I was 12), I can’t enjoy my kids and my life in the way I should.

As you read my blogs, you’ll quickly find out that my kids are my life. I spent New Year’s Day with friends. We are all mommies of young kids, and on the first day of the year, when you can hope for the world, we all hoped that our kids could float through life without pain. That clearly won’t happen. At one of the private schools in the area, the kindergarten girls won’t wear puffy jackets because ‘they look fat’. Imagine, in kindergarten, “fat” is already an insult and one that affects how the girls’ dress.

In the lingerie store, I see the most beautiful women, of all sizes and shapes, pick themselves apart. My friend Kim (www.mommyweardaily.com) sees the same things when she styles women. In all honesty, we agree, our jobs are very therapeutic. You can’t tell women that is about accepting your own skin, dressing appropriately for your body, and taking the time to enjoy life, without a bit of it rubbing off on you. What makes me sad (and speaking without permission for Kim) is that women are comparing themselves to the ‘Hollywood’ body. Let me be clear, I have yet to see a ‘Hollywood’. No one is perfect but everyone has their beauty.

Why I am writing my blog is because Kim and I are working on a project together. During our conversation today, she said, “How can a mommy teach their kids self esteem when she picks herself apart. The mommies need to fix themselves first.” It is such an obvious statement, but until she said it, I didn’t realize the impact our body image can have on our kiddos.

My three year old daughter matches the colour of her underwear to mine every morning. Today, she took my nail polish and made herself look like a ‘mommy’. (I am still calming down because she also painted the carpet in her room!) That little girl sees and mimics so much of what I do. I tell her that she’s beautiful and that her body will carry her gracefully through life. However if I spend my evenings in the mirror picking myself apart, that’s all she’ll learn. Any words I say will be overshadowed by my actions.

More than anything, I want my daughter to walk into kindergarten in the biggest puffiest jacket. If they call her fat, she can tell them, without anger, that’s she’s not fat, she’s simply dressing warmly.

As a parent, I have a great responsibility to live my life positively as my kids learn from my actions. Like anyone else, I have my ‘fat’ days. On those days, I stand before the mirror, and as I begin to pick apart my body, I stop myself. I force myself to make a mental list of my strengths (and I actually do have many) and think about how my body helped me achieve my successes.

Stopping the negative self talk sounds dumb but only by quieting that chatter, was I able to change me. When I hear my daughter say that she doesn’t like her hair (which she cut by herself last week), I can sit down and tell her honestly that sometimes mommy doesn’t like things about herself. Now, I also can sit with her and tell her that when I get sad, I tell myself that I’m a good mommy and I was pretty good at school etc. Then, Gracie and I sit down and talk about the things she’s good at too – and at three, she’s learning a skill that I only learned at 30+.