Well I am now officially the parent of a twelve year old girl! A wonderful birthday was had and a happy household all round. Over the past year, C has really changed shape drastically and now has the body of a young woman (gulp). She finds this quite hard to deal with although I can see that on some level she quite enjoys it too.
This is such an important time as at this age, children are beginning to build a picture of the adult shape they may have and we can make such a huge difference to how they feel about that. Here are a few tips which may help your child accept and love their newly emerging adult bodies:
1/ Be relaxed about your own body in front of them. Even if you have your own body issues, try really hard not to express them in front of your child. We are their role models for how they view their bodies so if they see that we judge ourselves for not being ‘perfect; then guess what? They will judge themselves that way too.
2/ Emphasise that beauty comes in many forms and is not dependant on being young, skinny and ‘perfect’. It is certain that they will be exposed to this idea outside the home as they grow up but we owe it to them to be a different voice.
3/ Do not talk about diets or weight loss in front of them. We are bombarded every day with the idea that diets work and that we can all be thin. Let’s face it – they don’t and we can’t! Talk about balanced diets and food for energy and optimum health and try to get them to see eating healthily as taking care of themselves and never about losing weight.
4/ Model the idea of exercise as a fun and satisfying thing, this doesn’t need to be running or the gym but can be walking the dog, dancing or going out on their scooter. Cultivate the idea that a strong body is a beautiful thing regardless of its shape.
5/ Make sure they know that magazines and billboards are fake – people don’t look like that. Their only purpose is to sell an aspiration so that they can sell stuff we don’t need. I am very proud to say that C thinks advertising is the devils work – as do I and she scorns it and knows it is all fake!
6/ Don’t praise or scold your child for their body shape! This sounds daft I know; C has a sticky out tummy (really normal at her age) and amazing long legs. We don’t make mention of either of them unless she does; praise them for who they are, not for body features they were born with. Of course you can tell them they are beautiful but they shouldn’t feel that you are any prouder of that than you are of their brains, wit and lovely personality.
C is growing up to be a very beautiful young woman who loves her body but loves herself for who she is inside as well. I know that she will have struggles with self image as she spends more time out in the world but I hope that the confidence that we have helped her to have in herself will show her that she should be proud of herself just as she is.
By Suzy Colebeck
I have to say this my own body image, and my attitude to it, is something I really struggle with hiding from my daughters. Would love to hear some tips from other mums of girls of how to change this. On another note, Suzy’s lovely post reminded me of a great blog post someone sent me a link to yesterday from last month: Waking Up Full of Awesome. Go check it out!
Free Your Parenting 
Is that your daughter or a stock photo? That looks like an impressively high jump!
:D It’s a stock photo, I’m afraid!
Interesting post, it made me think.
I don’t have daughters, my boys are 9 and 10.
I disagree with some of this, although of course ymmv.
For point 1, I just disagree. I think it is good to be relaxed about
communicating this. I want my kids to judge their own bodies and their
minds, and know how society will judge them.
We talk about diets (weight loss) and diet (healthy food) all the
time. What we eat and what other people eat. What will make you/others
fat or hyper if you start eating it. I think the food on offer in
todays society is a mine field and so should be the subject of ongoing
education.
We don’t do 6, just the opposite! :)
Well I’ve never scolded them for their body shape, but I say things in
warning appropriate to the boy. My eldest has an ectomorphic body
shape, like mine, so I warn him about getting too thin, and my other
son has a more mesomorphic shape and is in danger of getting fat if
his diet ever slips.
Clare – I will check out that other post.
Trillian – I reckon there was originally a trampoline in that picture.
//
Stuart
Thank you for your thoughts, Stuart. Interesting to hear a different perspective :)