This week something happened in our household that filled me with shock and dismay. Our eldest daughter got on the bathroom scale, froze, said, ‘Mom, I’m fat!’ and burst into tears. As a parent I’ve had many moments where I’ve felt like a failure, but never as painfully nor acutely as this one. And I don’t even know how this happened. For years the scale has been fun; something the girls hopped on and off of before or after their bath and excitedly announced the new number and how much they’d ‘grown’. But somehow, between then and now, those digits have taken on a new and not-so-fun significance.
And the worst part of all is that this child (young woman, really) is tall and thin, and while I try hard not to rate any body as ‘better’ than another, with her long dancer’s legs and beautifully lithe limbs she has exactly the physical dimensions our society deems beautiful. Having such a different body type from hers, I often watch her in admiration and (falsely, it turns out) imagine how wonderful it must feel to look so great without trying. I had no idea she was harbouring these feelings about herself. What happened to our sunny, supremely self-confident little girl?
As a far from perfect and slightly scatty mother, I forget things from time to time and more than once a week when my husband’s away we have cereal for supper. But the one area where I’ve never slipped up is around body image. Having grown up being told I was overweight and struggling with body issues my whole life, I’ve been supremely mindful of what I communicate to my daughters. I’ve never called myself fat or used the word ‘diet’ in their company. On the contrary, I’ve made it my mission to neutralise the images of thinness the world throws in their faces by sparking discussions around how unrealistic they are and how much more important it is to be healthy and fit and strong.
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Clearly, believing my solitary voice could counter the messages they’re bombarded with day in and day out was a moment of deep naivety on my part. As she stepped off the scale and looked at me with her trusting blue eyes, waiting for me to say the right thing, I panicked. I didn’t have the script for this. It happened so suddenly and unexpectedly, and while I think I know my children, I had absolutely no idea what had been going on in her mind. I started blurting out platitudes about how she was beautiful; about how everyone comments on her lovely legs and flat tummy, and that she’s the furthest thing in the world from fat. But as I looked at her little face I realised she wasn’t taking in one thing I was saying. So I sighed, took a deep breath and changed tack. Instead of trying to convince her she was wrong, I took her hand and said, ‘Darling, I know. I really know. Isn’t it crazy that we feel this way about ourselves?’
I admitted how, my whole life, I’ve hated the way I look and that even though I realise how insane it is, I don’t know how to change it. And that we aren’t alone; most women feel this way about themselves. The thinnest, most gorgeous girls you’ll ever see … most of them single out features they don’t like and secretly wish they looked different. And it’s a shame and a travesty, and we should all be above this by now, but we aren’t. And finally, after a few moments of talking like this in complete honesty, I felt her mood lift and saw the glimmer of a smile. ‘Thanks, Mom,’ she said. And I realised in that moment that my role is not quite what I thought it was. My job is not to create a perfect world for her but to listen, to understand and to really hear what she’s saying, as much as her words might pain me.
I know that no amount of logic will make her insecurities disappear. Heaven knows no amount of logic has alleviated mine. And I know that it’s not the last time this will come up. She is just entering her teens and, if she’s anything like me, a world of personal struggle awaits her. So my new parenting resolution is, instead of trying to ‘fix’ everything, to just show up emotionally and validate her feelings. Life is full of challenges and a really, really big one that lasts most (if not all) of our lives is learning how to be okay with ourselves. Some days we do better than others, but knowing we’re not alone in this … well, it does make it easier.
Susan Hayden is the voice behind the popular blog Disco Pants & A Mountain
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