you'd be so pretty if...

'Beauty Crutches' at Psychology Today

Today, I'm blogging about "beauty crutches" over at Psychology Today. Please stop by and comment!

See you here on Monday...and have a great weekend.

Can We Talk?

I've got a question for you: At this moment, what is your daughter most worried about?

My daughter's turning 13 soon and I consider myself very lucky that for the most part, she'll still talk to me about what's going on in her life and what she's thinking. But we also have many conversations that go like this: "How was school? Fine." "How was practice? Fine." I try not to take it personally when she doesn't feel like talking by reminding myself that adolescence is a time when kids are trying to figure out who they are and who they want to be. Separating from your parents is part of that process.

But just because our girls are pulling away a bit doesn't mean they don't need us. When I was interviewing girls for You'd Be So Pretty If..., one of the things I heard consistently from them was that they want to talk to their moms, but they feel awkward or embarrassed sometimes. The journalist in me dutifully recorded their words and asked them questions about why they felt that way. But the mother in me wanted to hug each one of them and tell them that inside every mom is a girl who still remembers how it feels to be unsure of herself. Watch this video from Dove's Campaign for Real Beauty -- the mother's words toward the end really strike a chord, don't they?  

The push-pull of mothering an adolescent can be confusing, for sure. But don't make the mistake of thinking that she no longer needs you -- or wants you around. Let her know you're always there to listen. She just might take you up on it.

Beyond The Mirror

Yesterday, I took part in a community food drive and delivered a short speech honoring an elderly man who devotes much of his time to feeding the hungry people who live around us. In my speech, I cited a few statistics, including the fact that one in six children in my state lives in a home where parents struggle to put food on the table. Close your eyes for just one moment and imagine how frightening and sad it must be to wonder if your children will have enough to eat today.

It's enough to move me to tears.

This week is also National Eating Disorders Awareness Week. Eating disorders, which include anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder, affect as many as 10 million females (and one million males) in the United States, according to the National Eating Disorders Association. It's tough to get your head around that, isn't it? Countless parents worried about being able to feed their children, while millions of girls and women deliberately starve their bodies of nutrition. But close your eyes again and imagine that you're a mom or dad watching your teenage daughter waste away. The refrigerator is full, the meals are cooked with love, but no amount of pleading can make her put fork to mouth. Imagine how frightening and sad it must be to wonder if your child will ever find peace and restore her body to health. 

That image also moves me to tears.

As any professional will attest, eating disorders are about so much more than food. They're often about control, self-worth, anxiety, depression, outside pressures, relationships and, yes, body image. If you suspect your child may have an eating disorder -- or if you suspect that you may have one -- contact the National Eating Disorders Association. You don't have to go through this alone. 

Is Your Body Your Life's Work?

As someone who writes about health, fitness and body image, I’ve gotten to know many people who’ve made an admirable commitment to healthy living. For them -- and for me -- choosing to take the best possible care of our bodies is about so much more than just creating a nice appearance -- it’s about having the energy and confidence to meet life’s challenges and stay open to new possibilities. Let’s face it: When you feel good physically, those good feelings spill over into your work, your home and your relationships.

 

But there’s a point where the scales tip (no pun intended) and a commitment to healthy living becomes an obsession. You’ve probably met those people who won’t even take a bite of their own birthday cake or can’t skip a workout to meet an old friend who’s in town. I experienced a small dose of that obsession in 2007, when I wrote a monthly column for Shape, a women’s fitness magazine. Readers followed my year-long journey as I worked to ultimately shed 26 pounds through grueling two-hour workouts and constant scrutiny of every bite that went into my mouth. Through it all, my children watched…I was exhausted and cranky and though I was indeed getting thinner, my behavior wasn’t always pretty. I liked that they saw me make a commitment to something and see it through. But when the column ended, I knew I had to find a healthy balance.

 

I also knew I had to show my daughter that the end-goal of healthy living isn’t a smaller body. After a year of unnatural focus on my appearance, both of us needed to be reminded that there’s more to life than what you see in the mirror.

 

So how do we strike that balance between healthy self-care and over-the-top focus on our bodies? It’s about finding ways to move daily that feel right for our lives, not an inflexible commitment to a gym schedule. It’s about making mostly healthy food choices, while recognizing that it’s OK to indulge in a treat when you want to. And it’s about finding something meaningful, whether it’s a career or volunteer work or a hobby, that totally engages us -- and has absolutely nothing to do with what we look like.

 

 

What Getting Older Gives You...

It's coming: In just about a week, I'll celebrate another birthday. It won't have the same festive hoopla that surrounded last year's birthday; then, I was 40 -- a milestone. Now, I'm just in my 40s.

Doesn't have quite the same ring to it, eh?

Still, I'll welcome this birthday and all the others I'm lucky enough to have. See, I don't have any female role models for healthy aging in my family (though I am fortunate enough to know quite a few kick-ass older ladies who I'd love to emulate). Neither my grandmother nor my mother lived to retirement age...and that's a very sobering thought.

When I was younger -- especially in my 20s, when I was teaching fitness classes at clubs across the state -- working out was all about cosmetic concerns. My body back then was an admirable reflection of the time I put into it. But I never quite appreciated it; there was always some part to work on or flaw to fix.

Now, working out and eating right are about so much more. And like many friends my age, I feel better about myself now than I ever did in my 20s. Life and experience gives you a certain perspective; as my mom often told me, "Youth is wasted on the young." I never quite got that until relatively recently.

But aging also gives you the wisdom to know that not everything is in our control. Taking care of your body goes a long way toward keeping you healthy, but disease doesn't always care. One of my favorite writers, Anne Lamott, spoke about body image over at Beliefnet recently. Whatever your beliefs, I think we can all appreciate the poignancy in Lamott's story about worrying about the size of her thighs as her best friend was dying -- and the wisdom in her friend's admonition that she "just didn't have that kind of time."

So bring on the birthdays. If I'm lucky enough, I'll be the first feisty old lady in the family.

Re-thinking Fitness

Can you hear that? It's the collective sound of mothers everywhere, trying to figure out what to do with the kids during the February school break. Frankly, I've never understood this vacation -- it hasn't been that long since the holidays and really, it seems quite cruel to give kids a week off during one of the coldest (depending on where you live, of course) months of the year.

Where I live, February often brings not only whipping winds and bone-chilling cold, but also a healthy dose of snow -- or, my particular favorite, freezing rain. Telling the kids to go outside and play usually isn't an option. That's why I've got a confession to make that just might brand me a bad mom.

I love our Wii.

Though I'll never be convinced that it's on par with running around outside, it does my heart good to see my son practicing his baseball swing instead of planted on the couch in a glassy-eyed, thumb-pushing frenzy of Playstation 2 games. I know it's still a video game, but at least there's some movement associated with it. As it turns out, video-games-for-fitness is something of a trend at YMCAs and schools across the country.

Most of the parents I know do a fair bit of lamenting about how things aren't the same for our kids as they were for us -- they don't roam the neighborhood with their friends, ride their bikes til the streetlights come on or play whiffle ball with a pack of kids at the playground. But I often wonder if we would have either, had we had all these channels, Web sites and video games available to us.

I think the healthy answer to all this lies somewhere in the middle. I'm a huge proponent of leading by example, so my kids will see me work out this morning...and if the weather warms up, I'll suggest an afternoon walk down to the beach or a game of driveway basketball. If not? I smell a them-against-me Wii bowling tournament in the works.

Their exercise may not always look like the exercise I remember from my childhood. But as long as they're moving, I'll take it.

Knock, Knock...It's Your Past

Hi, all:

Psychology Today has invited me to be one of its Parenting bloggers, so today, I'm blogging about middle-school awkwardness over on the PT site. Comments welcome! 

There'll be a new post here on Monday. Happy weekend :-).

Who Is That Belted Woman?

I'm a huge believer in the cumulative power of small changes. Time and again, I've seen it work in my own life. When my trainer wanted me to try running, I started with a 30-second run to the nearest mailbox and kept adding time -- each day -- until I made it to a mile. When work slows down, I know a few pitches and emails each day will soon have me busy again. Sure, big sweeping changes have a certain dramatic flair (if you've ever colored your hair blond, you know what I mean), but lasting change is usually built on the less dramatic steps we take each day.

I've been thinking about how this concept applies to making over your body image.

A group of writer friends was recently discussing how working alone in an office all day at home can wreak havoc on your sense of style if you let it. Most days, I live in jeans or even gym clothes if I've planned a late-day workout session. But this group of friends decided to try an experiment in which we all dressed up each day. Although the term "dressed up" is open to interpretation, the general idea was that we'd aim to put together a stylish outfit, along with styled hair, make-up and jewelry, if that was generally part of our "going out" look.

You wouldn't think such a small thing would make a big difference. But it does.

Case in point: I volunteered at the school book fair earlier this week and when I was getting dressed, I decided that instead of my usual jeans and sweater, I'd wear a button-down shirt. Then, feeling particularly wild and crazy, I decided to do something I haven't done in years: I tucked the shirt into my jeans and put on a belt.

I warned you it was wild and crazy!

It sounds completely silly, but I felt really polished. That one simple change made a dramatic difference in how I felt -- and, apparently, in how I looked. When my son's class walked through the book fair, he stopped, took one look at me and said (really loudly), "Whoa...where'd you get that? I've never seen you wear that before!"

I think it was a compliment.

My point -- and I do have one -- is that sometimes, what feels like a small or insignificant change can have a big effect on the way we see ourselves -- and the way others see us. Whether it's dressing up a little, trying a new workout or simply saying something kind to yourself when you look in the mirror instead of focusing on your "flaws," little changes can add up to seeing yourself in a whole new way.

Call Me, Kate Winslet!

No, I don't mean call me Kate Winslet. I mean Kate Winslet should give me a call.

Sure, she's done a lot of interviews about her body, her body image and Hollywood's perception of beauty. But I'd love to chat with her about the mother-daughter body image connection.

She touched on it briefly during an interview with Cynthia McFadden of ABC's "Nightline." Did you happen to catch it on Friday night? (Neither did I, but that's why I love Twitter). Click here to watch Kate talk about media images of celebrities and the effect that they have on young girls -- and on women. I love the part where she mentions her daughter!

Slightly scarier? Watching Kate get ripped apart in the comments section. Ouch.

But in the tradition of Jamie Lee Curtis appearing sans retouching in a 2002 issue of More magazine, I've got to admire someone who's willing to put herself out there to keep the conversation going. It's the talking about this stuff that will change things for a generation of daughters.  

Let's Talk About Sex

As an avid exerciser who's always looking to change up her routine, I'm constantly on the lookout for new ideas and ways to challenge and improve my fitness level. Some workouts are fantastic new finds, some are laughable and some just make me scratch my head and say, "Hmmm." Such was the case with the press release that landed in my inbox yesterday for a new workout from self-described "entertainer turned fitness guru" Tera Patrick. Its title? "Fit 4 Sex."

I'll admit I was intrigued.

It's no secret that improving your fitness level and feeling good about your body can have, ahem, positive effects on your romantic life. But Patrick promises so much more than that. According to the release, Fit 4 Sex is "a stimulating blend between a sex position guide and work out routine designed to attain your best body for sexual fulfillment."

OK, I had to look (and you know you want to). What I found was a workout description featuring several blush-inducing illustrations and exercises with creative names such as "The Last Gal Standing," "Frisky Kitty" and -- good heavens! -- "Pull My Daisy." 

Yes, I'm giggling right now. I never said I was mature. 

But given that I just wrote a post this week about my daughter's increasing awareness of how sex is used to sell products, I can only hope that she isn't reading this post. I wouldn't want to have to explain these poses to my children if either one walked in during a workout.

Still, Patrick's theory about the connection between body image and healthy sexuality raises an interesting point. What effect does body image have on teenage girls and their decisions about having sex?

Come on, you knew I was going to bring it back to this.

Consider this quote from A Generation Under Stress, a report by Girlguiding UK and the Mental Health Foundation:  

"Premature sexualisation and pressure to grow up too quickly emerged as two of the key influences on girls’ emotional well-being and mental health. Sexual advances from boys, pressure to wear clothes that make them look too old and magazines and websites directly targeting younger girls to lose weight or consider plastic surgery were identified as taking a particular toll."

Sure, all girls (and boys, too!) are feeling the pressure to grow up faster and faster these days. But is a girl who feels good about her body and herself more or less likely to have sex?

I'm sure I'm not the only one who knows a girl or two whose behavior seems driven by feelings of worthlessness. I also once knew a girl whose boyfriend constantly put her down and tried to make her feel that nobody else could possibly love her. But plenty of girls are also taught that their value is in their physical appearance  -- and being sexually desired is proof positive of that value.

To me, a healthy body image goes hand in hand with a healthy respect for yourself -- and the ability to make good decisions based on your own feelings, not on what someone else is telling you to feel about yourself. It's also caring enough about yourself to gather facts and protect yourself from bad situations. As a parent, I know there are some decisions I can't make for my children -- even though I wish I could. But I can do my best to help them develop a healthy respect for themselves and for others.

What do you think about all this?