Entries Tagged 'Body Image & Self Esteem' ↓

When Ainsley was younger, I suppose I was more naive and optimistic about my powers as a parent. Now that she’s nearing nine, I have the benefit of getting used to the idea of my own powerlessness.

Of course, I have a great deal of influence in her life and over activities she participates in, media she’s exposed to, that sort of thing.

But, there is a great deal about her self and her life that I am ultimately powerless over. It’s like when your baby is born and you’d always intended to have a blond baby and out she comes sporting bold black or red hair. For some reason, you weren’t expecting it and don’t really know how to respond.

I find in myself, and in conversations with other mothers online and off, that a lot of what we hold to be true as mothers is framed in our own personal experience as girls.

For instance, I got my period when I was 12, had to beg for a bra so I wouldn’t be the only 7th grader in the locker room without one. That was also the year I began shaving my legs, wearing make-up, pierced my ears, curled my hair and was devastated because I wasn’t allowed Liz Claiborne perfume and a Guess watch. Being 12 was HUGE in my own personal coming-of-age experience.

Yet, a generation later, girls mature faster. Lots of things go faster, change faster, develop faster. Cursive may, in fact, be obsolete as my 8-year-old just bought her own pink 7″ mini computer money she’s saved.

Puberty is happening faster in white girls by several years. As a mother, it has taken some getting used to that idea. We don’t know why. Scientists, doctors, researchers don’t know why. I’ve researched and reported on it a lot on The Girl Revolution, mainly in an attempt to understand how to prevent this from happening to MY child. Yet, all the sudden – as I come face to face with the reality, some things don’t seem to be relevant anymore.

What happened when we were girls – personally or collectively – is irrelevant.

As a group, generally girls want to stay inside the norm. If the norm changes, but you keep up with it, you’ll probably make out okay. So, if you’re the ONLY kid in your class who doesn’t develop a few years earlier this generation that is probably the occurrence that will be emotionally and socially damaging. To develop earlier than your mother, but at the same rate as the other kids in your age-range, will be the most comforting pace for most girls. Why should SHE care when YOU got boobs?

I wasn’t allowed to have a phone in my room. There was altogether too much privacy in that idea. Yet, I’m probably going to give Ainsley a cell line within the next several months. It makes sense TODAY.

Frankly, I didn’t expect this yet. But, I have yet to make any headway in stopping it, holding it off or reversing it. Some things, I’ve accepted, are beyond my control. One can eradicate BPAs from the home, eliminate hormones in milk, reduce exposure to media, visit physicians, and pray a lot and still, one must surrender to the fact that parents don’t control their children’s physical development.

It really is irrelevant that I didn’t need a bra till I was 12, that I didn’t start my period until after 6th grade, that I didn’t use deodorant or shave my legs until 7th grade. It really doesn’t make any difference to HER experience. I’m positive my parents made these decisions based on the culture we lived in – a predominantly Mormon one, in which this was also the timing of most of the other kids.

What matters in her experience is what other kids are doing now, what is safe and healthy, what she’s emotionally ready for, what the desires of her heart are and what is currently socially acceptable today.

This is her life. Her development and her experience. My job is not to determine the timing of the experience. My job is to support her through whatever her experience turns out to be. My job is the same as every generation of mothers and only the timing is different – to pass on Feminine Wisdom.

You remember Kevin and Ericka? The Unofficial The Girl Revolution Teen Romance?

A brief recap: Kevin made an inappropriate comment about Ericka’s curvacious bod. Ericka slapped him back in line. He wrote to The Girl Revolution to find out why Ericka didn’t like her curves. I wrote back, saying maybe Ericka is groovy with her curves – but, didn’t like strange men ogling them and treating her like an object at first meeting. He said he was sorry and asked her out. Ericka agreed to give him a second shot.

They’ve had a wonderful summer dating.

Ericka has since kept in touch. Sending me an email every now and again, giving me updates and asking for advice. I’ve asked her permission, and Kevin’s, to publish some of our conversations for a few reasons.

First, I think you all might have some great advice for them.

Second, I’ve received a few comments from other young men saying they find the stream helpful to their own navigating respect and dating.

Please, leave comments if you have further advice or experience for Kevin and Ericka.

Ericka:

Hi Tracee.  Don’t mean to bug you, just checking in.  It’s always nice to be able to talk to an adult other than my Mom.  Kevin and I are having a great summer, trying to take advantage of the outdoors with swimming, hiking, etc.  We do have lots of fun together.  I want to take things slow.  He gives great foot massages and back rubs  and we have kissed many times but that’s as far as it has gone.   Does it sound like I’m doing the right thing?  Just wanted to make sure.  My friends aren’t as conservative as me when it comes to dating.  I even got teased by my friends the first time I met Kevin.  “I can’t believe you slapped him, you’re such a prude, you really need to lighten up.”  But I was proud of how I handled myself and I think Kevin respected me more for it too, so in the end it all worked out.

Tracee:

Go slow. You’re right to respect yourself. I only know this because I was more like your friends as a teenager and it caused me a great deal of heart-ache. When you’re young, you don’t really understand that your actions and behavior, choices and consequences, will follow you far into adulthood. Most of my regrets showed up when I had a daughter and I realized the high price I paid by being promiscuous. I mean, I would never, ever want my daughter to go through the pain I went through.

One thing that sticks out in my mind is something I recently read in a Christiane Northrop book. She’s a world-class OB/GYN and scholar on women’s wisdom and women’s health. She wrote of a study that shows women have a chemical in their brain called Oxytocin which spikes when they have sex with someone. Anyone. Everyone. When women go through oxytocin withdrawal it is as painful as withdrawal from drugs. She said it can take 2 years to get over it. It chemically alters her brain, her body, her psychic energy – not just her emotions. So imagine having casual sex and having this emotional and physical rollercoaster over and over. That’s not really a fun ride for girls. I know. I rode that ride.

Kevin does seem to respect you. It’s not prudish to guard your body, mind and soul from casual sex and pain.

I thought it wouldn’t matter when I was younger. I thought it was just a game.

Take that advice for what it’s worth Ericka. Know that you make the best decisions for yourself.

Ericka:

Gosh Tracee, I don’t know how to thank you for this.  It must not have been easy for you to share all of that.  We’ll definitely go slow.  I don’t think sex has to be an important part of our relationship.

There is something that’s quite personal that I wanted to ask you about.  If you’re not comfortable with it, that’s ok.  My friends say that Kevin will eventually lose interest if I at least don’t allow him to massage my breasts.  I’m a little nervous about it but maybe they’re right.  If you have any thoughts let me know, if not that’s cool too.  This is all so confusing and tricky.  Life was so much easier before puberty, lol.

Tracee:

Kevin will not lose interest if don’t let him massage your breasts.

Want to know why men don’t calls girls back after sex? It’s not that he doesn’t “respect” her. It’s that he already achieved his goal.

Men are weird. They want you more if you don’t do stuff with them. When he achieves his goal, he makes a new goal. Breasts, down your pants, sex, etc. Then it’s new girl = new goal.

You should do what you’re comfortable with. For your own pleasure. Responsibly – emotionally, mentally, physically – responsible to your own self. Knowing that men are goal-oriented creatures. Not allowing him to achieve his goal right away is how you keep a guy interested and trying. Women and girls get far more attention and affection from men when they DON’T have sex with them. (Because he’s still motivated to achieve his goal.)

How old are you again?

Ericka:

Thanks again Tracee.  To answer your question, I’m 17.  I wouldn’t say Kevin has put a lot of pressure on me, other than me having to push his hands away from my bra area a few times.  He’s never said anything about it.  All of my friends allow their boyfriends to do that, some fully clothed some not, and obviously some of it goes beyond massaging, so I am starting to feel like a nun, lol.  But, I think we’ll keep things right where they are because that’s my comfort level.  Plus, we’re having lots of fun together in many other ways that don’t involve anything sexual.

I have a confession to make. . .

I think I’m beautiful.

Because I am.

I honestly can’t comprehend why women hate their bodies, their faces, their hair, their boobs, the minuscule details that they pick apart in the mirror.

I’ve tried to get it. But, I don’t. Maybe that’s a good thing.

I think I’ve made a conscious choice. I think there have been a lot of influences that have convinced me I am beautiful, hot, attractive, etc. Many of those influences have been men. Many of them have been women.

When I was in 7th grade, I was in a carpool and I was sitting on a 9th grade girl’s lap (the car was very full) and she said, “You have the perfect thighs. They aren’t too big or too small. They are just perfect.” I considered her super-beautiful and beyond cool. So I took the compliment, figured she was probably telling the truth and just accepted that my thighs are perfect. Until that moment I hadn’t given my thighs a thought. I still feel pretty good about them.

Over the course of my 15 year dating career, I was told by boys and men that I “had the perfect breasts,” one man even said, “those will never sag because of their unique shape.” I still believe to this day that my breasts are perfect. The sagging is minimal. Perhaps because that man was right or perhaps because I accepted his statement as prophetic and my body, happily, didn’t feel the need to disappoint me or prove him wrong.

My thick blond hair, my beautiful blue eyes, my tanned skin, my ass, my bow lips and even my feet have received compliments.

I don’t reject these complements, I never did. I accepted them as true, and as I age, I still consider them true. I’m happy to see most of these features appear in my son and daughter. Lucky DNA.

Of course, others in my family share the exact same DNA, the exact same lovely features, and still choose to hate and criticize them.

Through childbirth and aging, I’ve had some weight issues. OK. But, as I lose weight, I’m realizing that I don’t feel pressure – social or cultural – to be more beautiful. I feel social and cultural pressure to be less beautiful, to criticize my body or my looks, to downplay my beauty and to say it’s unimportant or irrelevant or ridiculous or that the truth about me is that I am not beautiful no matter what compliment you give me.

Why?

To make the other women who feel bad about themselves feel better about themselves.

Which, I admit, I tried to do.

I acknowledge that the extra weight protected me from two things I genuinely needed protection from as I transitioned into the roles of marriage and motherhood: the criticism of other women and the unwelcome advances of men.

Except when I was overweight and not claiming my beauty I noticed that it had absolutely zero effect on whether other women felt beautiful or not.

Last year I had an incredible experience at a self-improvement workshop. We played a game where we sat across from a total stranger. We didn’t even know their names. We knew nothing about who they were or what their issues were or their families or jobs. Nothing. Except what we could see.

Then we were told to be harshly critical and tell the other person what we really thought about them.

I was very uncomfortable with this exercise because I did not know this other woman at all. I didn’t want to criticize a stranger and would have preferred to say something kind about her. I wasn’t sure this exercise was going to be useful or helpful.

She said to me a paraphrase of this:  ”You’re cold and untouchable. You’re fake and phony and mean and shallow.”

What?

I think I said to her a paraphrase of this: “You’ve given up. You’re a victim. You’re not trying. You’ve put up boundaries.”

Based on?

I was wearing my nicest jeans and favorite shirt, my favorite red scarf, bold earrings, make up and I had recently had my hair done. I had put my best self forward for the first day of an unknown and honestly frightening experience.

She was wearing sweat pants, an ill-fitting shirt, her hair was unkept and in a pony tail, sneakers, and had not bothered to take care of some unfortunate facial hair.

My take-away from the experience was this: how I felt when she said those things was not a new feeling. It was a very, very familiar feeling. She felt inferior sitting next to me. She felt angry about that. I was representative of all the girls in high school who she had felt less beautiful and less worthy than.

I asked myself after that experience, “Tracee, how many years have you been fat or played down who you are and tried to gloss over and hide your true beauty to gain the acceptance of women like her? How many women have you allowed to be mean to you and diminish your value as a smart beautiful woman because she felt bad about herself?”

And the honest answer was a lot of years. In some ways, my whole life.

So what is the point of playing small if it’s not even going to make them feel great about themselves?

I recently saw a statistic that only 2% of women would describe themselves as beautiful. It was on that Jessica Simpson show, The Price of Beauty.

The “price of beauty,” in some ways is the contempt of other women.

I see it in my friends who have lost weight and been subjected to harsh criticism from coworkers and family members and friends. When they hit a normal BMI people call them anorexic or skin and bones and unhealthy. I’ve experienced it myself.

Logically I know that way more than 2% of women actually are beautiful. Yet, only 2% of them believe it.

I believe they’re beautiful, but when I tell them so, they insist that I am wrong. Or they insist that beauty is unimportant, trivial or a harmful influence of the culture and the unreachable and unrealistic beauty ideal.

I am beautiful.

I wish you felt beautiful too. I genuinely do.

But, if you don’t, that absolutely doesn’t give you carte blanche to be a mean girl and try to make me feel bad about myself to somehow make yourself feel better.

I hope, my daughter doesn’t cave to the pressure of feeling less beautiful than she inherently is. I hope she accepts compliments. I hope she feels beautiful. Because she is. Just like her mother.