46 // My in laws talked about fat stomachs in front of my 3 year old
”My in laws talked about fat stomachs in front of my 3 year old.
Now, she’s saying it too. What do I do?” 2 Things to combat Negative body image in a kids.
While there is a lot of fun that is being had in the summer, I know that bathing suit season can also expose our kids to some things we wish we could just put extra sunscreen on to protect our kids from, like fat-shaming and diet-culture.
That's why in this episode, we talk about how to handle things like negative body image and/or inappropriate comments that are made in front of our toddlers and children. While kids are still forming their views on body image and their own relationships with food, we know how they can be impacted by some of the things that people around them say or do.
So let's highlight two things every parent can do to respond when situations like these that play out - with extended family, in laws, or as we get back into the school year and kids hear things from others. We can't always avoid our children hearing these things being said, but we can control how we respond to such situations.
Listen to this episode of The Veggies & Virtue Podcast now!
Full Episode Transcription
Please note this a raw transcription. If something doesn’t read correctly, toggle to that timestamp in the show so that you can listen in on what was actually being said!
[00:00:00] You know, it is bathing suit season, it's family vacation season. There is a lot of fun that is being had in the summer. However, as this mom's question alluded to, I know that there's also some things that our kids can be exposed to. That is not really our ideal for them or for their childhood memories with summer.
[00:00:16] And that's because as I got this question from the mom, I was just thinking about how others might be wondering the same thing. And I wanted to go ahead and take a minute on the show to. How we handle things like negative body image and really inappropriate conversation in front of our toddlers and small children who are still really forming their understandings about their own body image and their own relationships with food and how that can be impacted by some of the things that people around them say, or some of the ways that even they might be treated by such people depending on how they eat or what the, you know, their body shape is and things like that.
[00:00:53] So going to touch on this in today's episode, With the hope of really equipping you as not just the nutritional gatekeeper, but as the mom who I know cares so much for your children's innocence and their body image that is forming in these early years. And we don't want that to be disrupted or.
[00:01:15] Distorted amidst all the fun things that are happening in the summer, out and around the pool at the beach on family vacations and in all those fun places that we might find ourselves.
[00:01:28] Hey mama, I'm Ashley, and welcome to the veggies and virtue podcast. In this podcast, you will find simple menu ideas. Kitchen organizational systems spelled out for mom life and feeding tips and tricks that are both evidence based and grace laced. I believe that you can find flexibility when it comes to feeding your family so that you can feel calm, capable, and connected in the kitchen.
[00:01:46] As a registered dietician and Christian mom of three myself. I want you to break free from the mealtime battles. And to feel equipped while feeding your kids all day long, pull up a stool at my kitchen counter. And let me pour you a cup of coffee and say a quick prayer for you. It's time to chat about the meal times messes moments and ministry of motherhood.
[00:02:07] I'm gonna go ahead and read you the question that was submitted by this mom, so that you have a little more context for today's episode. Sarah asked as a dietician. Do you have any advice or resources on how to combat negative body image for toddler? My in-laws talked a lot about fat stomachs and exercising in front of my three year old daughter.
[00:02:25] And she picked up on it and is now saying it about herself every. PS, I'm loving your combination cards. So quick plug. Remember that right now, combination cards are on sale. If you want to get the digital copies, you can get 20% off any single deck or 30% off, all three of the decks. So you get all three, four under $20 right now until meal times made easy launches and then you'll just have access to them within the course.
[00:02:50] So quick mention of that as I read the note that Sarah had asked me, but first, I mean, I'm sure as any of us, when we hear. Our heart just breaks a little bit, because depending on where you are at with your own relationship with food, this really could come with a trigger warning because maybe this is something that we experienced as kids or that we're, you know, all wherever we came from, when our own relationships with food and upbringing and body image were all trying to protect our kids from this very thing.
[00:03:20] And with so many of us born and raised in diet culture and with very well intending. That honestly just don't know any different. And as with a lot of things, as culture changes and as our lives change, and as research evolves, a lot of our parents don't even know what they don't know. So some of us may become more aware of what diet culture is.
[00:03:42] I have a whole module on this in meal times made easy. We spend a tremendous amount of time diving into your relationship with food as the mom, your spouse, or significant others' relationship with food. Your child's relationship with food and how you put all those together to look at the family's relationship with food, and how is this impacting feeding behavior?
[00:04:01] And ultimately, how is this shaping your child's upbringing to be any different than maybe yours was? Because we all come into parenting with these pre-existing you know, insecurities and body image issues. But what I see so often is it's. Other generation, you know, we look at, we have our own, but then we have the generation that went before us who did the best that they could and the best that they knew, how, but as we, as parents, you know, are more privy to all the information that's out there and constantly being educated or receiving information from different sources at a rapid fire pace, much more so than our parents were exposed to.
[00:04:38] We're seeing that there's changing tides. We're seeing that this conversation about fat stomachs and excessive exercise and all this really distorted sense of quote unquote, what's healthy is no longer what's valued as this ideal for health or what we want to idealize for our children and helping them to have really in these formative years to have really healthy habits.
[00:05:02] And so I give that context because I think we need to. One give grandparents some grace, because, you know, as the saying goes, you can't teach an old dog new tricks. A lot of the generation that goes before us raised us the best they knew how, but they're not necessarily trying to really transform their own relationship with food.
[00:05:21] Right now. There are some, you know, parents of ours and grandparents of our children who are being. Progressive for their age group to tune in, to intuitive eating. And you know, I'm very fortunate for one. My family raised me with a really healthy understanding and relationship with food before that was even a thing.
[00:05:40] But even still I've had to combat a lot of my own stuff. And even still I've had to work with my own family and my own parents a lot. You know, flipping the script a little bit on kind of what our inclination is for what to say about body image or the ways that we eat in general, but especially in and in front of my kids.
[00:05:58] And so this is, this could honestly be a multi episode series because it's such a robust topic, but again, I dive into it in depth and meal. Times's made easy. So if you wanna be aware of all the early bird discounts and everything as. Course launches in just about a month. Please make sure you're signed up@veggiesandvirtue.com slash wait list because we will do it's a four phase process and one of the phases is specifically on your relationship with food within your family.
[00:06:25] So we talk a lot more about that. There, but I wanna get into this here, because this question, going back to what the mom had asked and how do you address this? Because this is not like hypothetically protecting your child and raising them with a healthy relationship with food in like a proactive approach.
[00:06:41] This is having to react to a situation that actually happened and how do we handle this? And so when I was responding with the mom and chatting with her. You know, a few things came up to me that I wanted to go through with you specifically, if this is a situation that you've already found yourself in, again, if we're going preventatively and proactively, we may be handling it a little bit differently, but if you find yourself in this situation with a child, who's already.
[00:07:07] you know, echoing some of these comments or opinions that have been made and, you know, someone as young as three, she doesn't know what she's even saying or what this means. She just knows that someone who she loves and who she trusts and who she looks up to. Was saying these type of things. And as kids do they repeat those things for better and for worse, you know, they pick up on the things that we say that are good.
[00:07:28] They also pick up on the things that we say that are not so good. So when it comes to how we flip the script and how we kind of get this dialogue out of our child's brain and replace it with something that's more positive and productive one, we have to remember that they're little they're impressionable.
[00:07:43] And as I mentioned, they don't necessarily underst. Some of these higher level concepts yet, this is often why I'm not encouraging you to harp on your kids about all the nutritional benefits of the foods that you want them to learn to. Like, because their developmental stage is not there to be able to even understand these more complicated subject matters of the ins and outs of nutrition.
[00:08:04] They just need a kid friendly approach. How to learn to like new foods. And so when it comes to how to combat a negative body image, the negative body image was imprinted on them. They did hear it, but just like anything in parenthood, we have to water what we want to see grow. And so the two things I wanna break down for you guys today is what is the frequency that this kind of dialogue or, you know, negative body image type comments might be around your.
[00:08:34] So what's the frequency of it. And second, what is the focus? The thing that you can focus on moving forward when you're either right in the heat of that moment and in this situation itself, or after the fact when that kind of verbiage or those kind of comments come up, maybe again, especially if, and when it comes outta your child's mouth.
[00:08:53] So again, this was a question submitted by a mom, and so I haven't dialoged with her. About this, the way that I would in like say a one-on-one coaching session, but some of the things that I would encourage this mom to think about when it comes to the frequency are very similar to, if you have a challenge with say the way that someone else feeds your kids, the first thing I would focus on is what is the frequency?
[00:09:15] What is the frequency in this case that this child is around her grandparents or the mom who submitted the question, her in-laws. And again, this is not to harp on in-laws. I know that they can get a bad rep often. what I want us to focus on is because with some, let's just use the example of in-laws in this episode, something like in-laws, if this is just a, you know, annual summer vacation that they went on, they're very rarely, you know, in swimsuits or in a situation that maybe their, you know, the, their weight or you know, body image and a bathing suit and things like that might come up.
[00:09:47] If it's once a year, it's a different situation to combat than if you were at your, in. Multiple times a week because they let you and your children use their pool in the summertime. So you can see that the kind of the way we have to armor up ourselves and armor up our kids is going to be differently.
[00:10:06] If it's something that's a very infrequent thing and not something our kids are as exposed to versus if it's a very frequent thing and the same would go again, if this was the way they fed your child or the way they, you know, approached how you fed your child or things like. Always wanna focus first on frequency, cuz that will shift how we approach it.
[00:10:26] So again, without knowing this mom specifically or knowing the details of their situation, I'm not sure if this was just said one time or if this has been something that has repeated been repeated to in front of the child. So often that she, it has kind of become a part of the language that she's adopted.
[00:10:42] The mom did indicate in the question that the child has picked up on it enough that she's now saying it about he. every day. And so, as we shift into talking about the second part of this being, what can we focus on moving forward? I want you to think about it in terms of, if this was something said, just say one time that your child happened to pick up on, we should be able to replace that dialogue very quickly.
[00:11:10] Oftentimes kind of the general gauge for certain things might be as many times as they've been exposed to it is as many times as they're gonna need to be exposed to the opposite. So if this just was one comment that an in-law said, you know, in one family vacation, we should pretty quickly be able to replace that rhetoric in our.
[00:11:30] You know, communication and verbal articulation of, you know, the way they have body image and things like that. However, if this is a message where, you know, the little girl is around grandparents all the time and she gets this message again and again, and again, the frequency is much higher. And so the number of times that we are going to have to equip her and re work to replace that language and that vocabulary that she's learned.
[00:11:57] Is going to take a lot more times for us in order to do so. So this is often where. I will walk through FA with families. Is it a conversation that needs to be had just as if you were around a family member that maybe used language that your family didn't feel was appropriate to be used in front of your child?
[00:12:17] This might be a cuss word. This might just be certain beliefs or opinions being aired publicly in front of your child, whatever, maybe makes you feel uncomfortable, which I would very much include talking about, you know, fat Tommies in that for myself, that would make me very uncomfortable for my kids to be in.
[00:12:32] If it was kind of a one off that I could, again, quickly, if it was one time said, and it would be something I could more quickly replace with just the usual positive body image commentary and approaches my family use. I wouldn't necessarily feel the need to really address it with say my in-laws.
[00:12:51] However, if this is a situation where the F. is repeated and it continues to be a problem. And it's obviously continuing to impact and shape this little girl's, you know, development of her own body image, her own language development. And in that case, I would probably approach it with my in-laws or whoever the, you know, involved party might be because the frequency is enough that it is actually really making.
[00:13:18] An impact and not one that I'm comfortable with and I think is appropriate. And so in that case, away from the child away from the heat of the moment, or when the comment is said, you know, I would talk to my husband, especially if it's his parents, I would try and. Address is this something that I should address with them?
[00:13:35] Is it a relationship that's better suited for him to talk about with them to make sure he and I are on the same page. So this doesn't create any like, you know, problematic dynamics within the family or an extended family unit, but, you know, have a conversation with them just really quick and simple.
[00:13:50] You know, you don't have to go into some long winded you know, argument or combat. Dialogue about this, but I would talk about it with them and say, Hey, you know, I know sometimes as adults we say this kind of thing, but I noticed that Susie, whatever the little girl's name is, you know, I noticed that she was picking up on it a lot more than I realized.
[00:14:07] And I've had to be really careful about this, you know, as she learns all these new words and she often says things that we don't realize she's saying, and you know, maybe you can make it lighthearted and give a funny example and say, but I've noticed recently she's been saying this, and that's not something we really talk about in the home.
[00:14:22] You know, we don't really think it's helping. to embrace the God the, you know, God-given body that she's in. And we want her to have a really healthy relationship with food and also physical activity. Cuz this mom also did indicate talking about exercise, which I assume is in the context of. Oftentimes it's discussed as if, you know, you cheated on ate something, then you have to eat exercise enough to make up for it.
[00:14:44] That kind of context. Again, I, I have very little context for the situation, but that's most often how I hear it coming up. So I would talk about it with them again, talk about it in private and see some people, some parents, some in-laws are going to be more receptive to. You know, realize that that's not an, like, that's not an influence that they wanna have, or they don't wanna influence their grandchildren in such a way.
[00:15:07] And they'll respond really well to it. Others will not change their behavior at all. And we all can probably attest to having different relationships with different types of people who respond really differently. But if it's something. you would like to at least see potential change for, I would encourage you to consider and to talk with your spouse or talk with whoever might be the appropriate person on how that conversation needs to be had.
[00:15:34] That said, what can we control ourselves? We can't control how they respond to that. So whether we have the conversation with them or not, if they choose to respond in the way that we would hope or not, we can't necessarily, we can't control their response. What we can control is sometimes families do have to make the really difficult decision that that's a relationship that they're not going to have their child as exposed to as often because they see it's having a negative impact.
[00:16:02] This is of course talking about in the context of like body image or. You know, diet, culture and context and communications like that, but it also could be any negative behavior that we see our child being exposed to with a family member that we just don't deem as healthy or beneficial for them, where the benefit outweighs the risk.
[00:16:19] And so we may have to limit the frequency that our child is around them. If they're not willing to shift some of the language or the behaviors that they use in front of our child. So when. Outside of the frequency and, you know, adjusting some of that. What I would want you as a mom in this situation to be in focusing on is what can you control?
[00:16:41] And that's, you can control the language and the tone and the body image that you support and encourage and empower your daughter or your son to have. from within your household, because the reality is, is it could be an in-law who gave this kind of message. It also could be a kid at school who said something and your child came home.
[00:17:00] And so again, we can't always control the environment, but what we can control and what we can focus on is what types of messages we reinforce within the home. And so what I would encourage this mom or others in a similar situation to. Is to talk about with your child you know, there questions and curiosity, some kids are just really curious and they may not even know what the con what the word fat means.
[00:17:22] Oftentimes kids don't. They just, they almost think of it as it's a bad word, because so often we react in the moment of don't say that, and, and we are wa you know, we're giving negative attention to it, but it's attention. And so the kids don't know why is this whole fat word, even a bad word, which is not a bad word.
[00:17:39] That is not a bad word, but our. The response we often give our kids or others often give our kids, makes them assume as though it is. And so we wanna talk about, well, what, what do you think that means? Or what do you think Grammy meant when she said that? Or, you know, if your daughter says something, say, tell me more about that.
[00:17:55] What do you think about that? And then try and divert the conversation into something that's positive and proactive about what kind of messages you want to replace. You know, that verbiage with, and so things like asking her about her body and, you know, tell her about when your stomach got big. When you, you know, if you had a biological baby and you were pregnant, you know, talk about how your body, God designed your body to change shapes and sizes, to do different things.
[00:18:19] Then when you're pregnant, your stomach got much larger. And then once the baby came out, your stomach, you know, changed shapes and sizes again, and, you know, talk about your belly buttons and things that are really kid appropriate. Interesting. Kids are just interested. They wanna ask questions, they wanna learn, but they don't have the cognitive capacity to necessarily understand really complex, higher level concepts.
[00:18:45] And so you know, make sure that you're just asking questions, but also equipping her with. Information and words that empower her to know how to talk about her body. So if she's really interested in talking about her quote, unquote fat tummy right now, because that's the verbiage that she has in her vocabulary will give her new words to talk about, give her new adjectives that she can be excited and understand how to appropriately use.
[00:19:09] And additionally, if you see her talking about things, Seem of interest to her. You know, if she's asking about things like exercise or she's, you know, curious again, she's three. So there's a very limited understanding here, but we can still use these questions and these curiosities in kids to point them in a direction and really shepherd them in a direction that's productive and it's positive.
[00:19:32] And it's going to not only heal that negative body. Imprint that was initially made, but it's also gonna help us to continue to lay that foundation and to form healthy relationships with their own body and with their perception of self and exercise and food and everything like that, moving forward.
[00:19:50] So, you know, taking the opportunity to talk about activity and when you move your. You know, talk about joyful movement and express to your daughter. Oh, we're gonna go for a walk today. And I love how the fresh air feels when the weather is like this, or let's go to the pool. I love how my whole body gets to move when I swim and talk about the amazing things that your body can do and that your child's body does.
[00:20:12] In these activities, but not in a context of weight loss or fat shaming or, you know, anything like that, but just redirect the language so that it begins to replace some of that negative language that she might have adopted. so I know that this can be a really touchy subject. I know it can be one that as, you know, mothers and protectors, we so often want to react right away to, because it, it honestly freaks us out.
[00:20:39] It scares us that our kids can even be so impressionable that they can pick up on something like this at this sweet little age of say three years old in this example. But I think it's also a great little warning sign for us as families to, you know, take that responsibility and. That protect your role as a privilege and to see how we can step in and equip our kids with not just the language, but really the deeper understanding and desire to live in the bodies that God has given them.
[00:21:10] And to appreciate the ways that their bodies move and grow and change in our fueled and energized from food. And get to enjoy things like exercise and activity. And so if this is something that you personally still struggle with, or maybe you've been caught saying these comments before, and you know, it's something that you were trying to work on to shape re you know, relearn your own language so that you can help shape your child's relationship with food for the better.
[00:21:36] I encourage you to make sure that that you're on the wait list for my meal times made easy. Because we are gonna spend a lot of time diving into this so that you have a really thorough understanding and ultimately application for how to form healthy relationships for you, your spouse, other significant others in your life or your child's life, so that your child can have a healthy relationship with food.
[00:21:59] And ultimately your whole family can together. Enjoy.
[00:22:07] It has been a joy having you on podcast today. And if you've enjoyed it as well, I have a quick favor to ask. Do you mind hopping over to apple podcast and leaving me a written review? This will only take you a hot second. But it truly blesses me every time I get to read one of you right over there. And it allows me to bless others through this podcast and the episodes to come.
[00:22:26] The other thing that you can do is to take a screenshot of this episode and tag me over on Instagram at veggies and virtue, I would love to see what action steps that you're taking from this episode, and also to support your family in the journey moving forward until next time. Thanks for coming over to chat at my kitchen.
[00:22:43] Remember that you'll always have a seat and a snack waiting for you here.
