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This blog was co-written by Dr. Lorie A. Sousa.
As our kids have become adolescents, we find ourselves with so much to say to them before they embark on the wide world of adulthood. However, adolescents are not known for patiently listening and appreciating their parents’ wisdom. This makes it particularly tricky when you want to try to explain complex – even seemingly contradictory – ideas. There are a number of issues at the heart of femininity and health that can be difficult to unpack for ourselves and even more difficult to explain to our own daughters in a digestible and helpful way. Here’s the Cliffs Notes version if you find yourself with a communicative teen on the way to soccer practice or the mall. (Actual script ideas in italics!)
You can be a feminist and still care about how you look.
Feminism is about equal rights for all, regardless of gender. It’s also about treating men and women equally. However, decades of research suggest that women are evaluated based on how they look more stringently than men are. In other words, for some reason, the world cares more about how women look than how men look. (Historically, other qualities like their intellect and earning potential have trumped looks in importance in terms of how men are perceived.) What we want our girls to appreciate is that they have a lot more to offer the world than a pretty face.
You can be pretty and care about your appearance while still being smart, athletic, kind, generous, and strong. The inside of the book matters more, but the appreciation of beauty is hard-wired and undeniable. Feminism is about having the freedom to aspire to be whoever we want to be and not feel the need to fit neatly into anyone else’s limiting ideal of what we should look like or who we should be. What you think of you matters more than what anyone else thinks of you.
Accepting (and supporting!) others goes a lot farther than shaming them.
We’ve known many people who have had eating disorders and other health problems that were not at all obvious based on their physical appearance. You often don’t know much about a person’s mental or physical health based on what they present to the world in person – or even (especially) on social media.
There’s some cultural lore that “tough love” or pointing out others’ flaws is somehow helpful to them. But research doesn’t support this position. In fact, the reverse is true. Research shows that weight shaming, for example, results in weight gain as well as depression and social isolation. Clearly, if shame was an effective motivator, nearly everyone would be slender. Both compassion towards others – and self-compassion – go a lot farther in supporting health and well-being than does any sort of negative feedback.
Always try to make giving others the benefit of the doubt your go-to and don’t judge, shame, or be anything less than kind to people based on limited information. Make acceptance your default.
You can “eat the cookie” and still be healthy.
When we deprive ourselves of things we enjoy, we may not only find ourselves cranky but more apt to overindulge in whatever we are trying to avoid. When it comes to food, psychologists refer to this as the “What the Hell!” effect.
Take, for example, the case of many popular diets (e.g., keto, paleo diets) that prescribe avoidance of carbohydrates (a.k.a. “carbs”). Avoiding carbs may appear to be a simple way to potentially lose weight… until we’re tired, hungry, or confronted with delicious looking doughnuts. Then, we may find ourselves thinking, “What the hell!” and eating twice the number of doughnuts we would have eaten should we have just allowed ourselves doughnuts in the first place. No one enjoys the experience of deprivation, and when it comes to food, sometimes it can do us more harm than good.
It’s okay to “eat the cookie” without guilt or shame or negative self-talk about will power. Sometimes eating the foods we love and enjoying them is actually (psychologically) healthy and may keep you from unhealthy binging. This is not to say that cookies make for a healthy breakfast, lunch, and dinner, just that you don’t need to stress over food – enjoy it!
You can be self-accepting and still seek self-improvement.
Self-acceptance is the holy grail of mental health. However, self-acceptance and aspiring for self-improvement are not irreconcilable goals. In accepting ourselves honestly, we accept that we are imperfect. But we do not need to settle for whoever we are today – unless we want to. For example, we are confident that we are reasonably smart people. Multiple graduate degrees and a whole lot of life experience have left us secure in this belief. Yet, we like to read and learn new things. In fact, feeling intellectually capable has granted us some sense of security but also fueled our desire to keep learning.
We hope that you love and accept yourselves as much as we love and accept you just the way you are. But you can accept yourself as you are and still want to learn, grow, and improve. Change and self-improvement are some of the greatest joys in life. They can lead to making new friends, learning new hobbies, and greater life satisfaction overall. Seeking self-improvement is in no way an indictment of the people we used to be. We are confident that you can and will keep getting better with age. We can’t wait to watch you continue to bloom!
