Slimming delusion: how do I protect my daughter?

© Yuri Arcurs / istockphoto.com

My daughter is 13. I love the mischief in her eyes, her sense of justice, the dimples that appear on her cheeks when she has to laugh against her will. I love her shyness and her belly, which is soft and round, though she does a lot of sports. I love how she pleasurably incorporates everything delicious, and I love her aliveness, her swift legs. I just love everything that makes her. I think they are beautiful. I want her to be beautiful and adorable too. That's why I've challenged all people and images who want to make you believe that appearance is more important than heart and mind - and that a girl with a round stomach and strong legs can not be perfect. I was never a mother who scented a chattering behind every shrubbery. I'm afraid of Heidi Klum.

My daughter was eight when she said she played "Germany's Next Top Model" during the break. She did not know "GNTM", she had to go to bed early. Many classmates but made with her mother and Heidi Klum "a beautiful women's evening". They had explained to my daughter what she had to do: with a wiggling hoof and a hand pressed at the waist, stalking over the schoolyard. "And then Anna said my thighs are too thick, is that right?" - "Nonsense!", I shouted, "Anna is a hollow nut!" At that moment I decided: I have to protect my girl as well as I can from a beauty craze that leads to eight-year-olds no longer playing pony court, but rumkritteln on the bodies of their classmates.



Shortly thereafter, my daughter asked if she could even "GNTM" look. I said no and explained why I considered this program stupid and dangerous. Once I went with her to a saleswoman at H & M and complained because there were only skintight hipsters in size 128 in the girls' section: "These ten-year-olds need something to climb and run, not for the baby stick!" We finally bought a cargo pants, in the boys section. When my mother-in-law noticed my daughter's appetite was really big, if you did not even have to tell her to pay attention to her weight, I got angry. "I'll never tell her, 'Do not eat so much or you'll be too fat!'" I railed. "And you will not say anything because that's what I forbid you to do! Instead of fearing that your granddaughter is eating too many cheese sandwiches, you should be worried that one day she will stop eating!"



Germany's Next Top Model changes the perception

The scientist Maya Götz found out that the beauty ideal of children and adolescents who regularly see "GNTM" differs significantly from the beauty perception of those who do not watch this program. A good thousand youngsters were interviewed: "Here you see different women's bodies, which in your opinion is the most beautiful?" In the "GNTM" -Vielseherinnen landed the normally built body in last place - behind the underweight, the bombshell and the professionally staged overweight. Serious figures on how many girls and young women suffer from anorexia and bulimia do not exist. However, a study by the University of Jena revealed that one in three students suffers from early forms of eating disorders and worries about their figure. I'm alarmed, some other mother thinks I'm hysterical: "No girl gets anorexic just because it's' Germany's Next Top Model ''." True, there is no inevitability. If a child crosses the street once a week, it does not have to be run over. But nobody will deny that the accident risk increases.

If my daughter asked me tomorrow if she was allowed to watch "GNTM", I would not ban her anymore. She is too big for that. But she does not ask. She says, "the chick shit" does not interest her. She usually wears comfortable jeans, now and then skirts. She radiates when her father compliments her. She likes to cook. She lies on the sofa, stroking her stomach, and says, "I do not know why everyone wants to be so skinny, I like my stomach." I kiss her on the navel and am as happy as one can be only when one has the feeling that something decisive has been done right. I hope she is strong enough to stay as she is.

To read more: ? On the homepage of the Federal Center for Health Education (www.bzga.de) there are many information and references to various brochures for young people on the subject of beauty and eating disorders, including a body check, with which one can check his eating habits.

? On www.hungrig-online.de sufferers and relatives can exchange.

? As a graphic novel Lesley Fairfield has designed her book for adolescents on the subject of anorexia: "You have to be thin - Anna, Tyranna and the fight for food" (120 p., 12.90 euros, Patmos).



Davos 2012 - The Global Agenda 2012 (March 2024).



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