My heart breaks a little

I grew up with a history of disordered eating and body image issues.  I have never been overweight, but have very rarely been satisfied with my body.  While there have been times that I've been more accepting of the image I see in the mirror, I often fear that I may never completely accept it.  This was one of my the fears at the forefront of my mind when I heard the doctor say "It's a girl".  I wanted to do everything possible to make sure that my girls loved and accepted themselves.  Often I feel like a hypocrite saying this when I cannot do the same.

I've known for a few years that Sierra has been self conscious about her body.  I've made a very conscious decision to not talk about being "fat" or "dieting" in front of the kids.  We've focused on eating healthy and exercising to stay well mentally and physically.  When she has made comments about her body we talk about all of the wonderful things it does for her: she can run, jump, do gymnastics and karate.  We compliment not just her outer beauty but her inner beauty, her intelligence and kindness, her humor.  We've read books about loving ourselves and having good self-esteem.  I've done the things that I had hoped would prevent her from being like me.  From being unable to embrace everything about herself.

Brad has finally decided that we should deal with it head on.  I just hoped she might "out-grow" it (because, yes, Stacy, we all love our bodies more as they morph into adolescence!).  After having some long talks last weekend Brad suggested that Sierra write a story about it on storybird.com.  This has been a wonderful website for her to express herself creatively and emotionally.  Sometimes it's easier to write things than to talk about them.  Sierra gave me permission to post a link to her story here.  I've debated a lot about whether to post this, but decided todo it for a few reasons.  While I'd love for someone to hand me the golden ticket to make Sierra "perfect" in her own mind, I know that's impossible.  Maybe, though, someone has gone through something similar and has good ideas or resources... for both Sierra and me.  I think she and I both have some work to do!  Or maybe someone can take comfort knowing there is another mama whose heart is breaking when she knows that the person her daughter sees in the mirror is not the one her mom sees.  Most optimistically, I enjoy looking back at previous entries and seeing how things have progressed and changed.  I hope that I can one day go back and read this and see how far Sierra has come in the journey of self-love.