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Remember when you were young – how did you think about your body?

Did you want to lose weight?

Did you try diets as a teenager?

And did your mom talk about her own body or looks in negative ways?

All of this can really impact growing minds, but now that WE are the parents, we want to raise kids with healthy body images and a great relationship with food.

Professor of psychology and author of “The Body Image Book for Girls,” Dr. Charlotte Markey, joins us today to talk about just that!

You’ll learn:

  • How celebrating kale can backfire
  • What happens when we try to eat ice cream at 10:30 a.m.
  • Why repeat exposures to food is important
  • Why the word “diet” must be banished from our parenting language
  • How food is a form of self-care
  • And the amazing HOPE about our children’s generation that Dr. Markey left us with!

(Quick note: I know many in our audience are conservative, like me, so please know that there’s one story of a lesbian in the book and one of a girl who is transgendered. I wouldn’t hand this book to my daughter without a conversation about the moral implications of normalizing sinful behaviors. There are lots of really good chapters in the book, however, so it’s a good resource if you don’t have another one to help your girls understand their bodies.)

 

 

Can’t see the video? Watch this video on a healthy body image for girls here on YouTube.

No time to watch the whole video? Here are the notes!

Healthy Body Image for Girls Video Timestamps

  • 0:14 Today I’m with Dr. Charlotte Markey, a psychology professor. She specializes in health and eating behavior psychology.
  • 2:26: Dr. Markey shares her background with us. She was a ballet dancer as a child in a world obsessed with body image and full of eating disorders.

Healthy Body Image and Eating Behaviors

  • 5:23: We discuss how body image and eating behaviors are connected.

We live in a culture where if you eat a kale smoothie or a salad everyone around you celebrates that. Those are wonderful things, but we learn from an early age that what we put into our bodies affects how we feel about ourselves. -Dr. Charlotte Markey

  • 6:20: We condition people to feel good about making healthy or self-deprivation types of food choices, but yet we often celebrate with sweets, desserts, and junk food. What a confusing thing for a child to grow up with!

Raising Kids with Healthy Body Image

  • 6:48: What are some practical steps to raise a child with a good body image and a healthy relationship with food? Our generation has to be intentional because we grew up in a culture of diets, where healthy = deprivation.

If we want to raise kids who have a healthy body image, we have to set a good example. -Dr. Charlotte Markey

  • 8:44: Setting an example of how we eat and how we think about our own bodies is the most effective way to teach our children. They accept what we do as normal. Even casual comments not meant as criticism can be internalized by kids and teens.

Shifting Your Language Around Food

  • 10:06: We go through some examples of shifting your language and habits around your body image and eating behaviors.

Don’t call getting healthy a diet. -Dr. Charlotte Markey

  • 13:12: If you have really little kids, you can make changes to your eating habits without even discussing it with them, but as your kids get older bring them in to the process with appropriate language. Dr. Markey shares an example.

Teaching Kids to Listen to Their Bodies

  • 16:36: We talk about intuitive eating regarding what to eat and how much. This applies even to really little kids.
  • 17:46: Emotional eating and intuitive eating are not the same things. Intuitive eating focuses on how your body feels, not soothing an emotion like sadness or boredom. Sometimes people confuse them because “intuitive eating” sounds like eating whatever you feel like.

Being too forceful takes kids away from intuitive eating. -Dr. Charlotte Markey

  • 19:46: Many adults and teens literally don’t know how to listen to our bodies. Dr. Markey shares some tips to tune in and allow our kids to listen to their own bodies.

Healthy Habits, Healthy Food

  • 22:24: We want our kids to eat well, but we don’t want them to obsess over every bite.

Repeated exposure to vegetables is really important – and we need to model it. -Dr. Charlotte Markey

  • 24:08: Obviously at Kids Cook Real Food™ I’m a huge proponent of getting kids in the kitchen. This helps kids have confidence, feel prepared for adult life, and see food as a fun and creative activity.

Food becomes more fun when kids get into the kitchen. -Dr. Charlotte Markey

  • 26:34: We think of self-care as taking a bubble bath or a big bowl of ice cream, something pampering or a treat, but eating well is something that we do 3 (or more) times a day that is a way of taking care of our bodies. Self-care should make you feel good, not bloated, or guilty for “cheating” on your diet.

Food is a form of self-care. -Dr. Charlotte Markey

  • 28:18: How do we translate this philosophy when it comes to junk food? Focus on how the food makes you feel. Do you feel good and energized or icky and sick after eating a bunch of candy or chips?
  • 30:38: You definitely don’t want to create a dynamic of fighting over food in your family. You might need to lose some of the battles to win the war.
  • 31:34: We leave you with a message of hope and inspiration.

Kids don’t need plastic knives. They need real skills.

Teach safe technique, focus, and confidence in the all-time fav lesson from our kids cooking class! (ages 2-12)






Or find out more about the free knife class here.

Resources We Mention for Healthy Body Image for Girls

Dr. Charlotte MarkeyCharlotte Markey, Ph.D., is a professor of psychology and founding director of the Health Sciences Center at Rutgers University (Camden) where she teaches hundreds of students. She has a PhD in health and developmental psychology, with a focus on eating behaviors and body image and has published nearly 100 book chapters and journal articles in peer-reviewed journals. She’s super famous – featured in The New York Times, The Economist, US News and World Report, The Today Show, Time Magazine, The Washington Post, and many more.

Dr. Markey has is passionate about educating parents and children about eating, body image, and health. She often works with schools to develop programs and she lives with her husband, son, and daughter in Pennsylvania.

raising girls with a healthy body image