Teaching our children

No, this is not an announcement or anything, but it is something I have been thinking about a lot lately. How do we teach our children, especially our daughters, to love and respect their bodies? With all the negative influences of the world bombarding us it's no wonder that the age at which girls start feeling dissatisfied with their bodies is getting younger and younger.

As fellow (and future) mothers, sisters, aunts, young women leaders, etc. I would love any feedback I can get on this topic. How would you like your own children to view their bodies? Do you feel like you model healthy body image or is this something you are working on? Do you have any ideas for how we can instill healthy self-esteem from a young age? I am hoping to create a compilation of articles, insight, personal experience, and any other information that can help us to fight the ongoing trend of negative self-image and attitudes toward our bodies. I am so far from being an expert in this area so that's why I'm asking anyone who is willing to help me out- and please feel free to forward this request on to your friends, family members, anyone who you think might have good insight on this topic, or people you think might be interested in receiving new ideas, thoughts, etc on this very important issue.

You can email me at c.c.crofts@gmail.com, leave comments on this blog, send me links to comments on your own blogs, web pages, articles, etc. Anything I can get would be so very appreciated, and thanks in advance for your help!


Here are a few articles I found when doing a google search. I haven't read through them yet but at first glance they seemed to have some good info!

http://magazine.byu.edu/?act=view&a=2103

http://www.familytlc.net/preteen_body_image%20.html

http://www.webmd.com/parenting/features/helping-girls-with-body-image

http://www.education.com/magazine/article/Girls_and_Body_Image_Help_Your/