Do you want to parent without diet culture? You’re in the right place.
Raising kids who have a healthy relationship with food and their body isn’t easy.
I’m excited to have this space to share tips, resources, musings, and the occasional anti-diet rant, in the hopes that it helps you feel less alone—and gives you some tools to navigate parenting without diet culture.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the phrase “get in shape” and how rarely we stop to question what those words mean—and the underlying messages beneath the idiom. Does strength, flexibility, or endurance have a “shape”?
The phrase can seem so innocuous that many parents wouldn’t find anything concerning about a child’s announcement that they’re going to “get in shape.” In fact, most parents would respond with enthusiastic encouragement.
And why would a parent be worried? A desire to increase physical fitness seems like a universally praise-worthy goal in our culture.
In my work with families battling an eating disorder, however, I know just how common it is for a “fitness kick” to go sideways really fast. Or sometimes it’s a slow and steady descent that no one notices until the child is extremely ill.
I can’t tell you how many parents bring a child to eating disorder treatment and are shocked at what has happened. “They were just trying to eat healthier and exercise more.”
I wrote about this issue in an analysis for CNN—in that piece I share my perspective along with contributions from a therapist, dietitian, and medical provider. I was bracing for trolls (and there were some), but I mostly heard from parents who were grateful for this knowledge—and from eating disorder professionals who were glad this information is getting out there.
Some of the most powerful comments came from parents who had experienced an eating disorder themselves when they were younger, including several who became ill after a summer workout regimen.
Physical fitness (usually defined quite narrowly) is so highly valued in our culture that most parents wouldn’t know a desire to work out could be a red flag that indicates an underlying body image concern. Or, thanks to decades of marketing, they assume that “getting in shape” will help their child start liking their body. The reality is that body image is a lot more complicated than that.
Even if there isn’t any focus on appearance, tinkering with food and exercise is something to keep an eye on when it comes to growing adolescents. Losing weight even unintentionally—or failing to gain as expected—is a common trigger for an eating disorder.
So even when it’s “not a diet,” it can still be dangerous. Parenting without diet culture means staying attuned to the insidious messages that surround our families. We can’t eliminate diet culture, but we can learn to recognize it, even in its sneakiest forms.
I’m grateful CNN honored my photo request to avoid stereotypical images related to eating disorders. I don’t take that for granted. And I was bummed but not surprised to see another news outlet’s reprint of the piece that used only one stock photo but managed to fit three of the worst offenders in one image (scale, sad girl, tape measure).
I had a few people reach out to me because the advertisements that popped up around the CNN article contained really upsetting messages about weight loss. The ad algorithm makes my blood boil. It picks up words like “weight” and “diet” and “eating”—even when you’re writing about eating disorders—and serves up ads for all kinds of harmful programs and products. Some of the images in those ads are truly horrifying. If you had to see some of those, I’m sorry. And I hope you were able to scroll by quickly.
One of the reasons I want to start writing more in this forum is to be able to give you actionable anti-diet parenting guidance without a side of ads for intermittent fasting and problematic stock photos.
I’ll still be trying to publish things out there in the real world, too, of course. My passion is to get this information to as many parents and guardians as possible. But I’m also glad to create this little safe space here. And on that note, please help keep this community free from comments that put food or bodies in a hierarchy. It’s okay to have earnest questions, of course. But anti-fat trolls and “clean-eating-cured-my-cancer” comments are not welcome here. Sound good?
If there are any topics you hope I’ll cover in future posts, please let me know either in the comments or by email (you can always hit “reply” to a newsletter email).
Once again, I’m glad you’re here.