So I hung out with my young friend again yesterday (it’s a regular thing this summer). And she brought up the topic again.
“I’m skinny.”
“Yep, you are. Some people are like that.”
“Sometimes I get fatter, but then I always get skinny again, no matter what I do.”
“That happens to a lot of people. It works the other way, too. Sometimes I get skinnier, but then I get fatter again. It’s ok, though, whatever size I am, and whatever size you are. It’s just our bodies.”
“But I always get skinny again.”
“Bodies are like that. They mostly like to stay at one size. They might get a bit bigger or a bit smaller, but mostly they like they same.”
“Oh.”
At which point we reached the door of my house, and went in and had cookies and then I taught her to make mac and cheese.
I think she’s trying on the ideas I offered her last week.
I mentioned the topic to her mom, and she was very pleased we’d been talking about it. She said they’d been hearing Little Pitcherf say she was fat, and they tried not to tell her that she wasn’t, but to tell her that she’s ok no matter what size she is, and it doesn’t matter. (Hey, and they aren’t even fat activists! Go them!) But they know I’ve got some background in it, so they’re glad she’s talking to me about it, too.
It feels pretty good.
Oh, excellent! I love the way you’re talking about it with her.
(It can be so hard, growing up, if one’s body doesn’t match what people think it should, and everyone in the universe seems to feel entitled to comment and advise and interfere. Thank ghods my parents *didn’t*. *wry*) (And now, of course, I have the opposite issue, and no, weight isn’t the cause of all the rest of my medical problems, and anyone giving me grief over it is likely to get their head handed back to them. If I’m in a good mood.)