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Claire Zulkey's avatar

Yesterday my 11 year old son told me that they are saying "Thick thighs save lives" in his class lately. I thought briefly of all the hours I've spent comparing the thickness of my thighs to others and the long road to finally feeling proud of my bounty.

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MB's avatar

Thank you for this. My husband and I are fat parents, and our two kids are very differently built. When our bigger guy is angry about his own body, he lashes out at me and my husband that we are fat slobs. OK fine but we provide an array of healthy foods and support all his different health-related endeavors. Our younger son is 'normal' sized but had a lot of years as a very petite kid, and I think it created some envy for all of us until dealing with the way he was treated differently by teachers and classmates.

As far as language - other kids and their parents are going to comment on kids' bodies no matter what. They will FIND something to criticize or mock. My littler guy: "When are you going to grow? Doesn't your mother feed you?" My bigger guy: "What are you EATING?" It sucks and it's a thing we can't protect our kids, or ourselves, from. We can just make our own home safe.

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