Several times in my life, children have commented on my body, specifically its size. Long ago, pre-kids and when I actually wasn’t even at my heaviest, an eight-year-old friend bluntly informed me I was fat, as if I didn’t know. It was an awkward moment, and I don’t remember how I responded, if I did at all.
Kids are honest and straightforward, sometimes to a fault. I don’t want to limit their expression or to think that talking about bodies with trusted people is bad. It’s good! But there are social skills learned through these types of interactions. I’d rather the lesson be “ask in private with someone you trust” rather than “fat people are bad, but we shouldn’t tell them that to their faces.”
Read the rest on the Baton Rouge Parents Magazine website.