DON'T know about you but I shudder each time I hear a girl talk about dieting to lose weight, especially if it’s a girl who is already too thin.
Of course, many thoughts would simultaneously cross my mind: Does she even know what she’s talking about? Does she know the consequences of dieting and its impact on her health? How much research has she done to know what she’s doing? Does she even know the meaning of research?
And would she believe me if I were to tell her crash dieting that results in rapid weight loss could slow her metabolism and deprive her body of essential nutrients? Would she even care if told her that with reckless long-term calorie-cutting, one’s immune system and heart could get weakened?
No, I doubt I’d be able to get through to a teenager bent on self-destruction even if I were to tell her most men would find the hour-glass figure of Marilyn Monroe more desirable than the skeletal frame of Victoria Beckham. Somehow bizarrely it’s imprinted in the head of some girls and women that being all skin and bones is sexy!
As someone who believes in exercising and eating well to maintain a good body weight and keep healthy, I indeed find it disturbing each time I see a teenaged girl or a young woman picking at her food. What I see is ignorance, and it’s astounding that even in this age of information, a lot of people are not aware of the damage they can do to their bodies by crash dieting or readily embracing fads like detox programmes.
People buy into media hype all too easily. Instead of simply focusing on exercising and eating right to keep healthy, many girls and young women are foolhardily obsessed with losing weight through unhealthy methods like simply not eating, living on junk food, and smoking.
Many girls routinely adopt yo-yo diets, starving and then bingeing, while others readily throw caution to the wind by happily consuming foods that claim to be able to help burn the fat away without the need to exercise.
The world may be seeing more obese people than ever before (according to the World Health Organisation, there are one billion overweight adults globally), but at the other end of the spectrum we have the other extreme: people who are too thin to be healthy. And it’s all the more disturbing when these people are impressionable youngsters who, out of ignorance and led by cultural pressures, decide to starve themselves or eat too little in order to look thin.
To make things worse, we now have in our midst such new trends as pro-anorexia and pro-bulimia blogs that boldly promote eating disorders.
These “thin-spiration” sites, according to Today Health, now take inspiration from the “shrinking frames” of the Middleton sisters. Yes, that would be the wife of Prince William, Kate, and her sister Pippa, who unfortunately have become the source of inspiration for thousands of girls with their ever-thinning bodies and visible collarbones.
What is particularly dangerous about these sites that are almost impossible to control, is that while in the past they highlighted style icons such as Victoria Beckham, now the likes of Kate and Pippa are considered role models. And it can’t be good when these so-called role models fail to see the need to send the right message across: a case in point being supermodel Kate Moss who caused outrage last year by saying “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels”!
Faced with these realities it is little wonder we are getting such alarming statistics as those released recently in Britain under the Freedom of Information Act. Nearly 100 children aged between five and seven have been treated for eating disorders in the past three years, it seems, fuelling fears that young children are being influenced by photographs in celebrity magazines and other media.
About three in every 100,000 children under13 in Britain and Ireland have some sort of eating disorder, according to a study conducted by experts from University College London’s Institute for Child Health.
These numbers are particularly disturbing as they involve the very young. The human brain undergoes intense development between the ages of 12 and 25, and needless to say, a proper balance of oils and nutrients is needed. A young person who impairs that critical phase will, among others, experience moods that are less regulated, and have more difficulty in being flexible in their thinking.
According to one eating disorders expert, Janet Treasure, a “size zero” obsession could be leading young girls to swing between starvation diets and junk food binges.
Treasure, who is based at King’s College London, says the fashion industry’s obsession with catwalk thinness left models at high risk of eating disorders, yet millions felt inspired to try to copy them. Controlling weight and shape has become “a moral imperative for many young girls and it is almost a sign of goodness to be slim”, she says.
Echoing the same views is Susan Ringwood, chief executive of the eating disorders charity B-eat, who is quoted as saying the latest figures reflected “alarming” trends in society, with young children “internalising” messages from magazines which idealise the thinnest figures.
“A number of factors combine to trigger eating disorders. Biology and genetics play a large part in their development, but so do cultural pressures, and body image seems to be influencing younger children much more over the past decade,” Ringwood says.
So, how do parents deal with a world that seemingly prizes rail-thin types as an ideal of feminine chic? How do we counter such negative stereotypes and ensure our children do not fall victim to such damaging trends? Yes, we can voice our disapproval at all those celebrity magazine covers and skeletal models but at the end of the day, perhaps the surest way is to bring up happy and confident children who are able to think for themselves and do not succumb easily to peer pressure.
Ideally our children are capable of handling conflicts and have high self-esteem in order to counter negative influences that come their way. But for them to become such happy, confident souls, they would need a nurturing home environment that allows for positive emotional development – an environment where the child experiences enough love and security in order for his self-worth to grow.
It is all too easy to blame the media and the fashion industry for inspiring teenagers to engage in extreme dieting, because in the first place, if parents play their role effectively to instill the right values and beliefs in their children, the kids would then be less likely to adopt bad attitudes and habits.
Scientific research has shown how childhood experiences lie at the root of most long-term anxiety, and many emotional and psychological illnesses. The development of the brain during childhood affects future emotional well-being – and lead to such conditions such as addiction, anorexia, and anti-social behaviour.
Many experts have pointed this out, not least eating disorders expert Walter Kaye, a professor of psychiatry at the University of California, who says the causes of anorexia nervosa relate more to genetics and neurobiology than to size-zero models on catwalks.
Of the same viewpoint is Dr Dennis Friedman, author of An Unsolicited Gift: Why We Do What We Do, who has extensive experience in the psychology of parenting and its long-lasting consequences. Friedman has published innovative works on anxiety, stress-related illnesses, and phobias, and in his latest book, he analyses the role of the mother and how her love and care can determine adult actions and addictions.
So, yes, parents do play a key role in ensuring their children grow into smart and confident individuals who are able to make wise decisions in terms of their own well-being. Happy young people are less likely to be self-destructive in their lifestyle, and of course, the opposite is true for youths who are insecure and lack self-esteem.
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