About the Image:

“Respect & Accept Diversity of Size!”
A free printable mini-poster from Elizabeth Patch for International No Diet Day 2009.
Note from Elizabeth: “I left the artwork black & white, because as you know, we come in all sizes and all colors! So get out your crayons and celebrate.”

Download this FREE mini-poster from Elizabeth Patch’s website!

Changing the Conversation

My “day gig” is teaching high school. I interact with over 100 teenagers a day, all with various levels of emotional stability, intellectual capability, and ALL with increasingly shortened attention spans (thanks iPhone, iPod, Blackberry, video games, TV, DVDs in cars, text messages, FaceBook. thanks a lot). It’s pretty much the same as what you remember about high school: various groups & cliques, all vying for attention and acceptance, all judging and rating each other on appearance and the exact brand of possessions (the right jeans, the right Ugg boots, the right cell phone, the right…whatever). Its disheartening and downright boring to watch the same dramas play out year after year, but it’s particularly upsetting to listen, year after year, to girls endlessly obsess about their appearance. And when girls obsess about their appearance, the #1 complaint I hear (outnumbering hair, face, skin or clothes by a mile) is “I’m so fat”.

Now, I understand as an adult, that developmentally, a teenager wants more than anything to fit in with her peers, experience romantic love, and feel valued as a person, not as a child. The shorthand for all of these complex feelings seems to be the endless repetition of “I’m so fat”. The supporting response is “No you’re not!” to which the answer is “Yes I am”...Repeat. A mutual ritual of insecurity/reassurance all in the context of “I’m so fat”.

I’ve heard this very same 2-part conversation repeated ad nauseam for 20 years among every group of girls I’ve ever had in my classes. (Teenagers talk non-stop during class, because as we all know, teachers can’t possibly hear and/or understand what they are talking about!)
I am lonely, I wish I had a boyfriend, I’m not wearing the right clothes, I had a fight with my best friend, I have a zit on my chin, whatever it is becomes “I’m so fat”. It doesn’t seem to matter what size the girl is, or what clique she hangs out with, this conversation is universal.

Does this conversation change body size, improve eating habits or levels of physical activity in a positive way?
Sometimes. Maybe.
But it is also the conversation that justifies eating disorders.

Does this conversation cause misery, reinforce unhappiness, and perpetuate a bad mood?
You know the answer to this one.
You’ve probably had this conversation yourself.

This is not just adolescent insecurity expressing itself; the exact same conversation carries all the way through to the teachers at the lunch table. “I’m so fat/no, you’re not” can be heard among the female staff of all sizes. Only perhaps now it’s shorthand for: I’m tired, I’m feeling old, I wish I had time to get some exercise, I ate too much/too fast, I’m having a bad hair day, my husband is a jerk, please reassure me!

I can tell my students to change their conversation, and sometimes they will listen (temporarily). I can remind my circle of girlfriends that this is a boring conversation and they usually laugh and agree. I have learned to catch myself halfway through the “I’m so fat” thought whenever I look in the mirror, and stop it before it completes itself.

And now I’ve written and illustrated a book to help stop this conversation.
Maybe, just maybe, we can talk about ___________________(fill in the blank!) for a change.

This blog post was originally posted at Elizabeth Patch’s Sketchbook Blog and has been republished here with the permission of the author.

Enjoy More of Me to Love’s fabulous author interview with Elizabeth Patch.

Sign the “I’m So Fab!” Pledge in honor of International No Diet Day

Elizabeth is the author and illustrator of More to Love, an illustrated gift book for women on the topic of body image and self-esteem. As someone who suffered for many years from eating disorders and as a high school art teacher who watched in vain as female students starved themselves, even to death, Elizabeth hopes that she can contribute to diminishing our culture’s obsession with weight loss, dieting, and size.