In the 5 years that I've been a SAHM, my eating and exercise habits have changed. Some days, I feel as though I have forgotten even the basics of balanced nutrition. I've become a reactive eater, using food to soothe my stress. And I have been thinking that my failure to change is all about lack of control. Thanks for an eye-opener.

Control does have a negative implication, more so if you are predisposed to think so. If we soften it up to "influence," then I think "manipulate."

But my daughter does so love to dance. I'm thinking about trying it now myself, and perhaps we'll dance together - so long as I get the lead.

I have always been careful not to mention anything when it comes to Kid L's weight. Now that she is 11 she calls herself fat. It hurts to know she thinks that way; espcecially since she has recently lost ~10 pounds due to the ADHD medicine and is no longer in an "overweight" range.

I have a friend who will not eat in front of her parents b/c they have always told her she is fat. She is at most a size 8.

I have another friend who still thinks back to when her mother told her she was "going to have be careful" when sshe was 9. Now, she in turn worries constantly about her very slender girls weight (ages 3-6) and has even asked the doctor if they are fat.

Being controlled, no matter what the issue, makes you feel helpless and no child deserves to feel that way.

Andrea, you are a wise lady. This was excellent.

How about you just keep stealing my posts out of my head? And also explain to me how you're doing that.

My stint in the nut house really opened my eyes to why Ivy acts the way she does sometimes. There is nothing more frustrating and rage-inducing than having someone try to control you.

It always amazes me when adults resist the fact that children are actual people.

Thanks for this Andrea. I have long-standing weight and body-image issues that are also rooted in (lack of) control and feelings of powerlessness.

For the past 18 months or so, I've been wrestling with Chronic Daily Headache. Well-meaning friends and family continue to tell me that it is all stress-related. While some of the headache may relate to stress, this is not the sole cause. My physician backs this up.

The implication is that if I could only control my stress I wouldn't have to live in such pain. In other words, if I was more in control of my body and mind, everything would be fine.

I'm working with a therapist toward a better and more healthy relationship with my body.

Thank you.

I like you more and more every day.

What an excellent post. You are brilliant. Let me tell you, from dealing with three teenage girls, that "control" is a b-a-d idea. Guidance, steering, and most of all EXAMPLE. Not control. Lucky, lucky Frances.
I sure wish we lived closer.

This was an excellent post and still desperately needed in this day and age.
I was raised by a very, very vain woman who, even now, at 44 years old, does not hesitate to comment on my weight: too thin, too fat. NEVER just right. 2 days after I gave birth to my daughter she came to the hospital to meet her new granddaughter and the very first thing she did was point at my still swollen belly. "Why hadn't the swelling gone down? Her's had been instantly flat after giving birth." (That would be after the application of a girdle!)
My mother is forbidden for commenting on my daughter's appearance in any way. If she does, I leave for that visit.
Regarding controlling our kids, the most control I exert on her is sticking to a fairly regular routine. Most other things are negotiable.

great post.

Control is really just fear in action, yes? Our fear is so limitless, we try to corral it and reign it in. And the leftovers from that terror allow control to seep out and become normal. A comfortable sweater.

And the kids get the hand me downs, and the cycle continues. Fear is it's own animal, we need to be just as wild to protect ourselves from falling for it.

You always make me think, friend.

Ah, good post. It's strikes home for me especially now that I've been feeling particularly antagonistic toward my body.

Anyway, it seems you remember your mother's preoccupation/obsession with her body as well as I remember my mother's. (So painful). As I get older, I feel more gentle with it if I remember my mother was a woman who was trying to get some worth in a society that didn't want her to have any.

Some days that works. Some days I just get angry about it.

Every day, I promise not to do that to my own kids. We'll see how that works out.

ZM--and especially considering you're so active, what with the jogging pants and all. ;)

I do remember it. I've never been angry with her about it--her own family was plenty dysfunctional and that doctor certainly did a number on her head. It's actually always impressed me that, growing up with the impulses she did, she always tried not to pass them down--she never, ever made negative comments about my appearance, and has never, ever commented on my weight, whether I was thin or not. Which I think is rare for someone with that kind of background.

Like, you know, Arline's mom. Egads.

YT, me too.

I've tried control -- spent a period of my life believing that if I acted a certain part I could impose this on my self and end up actually being that way. Guess what. Didn't work and I ended up with no fingernails and no self esteem. You are so on and so good at this stuff, I am as usual in awe.
My husband is a weight freak. He actually judges people on their weight and fitness level. He has redeeming features, I hasten to add, or I would have been in jail for husbandacide a long time ago. Frankly, when he does this, I feel sorry for him -- but it took me a long time to learn to feel that way. Have I just contradicted para one? Oh dear.

Hmm. Coming at the control thing as a parent of a kid with type 1 is a bit different. I think. I do want to control O's blood sugars and what she eats, but I know that striving for perfection is futile. It's not going to happen and I'm going to make myself insane if I keep trying. So I don't. I log, I track, I have a very cool spreadsheet, complete with graph and pie chart and circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one.... but it's just a tool, just a means of keeping a handle on things, not something that will make things perfect. The only thing that will make things perfect is if she suddenly generates a working pancreas. What are the odds?

O tends towards pudgy. I don't say anything about her weight because I tend towards full-out fat and I have a massive amount of body image issues and I really don't want to drag her there.

But. She does have diabetes and as such, we need to keep track of what she eats and when. If I notice she's snacking too much on crappy snacks, then I will say something. If she's picking and not bolusing, I will say something. But it's almost always diabetes related, not "If you eat that, you'll get fat," related.

She's asked me to help her stop munching on graham crackers and such and I've agreed, but I won't nag, either. I don't really know where to draw the line on that. I am so afraid of passing along my food and body issues that, at this point, I'm not really doing anything. And I think that's almost as bad as being a nag about it.

I don't know how your mother made it thru the day on so few calories. I would have been eating my own arm.

On giving up control in relationships: we were choosing wedding rings. We had nearly settled on one design for both of us, one I liked. If I'm honest, I talked her into that one. My spouse-to-be hesitated. Her eye was caught by another one, one that was a little less classic than the one I wanted to have on my hand for the rest of my life, a shade funkier. I saw the choice I wanted go from "almost made" to "slipping away." I could argue her back, I thought. In pretty much the same instant I realized that I didn't want to associate an argument with these rings. Neither of us had to control the other's choice: neither of us could control the other's choice to marry, after all. We each made that choice in full freedom but in very different manners. And when you see them together our two rings complement each other in a way identical bands never could.

Andrea,

I am a 15-year medical journalist who was diagnosed with anorexia as a teen, I Just completed a book, "Lying in Weight: the Hidden Epidemic of Eating Disorders," to be published by Harper Collins, in May 2007. (http://www.amazon.com/Lying-Weight-Hidden-Epidemic-Disorders/dp/0060761482) The story of your mother and you fits in well with the dozens of women that I interviewed. Society holds a myth that eating disorders happen only to teenagers. And that the eating disorders go away when a person grows up. In "Lying in Wieght," I trace the life journey of a women with histories of eating disorders through marriage, pregnancy, parenting, mid and late life,. The parenting chapter most applies to your situation. Mom's with eating and body issues pass something down to their children. We don't know if that thing passed on iis genes or habits, or a bit of both. Some of the problem is about control, yes, but there is much more. The eating disorder serves many purposes depending on the person who has it and what life stage he or she is in. Healing is about finding your voice in some creative, spiritual, or advocacy endeavor. You cannot give up control without finding something healthy to fill in the void. Your blog is just perfect as a means to heal.

Trisha Gura
tgura@nasw.org
trishagura.com

Julia, I don't know how she did it either.

I'm not sure what you're describing as "control" is all that different than what I'm talking about--you're trying to control what you can control, i.e. logging things and getting O to test and bolus for snacks etc. That's different than trying to control the sugars themselves--as you said, the only thing that would control those is if she generates a working pancreas.

Sheila, that's lovely.

Trisha, thank you. YOu're right, people do seem to think that it happens only to teenagers.

Thank you so much for this. I am diabetic, too. I have left my doctor's office in tears more times than I can count.