women, stop calling yourselves fat in front of your children, even if youre saying it playfully and especially if youre not even close to it. 

My mom, when I was a child, was not big. I dont know her exact size through out but when I was 14, she was a size 10 and complained that 4 years earlier she was a lot smaller. She was a tiny teenager so I'm sure a 10 to someone who was used to a small number like 4 was big but she put herself down all the time. I dont ever remember her mentioning anything about herself that she liked. I heard her talk about her fat thighs, fat belly, fat hips, fat arms and she wasnt fat. But what all that taught me was that her size was too big and that she was unhappy with herself...which ultimately made me start to look at myself more critically. 

I was a size 5 at 14. A size 5 with hips and rather large DD breasts. I was disgusted by my body. I called myself fat, I covered in baggy clothes and wore a tshirt over my one piece bathing suit to make sure no one saw the fat blob I thought I was. I played basketball and was on the cheer squad and I was pretty average sized compared to the other girls but I felt huge. Now after marriage, children and illness I have gained a lot of weight and it bothers me that at a size 14 currently, I am more comfortable with and loving to my body than I was when it was a tight and toned size 5. It tears me up to know that the teenage me missed out of bikinis, pool parties, cute little dresses and bare midriff shirts. I hate that I missed out on years of what I call being too exhausted to care what others think. Now at a size 14, and you know what, sometimes as high as 18 of certain brands, I wear what I like and I feel good in what I have on even when I know theres someone staring at my random stretch marks peeking from beneath my bathing suit or my far from flat c-section poof. 

I spent years echoing the words of my mother into the mirror... 'oh God! look at how fat thats gotten'... 'ugh I cant stand the way this looks'...' I am so disgusting'....
I wasted so much time hating myself when I could have been skinny and happy and confident. It took me being fat and exhausted and honestly too caught up in doing for my children to finally stop being hard on myself. That is sad to me.....

Now, I'm not advocating for being unhealthy, so dont think thats what Im saying. I am overweight and I am working on changing that. I am on medication that likes to pile on the pounds while preventing me from eating which is part of the fun of getting fat to begin with ;) so my journey to healthy is going to be a long one. What I'm advocating here is self love. Stop looking at yourself and concentrating on what you dislike and please stop voicing those thoughts to your children who right now are not concerned with what other people think about their looks. Learn from them. Be carefree enough to have fun and not worry about what someone else thinks of your clothes, weight, hair, accessories, etc.