Growing Up With ‘Almond Mom’
“Let's say a mother uses body-positive language around her daughter and does not impose restrictive eating on her,” Kara Lissy, LCSW, a psychotherapist at A Good Place Therapy, explains. “Imagine that girl’s confusion when she later observes her mother checking her figure in the mirror obsessively, using derogatory language about her own body, and counting calories. The most important thing a mother can do for her daughter is to model high self-worth, though that can be an uphill battle against diet culture.
“Many neural pathways are formed during childhood and adolescence, and over time and with practice, these ways of thinking and behaviors become very engrained,” Lissy continues. “Young women whose mothers planted the seeds for their eating disorders feel reinforced when they are complimented on their weight loss, and learn early on to attach value to the way that they look rather than the other wonderful qualities about them that have nothing to do with their weight or what they ate.”
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