Strong Girls, Strong Women

My urge to start this blog stems from my experience working with young girls and pregnant teens.  I worked with girls between the ages of birth and 5 years and noticed that even at that young age, they were inundated with messages about how they should act and look.  Watching these girls play with sexed up versions of the toys that I played with as a child (none of the princesses had vapid stares or small waists when I was a kid) and new ridiculously sexualized toys such as Bratz dolls, made me realize that something is wrong with this picture.  I started searching for books to help me understand what was going on.  I read Peggy Orenstein’s, Cinderella Ate My Daughter and learned that I was only seeing a piece of what girls are exposed to.  Peggy Orenstein described the sexualized clothes that are being advertised to young girls (padded bras for six year olds, etc.) and beauty contests for toddlers.  I was shocked.

It wasn’t until I started working with pregnant teens that I saw the results of our highly sexualized girl culture.  I work on a daily basis with teen girls that fight the normal pregnancy weight gain, refuse to breastfeed because they are so convinced that their breasts are only for the pleasure of men, and would rather get pregnant than make their boyfriends use a condom.

 
My intent with this blog is to start a conversation about how older women can help the girls in their lives to fight the societal pressure to act and look a certain way.  Along with this, I believe that all women are struggling to fight society’s pressures even as adults.  I believe that if we learn how to heal ourselves, we can help future generations of girls to grow up strong and band together to fight back against the harmful messages that they are receiving about their bodies.