To be worried my 5 yr old DD said she was fat.

[OneDove]

my darling DD always dresses herself each morning and checks her outfit in my mirror. This morning I heard her say to herself 'hmmm I look a bit fat'.
I was horrified and a bit unsure what to do. I just called her over for a cuddle and told her she was beautiful. I am really worried she said this though. What should I say? That it's okay to be fat? I should say she is a slim girl and not much meat on her bones...as the saying goes. Is this the start of something? I really am concerned.

Has she watched you doing the same?

Hmmm no. We a pretty healthy family. I do Triathlons and open eater swimming. We all eat together healthily. I am pretty sure I have never said the words ' I look a bit fat!'

Hee hee Open Water!! Not open eater . Great typo tho.

What's open eater swimming?

They get it from school, my DD is 9 and convinced she is fat. we are both tall and I'm a size 8 and she is not fat but someone at school has mentioned her fat legs....

You did the right thing imo.

Well I wouldn't tell her it's ok to be fat because that's like saying it's ok to smoke or to make her body unhealthy in other ways.

To be honest, at this stage I'd ignore it. You've cuddled her and told her she's beautiful.

If you look 'horrified' she may well say it again for attention. She's more than likely heard someone else say it and just repeated it.

If she says it again, then I'd say it's time to think about how to tackle it.

My 5 year old DD regularly tells us she is 'nice and slim'. I find it horrifying that she is aware of her size in this way but we always try not to react. I think perhaps the current obsession with child obesity means that children are learning that fat = bad and are interpreting this in their own ways.

I did just ignore the comment and did not look horrified. It was just a bit shocking. I agree saying fat is okay would just promote an unhealthy view. I will keep a close eye. Thanks everyone x

I agree they learn it from school. When my dd was 5 she started saying that it was good just to eat soup because then she would be thin (she is normal weight). She also started commenting on perfectly slim women on TV e.g. Linda Bellingham saying they were "a bit fat". I had a chat with her about the important thing not being whether you are fat or thin but whether you are healthy. I explained about having a balanced diet (so not just soup) and doing exercise. Reception year was the worst for this ime.

Ds is 6 and he and his friends have said a couple of times I don't want to eat that as it can make you fat. Ime it passes quite quickly. Probably a way to understand something from school. Chat or healthy eating stuff.

So yes agree wait and see what happens.

There is nothing wrong with children aged 5 or 6 becoming aware of their body shape and size and how to keep it healthy through good nutritional practice and regular exercise because this is taught explicitly in many schools - it is certainly part of the NC in France. Don't know about the UK.

My 6 yo DD has done the same thing, saying that she wants to stay thin and not get fat - I am sure it's related to stuff that they do at school as they are a 'healthy eating' school. I've just talked about being healthy and reassured her that she looks gorgeous as she is. We are all sporty and eat healthily - I never mention food/diet/weight at home, in fact we don't even have scales, so I know it's not something she's picking up from us.

Why were you "horrified", OP?

OMG that is just so sad. In my day we never concerned ourselves with stuff like this, we were happy and carefree (generally), just concerned with playing with our friends and going to school. Just tell her she is lovely as she is and not to worry about stuff like that. Keep reasuring her how lovely she is.

My 4 year old DD said similar, 'do I look fat in these trousers?'. Turns out a boy at nursery picked up on the growth spurt she had had meaning her tops came up short so she flashed her stomach a little whilst playing. I told her she was perfect just the way she was and what her family thought was more important than a child she had met less than 6 months ago. I had a chat with the nursery as this was one of a few incidents with the same boy that week and went out and bought her nice long line tops to replace the too small ones and she was over the moon with her new clothes and has not said it again. I honestly thought I had years before I had to deal with a question like that and was so sad as we dont use words like that in our house at all.

A friend's DS had been saying something similar, turned out he had been watching iCarly????? and that was one of the main themes. Could she have watched something weight-focused on TV OP?