How Do I Help My Niece?

Excerpt from The BDD Family Book by Dr. Eva Fisher

Female-Initial Post:

It’s been ages since I posted on here, but I still come lurk sometimes. After a particularly triggering episode last night, I’m feeling the need for some advice/support.

Long story short, I was diagnosed with BDD a couple years ago, have been suffering with it almost all my life. Working with my therapist made it pretty clear that a lot of my body issues started as a result of my Nana’s constant comment and judgement of my looks when I was a child.

She was extremely loving, but also, always telling me to suck in, “suck in that gut” etc. when I was a kid, despite the face that I was very scrawny as a child (underweight, by doctors). Twenty-some years later I’m still hearing her commentary in my mind, but I’ve done a lot of work to make improvements.

Concerns About My Niece

Last night while I was hanging out with Nana and my mom, Nana started in on something she’s been going on about lately, which is her belief that my niece is overweight.

My niece (we’ll call her Jess, not real name) is not at all overweight, but she IS ten years old, which means of course she has the body of a ten year old; chubby cheeks, soft belly the same size as her chest and hips, totally totally normal.

But Nana keeps haranguing my mom to mention to my sister (Jess’ mom) that she needs to put her on a diet, or maybe take her to the doctor and find out what he can do. Nana thinks Jess should quit ballet because she’s too fat to be seen in a leotard.

I tried to point out that she is NOT at all, and that even if she were overweight, as long as she enjoys ballet of course she should keep doing it, no matter what she looks like.

Impact of Grandma’s Comments

After another comment about how if maybe Jess could do some exercises so she didn’t have such a “huge belly” I had to just leave. I made an excuse about the playoffs starting, changed the subject and went into the other room to watch the NHL.

But later when I went home, I had a full blown panic attack. I spent most of the night crying and am still this morning fighting back tears.

I refuse to let Nana do to my niece what she did to me. I don’t want my niece to ever spend a night as a 29-year-old woman sobbing over pains that were instilled in her as a child by the ignorance of a grandmother (or in her case, great-grandma).

Does anyone have any advice for handling this situation?

Breaking the Cycle?

I realize that Nana’s thinking on bodies and figures is as distorted as some of us; she’s an extreme perfectionist and expects perfection is other people’s physiques, to the point of being completely irrational.

But just like me when I was a child, my niece doesn’t know this, so she’ll think that what Nana says is truth. What can I do to break the cycle?

This excerpt from The BDD Family Book by Dr. Eva Fisher has been formatted for online reading, with minor punctuation adjustments for clarity. The original wording has been preserved.