Did My Barbie Dolls Influence My Body Image?
We each have an internal story that we tell ourselves. It’s unique to you, like unicorn magic, unique. The details of your story come from your experiences, your caregivers, and the things that influence you most, especially as a kid. Your story influences how you interact with the world and how you see yourself, including your body image beliefs.
Your beliefs are in your subconscious; those are the things that you learned by the time you were seven years old.
You likely don't remember the specific moments, but your body and mind do. Your body holds a lot of information and can be a place that stores trauma and things that you haven't processed yet.
Let’s pause for just a moment to define how I see trauma because I feel like our society at large says that trauma has to be these really massive horrible moments. The thing is, it can be tiny short moments too.
Trauma really is any time that you feel frightened, scared, disempowered, or misunderstood.
When you stop to think about it, that probably means more things in your life count as trauma.
Trauma is a normal part of our existence. It’s part of being human. We go through more difficult times, we go through more easy times.
That's not something to be ashamed about, it's a part of who you are and an important part of your story.
When I was a kid, I had a massive Barbie collection, like you couldn’t count them all, kind of massive. I was in love with Peaches and Cream Barbie and Barbie and the Rockers. I even got the Barbie and the Rocker’s van as a Christmas present one year. It was gorgeous! Light purple with speckles of paint all over it and it was so big! As long as my 8-year-old arms were wide. I played with my Barbies almost daily until I was about 12 years old.
When I was in high school I heard Barbie dolls being blamed for giving little girls an unrealistic body image and that Barbie was to blame for eating orders and dysmorphia. I thought, what?!
How can a Barbie doll influence body image when she's just a doll? I had more than 30 and though I wanted Barbie doll hair on occasion, I didn’t want to physically look like her.
Her high heels were crazy high and her foot was stuck in that shape, even my child mind recognized that wasn’t possible for a living human.
I saw my Barbies as fun shiny things to dress up and take on adventures around my room. They didn’t influence how I interpreted my body. So why was Barbie getting the blame?
As I thought more about it I asked myself what was I taught about body image?
I wondered if it mattered more what my caregivers and teachers taught and showed me about body image rather than the toys I played with.
I think that might be the key here.
The subconscious beliefs you learned as a child from the adults around you likely influenced how you interpreted your body.
So it made sense when I thought about it, that I would see Barbie in a healthier light. My mom detests high heels. Give her sneakers or flats any day. Which connects to my memory of staring at Barbie’s feet and thinking she must be in agony all the time.
Also, my parents were big on eating a balanced diet, with all the food groups present.
I had raw lettuce nearly every night with dinner along with a bowl of fruit, a protein, a starch, and usually a cooked veggie too. The food pyramid fascinated me and influenced my snacking choices.
Snacking was encouraged in my childhood home! Zero shame for getting into the Chips Ahoy or Doritos.
The adults around me didn't obsess or count calories. My mom always encouraged me to get shoes and clothes that fit and flattered me, regardless of the size on the tag. I never saw her obsess about how something looked on her, it either fit or it didn’t.
If anything I learned skinny shaming, rather than fat shaming.
Someone that was emaciated or too skinny was a bad thing. So it was important to have a healthy weight. I believe that comes from my grandparents that grew up in the Great Depression, where being too skinny would show that you couldn’t provide for your family. Overall I’m comfortable in my body 95% of the time and as a woman I think that’s a very good thing.
So coming back to the Barbie conundrum, is she to blame for an unhealthy body image?
Well, I think that depends on the messages you received from the adults around you.
For me, no, Barbie didn’t give me an unhealthy body image, if anything she helped me appreciate my flatter feet and the ability to move my arms.
What’s your story about body image?
If you’d like support unpacking your story, journaling is a great place to start!
(It’s my go-to-tool for understanding why I’m obsessed with rinsing my hands to what I want to eat for dinner). I’ve got a handy guide that teaches you how easy it is to journal AND feel good about it in just 5 minutes.
Kerstin Phillips is a Life Coach & Yoga Instructor, E-RYT 200 living in Berkeley, California with her daughter, husband, and kitty, Pesto.
She loves to journal, read, do all things yoga, and hike in Tilden.
Kerstin guides women and non-binary folx out from the shadows so they can embrace their true selves, feel confident in their decisions, and define their purpose, because everyone is valuable and no one deserves to be overlooked.
