picture of Jenna Bush in her wedding dress, and I thought she looked overly thin. I'm betting the daughter of the president is someone who is gonna diet herself to perfection for her marriage day.

Skinny can really look unhealthy...I agree, mpg.

well, I wouldn't comment on someone's weight.  I had an aquaintance in college who was tiny. She looked like an easily-snapped twig.  But she was strong and healthy and ate a lot.  

I don't know, thinness can be caused by a lot of things.  So can not eating.  Disease and medication can make you nauseous, and I've certainly been too poor to eat at restaurants.  

That said, it is pathetic that many women do seem to think they shouldn't eat, or shouldn't eat much in public.  It drives DH mad because he is always trying to get his fellow students to go for lunch breaks, and they'll be like "no, I'll just eat these carrot sticks and be fine for 4 more hours."  They probably eat after they go home, but I couldn't stand to do that.  Regular meals/snacks help keep up energy!

I was one of those very, very thin young women.  Weighed 103 lbs when I married.  In fact, even before my last pregnancy, I weighed 117 lbs.  

Ok.  So I don't weigh 103 lbs any longer.  I'll never see 117 lbs. again, either.  But, I'm still at what's considered a healthy weight for my height.  I'll be honest...I'd love to drop ten pounds.  I talk about doing so.  But to be honest, while I could do it easily, I'm starting to fear that doing so wouldn't be a great idea.  I'm not sure we aren't creating our own problems by losing weight and gaining it back.  

I think back to that part in Gone With The Wind when Scarlett's Mammy brings in a complete meal for Scarlett to eat pre-barbeque at the Wilkes', so that she wouldn't eat anything during the party and appear more ladylike. I don't know if this was the actual tradition in the anti-bellum South, but it was something the author felt was socially accpetable to talk about in, what, the 1930s, when the novel was written?

Without getting into the normative words "skinny", "healthy", and "fat", I will say that social constructs favor women engaging in bizarre eating habits. How many self-help articles have I read giving "helpful" suggestions like, eat half of your portion of food in a restaurant, then dump salt all over the rest so you're not tempted to eat it. Or, eat a salad before you go to a party so you don't fill up on party food. Basically saying, don't eat in public. It's baaaad. OK, I'm cherry-picking a few choice statements, but if those aren't quasi-anorexic eating habits normalised, I'll eat my hat (but only half. Hat is so calorie-rich.).

where I wouldn't eat on dates. You know I'd fool around with a salad, but not eat. I think it came from living in Hollywood for a brief time in my early 20's. I was a size six and people were always coming up to me to helpfully suggest I try this or that new exercise or this or that diet pill.

I returned to Florida a size 4 with cheekbones and clavicles. T'was not pretty (on me).

It took me a while to get normal again. When my husband I went on our first date I ordered an appetizer, entree, and dessert and I even brazenly reached out with a fork and took a bite of his food. He found all this utterly charming.

I will love this man till the day I die!!!

we spent a lot of time on the implications of how much space people were "allowed" to occupy and how it was a statement of power onstage to take up the most space.  Not a big leap there to the "big burly man" taking up a lot of space (just think of how men are "supposed" to sprawl in a chair) and the skinny skinny  women sitting with legs and arms crossed to take up as little space as possible...

The kids were always blown away when they looked around the room and saw that reflected in the way that they were occupying the space.

I like by a woman whose daughter has anorexia.

Go here read this.

fat.  I'm 5'10 and I weigh 216 pounds. I wear a size 18 -- sometimes a 20. There. there are my numbers. they are numbers they have no power over me because they are just numbers...  and you know what

I'm Frickin GORGEOUS.  As a matter of fact...I'm STUNNING.

I eat. I eat alot and i love my food.  And what i've noticed is that the two super skinny borderline food issue women in the theater are completely freaked out by the way I openly eat and talk about food - and frankly I think they're jealous.  

this is who I am.  life is too short for me to try to starve myself for...what?  a size 14??? I think not.  
chow down my friends and enjoy!

has the weirdest/worst eating habits of any adult I know.  For a long time, I never saw her eat anything other than an energy bar, and she HATES when there is a business lunch (where she mostly HAS to eat).  Apparently, before I knew her, she was overweight. Now she is definitely THIN.  Her bad eating is an in-house joke, but more of the "if we don't laugh, we'll cry" at how little she eats.

As the mom of a health and exercise concious teen daughter - I am very sensitive to this issue, and how easily healthy can slip into unhealthy!

when I could cry after class because of the misinformation my middle school students are still getting.  And the worst part is some of it is from doctors not just friends and media.
they are visibly relieved when the get good information and a message that they are just right!
They are starving for information about how to be normal and healthy and not about how to look to please a man (or worse, other women).
I think many, many women suffer from disordered eating and many more from eating disorders.
Here's a couple of good videos, both on PBS
Marathon Challenge, this is brand new and an EXCELLENT look at how our bodies work, male and female, work and why we can be "big" and still be healthy and how to ultimately achieve that health.  I've used it in 8th grade.
This is a little older, but still good: Dying to Be Thin. really explains eating disorders, treatment, and how hard they are to cure.  I've used it in high school.  generates LOTS of discussion.
Now, if we could deal with the websites that treat Anorexia as an acceptable "life style"

my sister, who used to own her own aerobics studio and taught 5 or 6 classes a day (plus personal training) tells the story of how she HATED going out to eat with clients.  She was thin (fit and muscular) because of her activity level, but she felt uncomfortable eating anything other than salad in front of them. It was weird, but she felt totally on display and had to keep up the pretense, for them, that eating a salad was the way to be/stay thin.  Otherwise they totally called her out on what she was eating.  She also became a counselor and dealt with eating disorders because she saw so many in the studio.

I only know a hand full of women who appear to have a healthy attitude about weight and food, and I am not one of them.  I was going to try to make some kind of point, but the truth is it just makes me angry and sad.

My sis teaches body sculpting 3 days a week and LOVES to run.  She is really very fit and not just skinny, but people (who tend to be overweight and unhealthy)actually accuse her of being bulimic or addicted to exercise.  She hates that she feels that she has to defend herself.  I think that for some, attacking healthy people makes them feel better about being unhealthy.    

When preggers with ds, I put on a lot of weight (90 lbs)  I haven't tried to take it off, but once I stopped breast feeding him at 1 yo year, I lost 45 lbs in 4 months (I lost 20 right away for a total of 65 lbs and I seem to be still losing).  I still eat and don't really exercise at all, my body is just goofy like that.  

One of my best friends who didn't know me pre-preggo, actually went to my mother because she was concerned about my weight loss.  My mom had to bust out pics of me from when I was a kid all the way up to right before I got pregnant with ds in order to convince her that there was no eating disorder involved.

food is such a pleasure in life, and extreme dieting (losing more than 2 pounds a week, gaining it back, doing it again) is so hard on the body.

I love food, I grow food, I love to cook, I learned to make some foods I especially love so that I can have them fresh and just to my taste.  I'm well within the healthy weight range for my height and weight.  

This article was one of the best recent illustrations I've seen of the madness of what is considered 'model-thin'.  To have the BMI of the winning model in that contest (16.1), my 5'4" self would have to weigh 94 pounds - I think I'd need an IV at that point.

I must say, I haven't known many men who like skinny women (or gay women either).  They like a nice waist, and some curves.  

I happen to think Angelina Jolie is too skinny.  As white movie actresses go, I'd rather look at Kate Winslet.

There's also the fact that a little padding may save your life if you need surgeryor get very sick. When I lived in West Africa, I remember some village women looking over a Victoria's Secret catalog that a volunteer had gotten in a box from family, and saying 'look, she's so thin!  Is she sick?  What will happen if she does get sick, she'll die!'

'Healthy-looking' is not an insult.

It's so interesting. One thing I would point out though is how many of us seem to know exactly how much we weighed at different points during our lives (I know I do too), what we weight now, and what we "should" weigh. I've never lost the last ten pounds after my second baby and have finally resigned myself that it's there to stay, since he's three.

Do you suppose most men could offer a detailed catalogue of their weight at different points during their lives? I'm guessing not.

And hats off to you Katie for not worrying about the "shoulds". That's one good way to live your life. I'm closer to being there than I used to be.

Health is not a moral issue.

There are unhealthy fat people. There are unhealthy thin people. There are healthy people who like to exercise and healthy people who like to read. There are unhealthy people who like to read and healthy people who watch lots of TV.

Yet, we, American society that is, treat fat and thin as moral indicators. Food is thought of bad or good in a generic way when there is no way of eating that is 100% healthy for every body.

The beauty industry and the marketing industry have made a big business out of making us feel like we NEED to be thin to be pretty. But you know what? We don't have to be Pretty.

all food is good in moderation, except pork rinds.

Pork rinds are evil. I've never had one, because I know I would like them.