posted with permission

My daughter sat in her creaky, wooden high chair last week, blissfully happy in her chubby 2-year-old frame, and I worried.

I worried because in a few years this toddler will stand at the edge of the nation's body-image vortex, swirling with size 00 jeans, underfed celebrities glorified in gossip magazines, the latest "America's Next Top Model" and an unrelenting marketing drumbeat that skinnier is better.

How do I keep her from falling in?

My New Year's resolution is to help my daughter prepare for the mind-numbingly complex, sometimes fictitious image of the female body. Unfortunately, I am out of my element.

Today, involved dads are entering unfamiliar territory, such as body-image anxiety. They want to help, but don't always know how, says Harvard Medical University researcher Dr. Nancy Etcoff. When Etcoff gives a speech these days, dads ask a lot of the questions.

I found this report on a study done on the called effects controlling fathers may have on their daughter possibly having an eating disorder.

Apart from there being no mention of the daughters mother being of any blame to why their daughter maybe anorexic, I know several young women who’s mothers still say to them, "your too fat" or "You don't need to eat that"...

What about the media?!? The pressure on young girls to look like the celebrities in the magazines, movies and on stage singing is huge its what is made out to be beautiful, if your skinny too you'll fit into the celebrity life style...

A father's relationship with his daughter may influence whether or not she will develop an eating disorder, researchers from Australia have found.