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I look at my oldest girl and I see what she is experiencing. Her body is transitioning, and she’s particularly concerned and curious about her new bouncy parts that garner attention from a variety of eyes. And as I watch my daughter navigate her new body, I’ve identified some methods to creating support and raising confident, mindful, fully expressed women.

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All the new year’s resolution hype around “weight loss as the key to happiness” can be super harmful. These awesome ideas can help you resolve to actually take care of your body instead.

A smiling parent hugs their child.

This author’s story shows why it’s so important to talk about menstruation with your kids – but you may still wonder how to do it. Try these strategies.

Check out the spoken word poem that started a powerful movement of self-love and remember that your body is not an apology!

Learning to use spirituality as a form of healing and resistance is vital to both ourselves and our given communities.

“Women are so good at this!” The harm of negative stereotypes is pretty obvious – but is a stereotype that seems like a compliment really any better? Celia Edell explains how “positive” stereotypes are worse than you may think.

Here are five phrases to feel capable, deserving, and enough.

Contrary to popular belief, eating disorders are not diets. They’re a type of mental illness and is categorized by a loss of self-control and an inability to think and behave rationally towards food. And while poor body-image and diet culture are problematic, eating disorders take on a whole new level of dangerous. So we need to be able to pinpoint when the former develops into the latter.

My body has been sneakily co-opted, labeled, taken away from me. The version that is handed blankly back has all the usual notes scribbled across its surface. “Not quite right,” “Bulky,” “Could be better executed.” “Missing a certain natural beauty.” I am missing a certain natural beauty, even though this is what I naturally am. I am missing myself. When did the theft occur?

I remember it more clearly than I want to – the memory of being forced to acknowledge the illness that my diet had spiraled into. We were at a pizza place, my friend Rob* and I. Despite everything that was going on,the only topic that I had energy to talk about was calories. A grimace passed Rob’s face, and he looked me right in the eye when he said: “I think you have a problem.”

Get the 411 on the vulva in this week’s video headline! If your sex ed class was insufficient (or non-existent) on the topic of female anatomy, we’ve got the solution right here. Watch as clinical sexologist Dr. Lindsey Doe explains the various parts of the vulva, their functions, and how to recognize healthy differences. Sex-positive and body curious feminists alike: check this one out!

From body size to body hair, society has so much to say about which bodies are acceptable and which are not. Sadly, the people who are supposed to love and affirm us unconditionally sometimes end up being the ones who project those harmful standards onto us the most. Check out this comic to see one way body policing manifest and how to fight back.

The entire world convinced me over the years that my vagina was gross, dirty, and ugly. That shit stays with you. But that’s the thing about self-image and cultivating positive, awesome body-love – you have to work at it. So if you find yourself in the position of hating your vagina or if you know a young person who might, here are some suggestions to get you started on loving it instead.

Body acceptance is not about disregarding your health. Its about loving and accepting your body and wanting to take care of it. There is no such thing as a “good” or “bad” body, and it is important to listen to your body and all the signs and signals it provides you. Accept yourself and your beautiful form, and this will encourage those you interact with to love their bodies as well.

As a fat person, I am often surrounded by people, messages, and media that work to ensure that I know that being fat is (supposedly) not okay. There are many ways that fat individuals try to manage living in the hostile environment, but I want to suggest doing something a little radical: coming out as fat. Here are some places to start.

Person looking toward the camera, sad

Many suggest “loving your body” is the key to recovery but for this author, that feels impossible. In this narrative she shares her struggles and how she’s come to work towards recovery without being able to love herself.

Pregnant person lying on a bed, looking concerned

It doesn’t take an expert to know that the celeb moms we fawn over don’t have the typical post-pregnancy experience. But applauding “bouncing back” from a pregnant body is just one of the ways we send humiliating messages to people who have given birth. Have you internalized these messages? Here’s your guide to challenging the criticism of the post-pregnancy body.

Do you look anything like the people deemed “most beautiful” by magazines? Here’s how the beauty bias might be getting to you – and what to do about it.