Tween's New Year Resolution: To Model Health and Happiness For Tweens

Here's one last resolution for consideration in 2011: role modeling health and happiness for our tween daughters. Like a few of our other resolutions, this one is for both tweens and their parents. We wrote about this topic earlier when First Lady Michelle Obama explained in an interview that "Throughout my life, I've learned to make choices that make me happy and make sense for me. Even my husband is happier when I'm happy. So I have freed myself to put me on the priority list and say, yes, I can make choices that make me happy, and it will ripple and benefit my kids, my husband and my physical health."

Making time for ourselves as moms is especially challenging given the demands of work, parenting, marriage - you name it. Personally, I can use all the positive reinforcement I can get, so I'm going to borrow the First Lady's motivation for sticking to a regular workout schedule and use Mrs. Obama's counsel "to put me on the priority list."

This will be easier said than done as self-sacrifice has become the m.o. in our parenting career. But after this month of sharing our resolutions and all of the great comments from readers, it became clear that the choices we make (especially publicly stated ones, like resolutions) and the deliberate actions we take have a visible impact on our tween daughters. If we want them to grow into women with a healthy, positive body image, we've got to start with walking the walk. So, 2011, here we go.

Check out our full list of 2011 Tween's New Year Resolutions (see the upper right corner of the blog), and tell us what you thought about this series.

Photo credit: O Magazine

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