Teens urged to build self-esteem 'from the inside out'

BY JOHN DECOSTE

jdecoste@kentvilleadvertiser.ca

NovaNewsNow.com

“It’s not the package, it’s the gift inside.” That’s the message Tiffany Mockford delivers to teens in an effort to help them build self-esteem “from the inside out.”

Mockford, who lives in Kingston with her seven-year-old daughter, was one of the workshop facilitators at Family First ‘Teen Talk’, a symposium on self-esteem hosted by the Nova Scotia Self-Esteem Association May 24 at Horton High in Greenwich.

Mockford studied biology at Saint Mary’s University and will graduate this spring from the Bachelor of Administration program at Kingstec.

She addressed the topic of self-esteem both from the perspective of a mom and as someone who dealt with eating disorders for most of her teenage years.

“I want teens of both genders, but especially teenage girls, to understand that even though the ‘outer package’ can be beautiful, the inside might not be,” she said, adding that often, the opposite may actually be the case.

Today’s teens “are vastly aware of how they look on the surface,” but not nearly as aware of what might be inside and hidden from view. “What’s inside is really more important,” she said. “We have to help them see what really matters.”

Mockford suffered from eating disorders – anorexia nervosa then bulimia – for 12 years, from age 11 to 23, resulting from a combination of poor self-esteem and peer pressure over body image.

Outside kept chipping away

Her troubles began when she moved to Nova Scotia from Western Canada. “There has always been lots of love and confidence in our family, but as a result of the move I gained a bit of weight. I was the ‘new girl’, and I didn’t make many friends for the first few months. I had a good foundation, but the outside kept chipping away at it.”

Once she started making friends, her issues with self-esteem started. “I became afraid of who I was and what I looked like. I dieted and exercised in order to stay thin,” she says, adding she was 5’8½ and 92 pounds when she graduated from high school.

She joined group therapy, a trial group for people with eating disorders, but soon “got out of control.” She gained 10 pounds, then 15 more her first year of university. “I distanced myself from my friends, including my roommate, who had a drug program.”

Her roommate helped her find a doctor, who hospitalized her. “At first I was really mad, but then I realized I wasn’t alone and that it wasn’t my fault. I learned I did have self-worth and that it wasn’t the outside (appearance) that really mattered.”

She finished her therapy at 24 and became pregnant about two months later. “I was worried because I still had digestive problems and gained weight easily, but for the first time I didn’t care about the outside.”

Even though her marriage broke up, her pregnancy, and the birth of her daughter, turned out to be not only “a life-changing experience,” but really a lifesaver.

Similar to addiction

“An eating disorder is similar to an addiction,” she said. “You miss out on so much of life. Having my daughter gave me a whole new focus and allowed me to shift my obsession to her.”

Now that her daughter is seven, “I’m already noticing that she’s aware of her physical self. Everyone sees the blonde hair and blue eyes and focuses on that. I try to focus on other things with her, so when you ask her what she likes about herself, she’ll probably say it’s that she can speak French.”

Her daughter “dances and does exercises, but we talk about how she’s doing it to make her feel good, not to look good or to lose weight. I try to impress on her the things that really matter, and that I want her to feel pretty on the inside, too.”

In that way, Mockford is able to channel what she has experienced to her daughter. “ I feel your looks are something you’re given, not something you’ve earned. You have what’s inside you for your whole life. It’s what’s going to carry you through.

“I try to remind myself of that on a daily basis and with my daughter now that I’m a mom,”she says, adding, “it would be great to be able to bottle up the innocence we have as a child” to use it when we become adults.

Mockford appreciated being asked to be part of the symposium. Talking about her experiences “was something I’d always wanted to do.” She admits for a time she was “too busy focusing on me to worry about the future,” but “I went back to school to show my daughter you can achieve what you want in life through hard work.”