Jessica Simpson has started having tough conversations with her kids about their own body images even as they tell her they don’t understand why everyone seems so obsessed with hers.
Jessica Simpson has been in the spotlight for decades now, with much of that time involving discussions of her body and weight. Now, she’s fielding questions from her kids about everyone’s obsession with her size.
It’s hard enough raising kids without having to add the extra layer of public scrutiny to it. Daughters, in particular, are quickly ushered into this world where their very bodies are something everyone feels they have the right to discuss. At 43 years old, Jessica Simpson is still dealing with it.
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“My kids have seen me [still] being scrutinized and it’s very confusing to them because they’re like, ‘Well I don’t even understand this, why don’t they just say you look pretty, Mom? You look pretty,” Simpson told Access Hollywood on Friday.
“I’m like, ‘Honey, I wish I could explain it,'” Simpson continued. “I wish I could say, ‘For me, it has gotten better but it still remains the same and I don’t know why. But it’s okay.”
Of course, it’s actually not okay at all. It’s just the way of the world and something Simpson has had to come to terms with, though she does wish it could change.
“I think that more than weight that people have focused on we need to focus on our mentality about even talking about weight,” she said. “I think it just doesn’t need to be a conversation.”
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Alas, for now, it is very much a conversation, and one that Simpson is having at home with her eldest daughter already, 11-year-old Maxwell. Simpson also shares son Ace, 10, and daughter Birdie, 4, with husband Eric Johnson.
“Maxwell is the tallest in her grade and she’s like, ‘Should I be insecure?’” shared Simpson, I’m, like, the fact that you’re asking me if you should be insecure means absolutely not. You’re comfortable, you stay comfortable, you be you.”
She said that she and her husband have tried to instill in their kids tha t “you don’t try to look like anybody else” or “dress for anybody else.” She emphasized, “Truly you don’t need to be anybody [else’s] size.”
“I think that more than weight that people have focused on we need to focus on our mentality about even talking about weight.”
Simpson’s more recent weight-related headlines have come as a result of her weight loss journey. She’s revealed she lost 100 pounds after the birth of Birdie. But she certainly knows what women have to endure in and out of the public spotlight when it comes to their body sizes.
“I have been every size,” she said. “I do understand every body, every woman, their mentality and how deserving they are of fashion and style and it’s just such a natural thing for me so I have to like I tell my kids how you feel about yourself is how you should feel.”
Just last month, Simpson publicly shut down rumors that she’d taken to using the Type 2 diabetes drug Ozempic to lose weight. Speaking with Bustle, Simpson insisted she’s using “willpower” instead of the drug.
“I’m like, do people want me to be drinking again? Because that’s when I was heavier. Or they want me to be having another baby? My body can’t do it.”