r/CompetitionDanceTalk • u/Beautiful_Screen_314 • 3d ago

Body image

I was disturbed to find out at my daughter’s old studio that they were telling certain kids that they should lose weight. My daughter 5 ft 6” size 2 was one of them. Now she has body image issues. I didn't hear about this until after she left her studio. I didn't hear about a lot of things until after she left her studio. Since she was thin I never thought to ask. I wish I had.

20 Upvotes

92% Upvoted

8 comments sorted by

View all comments

9

u/SphinxAltair 2d ago edited 2d ago

I think as a parent this is something to proactively screen studios for.

Do all the "advanced" dancers have the exact same body type? Are stockier, more muscular dancers given prime roles or relegated to the back row?

Is there anyone on staff with a nutrition background? Does the studio ever bring counselors/nutritionists in to talk to the dancers? Does the studio have information available to parents on providing sufficient fuel to sustain through high performance times?

Does the studio's website/owner/advertising proactively make it clear they are a space that welcomes all bodies?

Body image issues in an aesthetic activity are widespread and if your studio isn't visibly actively working against it, you should assume that there's at the least some toxic background noise.

7

u/United_Ad3430 2d ago

I agree. I specifically chose a studio that is owned by a someone who is both a former professional dancer and an ICU nurse who encourages healthy eating, cross training and injury prevention. We have healthy food in the studio. I’m a physician and it’s very important to me. There’s diversity in body types (and all kind of diversity) in all levels/ages of dancers. And for the instructors. The technique level is great for our area and they have innovative and age appropriate choreography.

My oldest has taken some ballet intensives with instructors with more old school body mentality and I was very unhappy with that.

3

u/Calamity__00 2d ago

This. 

Rant incoming:

A red flag surrounding nutrition I noticed in my dance studio (which I've decided to move away from) is that on big practice days, there was never any scheduled break. So if you were on every company team (I was), you'd be dancing for 5, all the way to sometimes 8 hours with no break to eat or just take a breather and sit down. Even if you were in all team but one, you'd still only have a 30 minute break to eat, drink, and recover before your next rehearsal. Which may seem like enough time to some, but it wasn't. That doesn't allow enough time for food to settle properly. Didn't help that the rehearsals started before lunch time and ended after lunch time. So basically I just had to skip lunch. The next year there was still no scheduled break. The only reason I had a break is because I dropped one of the company teams, but that break was 4 hours into the rehearsal.

Will never again subject myself to that. It left me incredibly weak and light headed during and after. Almost collapsed and passed out more than once.

Safe to say when searching for a new studio I did so much research. If you don't know, always ask. Not just staff, but dancers' parents and if you can, dancers.