Add Category
Rebecca Judd's daughter Billie is only 3 years old, but is already showing worrying signs of having negative body image, the presenter and former model revealed during her weekly appearance on The 3pm Pick Up program on KIIS FM.
"All of a sudden [Billie] has started caring about her appearance so much. It's really scary," Judd said.
"I don't know where it's come from because at home, I wear active wear pretty much, sneakers, chuck my hair up and barely put on any make-up."
Judd, who is also mother of four and married to AFL legend Chris Judd, said her daughter "hates" her curly hair and "screams at the mirror".
"She's got this brush and she's started standing in front of the mirror and she brushes and brushes her hair," she said.
"She's got this curly hair, so she brushes it and it springs back up. And she screams at the mirror, she's like, 'arrgh!' She's just furious.
"I said 'Billie what are you doing, just let it go babe you've got curly hair' and she says 'Mummy I don't like my hair I want straight hair like you'."
Last week the family were holidaying in Port Douglas when Billie said she didn't want to go out for dinner because she didn't feel as beautiful as Judd, a former model.
"We were going out for dinner, and I had these cool studded flats on," Judd said. "She [Billie] had these little flats with a pussycat on them and we were just about to walk out the door she goes, 'Oh mum, I can't go out for dinner, you look far more beautiful than me'."
Judd stressed that Billie, who's image appears frequently in her popular Instagram feed, "doesn't get screen time, she's not watching shows that would put any importance on appearance."
"She's not on Instagram, she can't read for goodness sake."
She said the behaviour of her only daughter has encouraged the family to put an emphasis on "being strong, kind and smart".
Earlier this year Billie was signed by Mattel as the local ambassador of a new Barbie range that launched in Myer back in May.
At the the time Judd said she only approved the deal after considering: "Is it going to be fun for her and is she going to enjoy it."
Judd, who is a prolific Instagrammer with more than 645,000 followers, has made headlines for years regarding her own body image.
Her forays into public debates about body image began after the birth of Billie in 2014 when she published an open letter lambasting media outlets like the Daily Mail for criticising her lean frame while reminding people that "being thin is not an illness".
"We wonder why there are so many nasty, negative internet trolls out there and we also wonder why so many women have body issues - ummm, probably because they read The Daily Mail," she wrote on her blog Rebecca Judd Loves.