Celebrate! October 15 is "Love Your Body Day!"

Women are bombarded with messages designed to make us feel inadequate - too fat, too short, with too-small breasts or too-large noses - and the fashion and beauty industries are the primary culprits. But you can fight back. Celebrate your body - its unique curves, its astounding abilities, its particular wants and needs.

Did you know:

• More than 80 percent of 10-year-old girls have been on a fad diet
  
  
• The body type portrayed in advertising as the ideal is possessed naturally by less than 5 percent of women
  
  
• The average weight of a model is 23 percent lower than that of an average woman; 20 years ago, the differential was only 8 percent
  
  
• Each year the U.S. spends over $33 billion on weight-reduction programs, diet foods and beverages
  
  
• 95 percent of diets fail.
  
  
• If the average male model had the same proportions as the average female model, he would be 6'5" and 160 lbs.
  
  
• Women experience depression at roughly twice the rate of men, regardless of racial and ethnic background or economic status.
  
  
• Almost 20 percent of females who participated in a recent telephone survey said they have had or think they will have cosmetic surgery at some point in their lives.
  
  
• According to a recent survey, the thighs are the part of the body that women would most want to change, with 35 percent of women saying they would change their thighs if they could.

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