Motherhood has brought me many joys and insights, but the new perspective it granted me on the role I had inadvertently played in young women's lives for the 2 decades I spent in the modeling industry was downright sobering.

I delight in my family obligations, but they leave little time for breaks let alone quick trips across the country.

I am not naturally that thin, so I had to go through everything from using drugs to diet pills to laxatives to fasting. Those were my main ways of controlling my weight.

While women across the globe have many differences - language, culture, environment - our similarities are undeniable, and the impact of abuse and oppression affects us all.

My parents were both from the East and had moved to San Francisco only so my father could go to law school there.

Just because you're a different size doesn't mean you're sitting on the couch eating bonbons all day long watching TV.

Being born and raised as a Californian, I somewhat ignorantly had taken for granted the diversity and liberal mindset that shaped my childhood and adult life.