This article was originally published on EverydayFeminism.com and is republished with permission. Content Note: This article contains discussion of eating disorders, including descriptions of restriction practices and family diets. There’s only one time in my life I ever remember seeing my dad cry. It wasn’t at his mother’s funeral or his father’s, though I knew he was sad … [Read more...]
When You Call Me Skinny (Hint: It’s Not a Compliment)
Content note: This article contains extended discussion of familial fat-shaming, attempted weight loss, dieting, and eating disorders. In a radical self-love webinar I took with TBINAA founder Sonya Renee Taylor, she asked participants to recall their first memory of body shame. Everyone had one. I went blank. I had none. The truth was, I had far too many. My entire life … [Read more...]
7 Things I Wish People Knew About Being a Fat Woman
This article originally appeared on SHESAID and has been republished with permission. I used to spend a lot of time wondering if people were polite to my face and rude behind my back, probably because I’ve caught people doing that before. To my face they’d tell me how cute my outfit was. Then I’d turn around and they’d make a comment about how “brave” I was for wearing a skirt … [Read more...]
6 Ways I Was Taught To Be a “Good Fatty” — And Why I Stopped
This article was originally published on EverydayFeminsim.com and is republished with permission. I wasn’t born fat. I came into fatness as a teenager. This was in part because of medication that increased my water retention drastically and in part because puberty gave me huge breasts, with a belly and thighs to match. And I was lucky, in some ways. My mother was also fat, and … [Read more...]
8 Lessons for Men To Heal Rough Relationships With Their Bodies
Content note: This article contains references to dieting and struggles with food. Men in our society -- contrary to what the ideology of toxic masculinity would have us believe -- are extremely susceptible to the weight loss, dieting, and exercise culture we're subjected to every day. That includes, but is definitely not limited to, the near incessant advertising for workout … [Read more...]
5 Things I Did After Turning 40 That Changed How I Saw My Aging Self
At thirty-eight I experienced a bit of a midlife crisis. Well, hardly midlife, but still a crisis nonetheless. Forty loomed on the horizon, and I felt a kind of aimless terror at that number. Some of it was kind of silly. What did a mature woman wear? Would I be forced by some secret fashion police to give up my band and anime t-shirts? Would I have to turn in my Chucks and … [Read more...]
Healing the Wounds of Growing Up in a Fat-Shaming Family
In the immortal words of Brianna in the classic film Bring It On: All or Nothing, "I've always had a big ass. It runs in my family. We're a big-assed family." My family never used to do “thin” well. My father hovered between “normal” and “more to love,” my mother had a substantially emphasised hourglass shape, and both of my younger brothers were noticeably chubby. As for me? … [Read more...]
5 Ways To Deal With Body Parts That Make Us Uncomfortable Without Body Shaming
Even when we have worked hard to move away from body shaming and toxic diet culture toward a life of Radical Self Love and Acceptance, we sometimes slip and our old thoughts start to fire again. It can feel like we are going backwards. It can seem overwhelming and pointless to fight the bombardment of negative body image information we receive all day in the media and the … [Read more...]
When I Broke Up With My Diet
[Content Warning: Some swearing and weight-loss/diet talk.] Up until about four years ago, I was in a long-term relationship. It had lasted, on and off, for fifteen years, and whenever we were together, it was the most intense relationship I’ve ever had. But it was a bad relationship, based on false hopes and promises of a better life, while giving me nothing much but … [Read more...]
4 Ways We Can Make Eating Healthy a Radical Body-Positive Act
I was twenty-eight the first time I ate a zucchini. Vegetables didn’t figure highly in my menus for most of my life. As a kid they tended to be canned with the occasional salad thrown in for good measure. I ate plenty of fresh fruit, but vegetables? No thanks! Mushy vegetables didn’t have much appeal but they were cheap. Growing up poor often meant cheap food such as white … [Read more...]
4 Things I Hear When You Talk About Your Diet
I don't want to hear about your diet*, and I especially don't want to hear about what you are not eating. I say this as a fat person who is completely happy with my body and refuses to go on weight loss diets, for a number of reasons that I will touch on below. To be clear, I don't say "fat" as an insult about myself, but rather as a neutral descriptor word to talk about how my … [Read more...]
