Trigger Warning: Discussion of workplace weight-loss competitions, dieting, weight loss and eating disorders.

We’ve all seen it on blogs, Albert Einstein’s definition of insanity: “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Insanity also means madness, and these two definitions are exactly the best way to describe workplace wellness programs.

A health insurance company’s wet dream

We’ve talked about them before. This March and April, CVS and Michelin created new rules for employees regarding their health insurance wherein those who didn’t meet the requirements for their version of healthy (not fat, not smoking, no high blood pressure or cholesterol) would have to pay more for their coverage. CVS’s extra cost was $600, Michelin’s was a whopping $1,000.

Over at Dances With Fat, Ragen Chastain posted about Penn State’s attempt to force its employees and their covered spouses and partners to get their BMI, waist circumference, lipid and glucose checked at mobile clinics, and take an online health survey. If they refused, they faced a $1,200 fine. Fortunately, the new wellness program, supposed to start in November, was abandoned by Penn State thanks to backlash.

And in this post, Carrie Arnold of EDBites explains how workplace Biggest Loser competitions can be triggering for those suffering and/or recovering from eating disorders, a factor that is ignored all together when these things are put into place.

Why are so many companies and organizations getting involved in regulating their employees’ weight, whether through restrictive insurance mandates, weight-loss competitions, or work-sponsored Weight Watchers (which had to be dropped at a former workplace of mine because there weren’t enough people interested to sign up)?  Well, for one thing, it seems a lot of them have bought into the fear about fat people costing them money and supposedly being less productive employees because they use up too much sick time compared to their thinner co-workers. Perhaps they were spurred on by the CDC’s infamous LEAN Works site. Add in insurance companies’ obsession with weight, as opposed to overall health, and it’s not hard to see why they’re panicking.

But the panic is really all for naught. This study, which Carrie also linked to, shows that the results of many of these programs simply aren’t all they’re cracked up to be.  A weight loss of one to three pounds to me doesn’t justify penalizing workers with metabolic issues, which affect many thin people as well.

If  employers  want employees to be productive and healthy, then don’t threaten them with higher insurance premiums. Don’t bombard them with Biggest Office Loser signups. Don’t post fat-shaming pictures and quotes. Focus on their job, not their waistline or their metabolic numbers.

Trigger warning: Discussion of eating disorders and weight loss.

Please help us welcome our newest blogging candidate, CherryBlossomKitty, who will be submitting three posts before our community votes on her inclusion. If you’d like to join our blogging team, check out this page.

Remember those booths at the amusement park where they would try to guess your weight? Someone would look you over and write down a number, then you stepped up on the scale and if the guess was within five pounds of your actual weight, you would lose? I remember it well. I was ten or eleven years old, and the person guessed 114 pounds. I stepped up on the scale and, sure enough, I weighed 114 pounds. I remember the exact number and the exact way I felt at seeing it, even though it was 30 years ago.

And so began a life-long battle against my weight.

You see, I felt quite ashamed that I actually weighed over 100 pounds. I was under the impression that I should weigh less than 100 pounds at that stage of my life. I felt embarrassed and extremely self-conscious. I may have even cried.

I had always been a little bit fluffy as a child, as had my brother. It was in our genes — my father was a defensive lineman for a Big Ten college football team, for goodness sake. It only made sense that his children would be larger as well. But I refused to accept that. I wanted to be thin and girly, not a brick house.

My freshman year of high school, I was still pretty thick. But sometime during that year, I got the brilliant idea that I would just stop eating. By the beginning of sophomore year, I had dropped quite a bit of weight. Of course, all my classmates kept telling me how great I looked, which only fueled the fire of my eating disorder.

Today, I look at pictures of myself from that time of my life and I can’t believe how emaciated I looked. I looked sick. I felt sick. I had no energy. I became withdrawn, depressed, and developed a severe case of irritable bowel syndrome, which I still have to this day. Yet I still refused to eat.

My disordered eating continued into college. After a particularly nasty breakup, though, something snapped in me and I turned to food for comfort. I swapped one eating disorder for another and fell into binge eating. I was also diagnosed with a mental illness and put on medication that caused weight gain as a side effect. My body changed dramatically, and I was horrified.

And so began the endless dieting. Looking up new fad diets, exercising my brains out, anything to drop some pounds. But of course, as we all know, dieting doesn’t work. It only leads to feelings of deprivation, which in turn causes one to binge even more on food. It was an unbreakable cycle for me and it stayed that way for many, many years.

I still have days where I feel some shame or guilt about being overweight, but thanks to some really good therapy and sites like Fierce Freethinking Fatties, it’s become much easier to see beyond my exterior and realize that I am indeed a unique and important individual with some pretty awesome talents and accomplishments, if I do say so myself. And you know what? Being a brick house ain’t all that bad… just ask the Commodores.

Laura, aka Cherry Blossom Kitty

Trigger warning: Talk of sports-related weight loss and eating disorders.

Timing may not be everything, but it’s important!

It is an auspicious coincidence that my date for posting this blog landed in between Weight Stigma Awareness Week (WSAW) and Love Your Body Day (October 16).  Additionally, the timing is fortuitous because October is that glorious time of year (for me at least) when I can watch baseball AND football! I love watching sports: football, baseball, basketball, soccer and even rugby. This time of year is like a Double Stuf Oreo^® (my favorite store bought cookie).

But all is not groovy in the clubhouse for me, and I need to just get this off my chest and see what you, the readers, sports fans or not, think about the fact that the world considers fat so fracking newsworthy?  That may seem odd considering that I write for a fat-focused website, but honestly, until the world just accepts that some people are fat and some people aren’t and that not all fat people are failures, it is important to write about when fat people do NOT conform to the biased stereotypes in our society.  And at the risk of putting myself out of a cause, I long for the day that FAT is NOT a NEWSWORTHY TOPIC.

Sound the alarm!

Okay, I’m getting a bit ahead of myself.  Let’s rewind the tape.

Because most sports somehow involve athletes, it is not unusual for issues of weight to creep into the arena and set off my weight stigma alarm. I am not talking about sports that are weight based like judo or boxing that have different categories for different weights. Those have their own long list of problems as athletes engage in disordered eating behaviors and drastic attempts to weigh in at the appropriate weight for their divisions.  Michelle Pittman, wrote a fantastic article about this for the ASDAH Blog, and it is well worth reading. What I am talking about is when an athlete makes the news primarily BECAUSE they are fat. I know this is not a new “news” phenomenon. There is even a slideshow dedicated to what most people perceive is an oxymoron: fat athletes. It’s called Best Out-of-Shape Athletes.

But this year it just seems to be more pervasive than usual! Perhaps it is because I live in Oakland, California. I am an A’s fan (that’s baseball for those of you non-sports fans). Across The Bay is another baseball team, the San Francisco Giants. You may have heard of them. They are much more famous than the A’s and usually draw more attention than the more “blue collar,” smaller-bankrolled A’s. But this season both teams are sharing something in common that has nothing to do with ERA, pitch counts, or RBI’s. This season both teams have star players who are *GASP* fat!!!! I will give you all a moment to compose yourselves from the shock that there can be a successful Major League FAThlete!

Is it a slow news season or what??

It has been a field day this season for the media at the expense of two players because of their weight.

Fathlete #1: Pablo Sandoval
Nickname:  Kung Fu Panda
A World Series MVP, born in Venezuela, 27 years old with his official weight being 240 pounds, Pablo Sandoval earns $8.2 million a year as the third baseman for the San Francisco Giants.

Pablo Sandoval knocking it out of the park.

Fathlete #2:  Bartolo Colon
Nickname:  Chubby Checker, or in the inner circles of baseball, Fatolo.
Born in the Dominican Republic, 40 years old with his official weight being 265 pounds, Bartolo Colon earns $3 million a year as a starting pitcher for the Oakland Athletics.

Bartolo Colon firing one into the batter’s box.

Both men have been outstanding in their field (yes, take a moment to picture the two men standing out in a field…I can’t help it…I have a thing for puns). If it weren’t for their size, I assume articles about them would be confined to their baseball stats. But because they are fatter than the average bear, we have been inundated with articles about their weight since spring training.  The articles have been so prolific, that because of the word limit of this post I had to pick out a mere fraction of the publicity being generated by the reporters, commentators, and pundits who clearly feel compelled to handle this subject of excessive love handles.

The media have a penchant for this, especially when the love handles are attached to famous people. And sports writers are no exception, as they blew the subject up to Olympic-sized proportions in ways that were infused with fat prejudice and false assumptions.

Example #1: In April 2013, Jason Turbow in an article for the New York Times:

If Pablo Sandoval hits a home run for every pound between his listed 240 and his actual weight, he may end up as the National League’s most valuable player. From the standpoint of body mass and natural ability, it is not such an outlandish proposition. So even if Sandoval’s build seems to garner as much attention as his bat — even if he looks bigger than ever — the man nicknamed Kung Fu Panda seems content with the way things are shaping up.

WOW! You mean you still have to mention his weight even though he is playing well? You can’t just treat him like every other third baseman having a good season? Could you imagine a news headline like this?

Despite his gigantic retro Afro, Coco Crisp is having an amazing season! How does a guy with hair like that play so well?

According to the Times article, Sandoval made the statement, “I’m at the weight that I feel great to play at.  If you feel good, you’re going to play good. And I feel great.”

And his performance was great!  So why, despite an amazing batting average last year and an impressive start to the 2013 season, does Turbow still need to make this statement in his article:

All of which leads to a question: how does a guy who looks so overstuffed do what Sandoval does at the plate and in the field?

Of course, I forgot! A fat man can’t be effective at any plate other than a dinner plate!!!

Time passed and the articles and radio sports shows continued to make a big deal about Sandoval’s weight. When he had an injury, the Giant’s staff was reported to say that even though his weight was not a cause of the injury, nor would it impede his recovery in any way, that they were making sure he worked on weight loss while he was on the DL (disabled list). Notice that the focus was not on making sure that Sandoval stayed in playing condition, it was on weight loss even though the disclaimer clearly states that his weight was not the cause of his injury or would get in the way of his recovery. Martin Telleria issued the dire warning: “San Francisco Giants: Weight of Pablo Sandoval Will Be His Demise.” Then there was Drew Silva’s article that really made my blood boil.

The world of sports is littered with sad stories of failure — failure that has come as a result of a myriad of issues. We’ve seen drugs rob athletes. On the other side of the spectrum, we’ve seen many promising athletes have their careers destroyed by injury. Somewhere in the middle, between destroying their own career through a destructive lifestyle (gambling, excessive spending, drugs) and failing through no fault of their own (injury), are the athletes who, while successful, have no hope of reaching their full potential because of their own personal choices. Pablo Sandoval, the third baseman for the San Francisco Giants, falls right into that category. Beloved by all in the Bay Area for his cheerful personality and love of the game, the man affectionately known as the “Kung Fu Panda” looks like just that: a panda — a big, out-of-shape one at that. It’s a reality every fan knows and has sadly accepted. His prowess with the bat and nimbleness for his size have always gotten him a pass. After all, if the man is producing, who are we to say anything?

That’s correct. Who are they to say anything??? EXCEPT THEY DID!!! EVERYONE DID. And if you read through the Sandoval articles, they are like reading about a stock I once owned. Sandoval’s weight is UP! Sandoval’s weight is down. Sandoval has regained all of his losses. He was put on program after program, weight loss regimes and intensive workout schedules and yet, he never maintained the weight loss. Hmmmm, this sounds a bit like yo-yo dieting to me. And we know how well that works! More recently in an article by Andrew Baggarly, we learn that Sandoval has now “revealed that he’s dropped 22 pounds in six weeks, and he has his oldest brother, Luis, to thank for it. Luis Sandoval recently graduated from a culinary school in Miami and is under his little brother’s full-time employment as his personal chef.”

So when he is successful in weight loss, all the credit goes to his brother, but when he fails it’s all his fault.

Dr. Deah’s disclaimer

I am not a medical doctor and I am not an expert in sports physiology. And granted, a third baseman needs to be able to run quickly in order to make some crucial plays. And let’s just agree for a moment that he is better at executing those types of plays when he is thinner. I still have a problem with the FAT BASHING attached to Sandoval’s weight. And while not all fat people have eating disorders, most people who have an eating disorder started off by dieting to lose weight. The pressure on Sandoval to lose weight using restrictive dieting techniques may have resulted in his extreme weight fluctuations, which in turn can impact his fitness levels and efficacy on the field.

If Sandoval does have an eating disorder, then he should receive the same level of support and empathy that Aldon Smith (a football player for the SF 49ers) just received for his drug problem. He was not ostracized or berated in the news; he was offered sympathy and the Niners sent him to rehab in an effort to rescue him from being another casualty as per Silva’s Category 1.  And that’s awesome for Aldon, but the double standard enrages me.  Especially considering that if Sandoval’s weight does impact his performance on the field, why is it that the reporters don’t take any responsibility for making a difficult situation worse?  Let’s suppose that Sandoval has an eating disorder, how is anyone helping him by encouraging the very behaviors that may have caused the eating disorder in the first place? Error! Foul! Red card! Any way you look at it, it’s wrong.

As for Bartolo Colon, perhaps it is because he is a lowly Oakland A, or perhaps it is because he is a pitcher and doesn’t need to execute the same physical level of speed and coordination, but there are less overtly negative articles about Colon’s weight. Along with the articles that do mention his weight, the authors include sophomoric bully-like name-calling (e.g., Chubby and Fatolo Colon).

Colon is the 40-year-old ace of the Oakland Athletics, the only All-Star on the team leading the American League West. Few players are older or seemingly in worse shape than Colon, who is 5 feet 11 inches and every bit of his listed weight of 267 pounds.

He seems to command a more mixed pitch count:

When Bartolo Colon sits down to the dinner table, he takes no prisoners — and leaves no scraps. He owns the plate when he steps on the mound, too. Baseball’s most consistent winner since the late 1990s, he has been devouring big-league hitters for nearly a decade, and now has a Cy Young award to show for it. Mocked for his Ruthian waistline but hailed for his Gibson-like stuff, Bartolo has baseball fans and experts asking, “Would you rather have a skinny guy spooning up fat pitches, or a fat guy slicing the corner with 97-mph fastballs?” This is his story.

Or this one by Larry Brown Sports:

If you’re a long-time LBS reader, you know that we have no problem with fat baseball players. In fact, most of the time the media complains about players being fat they are complaining about ones who are highly productive. Fat pitchers even started to become a trend at one point. C.C. Sabathia, arguably the best pitcher in the American League, is always being questioned for his weight. However, let’s not take our viewpoint to mean we don’t find it funny.  When a player has gotten as fat as Bartolo Colon over the years and is still playing baseball, you have to laugh.

Is that a curve ball or WHAT??

I guess that as long as there still seems to be an obsession to focus on weight instead of fitness and the prevailing belief that a fathlete is an oddity that needs to be paraded around as either an exception to the rule or proving the rule, we will continue to be inundated with these kinds of meaningless stories that do nothing to help the player. In the meantime, it is important to bash stereotypes out of the ballpark with the kinds of articles found on this and other Fat/Size Acceptance websites. But underneath it all is my enduring, impatient question…

Can’t we just PLAY BALL?????

Trigger warning: Discussion of self-injury, mental illness, eating disorders and weight loss.

This is the third post by CherryBlossomKitty, who is our latest blogging candidate. Tomorrow we will vote on her inclusion.

I’ve spent a great deal of my life hating myself. We’re not talking run-of-the-mill self-deprecation here — we’re talking outright hatred and disgust toward myself, the way someone might feel about a piece of random trash. We’re talking beating myself up mentally with endless rivers of abusive self-talk. We’re talking physically harming myself with various sharp instruments, resulting in permanent scars, because I felt I deserved to be punished for who and what I am.

Yes, there have been many times where I felt I’d be “better off dead,” as they say. Yet for some reason, I keep going. And it’s taken me the better part of 40 years to figure out what that reason is. It’s also taken that long to come to the conclusion that I was, indeed, meant to be fat.

Let me explain: The primary reason I weigh as much as I do is because of mental illness.I have been diagnosed with bipolar II disorder, borderline personality disorder, and generalized anxiety disorder. I’ve also had a couple of eating disorders as well. That’s a lot of disorders. And when you have a lot of disorders, you have to take a lot of medication. Anyone who’s had any experience with psychoactive medication knows all too well that weight gain is a side effect that usually cannot be avoided. Log into any discussion board on mental illness or psychiatric medications, and the one question people ask the most is, “How can I avoid weight gain with [x] medication?” Needless to say, the medications that I took over the years caused me to pack on a lot of poundage through no fault of my own.

Many people have told me, “Well that’s just an excuse! If you diet and exercise, you won’t be fat!” And to that I say, here… you take these pills for a while and gain 100 pounds, despite dieting to the point of starvation and exercising until you puke every day. You try it. It’s not so easy, is it?

I am a healthy person. My blood sugar, cholesterol, thyroid levels, blood pressure, and everything else are all completely normal. I eat as healthy as I possibly can and get plenty of exercise. And yet, my body remains fat. Go figure.

A while ago, I was able to go off of all but one of the medications I had been taking. My first thought upon achieving this goal, of course, was “Great! Now I’ll finally be able to lose some weight!” And I did lose weight… five whole pounds, and nothing more. After all that hating myself for needing to take meds that made me fat, it turned out that it might not have been the meds’ fault entirely. My body obviously liked the weight I had on me and decided to keep it.

So what is my body telling me? If you recall in part one of my story, I mentioned the fact that being large ran in my family. See where I’m going here? There’s so much more to one’s body composition than just diet and exercise.

Oh sure, I could increase my exercise. I could spend six hours a day at the gym and become totally ripped. I could cut out carbs and processed foods and go Paleo or whatever they call it these days. I might get thinner. But you know what? Being thinner won’t change all the other problems I have. Being thinner won’t make me more money. Being thinner won’t make me a better mom. Being thinner won’t magically take away my mental illness. Being thinner won’t make me any better of a person than I already am.

That’s the reason I keep going. I know deep down that what’s on the outside does not reflect what’s on the inside. And what’s on the inside of me — as chemically imbalanced as it can be at times — isn’t too shabby. Just ask my son, my boyfriend, my family, my friends… everyone who thinks I’m pretty great. Heck, you could even ask me, because after 40 years, I’ve finally discovered that I am a unique, talented, caring human with a lot to offer. And if someone else can’t see that, then it’s their loss, not mine.

The moral of the story here is when you learn to stop worrying about your body, when you learn to take all that energy once directed at hating yourself and instead use it for something constructive, you’ll be astounded at the number of doors you open up for yourself. When you learn to stop fretting about what “society” says you need to look like, and instead focus on your own unique beauty inside and out, you can concentrate on what you need to do to give yourself the best life possible.

And that, my friends, is what it’s all about.

Laura, a.k.a. CherryBlossomKitty

I don’t really dress up for Halloween, although I’ve long harbored a fantasy of thrift-shopping my way to the perfect Harpo Marx costume.

Peanuuuuuuuuuuuuuuts to you.

This year, however, I decided that I want to get into the Halloween spirit and don a costume that is utterly terrifying. But there are so many great options that I’m having a hard time deciding. So, I am turning to you, our faithful readers, to help me whittle down my choices some.

First up, there’s the classic Killer Clown costume.

I’m still working through my issues with It.

Regular clowns are scary enough, but when clowns turn bad, it’s shit-yourself scary.

Next up, Evil Leprechaun.

I’ve come for your soul… er, gold.

Given my proud Irish heritage, this is a great way to both honor my ancestors and frighten the neighbors as I peek through their windows, cackling.

Of course, you can never go wrong with Body Armor Made of Creepy Baby Dolls.

Only problem is I would HAVE to shave my head and face
in order to pull it off.

Can you imagine seeing this thing stomping down the street? I would immediately curl up in the fetal position and weep uncontrollably.

But for my money, there’s one group of costumes that has never failed to frighten me: late-19th/early-20th century trick-or-treaters.

This is some good ol’ fashioned nightmare fuel.

Proving once again that handmade is clearly superior to store-bought, you can see even more of these ghastly turn-of-the-century costumes in these two great photo sets.

The most tempting costume, though, is my way of giving the finger to misogynistic assholes who think female cosplayers MUST be body doubles for the character they portray.

Who wants to be my Han Solo?

Obviously, I’m not nearly as tan as the model above, but I think I could pull it off.

Given the choice between these costumes, I’m finding it nearly impossible to pick the most morbid, most disturbing, most monstrous disguise. Thankfully, there’s a woman in Fargo, North Dakota who has come up with a costume that has already caused countless witnesses to scream in abject horror: Concern Troll Who Bullies Children. Check out this spooktacular shit:

A local woman stated her intentions to take childhood obesity into her own hands… She has decided to give a letter instead of candy to Halloween trick or treaters that she feels are “moderately obese.”

Granted, most of the screaming comes from the blind rage caused when someone is so heartless and cruel, but isn’t the reaction the most important aspect of the perfect Halloween costume?

This woman, Cheryl, is not speaking out against Halloween as the moral equivalent of panhandling (as the perennial editorial letter bemoans) or that candy is unhealthy for children in general. No, she’s zeroing in on fat kids who like candy. As she told the radio show host she called into, “I just want to send a message to the parents of kids that are really overweight.” Aaaaaaah, now I see… this isn’t even a message for the kids. It’s to their parents… a sort of passive aggressive Trojan horse that the parents will (hopefully) never be able to track down to Cheryl. She continued, “I think it’s just really irresponsible of parents to sort of send them out looking for free candy just ’cause all the other kids are doing it.”

Hear that parents? Keep your fat kids home on Halloween because it’s irresponsible for you to let them go trick or treating with their friends. Instead, let them stay home and pass out candy to the acceptable children who will be enjoying the night. And — BONUS — the shame they feel will probably motivate them to eat carrot sticks and start a walking plan so that next Halloween, they’ll make Cheryl proud! Either that, or they’ll develop body image issues and/or an eating disorder as their developing psychological systems try to understand and cope with why they’re excluded from the fun, a point driven home in the article by Dr. Katie Gordon, North Dakota State University assistant professor of clinical psychology.

As if you didn’t hate Cheryl enough, she continues, “I’m contributing to their health problems and really, their kids are, you know, everybody’s kids. It’s a whole village.” Listen, you prying, platitudinous puritan prick, my kids are not your kids, period. If you want to raise perfect, “normal” weight children by shaming them and banning them from Halloween festivities, then have your own fucked-up kids. If you want to make some kind of “moral stand,” how about you just not hand out candy at Halloween at all, instead of targeting kids who are already the group most vulnerable to bullies. They don’t need you throwing your hate fuel on the fire.

But Cheryl hasn’t really thought all this out, has she? Judging by the actual letter, I’d say no:

The ignorance is breath-taking. First of all, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the categories for a child’s weight is based on their height-weight percentile.

• Underweight — Less than the 5th percentile
• Healthy weight — 5th percentile to less than the 85th percentile
• Overweight — 85th to less than the 95th percentile
• Obese — Equal to or greater than the 95th percentile

What are the odds that Cheryl will be able to properly diagnose kids who are “moderately obese” based on a five-second analysis from her front porch? And is she aware that in 2007, an expert panel decided to revise the BMI categories for kids (as they did for adults in 1998)? Just six years ago the 85th to 95th percentile was called “at risk for overweight,” 95th to 97th was “overweight,” and over the 98th percentile was “obese.” As I explained in this post, “Overnight, the number of overweight children jumped from 15% of the population to over 30%, despite the fact that childhood obesity rates have remained stagnant since 1999.”

But let’s accept current BMI categories as accurate. What are the odds that Cheryl will be able to guesstimate whether a child falls into those categories? Well, bear in mind that schools where they actually weigh and measure students have pissed off parents over and over and over and over and over by sending home “fat letters” for kids who don’t even appear to be fat. But even if they only contacted parents of kids who are demonstrably fat, those letters would still be wrong. And we’re supposed to feel reassured that Cheryl will only be targeting those who, in her esteemed opinion, are part of the magical “moderately obese” category she made up?

Setting aside these categorical shenanigans, real pediatricians don’t even base their health assessments solely on a child’s BMI category. Any pediatrician who know what they’re talking about will be more concerned about the child’s growth trajectory, not their size. In this post, I shared an excerpt from an article on KidsHealth, a site run by Nemours, one of the largest nonprofit organizations devoted to children’s health:

What’s the Ideal Percentile for My Child?

There is no one ideal number. Healthy children come in all shapes and sizes, and a baby who is in the 5th percentile can be just as healthy as a baby who is in the 95th percentile.

Ideally, each child will follow along the same growth pattern over time, growing in height and gaining weight at the same rate, with the height and weight in proportion to one another. This means that usually a child stays on a certain percentile line on the growth curve. So if our 4-year-old boy on the 10th percentile line has always been on that line, he is continuing to grow along his pattern, which is a good sign.

Finally, it isn’t just fat kids who are getting metabolic disorders. As I analyzed in this post, 75% of heart disease in children is caused by smoking, 43% of pediatric hypertension cases are found in kids in less than the 90th percentile, and while 15% of adolescents with impaired fasting glucose are in the obese weight category, 9.5% were “normal” weight. And none other than the Pritikin Institute (along with Ornish, the Pritikin diet is frequently prescribed for those with heart disease) has warned people that solely focusing on overweight kids is highly problematic:

Sure, obesity contributes to these cardiovascular-related woes, but if we focus only on obesity, we’re missing the millions of thin children who are also at risk… Explains Dr. Robert Vogel, leading cardiologist and professor of medicine at the University of Maryland, “This study found correlates with obesity, but none were very strong, which is to say that a child can be perfectly thin and have awful risk factors.”

The fact is, there is nothing more terrifying than people like Cheryl who, spurred on by zealous media coverage and an over-inflated sense of self-importance, attempt to play doctor to other people based on a front-porch diagnosis of who is and is not healthy. If Cheryl actually cared about the health of children, she would take their mental health into consideration and perhaps demonstrate empathy by imagining what it would be like if you were a child receiving that letter instead of candy.

I have two daughters, Linny (7) and Lottie (4). Linny has always been thin and wiry, while Lottie has always been soft around the edges, despite both of them eating the same diet and being equally active. This year, Linny will be a vampire and Lottie will be a black kitten. Were they to knock on Cheryl’s door and earnestly cry out “Trick or treat,” Linny would be permitted to grab some chocolate bars from the bowl, but Cheryl would pull that bowl back from Lottie and, instead, hand her this letter that tells her she’s too fat for Halloween.

Question: What kind of monster would do such a thing?

Answer: The kind of soulless monster that would make for the perfect bone-chilling, hair-raising, heart-stopping costume this Halloween!

Beware the Concern Troll!!!

Trigger warning: Discussion of how doctors treat fat  and eating disorder patients, including weight loss advice.

I’ve written here before about the ever-increasing number of studies showing just how biased healthcare professionals are against fat people and why that’s a major problem (apart from the obvious reasons, of course). Since then, a bunch of new studies have come out just adding to the list of people who hate us. There have been two in the last few weeks and I’d like to talk about them here. They were both published by the team at the Yale Rudd Center, which for all its faults, is the source of a huge proportion of the weight stigma research being done at the moment.

The first of the two studies looked at anti-fat stereotypes and biases in professionals specialising in treating eating disorders, including psychologists, therapists, social workers, dieticians, doctors, nurses, paediatricians, and a few other types of medical professionals. This was an anonymous online study that recruited participants through websites and mailing lists of major US Eating Disorder organisations and charities.

Despite the anonymity, there did appear to be some “social desirability” responding (e.g., answering to make themselves sound better (or less bad)). An overwhelming 94% of medical professionals thought treating obese patients with compassion and respect was important (one has to wonder about the other 6%!). Furthermore, 72% said that treating obese patients was professionally rewarding. Most reported feeling confident (88%) and professionally prepared (84%) to provide quality care to obese clients.

Despite this, 56% had personally heard or witnessed colleagues making negative comments about obese patients, 42% felt that ED-treating professionals had negative attitudes towards obese people generally, 35% thought practitioners were uncomfortable treating obese patients, and 29% reported that their colleagues had negative opinions about fat patients. The famous study where over 90% of people considered themselves to be “above average” drivers springs to mind here.

Their own responses to questionnaires about attitudes towards obese people showed moderate levels of anti-fat bias, although slightly lower than that seen in other professions. I particularly like the fact that on one of the stereotype questions, 50% of respondents felt that obese people were “insecure.” Gee, I wonder why. 55% thought that they overate, 38% that they were inactive, and 24% that they were unattractive. One-third said fat people had poor self-control. Generally, professionals with higher BMI themselves, or who had been working in the field for longer, were less likely to attribute obesity to behavioural factors, and had slightly lower fat-phobia scores.

I find it interesting that so many felt professionally equipped to “treat” obese clients. It is not clear from the write-up of this study whether this was in terms of treating EDs in obese patients or if they were talking about helping with weight loss. Most of the questions and responses sound more consistent with the latter, including only half believing that obese people could be successful in making behaviour change and half again believing that patients were motivated to change their diets. A whopping two-thirds did not believe obese patients were compliant with treatment recommendations, and only 24% were confident that obese people could maintain weight loss (which is actually quite high, given the evidence!). It’s also worth noting (though not entirely unsurprisingly) that higher anti-fat bias was associated with more pessimism about treatment outcomes.

Let’s forget for a moment that “treatment” means weight-loss and this is almost definitely a damaging “intervention” that shouldn’t be undertaken in the first place. What’s important is that these people think that this treatment approach is good and right, but the more they dislike fat people, the less likely they are to think that they’re going to get anywhere with their clients. Now this raises the chicken and egg question: is it failed treatment experiences (the most likely outcome when it comes to weight loss attempts) that’s driving the anti-fat bias or is it just that the disdain for fat people and the buy-in to all of the negative stereotypes that make people less likely to predict treatment success? It’s known that negative expectations are generally linked to poorer outcomes. So if it’s the latter, the implications for other treatments, ones that are actually helpful and that might otherwise work, are very serious. The next study down helps to answer this question, but there’s one more thing I want to talk about before we move on.

One of the most  interesting things about this piece of research is that it had an almost unprecedented drop-out rate for an online study, which the authors talk about in more detail. It is usual to be a little vague when inviting people to participate in a survey because you don’t only want people to respond who already have strong feelings in that particular area, which would skew the findings. This study was advertised as a study of professionals and practitioners treating eating disorders. They followed a link to the study website where they read more about the study and agreed to participate. 522 participants started the survey, but only 371 finished it. There was around a 10% drop out when participants were asked for information about themselves (completely anonymous, remember), the first being gender (about 8% drop out), and then height and weight (another 6% or so dropped out). Questions about what kinds of patients they treat were fine (so the drop-out can’t be put down to professionals who treat EDs (anorexia, bulimia, BED, etc.) but don’t “treat” obesity, but when the first questions asking about their beliefs in fat stereotypes came up, another 10% decided they didn’t want to continue. A few more dropped out at each set of stigma questions thereafter, in particular, when asked about their opinions of their obese clients (right at the end), giving a final drop out of 39%. It is possible that people with more stigmatising beliefs may have dropped out to avoid answering these questions, meaning that the final results under-report weight stigma in this group of professionals, but given the anonymous nature of the study, it’s still a little odd.

Finally, it’s well known that weight stigma in healthcare providers can affect treatment outcome of all conditions, may be damaging in its own right, and can have knock-on effects with respect to healthcare avoidance. In terms of eating disorder professionals, though, fear of fat may have an additional negative impact on safe, effective treatment for individuals with both high weight (you binge eat, but you’re still fat, so here’s a weight-loss diet) and low-weight EDs (I mean, anorexia is bad and all, but we wouldn’t want them to get FAT!!!). All in all, none of this is good.

The second study used similar methods, including anonymity, but contacted a small sample of postgraduate trainee healthcare professionals. The 107 participants were working toward qualifying as physician associates or clinical psychologists or medics undertaking their psychiatric residency. As usual, there were some very worrying statistics here. Half of the sample agreed that their peers had negative attitudes towards obese patients. Most had heard fellow students (63%), professors or instructors (40%), and other healthcare providers (65%) making derogatory jokes about fat people. Of course, only 3% agreed that it was ok to make fat jokes. And even fewer than believed that fatness was due to people’s own negligence and this made them deserving of such treatment. It’s funny how nobody thinks it’s ok, but everybody does it. Again, perceptions of motivation and “compliance” in obese “patients” was generally not good, and just a quarter felt treating them was professionally rewarding or that counselling or working with them was enjoyable. Yet only 13% admitted to actually disliking interacting with their fat patients.

What I found particularly interesting, though, is that the researchers looked at what factors (age, gender, ethnicity, BMI, self-esteem, their own body weight or shape issues, and anti-fat bias) were strongly associated with their expectations of treatment compliance or success. The only one that mattered (statistically speaking) was anti-fat bias. The greater the dislike, the lower expectations. Given that these are people who are not yet fully qualified and are likely to have had only a small amount of exposure to these situations, this goes some way to answering the chicken and egg question. The relationship between distaste and pessimism isn’t a result of years of failed treatment; it seems to be there at the outset.

There’s a theory that connects anti-fat bias with blame. If people think that fat people are fat through either personal character failings or just lack of self-respect, or both, then they will have a lower opinion of them. There’s certainly evidence from the stigma literature (and not just for weight stigma) that this moralistic relationship holds true. And this study found the same thing. Of all those factors tested (age, gender, yadda yadda yadda), compared with beliefs about how and why people get fat, none of them were associated with beliefs about a biological cause or a psychological cause, but anti-fat bias was strongly linked with believing it was because of behaviours, basically, greed and laziness.

Now, this might sound promising. Perhaps if we expand healthcare education to include more information about the complex causality of obesity (to include genes and environment, usually —why does nobody talk about how dieting makes you fat?!), then this would offset the moral judgment and reduce bias. So a bunch of researchers have tried it. There are a few examples in this review and a few more published since. They’ve used different methods: videos, lectures, all sorts, and they’ve all found the same thing: these interventions are very successful about changing beliefs. The students who receive the training generally have a much better understanding of obesity than those who don’t.

Unfortunately, though, they still don’t like fat people.

It seems, the theoretically understandable excuse that people’s distaste is simply a judgment on a perceived lack of personal responsibility in a society that values this trait is just that: an excuse. The apologists’ rationalisation of society’s sanctioned prejudice against fatties.

Trigger warning: Discussion of personal weight loss experience.

It turns out I have some corrections to make. For instance, it turns out I was wrong when I said it was unlikely I’d cross paths with Maria Kang. Her story exploded on my news feeds and, for the most part, it was the same photo with a headline to the extent of, “Is this woman a jerk?” One of the articles included a photo that made me think there was more to the story. So let me reintroduce you to Maria Kang:

Once again, she’s in activewear with her children, commenting on fitness. Only this one is a personal statement rather than a challenge. In my book, it puts doubt on the assertion that she’s a fat-shaming jerk.

One of the big challenges with the internet is that it’s a limited form of communication. You typically don’t get tone of voice or facial expressions to aid in context. Some forms of internet communication set a character limit and still photos don’t lend themselves to two-way interactions. What seems innocent to you can be a landmine to everyone else. Or maybe she is just a fat-shaming jerk. So I thought I’d reach out to her to find out.

I’ll call it a roving interview. She was on her way to another interview and I was on my lunch break. The connection wasn’t the greatest, so instead of a transcript, I was more focused on hearing correctly and scribbling notes. First of all, she was quite literally minding her business in the original photo as it ties in to her No Excuse Program. The link is neither an endorsement nor an agreement. You’re welcome to go there and form your own opinion, or not. She said she posed the question as a conversation starter, but it’s difficult to dialogue with a still photo. Personally, I’m more receptive to conversing with the message in the second photo.

In one of her blog entries, Kang wrote, “In no way am I stating others should look like me — in a world with over 7 billion people, that would be an outrageous statement to make.” What I took away from my time with her is that I didn’t detect malice so much as miscommunication. That’s not to say we agree 100%, but I do believe there is common ground.

For instance, her turning point reminds me a lot of Regan Chastain’s. They both decided it was time to stop hating their bodies and love them for the things they could do. In Maria’s case, it was her ability to have and nurture children. One of the interpretations she gave to her question was, “What’s your excuse for not prioritizing yourself?” Again, something many of us can agree on. It’s really easy to get sucked down into family, work, or any other number of activities that leads us to forget about looking after our own well-being. Though if you’re like me, you’re unlikely to consider that context on first glance. My initial contextual interpretation was “Leave me alone!”

She’d been accused of being a shallow person, a bad mother, being unChristian, and having an ugly inside.  How many of us have been on the receiving end of snap judgments for our appearances?  Exactly what does a good parent look like if they’re not a fitness model or a fat person? Ever had someone decide you’re lazy from a still photo? It’s my belief that thin shaming isn’t necessary for Fat Acceptance. Extending out to Body Acceptance, I’d rather judge the individual inhabiting the body than the body itself.

During our conversation she had mentioned that high BMI can be healthy. Now, obviously that doesn’t sell as well as calories in/calories out and I wish she was more vocal about that elsewhere. However, we both agree on the importance of looking after yourself at any size. That means eating the right foods for you, getting the movement that you enjoy, and generally caring enough about yourself to make those a priority instead of an afterthought.  Who here wouldn’t make themselves thin if they could will themselves that way?

Unfortunately, it takes more than sheer force of will. I remember being a Weight Watchers member for nearly a year, obsessively measuring food, counting points, and nearly going into a panic if I had to eat a meal without knowing its point value. I would plan exercise around the points I wanted to eat in order to create the biggest point deficit I could. The first week, I lost five pounds. The second week I lost three pounds. The next 50 weeks I gained and lost between one and two pounds. My loss “curve” was a flat line and this is why I take objection to the assertion that all it takes is discipline and willpower to lose weight. I was disciplining myself into disorder and none of it made me healthier.

Health started to happen when I found a doctor who could think outside the box to diagnose me instead of writing me off as crazy, telling me to lose weight, or running the standard tests and telling me everything was fine. Health came when I could keep food around long enough for it to do its job and nourish instead of torture. Health includes having the energy to exercise; call it excuses, call it an acceptable excuse, or call it a human experience. Why didn’t I prioritize my health? I didn’t like wasting money to be told I’m a liar. In short, we agree on the destination even if we don’t agree on the route.

The now-infamous story about a woman, known only as “Cheryl” in Fargo, North Dakota, who said she would be handing out letters to parents of fat children trick-or-treating refusing them candy may actually be a hoax, perpetrated by a Fargo-based radio station called Y94. But even if this does turn out to be a hoax, the fact remains that there are “Cheryls” who are more than willing to shame fat children in the name of “health,” and quite a bit of that shame comes from our own public school system.

Schools in Florida, California and Massachusetts have sent home letters to parents telling them their child’s BMI is too high and that they are overweight. These are 3 out of 21 states that require BMI screenings at the beginning of the school year for students in certain grades. The National Eating Disorder Association has criticized the practice, saying it can potentially trigger an eating disorder. Due to parental concern over bullying, Massachusetts decided to no longer send these “fat letters” home to parents, instead giving parents the option to choose whether or not to see the information.

Should it be a school’s place to monitor the weight of its students? The obvious answer is of course not. Education should be the top priority. But in the fervor over childhood obesity, the pressure is on for communities and industries involved the welfare of children to “do something” about trying to make those who are fat slim at any cost, even if it means resorting to scare tactics and body shame. Add in Michelle Obama’s crusade with her Let’s Move campaign, and the panic is even higher.

There are ways to advocate for children’s health that don’t involve targeting weight. For instance, focus on physical activity (allowing for disabilities) and good nutrition (without mentioning calories and dieting) for ALL kids, not just those that are fat. As we’ve seen in the reaction to these “fat letters,” both real and possibly fake, there are people out there who are tired of the pearl-clutching rhetoric and don’t want health to be a code word for thin.

Coming in 2014.

Trigger warning: Maria Kang is still an asshole.

The last month or so I’ve been completely immersed in writing the sequel to my novel Viral Nation. It’s called Rebel Nation, and it was the hardest, scariest story I’ve ever told. I dug deeper for this one than I ever have before. I had the added pressures of having already sold it, a publisher that’s expecting it on deadline, and people I don’t know waiting for it.

A few days ago I looked up from my self-imposed sequester, and saw that my Facebook feed was full of stories and comments about a woman named Maria Kang who was banned from Facebook for a few hours for posting comments about fat people that Facebook recognized as hate speech.

I have a couple of things to say about this.

First — Way to almost be supportive Facebook. Apparently they retracted their ban within a day with a “Whoops, our bad.”

Second — Kang is so wrong on so many levels. Bronwen and Gingeroid have already written about this, so I don’t want to repeat what’s been said. I’m just so offended at the idea that anyone thinks they get to decide when it’s okay for me to love my body.

This is what I look like. This is who I am. I’m not going to hide to make you comfortable. I’m not going to stop loving myself because you’re afraid that might lead to some wild epidemic of fatty self-love — and then where will it stop? WHERE WILL IT STOP?

Will fat people start thinking they have the right to walk around without being  made fun of?

Will the fatties start to demand respect from the world at large?

Will they stop spending boatloads of money on ineffective weight loss products, diet books, and dangerous surgeries?

Maria Kang, listen. We all come in different shapes and sizes. There isn’t a product or a surgery or a level of willpower out there that will make me not be a 42-year-old, 5’9″ woman with a large build. Nothing will make me tiny. Posting a picture of yourself — ten years younger than me with a completely different body type, and asking me what my excuse is — that’s just silly. You say you’re concerned about my health. You’re concerned that being exposed to a normalization of my body type will lead to — well, God knows what kind of world destruction.

Know what might have helped my health, since you claim that’s what you’re so concerned about?

Not spending 20-plus years buying into the idea that there is something fundamentally wrong with me. Not hating myself. Not ruining my metabolism with diet after diet after diet. Not developing disordered eating patterns. Not being afraid to be active and athletic once I stopped looking like an athlete.

“We need to change this strange mentality we are breeding in the U.S. and start celebrating people who are a result of hard work, dedication and discipline.” Really Maria Kang? Do you really think you can know anything about my work ethic, my dedication, my discipline, simply by looking at a photograph of me? How about my health, while we’re at it?

Women who look like you are the center of the universe, Maria Kang. Does Body Acceptance really threaten you that much? Do you think that in our society there is even a single woman who looks like you who will read a blog like this and say “Eh, fuck it” and stopped doing their crunches and eating their paleo meals, or whatever it is that hard work, dedication, and discipline looks like to you?

I’m going to love myself and continue to do everything I can to take care of myself — emotionally, as well as physically.

If that bothers you, Maria Kang, or anyone else, that’s not my problem.

Note: I received review copies of all three books I review today.

So, our blogging team discussed doing another 12 Days of Fatmas celebration like we did last year, but we only came up with 8 of 12 gift ideas, so some of our ideas will be popping up between now and the Winter Solstice to help you find the perfect gift for the fatty in your life.

I have been sitting on three books that I’m excited to share with you all that I think will make great gifts this holiday season. These books by fatties, for fatties and/or about fatties, and all three would make an excellent addition to your libraries and lives.

Viral Nation

First and foremost, the dystopian novel by our very own Fierce Fatty, Shaunta Grimes. This isn’t Shaunta’s first fiction book, but it is her first to catch the attention of a big publishing house, Berkley Trade. Viral Nation (available on paperback and Kindle) follows the lives of the Donovan family after a devastating virus wipes out the global population. The story begins as James Donovan watches his young son, West, and his wife, Jane, writhe in pain from the developing sores. With little hope, James resigns himself to the mercy killing he must perform in order to save his newborn daughter, Clover.

Shortly after injecting his wife with the syringe that takes her life, a visitor informs James that a suppressant has been discovered. Although West survives, he will be just as scarred physically as James is emotionally and psychologically.

Fast forward 16 years later. James is an executioner for The Company, which developed the suppressant. As a result, he lives apart from his children, West and Clover, who occupy the family home in the walled-off city of Reno, Nevada by themselves. West has practically raised Clover himself, even going so far as to turn down his chance to attend the prestigious Academy, where he would be trained to join The Company.

But this story revolves largely around Clover, an autistic young woman whose most faithful companion beside her brother is Mango the dog, who is trained to help Clover maintain her composure when her autism interrupts life. Clover prepares to attend the Academy, but problems with asshole classmates results in her being kept out of the Academy. Instead, Clover is put on the fast-track to becoming a Time Mariner.

At the bottom of Lake Tahoe, a man named Ned Waverly discovers a time portal that sends him two years into the future, when the suppressant has already been discovered. As a result, Waverly brings the suppressant back two years and saves countless lives in the process. Now, Time Mariners use the portal to retrieve messages from the future to aid in rebuilding the past, but also to prevent crimes before they happen.

With the help of the portal, The Company is able to issue warrants for crimes that have yet to occur, allowing them to execute murderers before they’ve had a chance to kill. The citizens of Reno, including Clover, appreciate the impact this has on violent crime in the city, until one day she finds out that her brother West is going to be implicated in a murder in the near future.

As Clover navigates her role as a Time Mariner, she must try to save her brother from his impending execution. Along the way, she discovers there are more secrets that The Company is hiding from the citizens of Reno, and the more Clover learns, the more she begins to embrace the calls for revolution from a group known as the Freaks.

Viral Nation is a gripping thriller that drags you from revelation to revelation, all the while seeing the world through the eyes of someone with autism. Aside from the engrossing storyline, I was engrossed by Clover’s perspective. Autism is a huge subject of interest these days, but Grimes (whose son is autistic) shines a light on this subject in a way that advocates for understanding of a complicated psychological and biological issue.

And then there are the questions Grimes raises. What is justice? What is security? What is fairness? As Clover slowly transforms from cog in the machine to a monkey wrench in the works, she reveals the lengths to which some will go to establish and maintain their power. She also meets the true victims of The Company’s plan for peace and order within the city walls, both in Reno and the remaining cities that it controls.

You’ll fall in love with Clover immediately and enjoy the complex relationship she has with her brother, and pretty much everyone else she comes in contact with. The unwinding plot will seize your imagination and keep you reading each heart-pounding chapter until the end, when we’re left holding our breath for Clover and the Freaks. This is a great novel that will someday make a great movie, I’m sure. A must-read for young adults and beyond.

Fatropolis: A Novel

One of my favorite conventions in the superhero genre is the Bizarro World, where all the good guys are bad guys and vice versa. In Bizarro World, Superman hates people and has a wicked goatee, while Lex Luthor is a selfless humanitarian defending the world from the Man of Evil Steel.

An interesting thought experiment is to imagine what this world would be like if roles were reversed and thin people had spent the past half century enduring body shaming and unhealthy diet plans, while fat people were celebrated in every conceivable media outlet and their bodies were held up as the paragon of health and virtue.

In Tracey Thompson’s debut novel, Fatropolis, (available on paperback and Kindle) Jenny Crandall stumbles through a mysterious portal in a changing room wall that leads her to this exact Bizarro World where fatties reign supreme and skinnies are disgusting pariahs.

This is not to say that Body Acceptance is about reversing roles any more than feminism is about reversing the power roles for men. But sometimes it takes a change of perspective to see the harm that privilege and power has over the spoiled identities it affects.

Through the lens of a stranger in a strange land, Jenny navigates a world of fat actors and actresses, fat crooners, fat fashion and fat celebrations. While she feels ostracized and lonely in our world, enduring the negative attention of coworkers who cluck their tongues at her plate, Jenny finds acceptance in a world where being thin is cause for shame and self-consciousness.

I often hear thin people criticize Fat Acceptance for not pointing out that thin people are often told to “eat up” but Fatropolis shows what it would be like if that kind of body shaming took place with the frequency, intensity and moral righteousness that fat people currently face. Although thin people may hear “eat a sandwich” from a nosy relative, there aren’t entire stores dedicated to fattening up thin people and thin people aren’t urged to change their bodies to suit an ideal. In Fatropolis, they are.

There’s also the issue of accommodations, where Jenny is accustomed to a dearth of plus-sized clothing options, Fatropolis provides access to fashions she would never find in the “real world.” The same with cars that are just right for a broad behind and booths at restaurants that don’t crush her midriff. Of course, that means that the thin inhabitants of Fatropolis are less comfortable and have less options, making life more difficult for them.

In this environment, Jenny’s self-confidence blooms and, finally able to feel comfortable in her own skin, she begins to accept herself. This is the best part of the novel, in my opinion: watching Jenny change from self-loathing to self-loving during her stay in Fatropolis. It’s a transformation similar to that experienced when someone finds the Fat Acceptance movement, but faster, given the accepting world in which she suddenly finds herself.

During her stay, Jenny meets and falls in love with Argus, a thin man who has spent his whole life trying to “fatten up.” Jenny finds herself in an unusual situation as she explains to Argus how thin and fat people are treated in her world. For once, Jenny is the one explaining the importance of self-acceptance and being kind to yourself.

While in Fatropolis, Jenny stumbles upon a bakery that doubles as a boarding house run by the warm and kind Irish lass, Dotty. As Jenny befriends the other boarders and explores Fatropolis, she must make a choice whether to stay in this world of acceptance and tolerance, or return to the “real world” with its perpetual shaming and discomfort. She also discovers that Dotty may know more about Jenny’s world than she first lets on.

Fatropolis delves into a fantasy where fat people have no need for “Fat Acceptance” because they are already accepted as they are. Thompson weaves a fun, thoughtful tale that puts our own struggle for acceptance into stark relief. It’s great escapism for those who may feel overwhelmed by the judgements and insults we must endure on a daily basis and I highly recommend it.

Healthy Bodies: Teaching Kids What They Need to Know

Although this is a work of nonfiction, I can’t recommend Healthy Bodies (available in paperback) enough. Author Kathy Kater is a Clinical Social Work/Therapist with over 25 years of helping adolescents and adults overcome their struggles with body image, eating, fitness and weight concerns. She’s also a vigorous proponent of Health at Every Size^®  (HAES) and has developed a curriculum aimed at middle school-aged kids.

Right now, the War on Fat means that schools are focusing on making their heavier students lighter. Period. End of story.

Kater takes aim at the subject of weight and goes right to the root of the problem: our culture.

First published in conjunction with the National Eating Disorder Association in 1998, this third edition helps young adults understand the harms of weight stigma, eating disorders and the media’s obsession with thinness. Healthy Bodies is full of detailed and deeply sourced information for teachers to understand the subjects Kater explores, then follows it up with interesting, engaging teaching plans and materials that will help kids learn the importance of self-acceptance AND self-care.

There is no shaming in this book, only an emphasis on how eating a healthy diet and getting plenty of exercise is healthy for ALL kids, not just the ones we’ve decided need a special intervention. But even more important than this message is the way Kater teaches kids about the unrealistic expectations that saturate our media. Now, more than ever, our kids should be taught media literacy and to recognize negative messages so that they don’t internalize superficial, unhealthy ideals.

Our kids are already media savvy and they’re exposed to so many influences that they need to be having the conversations that Kater will spark with the stories and discussion topics she has developed through her education and experience surrounding the complex world of adolescent physical and mental health.

Healthy Bodies is an excellent companion piece to Ellyn Satter’s Your Child’s Weight: Helping Without Harming (which I reviewed a few years back here), and it would make an excellent gift for the teacher in your life or for any parent who is concerned about the way their school is handling this issue. It’s comprehensive, informative and highly persuasive.

Trigger warning: This post is all about weight loss research and the unhealthy lifestyle changes that weight loss gurus promote.

One thing I’ve always found amusing is how in order to be deemed an expert on weight loss (like Maria Kang), you must simply do one thing: lose weight. If you lose 100 pounds and have the entrepreneurial spirit, you can open up shop on the internet and start dispensing advice like you’re Lucy from Peanuts.

That’s what the Capitalism is all about, right? If you’ve got the chops, you can make a living by offering goods or services that the public wants or needs. That’s all well and good, but what irritates me is that the fact that these self-ordained experts are assumed to be telling the truth about their lifestyle, regardless of the gaping holes in their story. Setting aside the fact that Kang promotes the idea that a 1,400-calorie diet is a both healthy and a sustainable lifestyle choice, I pointed out that Kang’s claim that she’s a working mom, just like you, is bullshit. But this kind of criticism goes ignored when the mainstream press gives coverage to weight loss gurus.

You may recall about three years back the media went ballistic when Redbook magazine featured an article and photo of Jillian Michaels as a fat teenager, saying that at her heaviest she was 5’2″, 175 pounds. As “proof,” they included the infamous photo of her as a fat teen.

Of her weight struggles as a teen, Michaels said “Oh, my God, it was pure hell.”

Michaels’ “fat” photo isn’t exactly revealing a fat kid. She’s wearing a bulky, dark shirt and her arms are crossed over her stomach. I get the distinct impression that this photo was specifically chosen because it obscured Michaels’ body enough that it’s suggestive of “fat” without actually appearing fat.

And yet, people will talk about how Jillian Michaels went from fat to fit, as though it’s certified fact. Why? Because she said so.

The same goes with the lifestyle choices of Kang and Michaels. They claim that they lead healthy lifestyles and we assume they are right because, after all, they’re thin. Clearly they have the answers and we should heed their advice, as weight loss gurus. But what we don’t see is what goes on behind closed doors. How much does Jillian Michaels actually devote to exercise? How much does she actually eat? She’s crystal clear about what she thinks the contestants on Biggest Loser (TBL) should do. She explains her TBL regimen in a Washington Post interview:

On the show my team does 1 hour of cardio in the morning. Then in the afternoon we do an hour of resistance training as outlined in my book followed by another hour of cardio. Then one more hour of cardio in the evening… We do take Sunday completely off – no exercise whatsoever.

So, in this article, Michaels claims that she has her team do three hours of cardio per day and one hour of resistance training for a total of 24 hours of exercise per week. But as I noted in last year’s Biggest Loser round-up, when contestant Alex can’t meet her expectations on the treadmill, Michaels tells the camera, “Alex works out for two hour segments, three times a day. There is absolutely no way this girl cannot jog at six miles an hour for five minutes on a one incline.” Assuming she still means they take Sunday off, that’s still 36 hours of exercise per week.

Likewise, Michaels says in that same WaPo interview regarding her contestants on the show, “My boys are not on low calorie diets. They are all consuming between 1800 – 2500 cals per day depending on their unique metabolic requirements.” But former TBL contestant Kai Hibbard told Golda Poretsky that they were put on 1,000 to 1,200 calorie diets.

As for her own lifestyle choices, Michaels claims that she eats 2,000 calories per day and works out strenuously two to three hours a week. And in this interview, Michaels claims she goes to the gym three or four times a week.

Here’s what bothers me, though: we take Michaels’ claims at face value. If she says she works out strenuously just three hours a week and eats 2,000 calories a day, we give her the benefit of the doubt and say okay. The same goes for Kang or any other expert: whatever they claim is the lifestyle that allows them to maintain their body, that must be true because look at their body!

And then there’s Health At Every Size^® (HAES), which is largely comprised of former dieters who have tried anything and everything there is to try: different caloric levels, different macronutrient combinations, different exercise intensities, different supplements and more. We have the exact same experience that all of the weight loss gurus have with one exception: we either haven’t had the dramatic results or we haven’t maintained the weight loss.

But when people ask us about our experience, the response could not be more different from the response that Michaels and Kang get. If I said, “I followed Jillian Michaels’ book Wow, Look, You’re Not a Fatass Anymore to a T and only lost 15 pounds,” what is the response from Michaels or anyone else? Either you’re lying or you were somehow doing it wrong.

When presented with personal experience of diets having failed or dieters having gained weight back while still on the diet program, weight loss gurus immediately begin their 12-point diagnostic check. They know that the problem is you, not the program they endorse, so they will ask you detailed questions about what you’re eating, how you’re eating, when you’re eating, where you’re eating, what you’re exercise is, how long, how intense, how frequent, how varied. During this diagnostic check they will pinpoint where you went wrong and tell you that if you just do X, Y, and Z, you’ll start losing weight again and be thin again in no time.

This is how weight loss gurus persuade the public that despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, their system works. If it weren’t for those pathetic people fucking up their instructions, we’d all have tight, toned bodies and type 2 diabetes would be cured.

When diets succeed, the weight loss gurus are truth-tellers, but when diets fail, the dieter who claims strict adherence is a liar.

Nobody ever seems to question whether Michaels might be lying about how much she exercises or how many calories she eats. Perhaps she doesn’t want it to seem like she’s obsessed with exercising or has an eating disorder, so she makes her regimen sound friendlier and easier than it really is. Can any of us know for sure what Jillian Michaels does behind closed doors? Nope. And yet weight loss gurus get to openly doubt the claims of any and all failed dieters because their fat bodies are the proof that they are lying.

This is the very root of skepticism over HAES: former dieters who claim diets don’t work were probably just doing it wrong all along, or else they didn’t try Guru X, Y or Z, who would have set them straight right away.

When I debate HAES skeptics, this inevitably comes up. They want me to show them irrefutable proof that failed dieters aren’t just bad liars. It doesn’t matter if I write an exhaustively-sourced explanation of why calories in/calories out is bullshit, it doesn’t matter if all the obesity experts have lowered expectations to define “clinically significant weight loss” as losing 5%-10% of your starting weight. What matters is that there’s a bunch of people on reddit who post before and after photos of their weight loss success and that failed dieters lie. Period. End of story. No need for further debate.

And yet I continue to debate them. Why? I consider concern trolls a whetstone to sharpen my rhetorical skills and arguments. I especially find it valuable when a concern troll can express their dissent without going all argle bargle on me. Two weeks ago, I posted my response to two studies that declared “fat and fit” dead, and included a lengthy rant about the reddit trolls who I can’t appease, no matter how much evidence I present. All I get back from them is argle bargle, including a Fitness Circlejerk response to this post (note: their infatuation with me is such that they have changed every redditor’s name to “fatchka”… I’m touched, boys).

At one point, a troll claimed he was going to get a copy of the study and prove that I was cherry-picking my studies, that I misinterpreted them, that the study was shit. I was kind of looking forward to an actual analytical response, rather than the argle bargle surrounding it. But as you can see in that thread, OP left us hanging. There would be no brilliant analysis that day.

Fast forward to two days ago and there’s a new question on our /r/AskHAES subreddit from /u/HAESFTW: Is there any evidence that weight regainers are actually following the diet when they regain the weight?

I clicked on it and there’s a brief followup:

It’s a fair question, but a terrible analogy. My co-moderator /u/LesSoldats provided some answers, but HAESFTW wasn’t satisfied. He then points to Linda Bacon’s HAES Manifesto (PDF), in particular, this passage:

Assumption: Anyone who is determined can lose weight and keep it off.

The vast majority of people who try to lose weight regain it, regardless of whether they maintain their diet or exercise program. This occurs in all studies, no matter how many calories or what proportions of fat, protein or carbohydrates are used in the diet, or what types of exercise programs are pursued. Many studies also showthat dieting is a strong predictor of future weight gain.

His complaint is that there is no proof that people who maintain a diet and exercise program will regain the weight, as opposed to the more likely outcome that the dieter has simply stopped following the diet and/or exercise regimen. Again, this is absolutely a fair point, and one that LesSoldats addresses in terms of the psycho-social reasons that diets fail. But that answer is not “evidence” as the main question requests.

As I said in my “fat and fit” myth-busting post, I haven’t done as much data dredging as I have in the past because it’s incredibly time consuming. But because HAESFTW was relatively respectful (compared to most of the argle bargle dissent we get), I decided to delve into the details and respond. It’s a lengthy response that uncovers more resources, more data and more info that sheds light on what we mean when we say diets don’t work. So, I am posting the conversation in its entirety below as a resource for everyone.

The bottom line is, diets don’t fail because failed dieters are liars, but because the only diets that yield substantial, noticeable weight loss in a statistically significant portion of the population are the same diets that are largely unsustainable for many, many reasons. The problem isn’t that you are a lying dieters, it’s that the expectations surrounding diets and weight loss are built on lies, half-truths, insinuations, shitty research and, above all, cults of personality.

This is a long exchange, but worth the effort, I think.

Proving the Unprovable

HAESFTW

Is there any evidence that weight regainers are actually following the diet when they regain the weight?

Atchka!

HAESFTW

Atchka!

HAESFTW

Atchka!

Trigger warning: Discussion of a personal diet (as in eating) plan and previous commitment to caloric restriction.

I’m two weeks into my 100-day Eating the Food Adventure.

To recap, two weeks ago I decided to start eating at least 2,500 calories a day. That’s a minimum, not a maximum. After years of studying Health at Every Size^® and intuitive eating, as well as struggling with binge eating, I’m finally giving up dieting. For real. I’ve wanted to give it up for three years, but it just. hangs. on. You can read more about what I’m doing here. You can also follow along daily for 100 days on my Tumblr.

Today I want to answer a couple of questions that came up in the comments here and on reddit to my original article and give a two-week update.

Someone pointed out in the comments here (and on reddit) that it’s possible I’ve been underestimating my calories the last three or so years (and I suppose my entire life) when I’ve thought I was eating about 1,800 calories a day. Of course, they then went on to insist that either I was lying or a freak of nature, but whatever. You know what? It’s true that I might underestimate my intake. I haven’t tracked what I was eating with any consistency. I do have a long history of calorie counting (like 30 years) and I think that I can do it pretty well — but it is possible that I’ve underestimated my daily calories. There have also been days when I binged. On those days, I definitely ate far more than 1,800 calories. On occasion, I track what I eat and it always comes in at 1,800 or so. But I’m willing to concede that I both sometimes ate more on purpose and unwittingly.

What I can tell you for sure is that I’m eating significantly more now than I have in years. Maybe ever. And it goes to reason that if I was underestimating 1,800 calories, I’m also underestimating 2,500, so I think it all comes out in the wash.

There were also comments on my last posts about just eating whatever I want, whenever I want it, and being guided by intuition. My answer to that is simple: I’ve tried to be guided by my intuition for three solid years. I needed more help giving up restriction. Desire to stop dieting wasn’t enough to overcome a lifetime of conditioning. For me, making sure I eat a minimum number of calories that is a couple hundred more than what my body needs just for basic functioning (my BMR, or base metabolic rate, is about 2,300 calories).

Can I tell you something? Tracking 2,500 calories, and knowing (and believing) that it’s a minimum not a maximum, is like Christmas every day. Someone on a Facebook page I belong to compared it to paying all your bills and having plenty left over for fun stuff. YES. It’s just like that. Sometimes I log into my tracker (I use myfitnesspal.com) just to see all those yummy, beautiful calories waiting for me to eat the next day.

Do you know about spoon theory?

The main benefit I’ve received from eating enough for two weeks is more spoons.

Two weeks ago, I was so used to running out of energy at 3 or 4 in the afternoon that I never planned anything for later than that. My husband knew better than to ask me to do something at night with him. I rarely went out after dark. I also knew I had enough spoons to either work out OR go shopping in one day, but not both. Ever. And maybe not even both on two consecutive days.

Two weeks in, my energy is lasting until 8 or 9 p.m. I still have a crash — that moment when I’ve definitively used up all my spoons — but it’s happening significantly later in the day. I shopped and lifted weights yesterday, and still didn’t crash until 8 p.m. That might not seem like much to you, especially if you’ve always had adequate energy. To me, it’s huge.

To me, it feels like healing.

To me, it means that eating more is a big, fat win. It’s enough. Even if Eating the Food means gaining All the Weight (that hasn’t happened so far, by the way). This isn’t about my weight. It’s most definitely not about weight loss. My clothes still fit. I’m pretty sure my weight hasn’t changed substantially one way or the other.

Know what’s gone, though? Edema. For the first time in years, my feet and hands aren’t swollen.

Know what else? Insomnia. I’ve gone from using a sleep aide several times a week to falling asleep easily and sleeping through the night, then waking up rested. For the last several nights, I haven’t even woken up when my husband, who works an overnight shift, came to bed at 3 a.m.

And one more thing: headaches. I haven’t needed to take Tylenol in a week.

I still have some residual restriction-brain thought patterns. Every once in a while I have a familiar twinge of fear. “What if I fail again? What if I can’t do this?” Then I remind myself that all I’m doing is eating enough. Far more than I’ve ever consciously eaten before.

I want to make something clear. I’m tracking what I’m eating right now because I want to make sure I’m eating enough. I have a history of restriction and I need something, right now, to help keep me from slipping into old patterns. I have not been able to turn the idea of intuitive eating into something that I can just do. My goal is to be able to eat to my hunger cues and eat enough without needing the extra support.

For the first time in (most of) my life, I’m not on a diet or trying not to be on one. I’m just eating. And it feels amazing.

Trigger warning: Discussion of diet and weight loss, as well as diet-related behaviors like food journaling.

I’m writing this on day 28 of my 100 day Eat the Food adventure.

In case you’re just tuning in, four weeks ago I decided to start eating 2,500 calories a day, which is a couple hundred more than my base metabolic rate plus whatever I burn on days I work out. My goal is to finally give up dieting, to sleep better, to have more energy, and to really live a Health at Every Size^® (HAES) lifestyle.

I’ve been blogging daily about my adventure on my Tumblr.

Like I did with my two week update, I’m going to address some things that have come up in comments here, on reddit, and in person, and I’m going to talk about how things are going after four weeks.

Someone made a comment on reddit to the effect that my Eat the Food adventure seems “wildly unhealthy” and expressed her concern that I haven’t talked to a doctor about what I’m doing. This comment really struck a nerve with me because at the time my personal Facebook feed was full of people (smart people, people I care about) talking about starting very restrictive diets for the New Year (everything from Paleo to extreme fasts and cleanses). There was not one comment on any of these threads expressing concern about cutting calories so deeply or going without food at all for up to ten days. No outrage that a doctor wasn’t involved.

If you’re concerned about your health, feel free to see a doctor, of course. But eating enough calories to meet your body’s needs isn’t something that requires medical intervention. I understand that if you’ve been restricting a long time (like I had), the idea of eating 2,500 calories or more a day can be shocking. But do the research. Figure out what your body needs. For me and my big body, 2,500 calories is only 200 calories beyond the bare necessities for functioning. It’s a significant deficit from the number of calories my body needs to maintain my weight (if my metabolism is working properly and I’m not starving myself, which significantly lowers that number of calories).

Someone else asked for clarification about BMR and TDEE. BMR is basal metabolic rate. It’s the number of calories your body needs to function at rest. It’s the number of calories a doctor would feed you if you were lying in a hospital bed. Your organs need these calories to operate optimally. TDEE is total daily energy expenditure. This is the number of calories your body needs to maintain your current weight, taking into consideration your current calorie output. In other words, TDEE is your BMR plus what you need to account for daily activity and exercise.

I live in a country that is obsessed with restricting calories, while I live on the planet Earth where millions of humans don’t get enough to eat without paying the diet industry for the privilege. Obviously, as a species we can survive on fewer than optimum calories. But have you heard of the Minnesota Starvation Experiment? During WWII, an experiment on the effects of starvation was performed on a group of 36 men. They were put on a diet of 1,570 calories.

Beyond the gaunt appearance of the men, there were significant decreases in their strength and stamina, body temperature, heart rate and sex drive. The psychological effects were significant as well. Hunger made the men obsessed with food. They would dream and fantasize about food, read and talk about food and savor the two meals a day they were given. They reported fatigue, irritability, depression and apathy. Interestingly, the men also reported decreases in mental ability, although mental testing of the men did not support this belief.

Sound familiar? It does to me. That was my life for a long time. Except I never got gaunt. I starved myself to the point of obsession, fatigue, irritability, depression, and apathy, even though I never lost significant weight. I did that to myself on the hope that I would shrink, even though for 30 years it never happened.

Someone brought up the question to me of whether or not it’s okay for someone to want to lose weight. I’m going to admit something to you right now. If my fairy godmother came to me right now and said, pick a weight and you’ll be able to stay there forever without starving or hurting yourself or going crazy, I would say “150, please.” I don’t have a fairy godmother, though, and 30 years of concentrated effort has only helped me gain 200 pounds since high school.

What I’m trying to say is that there is a difference between choosing the HAES path and wanting to be fat. I personally think that you can both want to give up the weight loss roller coaster and want to lose weight at the same time. Even Linda Bacon says that following HAES might cause your body to come to a natural weight for you, which may be lower than what you weigh now. I just don’t think it’s easy and I think that it takes a lot of work to get to that place.

Instead, ask yourself these questions: Are you eating enough? Are you exercising in a way that’s fun, rather than punishing? Can you look at yourself without dysmorphic thoughts? Are you getting enough sleep? Are you exhibiting the Minnosota Experiment effects in your efforts to lose weight? How upset are you going to be if your body’s natural weight isn’t the ideal weight you have in your head? This is Ellyn Satter’s Hierarchy of Food Needs:Enough food is the bottom. Enough food is stability. Not getting enough food is one of the primary reasons people who have a long history of food restriction followed by binging. It’s why poor people who live with food instability eat food that gives them the highest density of calories for the money that they do have (a one dollar McDonald’s hamburger versus one dollar worth of organic broccoli, for instance). You can read more about it here.

Like lots of people who have a history of food restriction, I was in the kind of weird position of having access to enough food, but still not eating it. In other words, I had the ability to be food stable, but chose not to be. Getting through these stages, for me and anyone else who is starting at the bottom of this pyramid for reasons other than poverty, is a matter of choice. Choosing to eat to my body’s needs, choosing to let myself eat food that I like, rather than food that let’s me keep feeling like a “good fatty.” Choosing to enjoy food. Choosing to eat new foods for the novelty of it.

Does it surprise you that choosing to eat food that is instrumental to your health is way up at the tippy top of this pyramid? It’s nearly impossible to leap frog over the other steps. Going straight from not getting enough food to eating a strict clean or Paleo or whatever diet is pretty much designed to fail.

Four weeks into this Eating the Food experiment, I’m feeling better than I have in a long time. My sleeping has improved immensely. I’ve used a sleep aide only twice in the last three weeks, as opposed to four or five times a week. One thing that’s happened that is a really nice surprise is that I’m sleeping deeply enough now that I don’t wake up when my husband (who works nights) comes to bed at 3 or 4 in the morning. My sleep is better, too. I’m waking up more rested.

My energy level has improved as well. When I started this adventure, I was crashing at 3 or 4 in the afternoon. Now that’s happening closer to 8 or 9. I’ve been able to do more in a day, too. I can workout and shop and do the laundry all in the same day, now. That’s what I call freedom.

Four weeks ago I was in a lot of pain. My shoulders and neck hurt all the time. I hold a lot of stress there. My back hurt — lower back all the time and my middle back, between my shoulder blades, due to lifting weights at the gym. My legs hurt. My head hurt. I took pain killers daily. My pain level has reduced to the point where I don’t need pain medication anymore. At all. My theory is that eating enough has left my body enough energy for recovery. I’m also working on reducing my personal tendency to push myself to the point of injury when I workout, which helps.

For the duration of this project, I’m tracking my food intake at My Fitness Pal. I want to make sure I’m eating enough. This, in combination with keeping a daily journal, has had the side effect of letting me see the connection between what I eat and how I feel. Lower energy days correspond with lower protein days, for instance. I feel better over all when I eat a solid breakfast and lunch.

I’m not going to talk about my weight until after the 100 days are over, but suffice it to say my clothes still fit.

Trigger warning: Discussion of veganism as a weight-loss diet and disordered eating.

I know, y’all might be tired of me talking about veganism all of the time, but it definitely has a special brand of fat hate. There was the Plan V that PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals… and objectification of women) pulled, along with PETA’s classic fat hate. But let’s be honest. it’s not just PETA pulling this shit.

What prompted this little rant? I went over to /r/vegan on reddit today and literally the first video I clicked on had fat hate in less than 30 seconds (and please, if you’re on reddit, please feel free to add a body positive comment to that video). The video opens with a man standing in front of McDonald’s saying that he’s planning on showing kids slaughterhouse videos. That’s the whole premise of the video. But he’s standing in front of a handicapped parking sign and at one point he says that McDonald’s has special parking when you become too fat or too immobilized to move.

Wow, just wow.

I’ve seen the studies people have pushed at me claiming that veg’s are thinner than meat eaters and I can tell you, it’s pretty much bullshit. There’s about a five pound difference and no study takes into account starting weight before going veg; meaning the people who go veg could, in general, be slightly thinner to begin with. This makes sense as veganism and vegetarianism has been picked up as another fad diet and health craze. One of those studies even refused to use vegans over a certain weight.

Vegans like to completely ignore the existence of fat vegans or, if they acknowledge us, we’re eating the wrong foods, stuffing our faces with Oreos and vegan cupcakes and fries all of the time. We’re bad for business, bad for the image of veganism. VegNews magazine on Facebook the other day posted a status about vegans needing to exude a healthy look to make veganism look as positive and tempting as possible. This ignores the fact that thin vegans eat junk food too and that, well, no one like a pretentious pompous health nut trying to act like they’re better than you because you had a candy bar while they munched on kale leaves.

But it’s not just all on vegans. I see quite a lot of veg hate from fat activists comparing veganism to disordered eating, eating disorders, starvation diets, etc. Veganism is mentioned casually as something that skinny body policing yuppies do, again, completely ignoring the fact that there are fat vegans and even body positive fat vegans. Remember, veganism is a moral stance, not a diet.

If you eat a plant-based diet but still live a non-vegan life (e.g., wearing fur, leather, wool, using products tested on animals) then you’re not a vegan, you’re someone who follows a plant-based diet, a strict vegetarian. The point of me bringing up the fact that it’s not a diet is that because it’s not a diet it doesn’t clash with body positivity, Health At Every Size^® (HAES), intuitive eating, or Fat Acceptance.

I’ve had an eating disorder, thanks very much! And veganism is most definitely not an eating disorder. Though with any “fad diet” (thank you asshats for turning it into that), it can be used for ill purposes, but most people just want to love animals and be left alone.

I’m tired of my ethical choices being used as a nail in the coffin for the body acceptance police and health zealots. Please just stop bashing vegans. Criticize the fatphobic ones! Criticize PETA! Do it! But please don’t generalize and pretend like we’re all bad people who hate fat people. Some of us are fat people and some of us want so badly to just be able to be fat and vegan without comment.

I’m stuck in the middle. I can’t talk to Fat Acceptance people about veganism and I can’t talk to vegans or be a part of their community because I’m fat. My husband has the same problem. We’re a part of all of these communities, but separate from them as well. It makes us feel stuck and lost and hopeless. Is there anywhere that we fit in? Anywhere it’s okay to be ourselves? If everyone could just stop being a dick to each other, that would be fantastic!

Trigger warning: Discussion of calorie counting in order to eat enough food to meet daily caloric requirements.

I’m writing this on day 42 of my 100 day Eat the Food adventure.

Six weeks ago, I decided to start eating at least 2,500 net calories a day. That’s at least about 200 more than my base metabolic rate (BMR), or the number of calories my body (based on height, weight, age, and gender) needs to keep my organs functioning without activity. Net means that I eat back any calories I burn through exercise. So, if I swim and burn 300 calories, I eat at least 2,800 that day.

I’ve been blogging daily about my adventure on my Tumblr.

My goals are to improve my sleep, reduce pain, and get rid of residual disordered eating patterns that have kept me from truly following a Health at Every Size^® (HAES) lifestyle.

As with my other updates, I’ll answer a couple of questions that have come up from readers and I’ll give a follow-up on how things are going so far.

Someone on Reddit asked what calculator I used to determine my BMR. I used one that utilizes the Harris-Benedict equation for BMR. Rather than link to a calculator with weight loss talk that might be triggering, I’ll give you the equation. If you want a calculator, there are plenty out there — just Google it. But be aware, please, that I could not find one that did not talk about weight loss on some level.

For men: BMR = 88.362 + (13.397 x weight in kg) + (4.799 x height in cm) – (5.677 x age in years)

For women: BMR = 447.593 + (9.247 x weight in kg) + (3.098 x height in cm) – (4.330 x age in years)

To calculate your TDEE (total daily energy expenditure, or the number of calories you need to maintain your current weight), use the following chart:

Okay. That was a lot of math.

I’ve had a lot of questions and comments about the fact that I track my calories. I know that’s a big, fat trigger for a lot of people and I’m aware that for that reason it wouldn’t work for everyone. I have had no problem switching from the traditional “eat no more than” dieting mindset to an Eat the Food mindset of “eat at least this much.” Despite years of trying, I have not been able to eat intuitively. For the first time, I’m getting there.

Intellectually, I’ve known since starting on my HAES path three years ago that food doesn’t have morality. No good food and bad food, just food. Emotionally, I could never quite get all the way there. Tracking has helped me finally do that.

Six weeks in, I’ve started to notice a lot of small things. Like, my fingernails have stopped breaking. School started for me this week, and I have to walk half a mile and up and down three flights of stairs to get from my first class to my second. I was able to do that this week without any problem. I drink less diet soda, not because I don’t love it anymore (because I do), but because my body doesn’t need as much caffeine as it used to in order to keep going until the end of the day.

I’ve had one unexpected problem. I’m so used to crashing at 3:30 or 4:00 in the afternoon, that I forgot what it felt like to just be normal tired at bedtime. I have to make myself go to bed on time. Once I’m laying down, I fall asleep without a problem. The quality of my tired is just very different. Instead of feeling like I’ll die if I don’t lay down at 8 p.m., I still have some energy left at midnight.

Edema was such a regular problem for me that all of my shoes are wide width. Some of them don’t fit me anymore, because my feet are no longer swollen. My legs aren’t swollen anymore, either. No more deep pits if I press a finger into my shin. My hands look and feel different to me too for the same reason. I’m sure I’ve lost edema from wherever I had it, but my hands, feet and legs are where I notice it the most.

Six weeks ago, I was in nearly constant 4- or 5-, sometimes 6-level pain. Sometimes even worse. My neck and shoulders were stiff. My back hurt so badly that it was hard for me to get out of bed in the morning or up from a sitting position if I didn’t have arm rests. My feet hurt, my head hurt. I was taking painkillers daily. I’m so happy to report that most of my pain is gone. One of my shoulders still feels a little stiff and I can still feel my lower back, but maybe a 2-level of pain and not constant.  I haven’t had a headache in weeks.

A side effect of the reduced pain in my back and shoulders is that my posture is better.

I’m less cranky.

The part of HAES that has always eluded me is the part that says if you allow yourself to eat what you want, the urge to binge on “bad” foods will disappear. I would eat ALL the Resse’s Peanut Butter Cups, then decide they wouldn’t be allowed in my house again. Until the next time they were, and then wash, rinse, repeat. For the first time in a long time, like since I was in the third grade, I feel zero guilt about eating. I eat what I want, when I want it, and until I don’t want to eat it anymore. The idea that I can literally eat anything I want, and as much of it as I want, and truly believing that, has finally taken root.

I’m cultivating this rebel attitude that I kind of love. I’m over being a good fatty. I’m over being able to hold up “I only eat 1,800 calories a day” and my 125 cholesterol as banners of my virtue. Fuck that. I eat what my body needs to not just function but THRIVE. A happy little side effect of having a thriving body is that the size of it stops mattering. The amount of space my wonderful, thriving body takes up has started to feel like the amount of space it deserves. 

I have this theory. Fat people often spend their whole lives trying to lose weight. The meme for losing weight is: eat less, move more. That’s such an oxymoron. No wonder fat people often feel like crap. But instead of blaming how awful they feel on not eating enough and moving too much, they blame it on being fat. And it’s a vicious cycle. Tornado-to-Oz level. A cyclone cycle.

Six weeks in, I feel like a cycle-busting, rebel bad ass. And I’ll take it.

Serious trigger warning: Eating disorder discussion with calorie counting and diet talk.

I have a new doctor. I sort of got him by accident. My general practitioner recommended him but at first I ended up seeing his nurse practitioner for my thyroid needs. Still, the head office peeps recommend I see him to “establish care.” When I told him I wasn’t there for any particular reason other than that he seemed a bit confused, but whatevs. We went over my health issues one by one. A bad ankle from an injury, bad knees from a genetic lack of cartilage, chronic bicep tendinitis from a fall several years ago, hypothyroidism (Hashimoto’s thyroiditis), bipolar disorder, migraines, and chronic nausea.

Yeah, it was kind of a long list (not as long as some, I’m sure). What was next was a discussion about autoimmune diseases and inflammation in the body. I’ve already seen my migraines lessen and my fatigue lift somewhat by eliminating gluten. But what was he talking about? Well, I don’t know how I’m going to manage to be honest and it’s triggering a lot of my old eating disordered thoughts.

You see, what I’ll basically be doing is a raw food vegan diet. I can’t eat anything in the nightshade family (including tomatoes… What? No!),  No corn, no potatoes, no peppers, no eggplant. No soy, no gluten or grains and, of course, no animal products. That doesn’t leave me with a lot, does it? Technically, I’m supposed to be eliminating nuts and seeds as well, but my doctor let me hang onto those. I see a lot of salads in my future. (I kid — I’ve actually found a lot of awesome raw food recipes). 

The annoying part, though, is that my doctor says he expects weight to just “drop off” of me. I looked him dead in the eye and said, “That ain’t happening.” When he asked why, I explained that I had an eating disorder for ten years and if that didn’t make me thin, certainly some stupid diet wasn’t going to. Still, he can’t seem to accept that I’m just naturally fat. No, it’s the fault of my meds not being high enough and my diet not being anti-inflammatory enough. It’s my leaky gut that’s causing me to be fat! So what if all of the women in my family are fat? They obviously must have leaky guts too, even if they don’t have an autoimmune disease like I have. The big thing I’m skeptical of was him linking my diet to my mood disorder. Well, my mom said he was a witch doctor, but I’m willing to try anything to avoid surgery and pain meds.

So what I’ll be struggling with is getting enough calories (last time I tracked calories, I ate between 1,400-1,800, so I need at least that many), getting enough protein, and finding meals that are filling and satisfying, as well as not triggering the “good fatty” inside me who wants to be proud for all the restricting I’ll be doing. At my ED worst, I was eating a veggie burger with ketchup (no bread) for lunch (100 calories) and tofu noodles (40 calories) with pasta sauce (150 calories) for dinner.

Oh god, it skeeves me out that I can still remember exactly how many calories I was consuming. You’re reading right though… I was eating about 300 calories a day at the time right before I found Fat Acceptance. It sort of makes me want to cry now. On one hand, I can’t believe I let myself get that low and on the other I’m so worried that I’ll do it again. It’s easy to under-eat when you’re literally eating nothing but fruits and veggies.

But I’m determined. I’ll stay body positive, I’ll keep loving myself AND I’ll keep to this diet to (hopefully) improve my health.

Trigger warning: This post is all about Biggest Loser, eating disorders, calorie counting and weight loss diets.

I need a few more days for to finish The Big Project, which will drop next week. So for now, I just want to reflect on the brou ha ha that sprung up around The Biggest Dickweed‘s 15th Inglorious Season Finale.

Rachel Fredrickson

Apparently, the winner this year, Rachel Fredrickson, lost 60% of her starting weight, finishing with a BMI of 18 (aka underweight) and the media and the public have been wringing their hands out of concern for this young woman because she’s now “too thin.”

My only question for those who are shocked at the big reveal is this: Are you fucking kidding me?

Case in point: yeah, it’s pretty shocking that Rachel Fredrickson lost that much weight in a matter of four months and, yeah, the fact that she’s the show’s first contestant to be classified underweight is great trivia, but it’s hardly new. The winner of Season 8, Olivia Ward, and her sister both lost half their body weight and both showed up at the finale with a BMI of 19.5.

Had Olivia lost seven more pounds, she would have been underweight too.

Since when did society really give a shit what Jillian Michaels, Bob Harper and Dolvett Quince were teaching their team, let alone their viewers? Where were you last year when three children were put through deprivation bloodsport — NBC’s Hunger Games — and encouraged to lose an unhealthy amount of body weight? According to Dr. Yoni Freedhoff:

[A]t the finale this past Monday we found out that 13 year old Biingo lost 43lbs in the 22 weeks, 13 year old Lindsay 47lbs and 17 year old Sunny 51lbs and though they didn’t announce percentiles I’d venture that each and every one of their losses represented somewhere in the neighbourhood of losing near 30% of their body weights in just 22 weeks. For the show’s children to lose 30% of their body weights in just 22 weeks puts their results right in line (and even in some cases exceeding) those of the show’s adults, especially when considering not fully grown 13 year olds’ resting energy expenditures are likely less than those of fully grown, taller, heavier, adults. What that means to me is that the kids, while not living on the ranch but while under Dr. Dolgoff’s supervision and oversight, were as or more extreme in their weight loss efforts than the show’s over-the-top, run till you puke, never eat a cookie, competing for $250,000/$100,000 adults. [emphasis mine]

But for some reason, this finale really shocked people’s consciences, such that even Bob and Jillian looked stunned at Fredrickson’s final weight.

The knee-jerk reaction is that Fredrickson “looks anorexic” or “scary skinny,” as some have put it. Although you can’t judge whether a person has an eating disorder just by looking at them, the possibility is there. After all, she has just spent months being pushed by the show’s trainers and nutritionists to restrict her calories to an estimated 1,200 per day and exercise between 36 to 42 hours per week.

Interestingly, Fredrickson just held a press conference about her “shocking” weight loss where she said she attends three or four exercise classes per day:

She said she lost all her weight under the direct supervision of the show’s medical experts and training staff. She said she did it with “super healthy” food choices, and by eating five small meals a day and hitting a calorie count of no more than 1,600 calories a day. Meals revolved around a perfectly balanced mix of carbs, fat and protein. In addition, she said, “I worked out a ton.” That included spending her working hours walking at a treadmill desk and then wedging in extra fitness classes and workouts where she could.

In the skewed universe of Biggest Dickweed, Fredrickson is actually splurging on calories. Yet we’re supposed to believe she got the largest percentage weight loss in show history? I’m thinking back to my post about how all fat people are assumed to be lying about their caloric intake, yet whatever thin people say they eat must be true.

Given how vocal Bob and Jillian are on pretty much every subject, it’s kind of troubling that both of them are gagging themselves on the subject. But of all the people involved in Fredrickson’s weight loss, Dolvett probably has the most information, since he trained her and established a relationship with her. Dolvett took to Facebook to suggest that this wasn’t quite the “victory” it should have been:

Last night’s Biggest Loser Finale has sparked a huge reaction and I do not want the day to end without addressing it. Biggest Loser is a journey which has its ups and downs. Please try not to look at one slice of Rachel’s journey and come to broad conclusions. Rachel’s health is and always has been my main concern and her journey to good health has not yet ended!!

Does that sound like Dolvett is comfortable with Rachel’s current weight? To me, it reads like “Yeah, she looks unhealthy now, but we’ll fix it.” It’s worth keeping in mind that Dolvett is the trainer who pushed one of his contestants to push through the excrutiating pain of shin splints, then went on to shill for Dr. Scholl’s magic shin splint foot pads.

The only positive thing that may come of this situation is that for the first time ever, NBC and Biggest Loser are under the white hot light of public scrutiny, which may affect the next season.  My guess? Probably not. This is the show that made their untrained, sedentary contestants run one mile on a beach and had an asthmatic train with marines, then act shocked — SHOCKED! — that contestants dropped like flies, including one who required two weeks of hospitalization as a result.

NBC knows endangering your health and life makes great television.

But one contestant hits “underweight” and everybody’s concerned about the show’s methods, let alone the message it sends to the families encouraged to watch.

Longtime readers recall that during Season 14, I suffered through every single episode of Biggest Loser and shared the results so you wouldn’t have to, and I crowned the show’s Biggest Dickweed, the Queen of the Bullies, Ms. Jillian “Boob Troll” Michaels.

Although not blogging about Season 15 gave me time to work on some other projects I had planned, I kind of wish I had, primarily because it surfaced during Week 5 that Jillian Michaels cheated by giving her team caffeine supplements without notifying the show’s doctors.

Bear in mind that during Season 8 (the same season as the ill-advised beach run), a booted contestant made an off-camera comment that Jillian Michaels was giving her team some kind of performance-enhancing drug, which led to an internal investigation that ultimtaely cleared Michaels of any wrong-doing. But in that E! article, the author shares this information:

NBC says all players must undergo intensive blood and urine tests before and during taping to effectively monitor their weight loss and ensure no one’s cheating. The only drugs that are allowed actually are multivitamins and caffeine pills to help get them through the day.

But it seems that since then, NBC changed its mind and no longer permits caffeine pills. Why caffeine pills?

Well, body builders believe caffeine supplements are a good way of boosting your metabolism and getting an energy boost for workouts. But the research is mixed. Skeptical researchers say that the metabolic boost is temporary, that there’s no evidence of long-term weight loss success and that chronic use produces tolerance. It does say that there’s a “small effect” when combined with ephedra. (PDF).

The most supportive study I could find was this nine-month, double-blind, randomized control study comparing 61 healthy, premenopausal women taking either a caffeine and ephedra supplement or a placebo. Keep in mind that this study was “supported in part by an unrestricted gift from AdvoCare International, LP.” What is AdvoCare? A supplement manufacturer, of course, which includes a detailed FAQ on the benefits of caffeine.

This study attempts to show that after taking caffeine and ephedra for nine months, subjects in the treatment group lost significantly more weight than the placebo group.

Wow! With caffeine, people lost 16 pounds, but without it they only lost 5.

But that’s not the end of the story. A response to this paper points out significant problems, primarily that the caffeine supplements included a purported appetite suppressant, Garcinia cambogia extract, while the placebo did not. Also, the caffeine group weighed nine pounds more and consumed 350 more calories daily than the placebo group. The critic concludes, “In view of the small weight loss in this study that may be attributable to ephedra alkaloids and caffeine, and the potential for attending cardiovascular risks, it would appear difficult to conclude that this prescription represents a useful option for the treatment of obesity.”

Even setting aside its meager effect, there’s also the danger of toxicity, which can lead to seizures or rhabdomyolysis, when skeletal muscle is broken down and can cause muscle damage or kidney failure. But the beloved Jillian Michaels doesn’t see it that say. “I stand by my opinion,” she said in response to her team getting sanctioned for her cheating. “A caffeine supplement is significantly healthier than unlimited amounts of coffee.”

That may be true when under a doctor’s supervision, but Jillian Michaels isn’t a doctor. And here’s the galling thing: Michaels doesn’t deny she cheated. She just thinks it wasn’t dangerous. But the fact that she cheated is evidence of the pressure everyone involved is under to lose as much weight as possible. Michaels has no doubt read or heard of shitty research like the one above and thought it would give her team an edge.

Sidenote: In response to getting caught cheating, Jillian went into full victim-mode, agreeing with a fan who suggested that producers only enforced the caffeine rule to reset the previous week’s results and keep celebrity contestant Ruben Studdard in the game after being eliminated.

This is why I don’t understand the public hand-wringing over Fredrickson’s startling weight loss. Not only is it absolutely logical within this toxic world, but the critics still seem to be under the illusion that the less-dramatic weight loss seen on Biggest Loser is somehow not dangerous or unhealthy or extreme. Take this relatively balanced Washington Post piece:

And therein lies the whole problem not only with the concept of the show, but the whole cultural dieting complex: This shallow obsession with numbers has more to do with appearance than with actual health, despite protests to the contrary. And that preoccupation with and scrutiny of appearance — even when it’s well-intentioned, as in the case of all the Twitter users expressing “concern” over Fredrickson’s reveal — ultimately undermines healthy weight loss.

But author Caitlin Dewey seems to imply that the problem is with the race to the bottom of the scale and that the problems would go away if Biggest Loser showed “healthy weight loss.” But what is “healthy weight loss”? In the Weight of the Nation documentary, the second episode was dedicated to the idea that “healthy weight loss” is around 7% of your starting weight. The CDC has similar recommendations. But can you imagine the shrug of indifference if Fredrickson had only lost 26 pounds? Here’s the visual representation of what that would look like, after Fredrickson lost 9.2% of her starting weight after four weeks.

Like it or not, this is what “healthy weight loss” looks like, according to obesity researchers and experts.

Contrast that with the actual final weigh-in that made so many people uncomfortable.

Sorry folks, but I don’t see the difference between the end result of Rachel Fredrickson’s efforts or end result of, say, every previous female Biggest Loser champions, including the previously mentioned Olivia Ward and Ali Vincent …

… and Michelle Aguilar …

… and Helen Phillips …

… and Danni Allen …

… except maybe that the show lasted longer than usual (contestants were home 4.5 months after the last day of taping, whereas we know that Season 13 contestants were at home for about 2.5 months. If these women had been at home for 4.5 months, their weight loss trajectory could have continued to plummet like Fredrickson’s in pursuit of the $250,000 prize and accompanying “fame.”

What bothers me most is when the media normalizes what Biggest Loser does, especially in the case of Fredrickson, like how the Today Show didn’t even ask her about the concerns and, instead, encouraged praise, as evidenced in this chyron.

As much as I hope Fredrickson’s extreme loss is a wake up call for society, I seriously doubt it. There’s drama here for the media to feast on today, but next season they’ll just keep shaking those pom poms for gladiatorial dieting. So media, save your fucking tears for Rachel Fredrickson and the final result she got because until now it has been referred to by these same people as “winning.”

Trigger warning: Discussion of calorie counting in order to eat enough food to meet daily caloric requirements.

As I write this, it’s day 56 of my 100 day Eat the Food experiment. This is my eight-week follow-up.

Just as a reminder, I decided eight weeks ago to eat above my base metabolic rate (BMR) for 100 days. BMR is calculated based on gender, age, weight, and height. It’s the number of calories your body needs to keep your organs functioning if you lay in bed all day. Total daily energy expenditure (TDEE) is the number of calories your body needs to maintain your weight, taking your daily activities into consideration. My TDEE is 3,100 calories.

For 100 days, I’m eating AT LEAST 2,500 calories. That’s the minimum not the maximum. And that’s net, which means that I eat back the calories I burn through exercise. I’m blogging about my experiment daily.

Today I’ll answer some questions that I’ve been asked and let you guys know how it’s going otherwise.

One comment I’ve had several times lately is surprise at how high a person’s BMR and TDEE are. If you’ve been indoctrinated to believe you “should” eat 1,200 or 1,600 or even 1,800 calories a day, the idea of a fat woman eating 2,500 calories a day ON PURPOSE might seem shocking. Even if you want to eat above your BMR, it might not seem possible if you’ve been eating 1,000 or more calories less for a long time. In that situation, my advice is to add slowly.

Yes, it is a lot of food. I eat three solid meals a day and a couple of snacks. I don’t skip a meal if I can help it. I allow myself fatty foods that in the past were foods I restricted, like avocados and peanut butter and olive oil and full-fat dairy products. I eat dessert most days. I might make a post someday, a picture post about what 2,500 calories looks like. It took a while for me to get used to eating so much. Eating breakfast was particularly hard. Eventually, my body got used to it.

If you’ve been eating far below your BMR, your experience might be different than mine. This post and this post at GoKaleo.com have lots of good information about what to expect when you start to eat more. I have three years of experience studying and working toward Health at Every Size^® (HAES) and intuitive eating. I think I would have had a different experience three years ago. Patience and being kind to yourself are very important.

Eating enough is largely about consistency — not 1,800 calories as a goal, but in reality eating 1,000 some days and 4,000 or more on binge days. Just 2,500 to 3,000 or so (depending on my exercise, my hunger, my mood, whether or not I’m about to start my period, etc.) every single day.

Another question I’ve been asked is whether or not I’m thinking about what I eat as well as how much. For me, decriminalizing food is very important. I can’t have good food and bad food. For me, food has to be just food, and I try to think about what I really want to eat before I eat most of the time. Sometimes, I just eat what’s available, but usually, I have choices. I do keep an eye on two nutrients. I try to eat at least 100 grams of protein a day, since this keeps my blood sugar even and makes me feel good physically. And I try to get 25 grams of fiber a day because I’m prone to tummy troubles that are kept mostly at bay when I eat enough fiber. Otherwise, I eat what I want.

I haven’t talked a lot about my weight over the course of the last eight weeks. That isn’t my focus, and I don’t want it to be anyone’s focus. I started this experiment in the hopes of improving my sleep, reducing pain and edema, and overcoming some lingering food hangups (mainly restriction and binging.) I was prepared to gain some weight if that was what happened. Lots of people do, at first, when they stop restricting completely.

I still don’t want to focus on my weight, but I think maybe I should talk about it. It’s starting to feel like the elephant in the room. Instead of talking about pounds, though, let me show you some pictures. (Click to make them bigger.)

It’s clear from these pictures that I haven’t gained weight eating at least 2,500 net calories a day. I do see some big differences, though, when I look at these two pictures. I took the picture on the left just after Christmas, or about 10 days into my experiment. I took the picture on the right on February 7. The visual difference in my face and neck is startling to me. The edema in my feet and legs is gone to the point that I had to buy smaller shoes. In fact, the edema had already reduced a lot when I took the first picture. I wasn’t able to wear these shoes on Thanksgiving  because they were too small.

What I notice most when I look at those two pictures, though, is how much happier and brighter and less tired I look eight weeks after eating above my BMR. The only other change I’ve made is that I’ve slowly gone from nearly no exercise to about 30 minutes a day of moderate-effort swimming most days. I can see the strength I’m building, especially in my arms and shoulders. My posture has improved, even, mostly because I’m not in so much pain.

I’m sleeping better than I have my entire adult life. I used to just think I was a light sleeper. Any little thing would wake me up and then I’d be up for sometimes hours before drifting back to poor sleep. I used to crash at 3:30 or 4:00 everyday. I mean, I’d literally shut down. I’ve had to walk out of a grocery store without my groceries because all of the sudden I didn’t have it in me to finish. Eight weeks in, I have energy to last through the day, until I’m ready to go to bed.

Even now that school’s started again for me, I have the energy to do everything I need to do in a day. That’s huge. In the past, I’ve had to give up exercise when I was in school because I didn’t have it in me to do both. I just finished my third week of school and I haven’t had any problem continuing to swim.

I still have some pain. Sciatica pain in my left leg sometimes and stiffness in my shoulders. The difference is that instead of feeling a general, all over, constant moderate-level pain all the time, I feel those things. And because they are specific, I can deal with them. I haven’t taken pain medication or a sleep aide in at least a month.

I’m re-reading Health at Every Size by Dr. Linda Bacon for the first time in a long time. She talks about eating intuitively and allowing the body, with its strong systems designed for the job, to manage your weight on its own. I have never been able to eat intuitively, no matter how hard I’ve tried. I couldn’t turn off the calorie calculator in my head or the voice that constantly insisted that I need to be a good fatty and that good fatties don’t eat a lot.

I took a class about Native Americans a few years ago, and learned that ancient North American societies that had access to plentiful food were able to build more advanced cultures that included things beyond finding food, like art and politics. So, Native Americans in the Northeast, who had access to fish and plentiful vegetation, made totem poles and had complicated social systems. Native Americans of the Great Basin, where I live in the high desert, had to work very hard every day just to have enough to eat. Their art was utilitarian — mainly baskets — and they lived in family groups. That’s how important food is to human beings. Maybe our bodies are something like that. If you eat enough, your body has the the resources to put to things like healing and exercise and … doing anything you can think of beyond survival.

I had a silly online argument with a troll this week where she insisted that no one NEEDS 2,500 calories, or even 1,800 calories, a day. That I wasn’t going to die if I ate below my BMR, which is only so high because I’m fat anyway. I’m kind of grateful for that exchange, because it made me really see that I don’t want to just survive. I want to thrive. Eating enough every single day so that my body doesn’t have to do parlor tricks in order to keep all my systems working properly is allowing me to thrive.

Being a rebel takes energy. That’s what I think every time I log into my tracking program and see my 2,500 calories sitting there waiting for me to enjoy them. I am done being a good fatty. I’m the fatty who doesn’t give a shit who sees me in my bathing suit every day. I’m the fatty who eats like she means it. And I’m the fatty who is healing and getting stronger every day.

Trigger warning: Images of extreme weight loss and discussion of said weight loss.

The negative reaction to the latest winner of The Biggest Loser, Rachel Fredrickson, might finally be the moment where the majority of viewers who thought this show was inspirational is actually just another piece of garbage in the increasingly growing landfill that is reality TV.

Rachel was 260 pounds and a size 20 when she joined TBL. In just over four months, she lost 155 pounds, bringing her down to  a weight of 105. Her appearance was so shocking that even professional fat-shamers Bob Harper and Jillian Michaels were startled:

After the live finale, social media exploded with comments from people saying she took it too far and looks terrible. Rachel, of course, is in the honeymoon phase of her weight loss, saying, “I have this brand new life ahead of me. I’m probably going to shop a little bit for some new clothes, but then save it and use it for something really special. It’s gonna be a great life.”