Battling Fat Trauma
“If anybody were truly concerned about fat, they would be working towards greater self-esteem and a strong sense of self for large people.”
“I remember [my dad] driving from Evansville to Hopkinsville… and he had an hour-long talk with me and my sister about how we were overweight,” recalled Crystal Renee Newman, a 26-year old woman who lives in Louisville, Kentucky. “He looked at my thigh and he was like, ‘Well you’re in elementary school and your thigh is bigger than mine…’ Every single time we would clothes shop, it just seemed like he would always bring up my weight. And I would be crying in the store…”
Fat-related trauma often starts early. It starts in the family, and continues the minute you turn on the television or access the internet.
When fat people are in the news, it’s because of some new study that reduces us to disease and death. We are mocked, ridiculed, and condescended to. Google “obesity” and you mostly get a plethora of articles about a new thing that obesity causes or a new method to “eradicate” it. President-elect Donald Trump, in a debate in October, warned about an anonymous “400-pound guy sitting on a bed” that might have hacked into the DNC’s servers.
It is rare to see fat people humanized in the media. For the most part, we are demonized, depicted as headless bodies in reported journalism. On both the small and big screens, we’re still stereotyped as lazy sources of comedy that eat too much, don’t exercise, and are full of insecurity. The most we usually get is playing second fiddle to a more conventionally attractive lead, with either pleasant, unassuming or prickly, off-putting personalities, depending on the actor’s gender and race.
Many say the shaming is out of concern for our health. But many fat activists, such as Rebecca Jane Weinstein, don’t believe that for a minute. “If anybody is truly concerned about fat…they would be working towards great[er] self-esteem and [a] strong sense of self for large people,” she said.“There is nothing more productive than feeling good about yourself and nothing less productive than hating yourself. Whether [being fat] causes health problems or not, hating yourself for it is not going to make anything better.”
Among the activists, researchers, and experts with whom I spoke, there was a constant resounding chorus of a desire for equity, dignity, and recognition.
“People think they have a right to project their desires, preconceived notions, and understanding on other people’s bodies, but there isn’t a particular moral value to a fat body,” said Lindsey Averill, a filmmaker, writer, and activist. “These are kindergarten lessons: don’t be mean to people!”
Both Weinstein and Averill were on diets at six years old. For Averill, it was her own “choice:” “I don’t remember [any specific] instance of someone bullying me, but I remember going to my mom and saying that I was experiencing bullying, begging to be put on a diet. From this [fat antagonistic] culture, I had been taught that I could solve the ‘problem’ of my body shape — all I had to do was go on a diet. [And t]he culture told my parents that that was an okay choice for a six year old.”
Weinstein, on the other hand, was forced into it. Her family found a friendly pediatrician and, from there, she “spent almost [her] entire life on a diet.”
That led to a downward spiral of fighting against her body in order to be thin. “I started doing lots of speed. I took diet pills, which [in the 1980s] had amphetamines in them, [as well as] street amphetamines — ‘black beauties,’” she said. “I stopped eating and started exercising compulsively.”
Weinstein adapted dieting ideas anywhere she could find them. “In my junior year of high school I met a girl who was taking laxatives,” she recalled. “She said to me, ‘Don’t ever do this. It’s the most terrible thing.’ So I immediately went out and bought a box of laxatives. I was taking 30 a day.”
Averill and Newman both echoed a struggle with disordered eating and clinical eating disorders. Not only are overweight and obese people just as likely to develop eating disorders as the general population, but biased assumptions about our size and eating habits often lead to a severe delay in diagnosis — an average of nine months — which can have detrimental effects on physical as well as mental health.
“I lost sight of the idea that food is something we need to be ‘healthy,’” said Averill. “Food was the enemy. Nobody was asking questions like, ‘Are you taking care of yourself?’ Instead it was just validation based on, “YAY! THINNER!” There was no reference at all for self-care. Because I live in a larger body, anything I do to get thinner is good, whether it’s unhealthy or not. And that’s wrong.”
Dawn Clifford, a professor of nutrition and food science at California State University at Chico, has conducted several case studies around weight bias and diet. Much of her work centers around debunking some of the myths around body size and health.
“I think it’s really important, when looking at this topic from a research perspective, to consider the cost of weight stigma in terms of individuals’ overall health and well-being,” she said. “There’s so much literature that shows that people often avoid health care professionals because of the concern that they’re going to show up and be harassed about their weight. So they avoid screenings… to avoid the fat shaming. The stress of stigma itself [is] linked to increased cortisol levels and negative physiological outcomes on the body.”
Clifford’s work on Health at Every Size was of particular interest to me. The HAES (pronounced ‘haze’) philosophy was first introduced by Dr. Linda Bacon in her 2010 book Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight, and quickly began to gain traction and popularity within fat acceptance and alternative health movements.
Its basic philosophy, rooted in evidence-based science, rejects the use of weight, size, or body mass index (BMI) as barometers for health. The guiding principles of HAES are instead weight inclusivity, health enhancement, respectful health care, eating for well-being, and life-enhancing movement.
For activist Crystal Renee Newman, Health at Every Size was a godsend. While discussing her challenges in attempting to enact “lifestyle changes” and continuously failing, she said, “I felt like, ‘You know what? I don’t have to [diet] anymore. I don’t need to blame myself.’ Because once I started getting into the fat acceptance community, I met fat people that run marathons and dance and they do things that they enjoy. They’re fat but they’re still happy.
“I started to learn about weight discrimination [and] multiple reasons why people lose, gain, or stay at a certain weight. I feel like I care about myself and my health more than I ever have compared to when I was being shamed by my family and teachers and was yo-yo dieting.”
There isn’t much scientific literature on the efficacy of Health at Every Size and other weight-neutral approaches to health. However, the research that does exist tends to be promising. Many studies point to positive results that generate greater physical and mental health, such as improved intuitive eating and food choice, increased metabolic health, and less weight bias.
Dr. Sara Kirk, a researcher at Dalhousie University’s School of Health and Human Performance, remains skeptical of some aspects of HAES, such as the concept of ‘intuitive eating’ and the push by fat activists to dismiss the impact of body weight on certain aspects of health. “We can’t ignore the health risks because they are there, but they’re not there for everybody,” she said. “Weight’s a really poor measure. Metabolic condition and parameters are more important.”
Rebecca Jane Weinstein still remembers the moment she’d finally had enough. “I spent years fighting with my parents over my weight…and my mother’s sense that I should never give up trying to lose weight. Any attempt not to diet was giving into failure.”
She continued, “[Although] I didn’t accept me the way I was, I couldn’t tolerate her judgment anymore. There was no way I was going to accept me when she continued to judge me. In the process of fighting my parents for justice, I started to find a sense of justice for myself.”
While Weinstein’s experience isn’t universal, the spirit of her struggle resonates. Facebook groups and pages that support Health at Every Size and other weight-neutral or fat- and body-positive philosophies routinely tout hundreds, if not thousands, of members and ‘likes.’ And while very slow-going, clothing retailers and fashion experts continue to embrace the diversity of beauty.
These movements are attempting what seems like the impossible in the current cultural and scientific climate. Activists, doctors, and fat advocates struggle to gain ground and are sometimes subject to ridicule. But they are all working towards the day when every fat person will be able to live with dignity and a strong sense of self-worth. To me, that day cannot come soon enough.
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