What I'm Tuning Into [Top Reads & Podcasts]

Every now and then, I like to share what I’m tuning into when it comes to diet culture, body diversity, Intuitive Eating, Health at Every Size and more.

It’s my hope that the following content will help support you on your journey toward a more peaceful relationship with food and your body.

Why Most Diets Don’t Work—and What to Try Instead [Popular Science]
“Something society doesn’t quite grasp yet is that weight is really, really hard to control. When somebody gains weight or their diet fails, they blame themselves rather than the thousands of forces that are conspiring to keep that weight on and to make you gain more weight.”

How to Help Your Kids Build a Healthy Relationship with Food [Popular Science]
“Because it’s so easy for caregivers to pass on their own disordered eating patterns, an important first step in setting healthy standards for your child’s eating is to examine your own relationship with food.”

The Dieter’s Diet [Bustle]
”Noom, the popular weight loss app, promises to teach you how to eat better, not less. (Except also, eat less.)”

For more on this, head on over to Virginia Sole-Smith’s follow-up piece. I also highly recommend her book, The Eating Instinct.

How to Fight Diet Culture at Your Family Dinner Table [Outside]
“Our kids are listening when we talk about ‘earning’ dessert with a hard hike or long bike ride, or when we call their Goldfish crackers ‘junk’ and try to steer them toward farmers’ market veggies instead. And they’re watching when we cut out gluten or stare critically at our thighs or our abs in the mirror."

You’re Showing Up in the World, and Nobody is Fooled [Burnt Toast]
If getting dressed in the morning, shopping for clothes and following fashion “rules” are all major stressors for you, then tune into this conversation between writer Virginia Sole-Smith and weight-inclusive personal stylist Dacy Gillespie of Mindful Closet.

“These ideas that that style is not for you, that you can’t take up space, that you can’t just be the physical person that you are, and that you should strive for an optical illusion that makes you appear smaller, which we then call 'flattering.' And that 'flattering' should be the priority above all else.”

Weight-Focused ‘Workplace Wellness’ Programs Drive Stigma and Inequity. Let’s Leave Them Behind [Self]
“Life is hard enough for workers of all kinds. Weight-focused workplace wellness programs could harm employees’ mental health in the short term, their physical health in the long term, and their pay in the immediate future. As we return to in-person work, let’s make the choice to decrease stigma and increase equity. Let’s leave workplace wellness programs in the past where they belong.”

I’m a big fan of all of Aubrey Gordon’s (a.k.a. Your Fat Friend) work and encourage you to check out her book, What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat, and her highly rated podcast, Maintenance Phase.

I hope you find this content to be informative, insightful and, ultimately, liberating. Tremendous gratitude to all of these paradigm-shifting individuals for making our world a better place.

What I'm Consuming [Top Reads]

As I’ve shared before, I constantly have my nose in a book or my ears plugged into a podcast.

I especially have a big appetite for content regarding food and body liberation, like Intuitive Eating and Health at Every Size.

Here are a few recent articles that really resonated with me (and many others!). Perhaps they will with you, too.

Smash the Wellness Industry
“The diet industry is a virus, and viruses are smart. It has survived all these decades by adapting, but it’s as dangerous as ever. In 2019, dieting presents itself as wellness and clean eating, duping modern feminists to participate under the guise of health.”

What Does Intuitive Eating Even Mean?
“If you find that you’re counting things, that’s not intuitive eating,” says [Evelyn Tribole, co-author of Intuitive Eating]. If there’s something called a cheat day, that’s not intuitive eating. If someone’s promising weight loss, that’s not intuitive eating.”

(To learn more about the basics of Intuitive Eating, head on over to here.)

What Happens When You Put a Kid on a Diet
This heartbreaking story is sadly one I’ve heard hundreds of times.

“If you are an adult putting kids on weight loss diets, restricting their eating, or telling them they can’t trust their body, you are an adult who is saying that the risk of a lifetime of struggle—a lifetime of self-hatred, a lifetime of disordered eating, a lifetime of not trusting oneself—is worth the possibility of a brief moment of thinness."

When Did "Fat" Become an Insult?
"For much of history...'excess body fat [was] a symbol of wealth and prosperity as the general population struggled with food shortages and famine, as we can see in Renaissance portraits celebrating full-figured women.”

I’ll be sharing more of my favorite content in the future, so stay tuned…