Nope, That’s Not a Compliment

Fat people get a lot of negative messages about our bodies every day. One way to fight this is to change the number of positive messages. Unfortunately I’ve found that some people don’t know the difference between an authentic compliment, and saying something really offensive. It’s cool though, I’m here to help. Allow me to elucidate using personal experience from […]

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Heavyweights (1995, dir. Steven Brill)

(CN: disordered eating and exercise) I wasn’t a summer camp kid– my one experience was a week at Girl Scout camp between 7th and 8th grade–  but I can see why it’s such a popular setting for movies.  Camp is removed from civilization, but not to the point where survival is in question.  The characters […]

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The 1% efficacy rate and weight loss as a prescription

Talk to nearly any person over a size 12 and chances are, they have run into a doctor or medical professional who recommended that their health would improve if they would only lose weight.  Whether that person went to a podiatrist for help with their feet or a gyno for a pap smear or an […]

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Fat, Austerity, Class and Benefit Sanctions

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Two Common Questions about Health at Every Size

I got an e-mail from reader Sarah, who asked the two most common questions that I hear about starting a personal Health at Every Size practice.  I’m going to answer them but before I do, just a reminder that the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are not size, health, or “healthy […]

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Lipedema Treatment, Part 5b: Weight and Special Nutritional Approaches

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Wondering Why We’re Fat?

Reader Michelle forwarded me a ridiculous graph called “This is Why You’re Fat America” listing the calorie counts for some very rich restaurant foods. I seriously doubt that The Cheesecake Factory is the patient zero from which all American fatness stems.  But this highlights a larger issue. I have noticed that guessing why fat people […]

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Screaming at Fat People for Fun and Profit

Several people have sent me a video of an individual who takes it upon himself to scream and rant and rave at, and about, fat people.  He is not the first person to believe that fat people are just a little bit of emotional abuse and bullying away from being thin (or pretend to believe it […]

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“Fat Girls” video

You know that I like fat women, so you’d think I’d like this video (linked below), but I don’t. It’s a fun enough song, but the women in the videos seem a bit like bullies. You also know that I deeply respect the folks over at Skepchick. Here’s a link to a post by Dr. […]

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New old program for WLS patients?

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Finally a Weight Loss Scammer Gets Some Consequences

Ah, Kevin Trudeau.  He came to the diet book world like so many others – as a con man (*cough* Steve Siebold *cough*).  He originally found himself on the Federal Trade Commission’s radar for schilling a cure for severe pain, and then a cure for cancer.  As part of a settlement he promised to, you know, […]

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Doctor Posts Joke Video Demonstrating Stigma That Kills People. Where’s the Hippocratic Oath When You Need It?

So apparently Dr. Terrible is getting a run for his money in my all time list of creeps.  Meet Dr. Irresponsible and Dr. Hatemonger. So yesterday, a number of people told me about a video posted on Kevin MD that was horrible beyond the normal bonds of horrible.  (Sorry, no power on earth will compel […]

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Waqas Khan is a Bigot Who Should Never Practice Medicine Again

On the blog KevinMD, (self-described as “Social Media’s Leading Physician Voice”) a video was posted [every trigger warning that you could possibly imagine, I definitely don’t recommend watching it] under the title “This is the video that will make you feel sorry for doctors treating obesity.” It’s a slickly produced video by Waqas Khan (who I don’t […]

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7 Ways to Show up for People with Mental Illness

Hi friends! Today I wanted to talk about how to show up for loved ones (or just people in general) that suffer from mental illness. I want to specify that I am taking about mental illnesses like depression, anxiety, and … Continue reading →

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How Long Do We Have to Hate Our Bodies?

It’s not new, but it recently surfaced in my Facebook feed–an article on CNN.com called What the Dying Really Regret.  In this article Kerry Egan, a hospice chaplain who has spent a lot of time consoling those with little time left on this earth, states: There are many regrets and unfulfilled wishes that patients have […]

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The Phoenix Falls Before Rising (TW/CW)

***TW/CW (Trigger Warning/Content Warning): For descriptions of abuse including violence, humiliation, molestation and rape*** ********************************************************* Yesterday I briefly mentioned the abuse I survived years ago. I glossed over much of it and wasn’t wanting that to be the focus of the post itself as I was trying to explain anxiety and the current struggle I’m […]

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Food, Fat People, and Double Standards

In response to reactions to my post yesterday about Ariana Grande’s #DonutGate, I wanted to revisit a post I wrote a few years ago about the double standards we have around eating in our culture when it comes to fat and thin people. I’m watching the show Friday Night Lights, it’s the episode where one of the tall […]

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Interview: Jessica Conger, actor, Most Likely (2015, dir. Andrew Bemis)

Jessica Conger is a full-time waitress and part-time actor in the Boston area.  She performs regularly with the Post Meridian Radio Players of Somerville and is a film producer with Bang! Films production company.  When not serving food, acting, or attending school, Jess like to read mysteries and brew cider and beer. She and I first met in […]

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The thief of joy…among other things

Anxiety… “Anxiety is Evil!” It really is Evil! Anxiety is the worst because it’s in your head but you can’t shut it off! I’ve never been diagnosed with anxiety or depression, I’ve never had therapy of that nature either. I’ve done a lot of self work and a lot of reading/research on my own issues […]

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Remembering Why This Work is Important

Every so often people tell me they couldn’t do the work I do with so much backlash and outright hatred that is directed towards me personally but so many people in fat community. I do it for people like this. Over the years I’ve had an outpouring of messages from people who have told me […]

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Licked Some Donuts? Don’t Blame Fat Kids.

Ariana Grande gave us a great example of just how ridiculous the “war on obesity” can become: First, she went with her boyfriend to get some donuts: For reasons passing understanding, she decided to lick some of the donuts that were on display on the counter, not tell anyone, and then buy other non-licked donuts. She was […]

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Say Something Sunday – War on Obesity Edition

It’s “Say Something Sunday,” a day dedicated, at least on this blog, to personal Size Diversity activism. I did the math and if everyone who views the blog each week did one piece of Size Diversity Activism a week, it would add up to over 1.5 million body positive messages put out into the world […]

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Facebook Envy: Feeling Bad About our Pretend Digital Lives

If you scrolled quickly past the above picture in Facebook, you might be convinced that I’m lifting some pretty hefty weights.  You might feel intimidated by yet another picture of a person seemingly able to do all the things. You might feel in some way inferior because you don’t have a picture in your Facebook […]

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Magic Quick Weight loss? Really?

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The Competition is a Lie

Well hello!  I’m still here, still alive (I know fat haters, you had me pegged as dying by the time I was 40!) and still keeping up with the fatosphere.  I know, I’m not writing as often as I used to – I have to focus on the boring stuff of life so much more […]

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That Ridiculous Oprah Crop Top Thing

In case you missed it, in the latest issue of O, The Oprah Magazine a reader asked creative director Adam Glassman “Can I pull off a crop top?”  His told her:  “If (and only if!) you have a flat stomach, feel free to try one.” So, obviously, Adam Glassman can bite me. (And why O Magazine […]

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Diminishing Distress Dials Down Diabetes

I recently ran across this article on Diabetes Hub which describes two important studies which correlate distress with poorer outcomes for people coping with diabetes.  The first of these studies involved a randomized trial of 150 women with uncontrolled diabetes.  What the study found is that those women in the study who were able to […]

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Even if Weight Loss Would Solve Every Problem

Weight loss is touted as a miracle cure.  We’re promised that it will make us healthier, happier, more attractive  – that the life of our dreams is just a diet away. We are told that being fat is the cause for everything bad in our lives – single and want to be in a relationship?  […]

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What My Body is Not

I get so many messages about what a fat body is, I thought I’d talk about some of the things that my body isn’t: My Body is Not Embarrassing Being fat (or being called fat) is no more embarrassing to me than being (or being called) brunette.  These are just physical descriptors. It’s not that […]

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Donut Rage!

Ariana Grande, a pop singer I’ve never heard of (possibly because I’m old and uncool), is taking some flak for having licked, or possibly pretended to lick, the donuts on display at a donut shop, while proclaiming, “What the f*** is that?” in reaction to an employee walking by with a tray of donuts and […]

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New Nightmare for Fat Flyers

A company called Zodiak Seats France has applied for a patent for their “Economy Class Cabin Hexagon.” In this air-born nightmare some seats (including the already horrible middle seat) are turned backwards allowing airlines to cram even more people in (and undoubtedly creating an upcharge to sit in a seat facing in a direction that doesn’t […]

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The Birdcage (1996, dir. Mike Nichols)

When I woke up on a Friday morning a few weeks ago to Twitter blowing up about SCOTUS declaring same sex marriage legal in all 50 states, I was happy that my home country was finally moving away from a gender-discriminatory policy.  Not deliriously happy, mind you.  I feel some kinda way about the political energy […]

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In Memoriam: the Dissolve

It’s one of the oldest cliches in film history:  the sudden and untimely death of a mentor. On Wednesday, the Dissolve announced that they will no longer be producing new content.  (Today is the two-year anniversary of the site launching.)  I initially resisted the impulse to write about it– partially because I was paralyzed by […]

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Public Health Without Weight Stigma

It’s become popular in recent years to act as if “public health” means making fat people’s heath the public’s business, or at least that most public health messaging should include some kind of fat=bad element. Many people  insist that it’s impossible to talk about public health without talking about body size.  I disagree.  I think that […]

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Link: Every Single Word

A project best summed up by its subtitle:  Every Single Word Spoken by a Person of Color in [Mainstream Film Title].  Creator Dylan Marron (whom you probably know as Carlos on Welcome to Night Vale) creates videos that stitch together all of the speaking screentime that people of color have in well known films.  Even […]

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The War on Obesity – Even if it Kills Us

I often talk about the war on obesity in terms of the way in which it’s goal is to eradicate fat people.  Every once in a while someone will object to my use of the term eradication. They say that even though these people are vocal about their desire for a world without fat people, […]

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40 Eye-rolls from a Christian who’s been waving that rainbow flag for years

Kevin DeYoung wrote “40 Questions for Christians Now Waving Rainbow Flags”, because he was apparently *shocked* and *horrified* when a bunch of people rainbowed their profiles in support of same-sex marriage. So, now he needs to reassert the tribal boundaries and point out how we’re not real true Christians. As far as I can tell, […]

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Look Mom! I’m in Reflekt Magazine!

Ok, so my mom doesn’t read my blog but when I received Issue 11 of Reflekt Magazine, I immediately ran over to show her! Reflekt is a really rad independent magazine based in Los Angeles. It’s all about style and … Continue reading →

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Tales From Retail: Let’s Get Ready To Rumble….

Picture it: NYC, 2011. Late Night. I’m finishing up my closing duties, and I’m on my way back from the bathroom when two men streak past me. One of them has a full garbage bag slung over his shoulder. I already know what this means, so I head upstairs as quickly as I can to […]

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Having Your Bullies Surgically Removed?

I’ve been asked a lot about a couple of articles that have been making the rounds. In one, a woman says that she’s decided to have weight loss surgery after her interaction with an online fat hate group.  In another a young girl had surgery to pin her ears back, from a plastic surgeon who created […]

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Lies, Statistics, and “Childhood Obesity”

Several memes have been making the social media rounds based on a New York Times headline: “Obesity Dropped 43% Among Young Children In Decade, Study Finds”   When you look up the study that’s referenced, the conclusion states “Overall, there have been no significant changes in obesity prevalence in youth or adults between 2003-2004 and 2011-2012″ So […]

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Sorry, RogerEbert.com, It’s Not Okay that Sadness is Fat

Guess which one is Sadness. Go on. Guess. Recently I saw a piece by columnist Olivia Collette Roger Ebert. com called “Why Can’t Sad Be Fat?”  The piece was written in response to the recent backlash regarding Pixar’s recent release “Inside Out”.  In the film, which takes place primarily inside the head of an 11 […]

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If We Really Cared About Kids’ Health

Yesterday I blogged about a terrible program designed to give kids a grade for their body size. Unfortunately this is not the first experiment foisted upon children.  I think that some of the people behind these programs may actually care about children’s health, but that doesn’t excuse their irresponsibility.  Still, I don’t want to criticize without […]

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New Way to Give Fat Kids a Failing Grade

An article in the New York Post today shows us exactly how screwed up our society has become when it comes to weight, health, and kids: “Gwendolyn wound up on The Post front page in May 2014, when she was listed as [overweight] on her DOE-issued “Fitnessgram” — despite being 4-foot-1 and weighing just 66 pounds […]

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Lipedema, Part 4: Possible Causes and Associated Conditions

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