Episode 120 Transcript

Welcome to the Fierce Fatty Podcast. I'm your host, Victoria Welsby and this is episode 120. Today, we're talking about “What about if you NEED to lose weight?”.

I'm Victoria Welsby TEDx speaker, Best Selling Author, and fat activist. I have transformed my life from hating my body with desperately low self esteem to being a courageous and confident fierce fatty who loves every inch of this jelly. Society teaches us living in a fat body is bad. But what if we spent less time, money, and energy on the pursuit of thinness and instead focused on the things that actually matter? Like if pineapple on pizza should be outlawed? Or if the mullet was the greatest haircut of the 20th century? So how do you stop negative beliefs about your fat body controlling your life? It's the Fierce Fatty Podcast Let's begin.

Unknown Speaker 1:10

it's our last show together. Oh, my globe. I know for now, I guess like we didn't really talk about it when we went out for dinner the other week.

Unknown Speaker 1:20

Went out for your birthday. Happy birthday.

Unknown Speaker 1:24

Thank you.

Unknown Speaker 1:26

Oh, now

Unknown Speaker 1:29

you turn 43

Unknown Speaker 1:33

Haven't been haven't been dead yet?

Unknown Speaker 1:37

No, I know.

Unknown Speaker 1:40

You got into 40. And just like don't even know like, you literally have to like do the math in your head because you can't remember.

Unknown Speaker 1:49

I'm 37. I'm still I think from the age of 35. I've always rounded up my age. And then when I did when I get to my birthday, and then I calculate how old I actually am. I'm like, a year younger than what I thought this is great. So it's a good like problem to have in my brain because I keep thinking I'm 38 Then I remember the seven and I'm like, oh page Columbo another year. You know, it's pretty good. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good way to do it.

Unknown Speaker 2:15

Today, our last episode, what are we talking about? So we are talking about, we really just want to put the nail in the coffin as it relates to dieting. And so we are answering the question, what if you need to lose weight? I said it like that, because you capitalize the need. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 2:36

Well, you want to lose weight to lose weight.

Unknown Speaker 2:40

Yeah, and I think we both got a lot of feedback from our audiences around this. So yeah, good.

Unknown Speaker 2:47

We'll just do a brief intro of the show for anyone who's listening. This is death to diets where we

Unknown Speaker 2:53

talk about diet culture, ridiculousness of diet, culture, stuff that's happening that's more topical, as well as stuff that you know, we've heard from you feedback from you on things that you want us to discuss, and we don't shame people for dieting, we really just talk about the cultural issue of dieting in general and how it hurts individuals and what we can do better. Yes, yes, yes, yes. And who are you anyway? Summer? Who the hell are ya?

Unknown Speaker 3:25

Summer Antonin. I'm a professionally trained coach that specializes in body image confidence and self worth. And I've been doing this work for about eight years, I help people all from all over the world. And I host a podcast called Eat the rules. Yeah, are you who are you? Who am I? Who am I'm still trying to work out some I don't know. But here is a 3d print of my teeth. So

Unknown Speaker 3:52

you come from

Unknown Speaker 3:55

you said, Do you want this? And I said, Fuck yeah, I want this 3d printing of my teeth. So I can put it on my desk. I mean, come on.

Unknown Speaker 4:03

Do you think Google will come and

Unknown Speaker 4:08

see if it will scare me, but he didn't realize that it was my teeth. You know, I kind of like for those who can't see the I'm smashing them together in a bite thing. But he just was cool. Yeah, so you know. So yeah. Anyway, that's a closeup of my 3d printing of my teeth. I teach people how to unlearn a fat phobia. So that's all people fat people, thin dieticians, tall people, short people, you know, everyone around everyone around the place.

Unknown Speaker 4:38

And I have a podcast face fatty which is where this has been hosted. If you know me, then that's it.

Unknown Speaker 4:47

And yeah, here's my non binary crown. Yeah, hobby Trans Day of visibility

Unknown Speaker 4:58

is trying to save his military

Unknown Speaker 5:00

This is the crown that I wore on my

Unknown Speaker 5:03

gender celebration ceremony on New Year's Eve. And it's got the color the non binary colors, which are purple, gray, white, and yellow. But I don't really like wearing it because it makes me feel a bit too feminine. So I'm like, like it because I want people to worship me, but also don't like it because I'm like, it's a little bit too feminine. I need to I need to mask it up a bit. Maybe put on some spikes or the Damascus? Yes. Yeah, it's like Game of Thrones, like the spikes out of the chair type of thing. Yeah. Yeah. Or it could be like, I don't know, with decks or something. I'm just thinking like, what can I find in the local area with your 3d teeth on it? I feel

Unknown Speaker 5:42

right? Because

Unknown Speaker 5:49

the idea was fucking rubbish. Nice try. but no cigar. No, it's not working. person better ideas. Jesus.

Unknown Speaker 5:59

Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 6:00

So so so so so so. So summer? We hear this all the time, right about, but I need what I've know if you do, I do, presume you do.

Unknown Speaker 6:14

With lots of use, but I need to lose weight. So I need to go on a diet, because dot dot dot dot dot. And so you're going to take the first big one, and I'll take the other one. And so what is the first reason that people say but I need to lose weight? for health, for health being I think one of the bigger bigger ones. So obviously, you know, most people believe that.

Unknown Speaker 6:43

In order to be healthy, you have to be in a in a smaller sized bought like in a straight sized body or in a lower body weight than you're currently at.

Unknown Speaker 6:55

We know that that is not true. We know that a lot of health conditions are more. It's more about like there's some correlation there not necessarily causation.

Unknown Speaker 7:08

I mean, actually, I was just curious, like when someone comes to you and says that, how do you answer that mutually? Yeah, so what I would say is okay,

Unknown Speaker 7:19

first off, I'm not a doctor, I'm not giving out. Yeah, health, blah, blah, blah, whatever. It's called diagnosis, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, I'm not blah, blah, blah, and blah, blah, blah. But I would ask the questions of like, you know, is normally the big kind of things that we associate with fatness? And so it's normally things like, type two diabetes, it's normally things like sore knees, it's,

Unknown Speaker 7:43

you know, like,

Unknown Speaker 7:46

so again, Sleep Apnea is Yeah, so it's normally the things that we associate, you know, the things that are going to kill all the fatties, and so I will present with them with information. And so my favorite resource do you know about this resource? Is the Hayes health sheets.com. Do you know about that one? Yeah. My loved ones that Reagan Chastain came up with. Yeah. And so I talked about it, like pretty much every every podcast episode. Basically, everything I ever talked about is just listening. And so all of them are all on there. So heart disease, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, joint pain, joint replacement, non alcoholic fatty liver disease. She had sleep apnea, PCOS, type two diabetes and osteo. Arthritis. And we look at them every single one, what causes this? And none of them are because you are too fat, because you need to lose weight. And the the biggest ones type two diabetes,

Unknown Speaker 8:52

non alcoholic fatty liver,

Unknown Speaker 8:55

heart, Hi, Claire straw, things like that. Most of it is genetic. And yes, fat people are at a higher risk. We don't know why. But what we do know is that fat people have worse health outcomes, because one, because of the stigma that we face, the the raging fatphobia that we live in to because of dieting. Dieting is really not great for our health, and three because of the subpar health care that we get. And so, you know, are those things, any of those things, the fault of fat people? No.

Unknown Speaker 9:39

So the big thing is,

Unknown Speaker 9:41

it's not your fault. And let's actually look into what we can do to support health using this information created by Raven Chastain, Tiana Dodson, and the last person it's skipping.

Unknown Speaker 9:56

It's gone out on my head, but it's a medical doctor.

Unknown Speaker 10:00

he's come up with these recommendations. Yeah. So that's what I would say. So what would you say? Yeah, I always like to ask people, What does health mean to them? I always like to understand, you know, what, what, you know, what's your kind of personal definition of health? Because I think that that's, that, really, it can be different. And I think that sometimes when we ask ourselves that question, we might start to identify things that actually don't have anything to do with weight, like we might think we might say,

Unknown Speaker 10:28

you know, it's, it's to have energy, or it's to, you know, be able to keep up with my kids, or it's to be able to, you know,

Unknown Speaker 10:41

sleep well, or, you know, like, just different components of, of health. And when we actually can look at those things, or we can create a personal definition. And I failed to mention, like mental health, I think a lot of people when they don't even think of that. But if you say, Well, what about mental health? And they might think, oh, yeah, like, you know, stress reduction, or some of these other things, we start to see that none of those things really have to do with the size of your body, that, you know, we can work towards better energy or stress reduction, or better sleep or better mobility, via things that don't require dieting or or weight loss, because we know that the outcome of dieting is actually going to be more harmful to your health overall, we know that dieting is a stressor, and we know that weight cycling is not not good for for your health overall. And so I think if we can create our own personal definition of what health is and look at what we want more of for ourselves, that that's really important. And I also think that just some education around the fact that we don't have so much control over our health as we've been led to believe, I think that diet culture, wellness culture, has us believe that like, we can control everything about our health, like if we only find the right supplements, the right nutrients, if we only eat more of the certain foods, that we can, you know, that we can control our health outcomes. And like, that's such, that's such bullshit, like, we we can't, it's so much it, like you said, so much of it is, is genetic. And I think that a much smaller percentage is really related to things like food and movement, I would say stress is probably a bigger component in that one that we tend to neglect because we just want to like, we just feel that like, well, I need to just add more kale to my life or something like that. And that's not actually going to do anything

Unknown Speaker 12:43

that you would have everlasting life.

Unknown Speaker 12:47

superfood, right. That's what that means is.

Unknown Speaker 12:50

Yeah, super cute. Oh, I thought I was gonna live forever, because I had a cow sandwich one time.

Unknown Speaker 12:58

Yeah, really good point this summer is something that I talk about a lot is the determinants of health. And I'm actually reshare the graphic on my Instagrams of what I used to think what I eat and how I move is pretty much 90% of what made up my health status. The reality is my health status is made up of many different things. Things like the fact that I have white skin, that I am university educated that I live in Canada, that I have access to go into therapy, that I go to visit a doctor who doesn't shame me constantly because of my weight. Only sometimes that I'm not exposed to guns that I have safer sex that I

Unknown Speaker 13:54

wear so long, huh? You don't smoke either, which is, yeah, and so and so it's actually really, really, really complicated. And there is like health, like, what does that mean? You know, what, what is it? You know, it's such this amorphous concept of, we can never arrive at being healthy. It's not a place not a destination, we can get to where we like, right? That's it, I'm done for life, I've ticked the health box, and I can just live forever. It's just it's constantly changing. There's so many different parts of what is healthy, and most of it we can't control and just a kind of quick, you know, quick and dirty overview of the determinants of health, massive study done, individual behavior, it makes up 36% of health, determinants of health on the individual over level, and individual behavior isn't just food and movement. It's psychological. It's mood disorders. It's a risk related behavior, like driving a car and the risks

Unknown Speaker 15:00

associated with getting into accidents, it's your sleep patterns, and physical activity and diet. And so physical activity and diet are just two points within 36%. And I think that's something like, I don't know, 6% or something. So and So, really what society tells us physical health is is like 99%. How much kale do you eat? In reality? You know, and even in that diet, and diet and moving, that doesn't necessarily mean that you just eat kale, and work out 75 hours a day, is actually way more complicated than that, and more nuanced, and is different for everyone. Yeah, yeah. It's so individual. And like, I'm just, you know, privileged, like you said, plays such a huge role with, with all of this stuff. And I think that, like, we also need to be asking ourselves, you know, if we want to make changes in the name of health, like if we want to, you know, focus on whether that's blood sugar management, or, you know, better stress reduction, or sleep or whatever, to always look at what you can add versus what you need to take away. Because I think that we've, we've learned that like, oh, we must take a restrictive approach, we must look at what I should eliminate from my life or my diet. And I'm a big fan of looking at like, well, what, what can we add more of

Unknown Speaker 16:31

it and making changes that are really, really small, that feel ridiculously doable? Because I think that there's also this mentality of like, well, I'm going to make all these sweeping changes, and I'm going to starting Monday, I'm gonna, you know, do, I'm going to go to the gym, and I'm going to eat this. And, you know, we know that we know that ends up, end up kind of in like this kind of the same sort of restrict binge cycle. So really looking at two things. One is like, what can you add and what feels ridiculously doable for you? And, you know, how are you going to feel if your body doesn't change? Like, what how are you going to sort of assess whether something is working for you? Like, what can what intentions can you set for yourself? Whether that's, well, no, it's working for me if I just you know, if my digestion is better, or if I'm sleeping better, or if I just feel better overall, and bring it back to, you know, listening to our bodies to kind of see what, what feels best. For us knowing that like, that doesn't mean you're less of an individual, if there's something wrong with you, if you have a health condition, or if you have if you have diabetes, like it's not your fault. So much of that is is like you said just outside of our control? Mm hmm. Yeah, and the kind of the health ism and ableism that's in there as well. Exactly. Like you say, someone who is not healthy or not able bodied, is exactly equally as worthy and important as someone who is quote unquote, healthy whenever healthy. Yeah. And if you choose to engage in like health behaviors, that doesn't make you a better person, like then someone else who if you have that choice as well, like I think that that's

Unknown Speaker 18:16

another thing that we have to divest from is this idea that like I'm a better person because I do these things you're not on and I some I definitely felt like I was a better person when I was like running 10 k's and stuff and posting about it on social media being like I did in the rain, what's your use?

Unknown Speaker 18:37

As a better person. Did you do that? Did you realize oh, my God, this memory popped up of me and my then boyfriend running in the fucking snow and ice. And I said, we are so dedicated to health that we do it even when and I was and now I'm like, what?

Unknown Speaker 18:53

Snow and Ice worm because it's dangerous. And two, why are you being such a self righteous decayed by posting it on Facebook? And you know, people I'm so so bad. I need to, I need to find it again. So that I can share it and be like, Look, what a balance. I mean, I I definitely have some shit like that to it. I think like you it might have made you feel like a better version. But that was because you were so insecure. Like you don't I mean, like you didn't actually, like wholeheartedly feel like a better person. It was like that hit of validation that you're getting made you feel like about her first. Yeah, exactly.

Unknown Speaker 19:31

Yeah, you're right, because I was actually just being like, Oh, look, I'm such a good fatty because I'm going out for a run.

Unknown Speaker 19:37

You tell me that I'm okay. You know, I understand Paul. You know, we need you know, I understand I get them that there were there were sausage and they were addicted. You know both of those things at the same time. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 19:52

Okay, so then anything else you want to say on that or should we move over to the other reason? Let's go on to the other thing, which is

Unknown Speaker 20:00

The other big thing is mobility, which is the other thing is people say, I am so unfit. Now now that I've put on weight a lot of people since the global Panini that we are in, they put on weight. And now they can't do the things that they used to be able to do before the Panini, or perhaps when they were younger. Or they say, you know, now I go upstairs, and I'm out of breath. And it's because I've put on a little bit of weight. So what do you think might be going on there? Summer? Yeah, I mean, like, here's the thing.

Unknown Speaker 20:40

There's a couple things one, fat phobia, like just the this sort of belief that like, well, it must be because of my body size, because that's what we've learned.

Unknown Speaker 20:51

As well, like, sometimes when our bodies change, there's an adaptation period that happens that it takes a while for your body to like, you know, feel the same way that it did before.

Unknown Speaker 21:06

And so sometimes, you know, like, for example, if your belly sticks out further than it did before, then doing particular things like whether it's tying your shoes or doing a particular pose in yoga, like that is going to get in the way, and it is, is going to feel different. And I think that that doesn't mean that there's something wrong with you, or that you're, you know, like that. You need to make a change to your body. I think it's just like, how can we work with the body that we have in this moment? And how can we take the focus off of weight being the problem and focus on like, what we really want more of if, for example, we want to be able to, you know, pick up more things or be more mobile? Mm hmm, yeah, I always find it, I find it so interesting that it's kind of like A plus B equals C, you know, one plus one equals 10. Because we've got a bigger body, then, of course, it's because we have a bigger body that we can no longer do the things that we used to do. And a lot of times I say, I say get my detective glasses out my molecule or whatever it is, you know, the thing that was it called the magnifying glass. And so okay, what's going on your life and like, when the last two years we've been in a global pandemic, I've given birth to a baby, I've had postpartum depression. I have suffered suffered an accident when I fell down the stairs and hurt my back, I stopped being able to go to my weekly Pilates class. I haven't gone out and done any type of movement recently.

Unknown Speaker 22:34

Yes. And it's like,

Unknown Speaker 22:39

I'm good. Any of those things together mean that you don't have the same abilities that you did?

Unknown Speaker 22:47

You made? And so if you do want to get back to whatever, you know, physical ability or mobility that you had, what can you do exactly what you said some? Or what can you do to support yourself towards those goals? Because if we try and lose weight, it's, it's not gonna, you know, we just know it's probably not going to happen.

Unknown Speaker 23:09

And so yeah, and the big thing as well is what you touched on of people saying, I feel uncomfortable in my body. And I like to think about it. When I was a kid, my mom said to me, do you want to get a hair cut, we have this this hairdresser that would come around our house, like super cheap. And she says, You're gonna Can you can get hair cut called the bomb. And I was like the bomb I wanted. She was saying a bob, but I missed.

Unknown Speaker 23:35

And I was like, Oh, the fucking bomb. Yes, please. And so I had long, thick hair, the hairdresser cut it short, didn't do any layering, because it was just like a quick and dirty thing. And the next morning, I remember waking up and seeing myself in the mirror, with this triangle of hair on my head, and being like.

Unknown Speaker 23:56

And it was really alarming. And when I shaved my head, going from long hair to having a shaved head, it's just weird and different. And so it's more noticeable. And that's hair. Having a bigger body is a lot. There's a lot, you know, there's fatphobia behind that. And so, of course, it's distressing. And of course, you feel physically uncomfortable, especially if you're wearing the same size clothes, especially if you're noticing changes in your body. And those changes in your mind mean that you're a bad person or you're or you're unhealthy, or whatever it is. And so you will get used to those new sensations of having a different body, you know, the same ways you get used to a shit haircut like I got when I was a kid. Yeah, I always use the example.

Unknown Speaker 24:42

I always use the example of like a new pair of shoes. It's like, you got to kind of break it in, right? Like it's like the body that if it's different, it it it's going to take a little while for your, your your mind to sort of catch up and and normalize it and I think that one of the things that often

Unknown Speaker 25:00

We do is like we completely,

Unknown Speaker 25:03

like, try to not look at it, we try to, like, avoid it, like we're just walking around with our heads cut off. And I think that that actually exasperates the issue, like, even just, you know, some physical touch, like put your hand on your belly or look down at your legs, like, take a minute to take them in, and whatever feelings come up are valid. But making your body less familiar, or I should say making your body more familiar is going to be beneficial to to that process as well. Because I think that we are, if we sort of just are like avoiding mirrors or avoiding pictures, we never see ourselves in our bodies of change. And then we're going to do something we haven't done, then it's going to bring up a lot of sort of feelings and and beliefs that we have. And so trying to work through that as well to become a little bit more embodied, I think is beneficial in that process. Mm hmm. Absolutely. And the other thing that I want to talk about in regards to mobility is

Unknown Speaker 26:03

wanting to unpack the ideas around health ism and ableism on this topic, too. And the idea that as we age, and because of life, because we you know, we don't know what's going to happen in life, you will lose my ability, as you get older, you're not going to have the ability to do the things that you did when you were 20. And you never know what's going to happen, you might lose your mobility for a reason. And so if you're tying your self esteem and your worth so closely to how mobile you are, and, and your health status, then you know I've got to break it to yet you're going to die one day, you know, you're going to get hopefully you're going to get old if we have the pleasure of of being able to age, and so things will change. And so if we can untangle our self esteem and our worth, from what our body does, I think that's really crucial. Because if we can't, then we're just going to be miserable for the rest of our lives. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Totally. Yeah, it's kind of the same thing with like, your appearance, like I we're all aging out of this out of beauty standards. You know,

Unknown Speaker 27:15

if you're if you're if the way that you view yourself as a whole is hinged on that, then you're gonna it's gonna really hurt as you continue to see wrinkles and things hanging towards the floor. Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. Unless, unless you're like me and you have saggy tits from the moment that you have tits, then, you know, you know, I had to deal with that since I was like 12 or whatever. Anyway, so I don't have to I don't I don't have tickets. So I can't really

Unknown Speaker 27:48

I don't like the zoo because like my

Unknown Speaker 27:56

my little prunes my little prunes. Oh.

Unknown Speaker 28:01

Unknown Speaker 28:07

now I want to talk about the reason that you might actually need to lose weight for health reasons, because, and people might say WHAT THE FUCK Hang on, you were both just talking about how you don't need to lose weight for health reason. But there could be a reason that you need to for health reasons. And that is if you are being denied life saving surgery until you meet an arbitrary BMI number. So, some people will say, like for gender confirmation surgery, we are not going to offer you gender confirmation surgery, unless you have your stomach amputated first, unless you lose weight first. And so you may choose because, you know, it's a life or death situation, you may choose to undergo surgery or to participate in a diet knowing that it's harmful to you knowing it's you know, not going to be resulting in long term weight loss in order to get life saving surgery or access to care or so many different things that fat people cannot get access to because of these ridiculous BMI standards.

Unknown Speaker 29:27

Yeah, and fertility I think is another one although, you know, it's not necessarily like life or death, but for a lot of people that's like, Yeah, they really that's what they want, like that's their life is is to be able to you know, have a family and, and there's a lot of, you know, fertility clinics or IVF that there's, there's a BMI limit and low is low, low low that BMI limit is basically you have to be straight size. Like it's fucking that really is so low. It's fucking gets on life.

Unknown Speaker 30:00

laps. And I am I made this whole post on Instagram medical fatphobia how public health promotes the eugenics of fat people and it goes into every single thing. Not every single thing because it would be like 50 billion things along, but a lots of different things that we don't even realize that how fat people are denied things. One that is very distressing to think about is

Unknown Speaker 30:30

transplants. So if you're on a transplant list, if you are fat, you are seen as your classic as higher risk, and so you're less likely to get a transplant. And so imagine if you're, you're so sick, that you need an organ transplant, and then having to either undergo stomach amputation or squeezing surgery or a diet in order to get life saved it life saving transplant is just so violent.

Unknown Speaker 30:59

It just makes me it makes me and you know, and the list goes on and on and on of different ways that, you know, things are denied to fat people. And so you may as a person make that decision to say, You know what, I know this is bullshit, but I'm going to die if I don't adhere to their,

Unknown Speaker 31:20

their guidelines. And so I'm gonna, I'm just gonna do it. Because this thing is so important for me. And the other thing to think about is

Unknown Speaker 31:31

when people are living with multiple marginalized identities, then perhaps dieting is the only way to be safe, or is a great way for them to be safe if they live in a fat body. Because society is kinder to fat people who are trying not to be fat versus fat people who are

Unknown Speaker 31:51

proudly fat. And so sometimes it is easier just to engage in dieting to prove your humanity to society. And so that's really important to recognize as well. Yeah. And I think he was sort of see that with celebrities, because they're under so much scrutiny and constant criticism. And even though they have wealth privilege,

Unknown Speaker 32:15

you still see how they will sometimes go down that route road. And it's all like, I think that it's it's also connected to that feeling of like, well, I want this, like the safety of not having that constant like barrage of criticism. Yeah, I can't even imagine like, I've done episodes on there. So you know what happens when your favorite fat celebrity loses weight, and I just think, fucking hell, like, if I was a celebrity, I wonder if I might be succumb to the pressure of the absolute scrutiny of my body, every single centimeter of it being pulled apart. My not being able to get roles being being casters, like the funny fat word, or this type of things. You know, I wonder if I would succumb to that. And this is coming from someone who is a fat activist. And so

Unknown Speaker 33:09

we're also putting these these people on a pedestal as if to say, they should have their shit together. They're representing the fat community or whatever. And it's kind of like,

Unknown Speaker 33:20

Yeah, but there are a few men, you know, when did they say, We don't know their history with dieting, and if they, they had a history of disordered eating, and all that type of stuff, and they're in fucking Hollywood, like, every single one of their Hollywood friend is probably like, oh my god, I'm just gonna rub some dust into my eyeballs. And I'm gonna lose like, you know, and so it's probably exhausting. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I imagine. Yeah, no, I think you gotta like, have empathy for people. Because, yeah, it's just the culture we live in is, is violent, as you said. So yeah, yeah. So yeah, especially those who are, who are like super fat people, or, you know, fat people who are also people of color, or also are disabled or also are trans, you know, etc, etc. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's the crux of, of death, the diets. I think we we don't want to say exactly like we say at the beginning of every episode, that you're, you're a fucking idiot, if you die if you're dieting, we're saying diets don't support us in the way that we've been told that they do. And in fact, they're really harmful. But we understand if people want to engage in diet culture for many different reasons. And it doesn't mean that you're a bad person or you're not smart or, or whatever. It just means that our society is not built to support people, fat people, you know, and other models identities. Exactly, exactly. Should we talk about what the audience said? Yes, please, you go ahead and we asked the audience, do you know how to deal with health issues without dieting or attempting weight loss? I was sort of surprised by this. So

Unknown Speaker 35:00

My audience said 37% said yes. And 63% said no, just pretty close to yours. Yeah, mine was 31% said yes. 69 said no. Why are you surprised? No, I felt like more people would say, I know how to deal with health issues without attempting weight loss.

Unknown Speaker 35:19

Yeah. Yeah. Follow. Like, they're they follow. They follow us. Like, I'm like, they listen to the podcast and stuff. And so that's not to say there's anything wrong with people who said no, but it just it shows how pervasive fucking messaging is. Yeah. I think maybe what it is, is I think some people think, oh, other people can be healthy and fat, but not me. Yeah. And one of the bad ones, you know, I, you know, because I'm trying to think about Yeah. And maybe they haven't listened to our podcasts. Maybe they haven't been following us for a long time. Maybe they're new people. And the ones who said yes, you know, I do know how to support my health without attempting weight loss. And the people who've been around for a little bit. Yeah. Oh, maybe I need to talk about this even more. Yeah, I know. No, actually, it was like a real. I was like, Oh, wow, like, Okay, I'm so glad we're doing this episode. And there needs to be more. Like I did, I did like a deep dive on diabetes with goddess oyster and Rebecca scritch field. And I'm like, I have that because I feel like that's, there's just so many health conditions that there's these misconceptions about so yes, like, oh, we just need to do more, you know, more education around this.

Unknown Speaker 36:32

Then we asked, What reasons do you feel you need to lose weight.

Unknown Speaker 36:37

And so my audience said,

Unknown Speaker 36:40

just feeling uncomfortable sleep apnea health, fitting into airplane seats, restaurant booths, things that associate that are associated with, you know, weight discrimination and things like that pressure off joints, to get hip surgery, feeling more confident, to be taken more serious, seriously, professionally.

Unknown Speaker 37:00

What about you? Yeah, that's there's some really good responses because, you know, like to get hits hip surgery, that's an a prime example of someone whose will probably unless they can find a doctor who will operate on them have to do something which is not conducive with health to get surgery. And the reality is, the world is kinda too fat, or too thin people.

Unknown Speaker 37:25

And that's what my first might what people are saying to be attractive. And so to be attractive. That's obviously subjective, the world tells us that fat bodies are not attractive. I personally don't think it's true. I think that people are fucking amazing. But the world in general tells you, you need to be smaller to be attractive. But anyway, so to be attractive world is kind of two smaller bodies. So I look like the girls that the boys want. The boys fancy, worried I have diabetes. And then someone sent a longer message, which is I'm really struggling to access any health care as a mid fat person. And I don't see that changing in my lifetime, the bigger societal fatphobia to I feel simultaneous Lee emboldened to change the world and take down the system and live radically and life has been incredibly hard due to fatphobia. But I won't pursue intentional weight loss for for one thing, I'm in recovery from anorexia, and my whole life is talking about this. But yeah, I guess those are the reasons I feel that sometimes feel that sometimes, but don't act on it. It's kind of like holding these two realities of, yes, if I was sinner, my life would be better in lots of ways, because,

Unknown Speaker 38:39

but I probably can't get there. And that sucks, you know? Yeah, that's really tough. Yeah. So next question was, if you think that there are health issues that will will mean you need to lose weight. What are they? So what are the health issues that you think that you need to lose weight? What did your people say? Arthritis, bad knee high blood pressure, diabetes, acid reflux, fertility, and I think

Unknown Speaker 39:07

you I'm seeing yours, they seem to echo that those health notes I feel are so important, as it relates to a lot of those.

Unknown Speaker 39:17

But that's where again, that like the IVF and the fertility, that one's so tough, because

Unknown Speaker 39:23

I mean, fertility, the fertility is different. If you're if you're trying on your own, there's ways but if you need IVs, then yeah, you may be denied that which is one of those really hard situations. Yeah, acid reflux. I've never heard that one before. Oh, I mean, like, you know, I mean, doctors will just say it's your weight. Everything you ever saw you my eye. I was literally just gonna say an ingrown hair and my eyebrows.

Unknown Speaker 39:55

Wake like

Unknown Speaker 39:58

oh my goodness. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 40:00

Yeah, yeah. And and as well like we've been so mindset, you know, diabetes infertility, bad back and hips, arthritis to get pregnant and have a healthy pregnancy. And so a lot of these are, you know to get pregnant and have a healthy pregnancy. So for people who are on the pregnancy thing, Nicola salmon fat positive fertility is excellent and we'll break down

Unknown Speaker 40:22

what's going on there and the realities of it and so, so doctors will say like, Oh, you have if you're fat, you have a 50% increased chance of getting gestational diabetes. And then we look at the numbers it goes, it's something like a straight size person has a nought point 5% chance of getting gestational diabetes, and the fat person has a nought point seven 5% chance, you know, and so, you have these scary things said to you, and you're like, oh my god, I'm gonna, I'm gonna hurt my baby. Because I'm fat. And it's my fault. And the reality is that gestational diabetes is not your fault to begin with. But the risk around these types of things are way overblown, very often, and you can get pregnant if you're fat. And actually trying to lose weight to get pregnant is putting your body in a state that makes it harder to get pregnant. Yeah, Nicholas salmon talks a lot about that stuff. Yeah, and so taught questioning these things like oh, arthritis, you know, arthritis, and someone saying, Oh, I'm could get arthritis. And I'm sure they said I'm 40 my sister had arthritis from the age of like, 20. It's a you know, she heredity it was her, she got it from my mom. So you know, and she straight size and do strange sights, people also have bad back and hips. Is it true that being fat is the cause of these things? You know, no, our joints are massively supportive. And all the times overusing them by running and doing things like that doing over exercising, or having injuries

Unknown Speaker 42:11

can cause complications. But again, go to the Hayes health sheets for more information, and how to treat this stuff. From a doctor. I want to give a shout out to Nicola salmons book fat and fertile.

Unknown Speaker 42:28

It's so good. Even if you are not fat. I think it's like an amazing book on pregnancy and like trying to become pregnant.

Unknown Speaker 42:37

And if you are obviously it's, it's even better because that's who it's geared towards. But it blows up so much stuff. And she was also on my podcast, too. So there's that interview there. I can't remember the episode number. But if you Google it, then she'll come up. So

Unknown Speaker 42:51

I'm always I'm always dropping her name because her work is so good. And she's such a nice person. She is she and she has this many British person like me. So you know.

Unknown Speaker 43:04

Yeah, but I think I think the other thing too, I wanted to mention the high blood pressure is interesting, too, because you and you've spoken to this or you shared this I know is that like if the cuff isn't the right size, because if your arm is so this happened to my husband recently because he's bigger.

Unknown Speaker 43:20

And like, for some reason is the dental assistant takes his blood pressure and it came back high. And I was like, I was like to think maybe they use the wrong cuff size because like he's he's big and his arms massive. And so

Unknown Speaker 43:35

that can also like give false reading, right? If you if you have a too small cough, it will give up false high reading. Yeah. So how often does a doctor or a dentist have any more than one size? cuff? Yeah. Oh, this was a dental assistant to like, no offense, your dental system. I was like, why do they take your blood pressure the oddest thing I've ever heard?

Unknown Speaker 44:00

You're gonna go run off and if you're fabulous last summer. Yeah, I gotta go pick myself up. But these have been so fun. I've loved doing these. I feel like we've gotten some really good feedback from them. So who knows what will happen in the future? Yeah, who knows? Whether we'll just keep having conversations at dinner or whether we choose to.

Unknown Speaker 44:21

Yeah, right. Yeah, that's it. All right. Wow. Thanks, everyone, for hanging out with us. And I guess we'll see ya on the Instagrams. Which is where you can find us where can people find you summer? Yeah, they can find me.

Unknown Speaker 44:37

At the body image coach calm my podcast is called Eat the rules. And I'm summer intern in on all the social platforms. What about you? I am first fatty everywhere. Easy peasy lemon and lime. So come follow me. Let's have some fun.

Unknown Speaker 44:56

Okay, well, we're saying goodbye. Thanks, everyone.

Unknown Speaker 45:00

See you later in a while Cocteau. bye

Unknown Speaker 45:08

Thanks for listening to the episode and if you feel ready to get serious about this work and want to know when the doors open to phase fatty Academy which is my signature program, where I teach all about how to overcome your fat phobic beliefs and learn to love your fat body, then go to phase fatty.com forward slash waitlist again that is phase fatty.com. Forward slash waitlist to get your name on the waitlist. For when first party Academy my signature program opens