Episode 132 Transcript

You're listening to The Fierce Fatty Podcast Episode 132 “Raising fat positive kids”. I'm your host, Vinnie Welsby. Let's do it..

I'm Vinny 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 with 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.

Hello, hello. Welcome to our episode. Dude, how you doing? How's life is it great, I hope it is. And back after a week off you might be able to hear Dougie Dougie my dog. In the background today. He's he's running around a little anxious, a little anxious because he's so sensitive. A neighbor two doors down their smoke alarm battery needs changing. And you know that little beep that it does, that he's terrified of that beep and he can hear it through the hallway into our apartment. And it's been going on for like three days. And it really scares him. I left a note on the door neighbor's door being like, I'm sorry, but my dog is a baby. And yeah, he can hear it through the night with the bedroom door close with the two two front doors. And then a bedroom three doors in between the beeping and he can still hear it. And he's like sitting on my head at night and pacing and pull baby. And because he last this weekend, I took him to a river here in Vancouver and we threw some steaks, we had a gay old time, it was very fun. And then he got a parasite. And so we had to he was shitting his pants for four days until he started medication through the night. It felt like I had a child. And I don't want children and so it reinforced my child free status. Because I was like how do parents do this? Like waking up to five, seven to take him downstairs to so you can do a poo? That's like how to fuck how how do people go and then like, go to work. And, and it's not just, you know, the few days I experienced. And when I took him to the doctor was like, let's monitor him see how he gets on. And then eventually it was like to come in and and they were like, oh, their medicine would take 48 hours to work and I was like 48 hours I can't handle not getting enough sleep for another 48 hours. Luckily, he it worked immediately. So I was like oh thank god. So I mean kudos to any parent who is even like getting up once in the night. And that's like, you know, if you have a baby then I'm sure it goes on for like a year or two or three or fuck fuck have I know. 10 2018 years? Yeah, so and then the weekend before bless Dougie, what a little baby. We're at the beach, different beach at the seaside this time Florin sticks having a gale time again. And he rips off his two claw which is just some cloth. If you're not a dog owner or you know just hanging off and he was like my foot and I was like oh my God took him to the emergency vet and had to have to cut it off and he had a little bandage on his foot in the color of a giraffe and a cone on his head for a week and medicine and stuff. So he just he just recovered from that and then I was like let's have some fun and go to the lake and then he got gets a bag parasite. We haven't confirmed what it is. I've just sent his poo off for testing to confirm what it is what's going on or some bacteria whatever. So now the fire alarm thing so if you hear him running around, he's like I'm scared like and during the podcast I can't be playing music. So that's what I've been doing playing music should distract him. So he can't hear. And so I stopped, stopped, the music stopped recording the podcast. And he's like, okay, that again, what are you doing? Why is it so scary?

Unknown Speaker 5:16

Yeah, so hey, here's a little update for you, if you are an Instagram user, and I think even if you're a Facebook user, too, it might work for Facebook, too. There is a new way. Face, Instagram has made a change so that you can remove weight loss, add weight loss ads. So what you do, I'm going to link to a post in the show notes. So if you forget, and you need a reminder, or images to point you how to do it is you go to your Instagram, and then you go to your profile. And when you're on your profile, there's the three lines, the burger icon thing, you click the three lines, you go to settings, the gear icon, which is at the very top. From there, you go to ADS, click that, then you go to add topics. And then your search. For body weight control, body weight control, now, I'm in Canada, body weight control didn't come up for me. So it might be if you're elsewhere, body weight control will come up. But I did search the word diet. And so lots of different diet stuff came like weight loss diet, there was no weight loss on such a weight loss too. But for many people, it's probably going to work for some reason, my Instagram is all over the place. And I'll get some features for the feature. So hopefully, this is a feature that you can have. If you don't have body weight control, you can maybe do diet and look at for the diet stuff and you just say see less, and so you can't say don't see but see less. It's either no preference or sealer so little tip the other. Also, I noticed I changed my agenda on Facebook to male. And I got like adverts for things like beef and shaving and man and muscles and cars and shit. You know, I think my gender there is non binary. And so they're like, Now I change it and they're like, oh, okay, non binary, these motherfuckers are gonna get dyads Yes, so no tip for you that little tip for the year though. Now, today's episode, we're talking about children, those children and you know those things, you know, I said, I'm child free, but I do like children used to be one all those years ago, like children just don't want them for myself. And one of my members of face fatty Academy, which is my program to help people learn fatphobia recently had the experience of taking her son to the doctor who proceeded to lecture on how her son was too big and questioned what she feeds him and how much he exercises that's where I wish I could be like buddies, buddies with, you know, be like a little like, no, come up on your shoulder in those moments and be like, really, this is what we're gonna say to this motherfucking doctor, oh, I just like manifest in the room like poof, like, you know, what was that? I Dream of Jeannie. And then the mum would just come into the room and she was like a genie or something anyway, you know, you just be like, shaking knows what we're going to twist your nose, do a little nod. And then poof, here I go. non binary fat positive. Got x there, too. We're like we're not doing this a BS today. Yes. So I wanted to talk about, you know what I would do in that instance, if everything was perfect. And you could do all the perfect thing, which is probably not likely, but you know, the perfect solution to that. And then like the imperfect, we're trying to be the best we can be. And talking about child stuff and something that a stat that I had seen a couple of years ago from I'm going to link to the account.

Unknown Speaker 9:54

Go back, go back. Go back. Come on. Yeah, so the account is early. So, Rumsey our D are registered dietitian, thin white person, just just a heads up that shared the stack because she'd looked at information on she she's written a book a couple of years ago. And she looked at information on well, how prevalent is things like eating disorders and kids? How prevalent is things like type two diabetes, which society says is caused by fatness? And so we see the message that oh my god childhood, oh, word rates, childhood fatness rates are out of the truth. There's just fat kids roaming around eating the good thing kids and destroying the world. And yeah. We No, no, it's no, I'm gonna go through some stats here. But basically a stat that Alyssa shared, which, like a heads up, she's not saying that fatness is caused by type two diabetes, but people think that right? So this is a stat that she shares, children are 242 times more likely to suffer from an eating disorder than they are from type two diabetes. If you took a sample of 100,000 children, only 12 would have type two diabetes, but 2900 would meet the criteria for an eating disorder. And again, fatness does not cause diabetes, you cannot eat your way into diabetes. Diabetes is a genetic condition. We have higher rates in we have like other things that might affect it in regards to marginalization and oppression, race, things like that. But it's not something that fatness causes, or you can eat your way into being diabetic. And so if we're worried about fat kids, what we should be worried about is the stigma that those fat kids are experiencing and not telling them to not be fat, because it's not helpful. And they're 242 times more likely to experience disordered eating eating disorder, you know. So, I'm going to link to these but we've got stats from National Eating disorders.org. And I'm going to link to Ulisses story highlights, which also links to the studies that show like what uh, rates of childhood diabetes, what are rates of eating disorders in children, what are let's talk let's look at the rates of childhood fatness. And then and big content warning there because

Unknown Speaker 13:18

there's Oh, words all over the place and this stigmatizing language all over the place, because some of the stuff about like, Oh, my God, oh, no, the kids are fat, and they're just so terrible and stuff. Obviously, Coke has a shit ton of awful stuff in it. And then then then they're like, Oh, sure, you just, you know, whatever, a few kids that whatever, no big deal, but there's terrible. So just a caution on that. And also in this episode, I'm just going to be briefly talking about things like eating disorder, prevalence, and things like that. So if that doesn't feel good to you, or you know, concerns about weight and kids, then skip this episode or skip like 15 minutes ahead, because then I'll be talking about how to raise a fat positive kid. Okay, so some stats and stats give me some stats, a lot of stat. By age six girls especially start to express concerns about their own weight or shape. 40 to 60% of elementary school, girls aged six to 12 are concerned about their weight, or about becoming too fat, and this concern endures through life. So kids are at the age of six, picking up this message. And this is what this study is saying. But I would hazard to guess that it's a lot younger than six. And I'm thinking about when kids start to understand like, who's part of the ingroup and who's part of the out group and who's friends and who's not friends and you know, if they're not exposed to certain types of people, then they can see them as the out group and I I guess I hate to say this is against just me thinking about Me sitting and watching cartoons with my siblings. The fat phobic food restrictive diet culture and messages from like fucking Coco melon. so awful. I'm just like, what? You know, like the one the one if you know Coco melon the one it's like, ooh, Daddy's not tonight some sugar one a naughty daddy, or mommy and mommy and binge eat some things or What a naughty Mommy. Oh, we've caught Timmy or whatever his name is Jimmy and Jimmy ate some cookie. Oh, what? Oh dear. We're going to be a good family now and eat some vegetables and fruit. What that are like Peppa Pig, where it's always like, Dad, you're a fat fucking bastard the whole time really, is that the dad's character is all just that he's a fat slob. Like, and he needs to lose weight. What? What I thought Peppa Pig was, you know, the source of the source of American children picking up British accents, not visible shit. But yeah, it turns out it is. And you know, I've probably only watched 1000 hours of kids shows with my siblings. And so, you know, I don't have as much of an idea as people who watch more right, you know, kids and stuff and parents, and caretakers. So okay, the best known environmental contributor to the development of eating disorders is social socio cultural idealization of fineness. Let me read that again. The best known environmental contributor to the development of eating disorders is the idealization of fineness of American elementary school girls who read magazines 69% say that the pictures influence their concept of what the ideal body shape is. 47% said the pictures make them want to lose weight. Children of mothers who are overly concerned about their weight are at increased risk of modeling their unhealthy attitudes, and behaviors. An estimated 90 to 95% of college students diagnosed with an eating disorder also belong to a fitness facility. In trustor, 42% of first or third grade girls want to be thinner. In elementary school, fewer than 25% of girls directly Yet those who do not know what dieting involves, can talk about calorie restriction and food choices for weight loss fairly effectively. Yeah, so that was that was definitely me, you know, I engaged in behaviors, which now I would say is like, over exercising dieting, eating disorder, you know, things like not eating.

Unknown Speaker 18:02

And I wouldn't have said like, this is a diet Oh, this is, this is me trying to lose weight. You know, I knew that I was doing those things to try and be thinner, but it wasn't you know, I didn't connect the dots it was just behaviors versus understanding what those behaviors were at 1% of 10 year olds are afraid of being fat 46% of nine to 11 year olds are sometimes or very often on diets and 82% of their families are sometimes are very often on diets, oh 82% of nine to 11 year olds, parents families are sometimes or very often on diets.

Unknown Speaker 18:51

Just as thought of kids being I know, experienced it, and millions of millions of people do and kids do and I mean, like how many people listening to the show is a fat person who experienced their parents, or caretaker or someone influential in their life when they were younger, dieting or wanting to be thinner, or having food rules and all that type of diet culture behavior, like loads of us. Over 50% of teenage girls and nearly 1/3 of teenage boys use weight control behaviors such as skipping meals, fasting smoking, cigarettes, vomiting and taking laxatives just a head up heads up a lot of this data is it's it's very it's very white. It's very sis. There's there's there's a real lack of information on compared to you know, white sis, kids on it You know, studies doing looking at trans kids or queer kids or kids from different backgrounds, there's more of the stuff for for, you know, people of color more so than maybe gender diverse kids, but still compared to the, you know, the white sis stuff, it's like, you know, night and day with the amount of information but still, there's still not enough information about all of this stuff. There was an all of these these if you want links to all of these studies are all under this to documents that I'm going to link to in the show notes show notes, for this one is facebook.com, forward slash 132132. So there's a table here on prevalence versus funding. Despite the prevalence of eating disorders, they continue to receive inadequate research funding, so they they're showing different things and the prevalence, so outsiders disease prevalence is 5.1 million. The NIH research funds 450 million autism, 3.6 million prevalence and the funds 160 million schizophrenia, 3.4 million prevalence and 276 million in research funds eating disorders, which are there are many, the prevalence is 30 million. So all of the other prevalences were 533 million, and this one is 30 million. So the research funds is 28 million. So the other ones were 450 160 267 million, and then intersections only 28. So they say here, research dollars spent on Alzheimer's disease average $88 per affected individual in 2011. For schizophrenia, the amount was 81 for autism 44. For eating disorders, the average amount of research dollars per affected individual was just 93 cents. And this is from the National Institutes of Health 2011. And I wonder what the autism one How much is that is is the you know, what was that? You know that that model who used to wish like a playboy or Jenna McCarthy, who was like autism, vaccines cause autism. And so there's been an A bananas amount of research to prove that vaccines don't cause autism way too much, way too much. And so I wonder like, how much of that 3.6 million? I mean, this is 2011? I don't know. Yeah, it would have been going on in 2011. That is to debunk pseudoscience. So, yes, yes, yes. Yes, yes. So they said we've got links to all of this, this juicy stuff. And basically, the research that we do have on people who are not white and sis is that

Unknown Speaker 23:15

it's it's more prevalent and obviously treated less. And there are more other things going on at the same time. So if someone's got BDD binging disorder, then they've also got things like PTSD or low self esteem. More likely, if you're also marginalized in other ways, is what the research is, is kind of beginning to show but again, it's not robust enough to have any really clear conclusions. So just kind of pointing that out of if there, if there's any other marginalization is going on, then, you know, it's probably even more difficult to deal with and to get diagnosed and to get help. As it is for kids as it is for adults, right. So so so so so so so what we know about kids is that they're fucking going through it, they are going for it when it comes to learning that thinness is best. And there they are. Learning that they need to be thin in order to be whatever it is that they've been taught that fitness entails. And if you think about what you might have learned, fitness entails and what comes with fitness as a kid, then it's probably pretty heartbreaking. I know for me, a big part of what I learned in my childhood was that because I'm fat, I will never get a boyfriend. That's a big message. I heard that you never gonna get a boyfriend and no one's ever gonna love you You and also don't dream too big because your fatness is going to stop you achieving things. And the big one, like I remember is seeing an opera singer on songs of praise if you're British, you will know that song which was a no that that TV program which was on our Sunday, really fucking boring, and it was just people singing songs for Jesus. Right very boring program. Anyway, that was not pressing on songs of praise. And I was like, Mommy, I want to be an opera singer. And she said, No, you can't be an opera singer because you're fat. She I think she'd heard of the you know, the fat lady sings and foul bro thing? Because isn't that like the cliche that you know, Pavarotti and opera singer is a fat right? I don't know. But I think I think she was thinking about, you know, being a pop star or whatever. Yeah. So and, and. And me saying the story about my mom, it's not like my mum was like, What can I do to fuck up this child's life? She was thinking, I'm presuming obviously. I can't read her mind. But she was thinking, Okay, well, if my child wants to be a singer, what do they have to do to become successful as a singer, they need to be thin. So I'm going to help them by telling them great idea. Being a singer is a wonderful thing. So why don't you become thin, so you can make it happen, like, I'm presuming that that was a thought process behind thinking, but the message that I got was a little bit different, you know, the message I got was, you know, you're a fucking fat loser. And even if you are good at singing, it doesn't matter because you're fat. And no one wants to see a fat person singing is what I heard.

Unknown Speaker 27:04

And, and with the, with the saying, You're never going to get a boyfriend, if you're fat. I'm I, again, you know, something, maybe there was a little bit of malice of, you know, I was misbehaving. And she was like that, I'm gonna stick it to them. But I think mostly it was, I really want you to be in the best position in life to achieve what you want to achieve. And fineness is going to get you there. And so you should become thin. Same way, as my mom would encourage us to go to university and I played the trumpet for years, and she would encourage me to do that. And because we came from a very, very poor household with a lot of other things happening to you, and like my dad was, my dad was using alcohol, and you know, we lived in an awful neighborhood, and I'd experienced sexual sexual assault as a young child and things like that. So I'm thinking that she wanted us to do these extracurricular things get to university, be attractive, be healthy, so that we could get out of poverty, we could get out of abusive situations. And the in some ways, it that was helpful, because, you know, three of the four of us who grew up together and actually, my, my other siblings, too, they all happen to go to university too. But three of the four of us growing up growing up, we grew up together, we did all go to university, which was which was coming from where we came from, was very surprising. Like I wouldn't know anyone else in my neighborhood who would have also gone to university right? And luckily in the UK, if you're poor the government pays for university which is wonderful. And that's how we how we managed to get there and because my mum was already kind of like let's say you're smart she would tell us that you were smart but with the with the telling me that I was fat because I was the fat one right? That did not help me get out of shitty situations. In fact it put me into shooting 66 Shitty situations right because empowering you know, empowering me to say you know, you're smart, you can go to university was was was empowering and felt good, whereas you are fat and you should be thin, was not empowering. It was filled with shame. And what we know when we shame people to not be fat, is it just the opposite not that being fat is a bad thing, but shame is not a good motivator. And you know, that fear of oh my god, what if you do become fat and I I'm guessing a lot of parents are like, Well, I'm trying to protect my kid because the world doesn't like it. If you don't conform, I don't want my kid to be queer or trans or fat, or, you know, any of the things where they could be a target for discrimination thing is, though, you're starting the discrimination at home, you know, you know, it's like, kind of like, I'm going to, I'm going to make sure that they feel marginalized. So here, so they can form so they don't feel marginalized outside, but they're going to, they feel marginalized at home and outside, because they're not going to change their identity, probably. And then they know that the place that should be filled with love and acceptance is not so but I know, like, it's, I just kind of feel like I get it. But the logic is faulty. And especially, you know, I'm 37. So, you know, 3730 years ago, whatever. We weren't really talking about this as much this stuff. So hopefully the next generation is going to kind of if I had kids, hopefully I would not fuck my kids up as much in regards to that, that, you know, body stuff and food stuff. I probably fucked them up in some other way. And they'd be and then 30 years time that'd be on a podcast being like, yeah, man, my parents Vinnie. They were just a fucking piece of shit. And they did these and I'm like, Yeah, but you're not ashamed to your body? Yeah. And I'm like, Yeah, but you ruined my life in this way.

Unknown Speaker 31:26

Yeah, so so so so so so. So yeah. When I was saying about how being taught that being fat was bad. What that led me to was, and I've spoke about it on the show before at the age of 17, my first boyfriend was 30 year old and he was abusive in many different ways. And I always just thought, I'm so lucky that he would even talk to me that he would want to be with me. Because I'm fat, right? Like, this is all I deserve. Because I'm fat, you know, because I had that you never gonna get a boyfriend if you're fat. Oh my god, I've got a boyfriend. I am having sex with someone. Someone wants to have sex with me. Even though I am this awful, disgusting. person. And now I'm like, nah.

Unknown Speaker 32:24

Oh, my God, and obviously experienced abuse, which was awful. Yeah, so it didn't help me because I was constantly just like, how can I get thin? I need to be thin because you are thin. And I'm going to receive love and praise, and lots of good things. Okay, so how can we protect our kids? And obviously, I don't have kids. So I'm not an expert on how to talk to kids. But I know about creating environments, which are supportive to fat positivity. So in this example, the story that I shared at the beginning the doctor saying your child is fat, and oh my god, it must be because they are doing XYZ and you're a terrible parent. And you know, kids have been taken from their parents because they are fat, which is fucked up 1,000,000,000% totally fucked up. Not okay. Because guess what? Fat kids exist, have always existed, will always exist. fatness is just a normal part of being a human being, you know, AI now. And I think about why we're so stressed about is Oh, my kid fat. Let's not have fat kids. Because it's gonna mean that this and that. And whatever, that as soon as a kid starts showing any signs of like, you know, being chubby or fat or whatever, then, you know, people are like doing the sign of the cross and being like, Oh, my God, police. We need to stop this, this this before it gets out of control. And they pathologize a normal kid's body and start messing around with it, you know? And I think about how kids, you how humans grow. And how if you've not seen a kid for a couple of years, or a year or over the summer or whatever, and they're like 10, and they've gone from 10 to the age of 10 and a half or 11. And then you see them and you're like What the fuck? You've grown like 17 feet like you used to be at my knees and now you're taller than me what the heck. And it's, you know, we wouldn't be like oh my god, Quick, get them to the doctor. They've got this weird stretch thing going on. We've got a really stretched kids going out here and just being tall and know we'd be like, Oh, well, that's just a normal part of growing and, and just because some kids might grow taller, quicker and some kids might Like grow wider, and then tall and then maybe wider, some more and then maybe a little bit taller, but maybe not, you know. And so if the kid is not doing the wide and the tall at the same time, or the just the tall or not the wide, then we're like, oh my god, a kid can't just do the wide. And we just be like, Oh, we know, they kid the child is growing. You know, I just think about how it's kind of like, just overreacting, when I say overreacting, there should be no reaction apart from supporting a kid in living maybe temporarily in a body, that is marginalize, maybe they're just, they just happened to be a fat child that turns into a fat adult. And that's absolutely fine, too. And that's no problem whatsoever. And so the only thing that we would need to do to react to that, and even if we have small kids, is to talk about discrimination. And talk about body diversity. So in this instance, the doctor is like, ah, yo, kids fat, and you are a piece of shit because you have a fat kid. So this is Dreamworld this is, if you knew it was coming, had rehearsed your script, beforehand, was feeling great had no social anxiety, there was no power imbalance between you and the doctor. All of them, you know, perfect stars need to align, that is probably not going to happen for most people. And that through no fault of your own, is, if the doctor starts talking about the child's weight is saying, I'm gonna stop you right there. Hey, child, can you step outside? If that's possible? Or can we talk in private doctor or healthcare provider? So that's the first thing, can we remove the child from experiencing potential trauma, we might not be able to do it, right. Like, if it's a three year old, you can't be like, Oh, three year old, go and unclick go outside and you know, play with some traffic.

Unknown Speaker 37:02

But if that's possible, we want to try and avoid the kid experiencing it. Then saying to the doctor, I don't expose my kids to weight bias. So we don't talk about that. We don't talk about weight, like it's a problem. That's not going to happen. Again, this is dream world. That you might say this, if you if you ever if you can say this, like if someone can say this during the doctor's visit, I would be like, Wow, because there's so much going on, right? You know, you're gonna go in for a doctor's visit, and you're not expecting the doctor to be a bellend. Well, maybe we are if you're fat, then you probably are. But in that moment, even someone like me, you know, your brain is like, Oh, my God, oh my God, what's happening? How shit is happening? Oh, my God, the time this thing? Oh, God, the child is hearing it? Oh, what do I say? And then you're like, Well, I think it's fine. You know, you'll come out with something. And that's normal. Because our brains are like, you know, fight flight, freeze that type of thing. So and so if you can't say to the doctor, Listen, I'm not gonna, let's not talk about this. You could, you know, just nod and smile and be like, yeah, sure, great, whatever, and defend your child as much as you can. But if you if you can't do that, for whatever reason, then you can do damage control after you leave the doctor's. So it's that remove reduced protect that I've spoken to you law about before. Can you remove the thing? Maybe, maybe not? Can you reduce the exposure? Can you like say okay, and have conversation? Oh, actually, I'm here today to talk about little Timmies knees or whatever? Can we get back to that? And they're like, yes, because he's got sore knees because he's fat. And then if you can't reduce, can you protect and so protect that gorgeous brain of yours and of your kids, kid, children, multiple, whatever. And so depending on their age, you may want to have a conversation with them afterwards about what happened and how they feel about that about it and reassure them that there's nothing wrong with their body and that doctors can hold biases and stigma. They might be a little bit too young for that stuff. You might want to not have a direct conversation and instead make a bigger effort to fill their brain with fat positive goodness, whether that's not watching Peppa Pig that day and instead watching something which is more fat positive and watching I don't know. I can't give you a recommendation on shows. I'm sure there's probably lots there's probably lots of talk about fat stuff. You can you can give them order some some books or get it from the library. And in the show notes. I have got a list of books for you. Whew, a list of like 30. But for ebooks in a range of ages for you. So, yeah, filling their brain with fat positive goodness, because a lot of the books, even if we don't have media that, you know, kids are consuming, that is specifically anti fat, the media that kids will consume the same as us. It's so it's so there's no diversity, right? There's no diversity. And so even if it's like, oh, it's Power Rangers, but you know, where's the fat Power Ranger? You know, there's only one isn't? Or is it one or two? Like, there's maybe it's a one Black Power Ranger, and then there's one Asian power ranger. But anyway, they've got hats on, so you can't even see. But but, you know, I'm saying that, can we? You know, remove the egregious stuff, if possible. Not always. But can we also see if there's something that's a little bit more diverse, and the same with books like that, like, when I'm reading books to my siblings, I'm like, wow, like, every fucking character is why.

Unknown Speaker 41:24

And he's just just standard,

Unknown Speaker 41:25

right? The toys is just white, and thin, you know? So yeah, if we can make some type of changes there, but you know, what the biggest thing that that you can do is to work on how you think about yourself, how you talk about yourself, and the modeling of behaviors for your kids. If they see someone who's dieting and saying fat is bad, and all that type of stuff, then they're probably going to pick it up. They see people being chill around food and around bodies and saying, Oh, if our bodies are cool, and just not making a big deal, then they're going to pick up on that too. They're obviously going to pick up on the ship stuff when they leave the house too. And we can't stop that happening. But we have such power in those more intimate relationships that we'd have with with family. And, you know, everyone's gonna fuck up, right? Everyone is trying to do their best in life. And so there's gonna be times where you fuck up and you're like, Oh, God, but if we're moving towards a place where kids know that they're safe, and they have a safe spot to land in regards to their body, and their uniqueness is it's beautiful, right? And we'll talk about food. If you want to learn more about raising an intuitive eating kid, then. Oh, and there's that book Body happy kids that I'm in. And then Ellen Ellen SATA Institute talks about the division of responsibility from toddlers onwards. So division of responsibility with kids this is raising Intuitive Eating child is you decide what, when, and where a child is fed, and the child decides whether and how much so like a simple thing that I see is a simple switch we can make is thinking about how the way that we talk about foods like sweets, oh, they're bad the sweets you have after dinner, the sweets of the tree, eat the dinner first. Because that's the yucky food that's a boring food. And then you can have the good foods a little switch you can do is is giving dessert with dinner at the same time. And knowing that the kid is probably at least for the first bit going to be having the thing which is a dessert item and asking for more and then you're going to give them as much as they want because they have learned that that thing is like magical and, and maybe a little bit taboo and you can't have it because if you do then you're gonna get fat and oh my god, fat is bad. And, and, you know, imagine if we gave that message about other things, you know, like, if you're like, Oh, don't eat so many peas. No, you can only have peas after you finished your cookie. No, you can only have three peas you can't have four peas. Oh, and hiding the peas in a high cupboard so they can't get access to them and and, you know, you secretly MPs and then saying, oh my god, I had some peas. I'm such a bad person and I should stop eating the peas. They're gonna start being like, Please give me the peas. I'm gonna have my peas Come on now, I want some pays. And of course, you know, you know, cookies probably do taste nice doesn't nicer than peas to kids and but you know, we're really, really working hard to help kids be disordered around food, right and make it a big deal. And if we work to not make it a big deal, and just give kids as much food as they want, within, you know, there are there will be rule set to like, I'm not an expert in this, but you know, for example, you're just about to make dinner. And the kid says, Oh, can I have food? And you say, oh, you know, it's not because you decide when, right? Because I Yeah, absolutely, we're gonna have dinner in 10 minutes. And so we're gonna eat then or, or they might say, at nighttime, you know, how kids stall to get into bed, and they're like, I'm thirsty.

Unknown Speaker 45:51

I'm hungry,

Unknown Speaker 45:52

I need to go to the toilet. So, you know, if they like I'm hungry. The messaging that you are, you know, that you're saying of like, you know, you're not hungry, you're being greedy, or whatever, something like that. Versus Oh, yeah, absolutely. The kitchen is closed right now. But if what I'm going to do tomorrow's I'm gonna remind you, when the kitchen is open again, so that you can have some food, and not, you know, shaming them or telling them, you know, making out like, it's a bad thing. Yeah. So that's a simple thing that we could do. So let me let me let me round up everything that we're talking about how to raise a fat positive child. So talking about fat phobia, and body politics, and depending on the age of your kid talking about how the world has fucked up, and we. But we don't fix bullying by giving the bully or lunch money. And so we're not going to change our bodies in order to adhere to what society might say, or do to us or say about us. Because it's not okay to judge people, and especially in the home environment, as well. And tell them that they are worthy no matter what they look like or what they do. Never put them on a diet, unless it's like a diet for medical reasons. Like, you know, your child has epilepsy and they need to do keto, but never putting them on a diet standing up for their rights. If the doctor tells them that they need to lose weight, or if the school sends a letter home saying your kid is fat, or they've got work to do, which is weighing themselves standing up for them and saying that that's not appropriate to the school or the doctor if you can do that, that is beautiful. Don't shame their body in any way or shame them for wearing certain types of clothes. Don't bully them into moving their body. Yeah, movements great and all but it's more important to not cause damage to their relationship with movement. And that's something that a lot of adults bring into life is trauma or around being forced to do the 1500 meter run at pe 1500 I hated it and monitor what the the media they're consuming. So are they watching hours of Peppa Pig? Were they constantly gone about habit ads a fat bastard and he needs to lose weight? Can we also sprinkle in something that's more positive? Can we buy books celebrate body diversity? Don't force him to spend time with people who are raging weights, bigots, or diet culture zealots if they have to, for whatever reason, talk to them about the types of things have been exposed to and how it's, you know, it's not okay, and all that type of stuff. But the number one thing that you can do is unlearn all of that stuff that we learn as kids and model behavior to show that your body is a okay the size it is, food is not a big deal. And remember the stat about kids being 242 times more likely to suffer from an eating disorder than type two diabetes. Not that being fat causes diabetes at all. But if you have a fat kid, and the doctor is like, Oh my God, they're, they're about to spontaneously combust and get all these terrible things. The chances are, that they are 242 times more likely to You get an eating disorder than they are type two diabetes and so what we really need to worry about is protecting children's gorgeous brains and not making a big deal if they're fat because being fat is just a normal part of being a human being so if you want the list of books so this is the books like I've been gathering it for you know list of different types of books and stuff so this is kids books but the new one that came out is celebrate your body and it's changes to by Sonya Renee Taylor. The ultimate puberty book for girls that looks fun. And body image because all bodies are great by Tierra Han. We've got also things like C is for consent. It's okay to be different by Todd Parr.

Unknown Speaker 51:00

Comma colors mustache, how sounds fun. So we've got you know, like young adult, we've got, you know, baby stuff and everything in between, right. So the intuitive eating workbook for teens a non diet body positive approach to building a healthy relationship with food by Elise rash. So yeah, so go go check out the show notes for a different book, recommendation, show notes at food started.com. Forward slash 132. also links to all the studies for the things that I was talking about. And listen, if you're a parent, I mean, if you're a human, you've you've you've fucked up, right? We've all fucked up and done things and been like, Oh, good. We're all trying our best. And we're all you know, kind of working towards moving to be better and all that type of stuff. And even if you have fucked up, we can have conversations and say, Hey, I think I fucked up with that. You know, like, it just I was talking to my mom a couple of weeks ago, and she was like, You know what, I feel really guilty about one of you, I can't remember which kid she said, Oh, but you got your your exam results, and I was disappointed, and it made you cry. And I was like, oh, yeah, that was me, actually. And I was like, Yeah, I remember that. And she's like, I feel really guilty about it. And I just want to say sorry, and I was like, Oh, shit. Yeah, well, thanks. I appreciate that. And, you know, that was like, 20 years ago. And she, she, like, remembered it. And it's been on our mind and apologized. And obviously, we've talked a lot about, you know, the fat stuff, and dieting and all that type of stuff. So even if we do fuck up, I think sometimes fucking up means that we can also have the chance to build nice relationships. To say, Yeah, we fucked up and what can we do to make it better, and I really saw that when like I was doing a course it was called daring, greatly. Brene Brown, brainy Brown is I've since learned by doing this course, super fat phobic. And so I was doing this course and with my therapists office, and my therapists office is great. Really, really good. And so they were showing videos of brandy Brown had made and we'd be going through his course material. And one of the videos she was saying some really fucking inappropriate shit. And I was like, what? Oh, my God, I thought that this would be safe. How often do I do like self self help stuff? It's just so fat phobic. It's just, you know, you just expect it right? You know, like, oh, how to improve your productivity. And you'll be like, don't be fat. How the fuck did you grow Baba into there? You know, and they'll talk about diet and stuff. It's, it's just, that's why I can't read health self help stuff anymore. But anyway, I thought this was going to be safe because it's run by my therapists, company group. And they are they are excellent. Right? And so afterwards, me and another fat person watching this video. We're both like, in the group saying, Oh, wow, that was fucked up. And then the leader was like, Yeah, that was fucked up. And then afterwards, I sent an email saying, Hey, that was really fucked up. And and so she sent a beautiful email response, she had contacted Brene Brown Company and saying, Hey, this is fucked up. And she said, I'm never gonna, we're never going to share that that thing again. And also, to think give me like a free session or something. I'll come up with something. What is something it was like? They did something and I was like, actually, I feel so even though the bad thing happened, right? And it wasn't the worst thing in the world. Um, but you know, I thought I was in a safer space and then Brene Brown comes with roll. That'd be bad even though that happened, the my respect and and comfort and and feeling seen and heard level increased afterwards. And that was like a really beautiful thing for me to experience because it really made me feel like it's okay if I fuck up and obviously I've been you know, we quote, know that it's okay for us to fuck up. But seeing that the fuckup made the relationship better. And it's almost like you will fuck up and it's a way that react. And so with kids like you will fuck up same with everyone else. And then it's a way that you can humbly say I fucked up and what can I do to make it better?

Unknown Speaker 55:53

is probably even more than was it because even better lesson maybe? Maybe we can try not fuck up people but you know, that's just not possible a lot of times because it's humans talking to other humans. Yeah, so,

Unknown Speaker 56:11

okay.

Unknown Speaker 56:13

Remember there's that that that removing the weight loss ads from your feed hack as well in the show notes and if you enjoyed the episode and you feel like it why don't you write a review?

Unknown Speaker 56:26

Hmm, that would be amazing. And you can add to the review list of saying the shows and mutts nuts there than mutts nuts because we've already got a couple of months nuts on there I think some time I must have said much nuts and anyway go go and add a review if you feel inclined. Um and I'll see you in the next episode. Okay, see you in a why y'all alligator stay face fatty Good boy.

Unknown Speaker 57:04

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 fears fatti 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 first fatty.com forward slash waitlist again that is fierce fatty.com forward slash waitlist to get your name on the waitlist. For when first fatty Academy my signature program opens