Episode 169 Transcript

Read the transcript alongside the audio.

You're listening to the Fierce Fatty Podcast episode 169, Intuitive Eating for Pets and Dealing with Anti-fat Family we've got listener questions again, let's do it.

Unknown Speaker 0:28

face fatties and fat allies, welcome to this episode. Just had a nice little smiling session because for the episode before I start, I take some photos for purposes for the podcast, you know, whatever sharing blah, blah, blah. And I always seem to do the same pose because there's always like a question posed like, is this blah, blah, blah, question.

Unknown Speaker 0:53

And I how many how many facial expressions ocan I do? Oh, curious or investigation.

Unknown Speaker 1:03

And as I started doing that, and then I was like, hold on, if I can minute this is about pets, and I have Dougie the dog.

Unknown Speaker 1:11

Excuse me Dickey, the dog you need to be in the pictures that I take for this so holding him and taking some pictures and he's so fucking key out when I eat his legs.

Unknown Speaker 1:23

And it was his gotcha day yesterday. Yesterday the got your day the day I got him from the adoption place. I also call it his birthday because he was about a year when I got him who the fuck knows. And so nine years since I got him and 10 years of him potentially being alive. So we got some chicken breast for

Unknown Speaker 1:45

throughout the day, which he was very happy about and I box toy thing that I made him, I have to make him a frickin new toys all the time, because he's too smart. What I do is, if you've got a if you've got a pet the likes, I know games. So what I do is I get containers. So either cardboard box. So anytime I get delivery, I keep the cardboard box. And if I ever have like little pop bottles, I'll keep them and I'll just put a little hole or with a cardboard box. I'll put treats inside it and then tape it up and then cut it a little hole. So you can smell the treats inside and then let him tear up the box.

Unknown Speaker 2:25

Yeah, so that's his, that's his after dinner. Activity is playing with these things. And whenever I buy things which are proper for dogs, they they're nowhere near as good. He works them out within like 13 seconds. And they're expensive. And yeah, he'll say, yeah, the cheap shirt, right. Yeah, so I'm happy to consider taking some photos with him with Dougie take a photo with your pet

Unknown Speaker 2:52

NIGO now I've got some cute photos. I when I got my Canadian PR card renewed and I do do go to the photo place. And I was like, oh, take a picture of me to me and Dougie and I'll pay you whatever it is for the passport thing and I took it and it may did you have like read demonize.

Unknown Speaker 3:14

Like, didn't look didn't look as good as I thought I thought it'd be like a really cute family pet portrait. But apparently having passport photos with your dog doesn't look as good as what I imagined. I was like, Oh, I'm gonna put this online, you know, frame it and stuff. And then I saw the photo and I was like, No. And then I was like, Oh, I can edit it and just put like black circles around the red boots in his eye. No, no, no, no. Much better when you can just take pictures and look at it yourself and be like, oh, yeah, that's cute.

Unknown Speaker 3:43

Okay, so we're gonna be talking about pets today. But we're going to start with a question from Cecilia. Also see, really? You're breaking my heart. Is it Cecilia? Oh, yeah, Cecilia, Cecilia, I'm sorry, you probably get people singing that song that you all the time. Okay, so this is an extension from last week's episode, which was a listener questions. So we've got a few for you today. This one from Cecilia reads, I'm doing intuitive eating and have dropped all food rules. Hey, trying to eat mindfully and staying in the present moment as I tend to emotionally eat. By the way, nothing wrong with emotionally emotional eating as a way to cope if that is something that works for you. I think emotional eating has been demonized way too much in our culture. Anyway, that's not what Cecilia saying. But anyway, so my weight has gone up considerably. I've had to change my wardrobe. According Lee. I've accepted my larger body. I feel gaining more I sometimes absolutely want to run back to my thinner itself even though I have tried and my body won't budge. And furthermore, I'm 63 with osteoporosis, and the extra weight is probably even better for my

Unknown Speaker 5:00

Bones. It is, by the way, one of the episodes I talked about the benefits of being fat. One of them is it protects people from falls. One of the one of the big risk of accidental death from falling as you get older, that people have Cushing cushion cushion cushion, cushion for the pushin cushion for the falling. So,

Unknown Speaker 5:28

yes. And that's studies have shown it, not just job, not just anecdotal data, my question, my question is, how do I keep myself from having doubts. And finally just feel like myself without the pain of not liking my larger self? Oh, Celia, I bet you so many people are saying me, oh, my goodness, people with intuitive eating journeys, putting on weight, not everyone puts on weight. But it can be very distressing. And Cecilia says, I've accepted my larger body that I fear gaining more, and absolutely want to run back to my thinner self, all of those emotions, a totally normal. That's why I say a lot of people are going to relate. That's me. It's totally normal. And so one thing I want to start with is that your body has changed, and it's new. And that can be distressing in in of itself, especially if you have a change in your body, which you can physically feel. So an example of hair of when I shaved my head, I used to have long hair, and I shaved it bald a few years ago. And it was really fucking weird. It was just noticeable all the time. When I got out of the shower, when I went in the shower, or when I touched my head when I put hats on my head, and it stuck, stuck, stuck to my hair like Velcro. It was constantly a reminder there that something was different. Now society has stories about what about hair, but not as much about as it was about weight. And so you know, when I would feel my hair, I'd made that decision to cut it right. And so I wasn't feeling the lack of hair and being like, Oh, you're ugly. I was just like, oh, you shave your head and it feels different. There was kind of like a neutral thing, or even a positive thing of oh, this is fun.

Unknown Speaker 7:29

But when we our body weight changes, and we feel it, we can feel it feel the difference. It is noticeable, because it's different. And it's new. And it is distressing, because society tells us that having a bigger body is bad. Also, our clothes might be tighter. And so there's a physical representation of the fact that you have given up that your body is bad. You might be in pain from you know, things digging in. And so it's more negative emotions, right? Hat by the way, you're not bad you haven't given up. It's just a change in bodies.

Unknown Speaker 8:05

And knowing that people might be also judging you and I talk about that in previous episodes about judgment, I think it was last one or the one before talking about, what if you're worried about people judging you, those messages are going to flash into your mind. I feel my body I notice it's bigger, you're a loser, or whatever it is that you're thinking about fatness. So right now it's probably potentially the height of the distress that you might feel. If you put on more weight, then that distress might

Unknown Speaker 8:35

continue to be a part of how you're feeling right now. But you will slowly get used to having a bigger body in regards to noticing more volume in places, right? The longer that you have that body, it's just going to feel normal to have more flesh in certain places, or whatever, right?

Unknown Speaker 8:58

But still, you might have those messages of your loser, whatever. So if you do have that, I would want you to think about what are you making weight gain mean about you? So something I do with clients is I will say, let's imagine that I can see into the future. I can't see into the future. There's no way I can know what's going to happen in the future. But let's imagine and I can see in the future that you have a bigger body than you currently have. How does that make you feel?

Unknown Speaker 9:30

Everyone? Almost everyone. I don't think I've ever met anyone who said

Unknown Speaker 9:35

actually, one person did. And I was like what?

Unknown Speaker 9:39

So almost everyone said, Oh, I don't feel good. So I was like gross, disgusting, scared, sad, worried, worried about my health.

Unknown Speaker 9:54

Disappointed.

Unknown Speaker 9:57

So a range of like disgust to sadness

Unknown Speaker 10:00

A disappointment, one person said, I would be happy because it would

Unknown Speaker 10:05

show that my body's done what it needs to do to heal. And actually, that was a, that was a dietitian in a group that I was teaching. So that doesn't count. They were, they're a person who's done done a lot of work around this. But it was the first time I heard someone have a reaction, which wasn't a negative reaction. And I was like, wow, that's really cool. I don't know, if someone asked me that question. I would, you know, I wouldn't have a negative reaction to I'd be like, oh, you know, it's interesting. It's curious. It's probably normal and natural. And that would mean that I was like, some older, fat, amazing person, you know, anyway. So what would it mean about you? What does it mean about you? If you have a bigger body? What does weight gain mean about you? And write down those words?

Unknown Speaker 10:51

And see what comes up, you know, you know, lazy, greedy, sad, just wishing I was thin, or whatever it is, or it may be your other people that says, I don't give a fuck. But for Cecilia, here, obviously, that is something that's that's on Cecilia's mind. So, what beliefs also are you holding about fatness? So that question is really interesting, because when we make it about ourselves, it's easy to pick out the where our biases are. And we make it about other people. It's very easy to be way more generous. So if you if I frame that question of, What if your best friend put on weight? You'd be like, Oh, well, I wouldn't care. Like, I'd be there to support my friend and you know, whatever. You know, would you think that they were lazy? No. Would you think that they were unattractive? No. Maybe some people might say yes. But it'd be way more easy to have grace for other people. And so when it comes to ourselves, that's what we make the question about ourselves, it's way easier for the bulls yet to come out the bullshit bias. And obviously, how you're feeling is not bullshit is absolutely valid, but it's comes from bullshit that you've been fed, and biases that you've been taught. So that tells me that you need to work on those areas. So if you say, You know what, I'm not worried about health, I know that, you know, if I have a bigger body, it's probably where my body needs to be. And health is not related to my weight. You know, Celia, saying, I have osteoporosis. So the weight is probably good for my bones. And so if I ask Cecilia, that question to Celia might say, oh, you know, well, health wise, I know, it's good for my bones and

Unknown Speaker 12:31

blah, blah, blah, but where what Cecilia might say, or anyone else is, but my partner is really attracted to people in bigger bodies, a wide field and attractive myself.

Unknown Speaker 12:43

And you know, what, there's a lot in my family around like hard work and not being lazy. So I would feel that maybe I'd been a little bit lazy. And so that is just so helpful and useful, I'd say Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, okay, well, someone needs to work on looking at laziness, looking at capitalism, looking at colonialism, to unlearn all of that, that bias. And then if it comes to, you know, I'm worried I'm not attractive, then that, that means that you need to work on viewing fatness as more attractive, that's an area that you need to focus on. Viewing your fat bodies attractive. And so maybe it's a case of, you need to,

Unknown Speaker 13:29

I don't know, for example, do a boudoir shoot with a fat positive photographer and view frame yourself in a way that is, is seen as beautiful objectively, it could be that you need to expose yourself to more diverse bodies, get your brain soaking up all of that goodness. So it can be different for everybody. And whatever is helpful for you. Go ahead and go ahead and do it and experiment. Right. So if you're worried about what if I put on more weight, then it's because you're making that mean something.

Unknown Speaker 14:03

And it could be that that thing is true. Like I'm worried that I'm going to experience more bias. Yeah, absolutely. That's true. You probably will experience more bias if you have a bigger body. And also Okay, well that's, that's, that's true. And that's that's probably what's going to happen to me, how can I help myself feel more resilient to surviving that? What can I do to support myself? How can I prepare myself to go into that Battlefield? If that ever happens? Yeah. So that that question really is kind of, you know, what we how would you feel about yourself if you had a bigger body in the future, and what beliefs you hold about fatness? So you

Unknown Speaker 14:46

want me to keep unlearning them and knowing these things are motherfucking sticky as shirt. So you know, we've been working on this stuff, maybe for years, but sometimes because of the society that we live in because

Unknown Speaker 15:00

We live in diet culture, because we live in an anti fat world, we're still being bombarded with those messages. And so it's a lot of work that we have to do to unlearn it, because, you know, we're learning new things. And then we go out into general society and all of that knowledge has been like sucked out again, by, you know, a billboard saying fat people are taking over the world, or by some diet ad or, you know, seeing your cousin and then talking about being on those Empik or whatever, for weight loss. So, yeah, I know as well, we talked about it in previous episodes, getting out of constant learning mode. And so if you have those fears, and your the way that you're feeling about yourself is stopping you from doing things, making sure that instead of just learning and just absorbing information, you're also taking action to help yourself,

Unknown Speaker 15:51

overcome any fears that you have. And one example I always go to is wearing a swimsuit. And so if you're worried about that, taking small steps to overcome that fear. So actually, something I experienced just this week, I realized that I had a fear about a clothing item. And I went ahead and took my own advice. And that clothing item was something that was really low cut, like low cut to middle of your belly low cut.

Unknown Speaker 16:20

I don't have a lot of tips showing things not because I don't like show my tits, I just haven't really done it that much. And I've just been in a love affair recently, with my tears being like, I've got a fucking bang up pair of these big juicy saggy tits like, whoa, I'm going to show these motherfuckers off and really embracing.

Unknown Speaker 16:43

There's a movement from the slum sunflower called saggy boobs matter. They're, they're a black person talking about their own saggy breasts. And, you know, that's something for the back of my mind. For years, I've been like, Oh, my tits aren't good, because they're saggy. Fuck no. And it's so wrong. Oh, they just say Jessa. Anyway, and you know, tips can be juicy. If they're small or big, or, you know, you can flop them over your shoulders, whatever. So anyway, I was like, you know, on showing off some more, so I got a

Unknown Speaker 17:18

low cut top. You know, what I'm what my brain was saying.

Unknown Speaker 17:24

You know, my brightest

Unknown Speaker 17:27

people are going to be gasping in the street from the horror of seeing my tips. And and, you know, it's just the side of my tears, right? It's not like I was walking out with, you know, nips, with nips with bells on or something.

Unknown Speaker 17:41

And people would be double taking, you know, I'm just being like, Oh, my God, and that someone would approach me and say that is really inappropriate. Like, what you think about the children?

Unknown Speaker 17:53

Honestly, I just thought that I would, you know, walk out of my apartment, and people were like, Jesus Christ, there's a side of a breast

Unknown Speaker 18:02

police.

Unknown Speaker 18:04

So I went and I went digging for a walk and went to a couple of stores. And

Unknown Speaker 18:10

no one said anything, no one noticed. No one looked I was looking at people's eyes thinking, like the half like, are they looking? And how far are they looking, and I see anyone looking, which should have got a mirror or something.

Unknown Speaker 18:27

No one gave a fuck, maybe they did. They didn't say anything to me. So I was I was kind of conscious of doing this little journey. And then then I will the top again,

Unknown Speaker 18:40

a few days later, I don't even think about it. I didn't think twice about it. And before I went out, I wore that top. So the first first time before when I will the top inside, just went inside to see how it felt.

Unknown Speaker 18:53

And that's the same with crop tops, right? So crop tops, people in the northern hemisphere, it's getting into summer crop tops, you might want to start with something which is a really long crop top or just wear it at home, wear something that is cropped but has long sleeves, like I have a cropped jumper or aware of something which you with something over the crop, something with

Unknown Speaker 19:19

high waist underneath, so it's not you know, barely cropped, it's like a whisper of a crop and then move up from there. Right? So

Unknown Speaker 19:29

you're gonna have doubts with this process, but the more and more you work on them, they will begin to fade and then you know what something will can trigger you. Again, say if you get content at the weight that you are, maybe if you put on weight or if you know you see your ex boyfriend with a new partner and their baby.

Unknown Speaker 19:49

Then you might be triggered again. But you'll learn to cope and you'll learn to not focus so much on your body and focus on other things which is underneath that which is you know,

Unknown Speaker 20:00

the worries of rejection and loneliness and seeking love and connection and all that type of stuff. So Cecilia, sounds like

Unknown Speaker 20:11

as well, you kind of new to this stuff, maybe I don't know, I'm doing Intuitive Eating have dropped all the rules. I'm trying trying to eat mindfully. Yeah, so it sounds like you probably newer to this. So, you know, it's like you're a teenager or you know, you're in that kind of awkward phase of like being like,

Unknown Speaker 20:30

I don't know. And then you'll settle, you'll settle in, you'll settle into how you feel and feel more confident. All right, so let's go to an email from Jane, which was just read Hello. I was like, I can't really haven't spoken about this. Well, I can because it's kind of a niche is a niche, David dobrik, pets, pets and intuitive eating and fat bits. But I think about it often. So Jane emailed me saying, I really enjoy your podcast, you have a way of bringing a certain amount of light heartedness to tough topics. Thank you, Jane. I have a question about pets. I have a cat who according to my bed is oh word. Oh wait. My vet encouraged me to put my cats on a diet. I refuse to put my cat on a diet. It's too triggering for me. Since I have a long history of dieting to try and change my body size. I'm not going to do the same thing to my cat that my parents encouraged me to do when I was a teenager. It just seems wrong. I free feed my cat dry food. Brackets. I fill his bowl every day and let him eat as much as he wants. Then I feed him one meal of canned food in the evening when I get home from work. His weight has stayed consistent after he gained some weight. In the first few months. I had him. He was quite skinny in Australia when I got him. He was six weeks old when I got him. I've had him for about nine months now. I take him to the vet every six weeks to get his nails clipped. Every time I take them to the vet. They weigh him. Sometimes a vet tech will comment on his weight. Oh, he's down a pound doing good. was one such comment. Little did she know that I had just switched him to new food, which he didn't like and he wasn't eating enough. Anyway, my question is, is it right to assume dieting is just as bad for pets as it is for people? And if so how do you set boundaries at the vet clinic? Thank you, Jane.

Unknown Speaker 22:20

So sorry, excited when I got Matt got my email. This is my response to Jim. You know what, this is something I have often thought about and I don't really know the answer. I know anecdotally, from my experience with pets how I feel. But I don't think that is any clear evidence that I'm aware of about regarding fat positivity with pets, or pets and intuitive eating. I think that anti fat bias creeps into all areas and vet clinics are not immune. I'm pretty sure that statements about how size causes pets to have bad outcomes are probably similar to similar to those in humans. Brackets, probably not a lot of clear evidence.

Unknown Speaker 23:09

I know with my dog, I feed him intuitively. I give him unlimited kibble. And he just snacks when he's hungry. I also give him wet food in the morning and the evening. And then he has his, his, his desert with his toy. In afterwards after that. When I first got him he was he was thin. He was a stray he was thin and he was you know the broken pelvis and the bloody face and no hair and, and he ate a lot. And then he seemed to relax with food. As he learned it was abundance. He is classed as a quote normal weight doc. So that's have never said to me, the dog is big. You see pictures of Dougie seems like a average, average cute little baby perfect baby boy. So I've had him for nine years. But still, the vet practice has made comments if his weight goes up and down a pound, which I find annoying. So they don't say he needs to lose weight. They just say, Oh, he's up a pound or he's down a pound. And I'm like, does that matter or is down like point five of a gram who the fuck cares? He's probably did a shit or something. You know.

Unknown Speaker 24:18

I also had a cat who was originally stray and fat. So it was a fat stray cat. He was fat all of his life. His weight never changed. And the vet constantly complained that he would suffer due to his size. So the cat was originally my my partner at the Times Kai was his cat. And then we got together and so you know, he was like the chart. He was in charge of the cat but you know, he was my cat. But so my then partner tried him on a diet a few times throughout his life, which quickly stopped because the cat was so miserable. He lived to an old age and never had any issues.

Unknown Speaker 25:00

Due to fatness, he's just a big ol boy, you know, and he was strained it was a big ol boy. And when he was on diets, he'd never, never lost any amount of weight. And he just died of old age. You know, we don't I can't remember how old he was, but he was old as fuck.

Unknown Speaker 25:18

Like, how is he still alive old? But saying all that there are some dogs who have brain differences, but different drives, which make them hyper focused on food. I always wonder about the animals who are only fed a certain amount at certain time and whether they would be so desperate for for the food, if they were fed unlimited amounts? I don't know. But I'm curious. And to answer is dieting bad for pets? I don't know. I would presume so. But to what extent, animals don't live as long as us for the effects of stress to accumulate. So that lack of food is causing stress. Right. And so, you know, if if a dog lives, I don't know, 1015 years? Is that long enough for that stress of not having enough food to have an impact? I have no idea that stress could have an impact in 10 minutes, I don't know. Or it could be 10 years.

Unknown Speaker 26:17

Also, animals, animals don't have the ability to internalize anti fatness. So I think, you know, animals know if you're being mean to them. And if you're like, Hey, fuck you fat dog, you know, they're probably not like, Oh, my sit down fat. But then probably like, my iron is mad at me, you know? So I don't think many of us are doing that, like, Hey, fuck you.

Unknown Speaker 26:39

But, you know, they're not experiencing that anti fatness that komplet all the complex emotions that we are. And that social rejection that we're feeling and the shame that we're feeling. So their bodies presumably would know that they're hungry. And long term, I could imagine that being harmful. But we just don't have that evidence as far as I'm aware. But I think the real issue here is that it doesn't feel good for dieting to be brought up so frequently around you. So for Jane, Jane says it doesn't feel good. Because of Jane's long history of dieting, or dieting.

Unknown Speaker 27:20

Our animals can feel like an extension of us. So it's a motive.

Unknown Speaker 27:26

It really is. The last time I noticed that I had an anti fat thought was that I can remember was a couple of years ago, during the pandemic, the groomers were closed. So I grew up to my mum's groomed my mom's dog.

Unknown Speaker 27:43

Got some

Unknown Speaker 27:45

shaving thing off frickin Amazon and have a go. I've professionally groomed my mother's dog

Unknown Speaker 27:53

looking breeches. Absolute look like dogshit anyway, so I did it to group and I cut Dougal's hair to head on his body. I've never done that before.

Unknown Speaker 28:04

And so and then afterwards, my mom says he kind of looks he kind of looks fat. Cuz he's fluffy, right? He has a lot of fluff. And, and I was like, I can't remember I said, I said something like, you know, that's okay, whatever. But in my brain, I was like, Don't call my child fat. Like it was a bad thing. Like, oh, typical. Here's a fat person with a fat pet. And my mom wasn't saying that she's you know, she wasn't saying, Oh, he's he she was saying like, he looks fat and squishy and cute, right? She wasn't saying in a negative way. But my brain kind of went to that even though I was like, Yeah, you know, he's cute, whatever.

Unknown Speaker 28:40

Because it did really feel like an extension of me. He did. And I as well like, imagine that for kids too. I don't have kids. So I got you know, can imagine that's really, really difficult, too.

Unknown Speaker 28:53

So it sounds like it sounds like Jane is happy with the cat's weight. And that hearing diet talk doesn't feel good. And so that's enough reason to set a boundary with the vet. Like, you can also think I feel like it causes harm for my cat. I don't like hearing it is triggering for me. So, you know, I don't want to hear about it. I'm not putting my cat on a diet. So that's the end of that. And I'm sure you know, having a flexible boundary of

Unknown Speaker 29:22

you know, things change or you know, the cat puts on, you know, lots and lots and lots of weight that weight that could be linked to some type of health condition or something. You know, I'm sure that Jane would have those flexible boundaries of you know,

Unknown Speaker 29:38

let's let's maybe talk about it then and see if there's anything going wrong and yeah, so it sounds like you know, that is enough. But anyway, we're talking about we're talking about pets and fat pets and intuitive eating so I wanted to get your opinion so I asked people on my Instagram What do you think about fat pets and intuitive eating can pets intuitive eat

Unknown Speaker 30:00

I know like I've mentioned anecdotally, Google intuitively eats and even when I give him treats, right, you know, I do the the dessert thing the toy. And so I'll put some kibble in his toy and then some treats. So I have this big box of treats where I've chopped them all down into little bits so they can forage for them. Often he doesn't finish the treats in the bowl. He's just like and done whatever. Often, treats will just hang around the house, and he won't eat them. So he's never, he's always just, you know, not being that fixated on food after he felt secure. After we fit, you know, I fed him after he was rescued, because obviously, he was thin and thin and abused or baby. So yeah, anyway, this is what everyone else says. But also also also also, the other thing is some, you know, some I know, I've only had experience with Google and a cat. Google is a puppy on Pomeranian sausage dog, Border Collie, mutt thing?

Unknown Speaker 31:03

Who the fuck knows? Basically, I don't know what he is. And I know some breeds are hyper focused on food and some breeds will eat. But I'm curious.

Unknown Speaker 31:16

If say if those those dogs those dogs that would eat any say if you put it in the dog in like a warehouse with like a 20 tons of kibble, and wet food and all that type of stuff. Would that dog eat themselves to death? I don't know. Or would that dog be like,

Unknown Speaker 31:39

just like she was like humans are when we're denied food. And then we eventually

Unknown Speaker 31:44

give ourselves permission to eat food. We'd be like, Oh, my God, that was Oh, that's too much.

Unknown Speaker 31:49

Give me more rules too much. And then eventually you be like, Oh, I'm done with that. Would would a dog be do that? Just be like, Oh my God, give me everything, eat everything and just you know, have a tummy ache. And you know, maybe they die from that because they told me exposure explodes is that thing? I don't know. Urban Legend time.

Unknown Speaker 32:08

So all would they come down? I have who the fuck knows? I don't know. I don't know. That's probably not an experiment that's going to happen, right?

Unknown Speaker 32:16

Anyway, so quote from someone I have thought about this myself. I wonder if we could if we control their diet, it results in non intuitive eating from them? Or if processed food isn't really intuitive eating for animals? Or if some animals are just bigger, and we have fat bias? I don't know the answer. And perhaps there are studies on it.

Unknown Speaker 32:38

Yeah, and that's the thing is some dogs are just naturally very thin like poodles, right? They're just like, and then turn. But then other dogs are just, you know, just tanks.

Unknown Speaker 32:50

And I think I think when we're thinking about fat pets, we're probably thinking about

Unknown Speaker 32:56

a fat poodle, you know, or even fatter, chunky, normally, chunky pet.

Unknown Speaker 33:05

Someone else says, pets aren't human. And they aren't, they aren't always able to intuitively eat some to intuitively eat some do. But many will eat anything, even if they're not hungry. Pets are not responsible for their food, health and well being. We are. Yeah, so that's absolutely right. You know, that's a thing as well with eating with pets. Sometimes I'll eat things which is not good for them, you know, whereas we can as humans make the decision. I'm not going to eat that thing. Or I'm going to eat that thing. That's not good for me because it makes my tummy upset. Or, you know, because it's plastic or whatever. I had to take Dougie to the vet because he swallowed some past plastic on a salmon skin. Chewy thing when I wasn't looking. And also he I call him The Bone Collector because he walks up bones. We have two chicken shops near me. People throw their chicken bones because I know that even though they're probably delicious, it's could could kill him if he gets a bone stuck in his throat. Yeah, anyway, wait also impacts animals differently than humans and can adversely affect their health and quality of life. I'm 100% Fat positive and about intuitive eating for people but pets are not comparable. Yeah, and that's the thing is like humans and humans and pets are just vastly different

Unknown Speaker 34:24

in many different ways.

Unknown Speaker 34:26

And I wonder, you know what I see.

Unknown Speaker 34:29

I watch a lot of animal rescue videos and you see these rescue videos where

Unknown Speaker 34:35

a dog is rescued and it's a very fat dog and then they're like, Billy's journey to lose 200 pounds and I'm like our poor Billy the burner doodle is fucking miserable life, being on a diet but also Billy, the burner doodle doesn't seem to be mobile and wants to be mobile. And half of it is them helping

Unknown Speaker 35:00

Billy the Bernie doodle. I'm making this up there is no, there probably is a billy the Boehner to do but I don't know. It's not an actual story. Half of it is rehabbing. Billy and Billy's ability to, to walk and run and play. And I'm like, Yeah, that's great, right? Like, if a dog wants to run and walk and play, and that's, you know, the submit that they're capable of doing, then let's help them you know, then, you know, a dog is not going to be like, Hey, I'm going to do some water aerobics so that I can increase my mobility, you know, they don't, they don't have that ability. And so I wonder, I wonder in things like that, whether we're focusing on the wrong things the same with humans, we're focusing on the way that not the outcomes, health outcomes, you know, like,

Unknown Speaker 35:54

and as well, all of these, they never in the story said, Oh, Billy, the burner doodle or you know, Sally, the sausage dog is, is fat and also because they are fat, here are the poor health outcomes outside of mobility. I've never seen that. But you know, this is this is anecdotal evidence. This is just me watching these videos. And so if we are thinking about pet health, should we just be focusing on health and not on putting pets on diets? I don't know. I don't know. I'm just thinking out loud here. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Okay, so, these are short, short replies.

Unknown Speaker 36:37

I love fat pets. I also acknowledged that my dog appears to have no sense of fullness cues. So dot dot dot, yeah.

Unknown Speaker 36:45

Woof. Well, we have a feeder that dispenses a certain amount of food each day for each pet. And that's it. We give them food based on what the vet says based on weight. I'm sure one of my cats will eat more if we let him but he also picks it up. Yeah, so that could be a you know, I feel like we know our pets and we know if they're the type that that eats more than is comfortable for them and then picks it up. Or if they are able to understand I've had enough and that feels good.

Unknown Speaker 37:20

Dogs are often over eating because of trauma at this point. It is probably impossible to try intuitive eating. Yeah, and so we do go Dougal was was, you know, a year at a show or whatever when I when I got him and so maybe that was a lucky time. Maybe an older dog, it wouldn't have worked.

Unknown Speaker 37:40

Someone else says we always have food available. He gets some scraps and he loves ice. I love it when you see dogs eating like ice and vegetables. Like dude, he's so fussy you will not eat anything like that. There's a coward that

Unknown Speaker 37:57

a go golden retriever and then a puppy golden retriever eats like broccoli and okra and bell peppers and they're just like munching away and crunch and crunch and crunch and it's so fucking cute. Different species equally equals totally different outset can't just transfer principles one on one.

Unknown Speaker 38:17

Cats there are so many ways to interfere already. It's hard not to have restrictions. Important to Office safe spaces play food enrichment, so they don't eat out of stress. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 38:34

Yeah, and I wonder if you know like, I wonder if there is an element of that that eating out of stress or? I don't know I don't know. I get food when they ask for it. Some of my cats are fatter than others and I'm cool with it.

Unknown Speaker 38:49

Only judge what pets are fed not how much because they have different nutritional needs.

Unknown Speaker 38:56

Yeah, like I would the only time I would judge what an animal is eating is if someone was putting an animal on like a vegan diet because as far as I'm aware cats are carnivores and need me right. So but I would not judge you know how how people who were houseless have pets and I just think let them have her let them have pets because they're probably looked after better than a lot of pets who are with in homes, you know, because they with them all day long and they're wonderful companions and

Unknown Speaker 39:36

and if that means someone who has doesn't have as much access to to money, feed some that the pets

Unknown Speaker 39:46

lower quality food. I think that's fine too, because we can't I don't think we can deny companionship to people who don't have the access to be able to feed their dog raw foods and

Unknown Speaker 40:00

and blueberries and quail eggs every morning. You know, if I gave Google that he'd say fuck off. I want to fucking quail egg. But you know I I wouldn't I wouldn't judge you know, unless it was a vegan imposing a vegan diet, then I would probably be like, That's not so great

Unknown Speaker 40:21

okay someone else says my dog would never stop eating she would barf and then keep going. It has happened. My cat has been fat shamed at the vet is the same person my cat has been fat shamed of it but she is the overlord of the house and insists food

Unknown Speaker 40:37

she insists food is always available she does not make herself sick. She has no health issues. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 40:45

Cats are funny.

Unknown Speaker 40:48

I have a lot of thoughts one the way people treat owners of fat pets especially if they are fat is rude. Yeah, agree to pets don't give it don't get to live that long with us. Is it really so bad to spoil them with tasty treats? Three there are many reasons pets are fat and it's okay. Health at Every Size. Well they say h a s but I think they mean Hey, je s how are you? They are their results

Unknown Speaker 41:14

I'm just glad I'm not the only one thinking about this honestly. Yeah, cuz I Googled this and it was people been like, I don't know I've been thinking about this. I don't know. Someone says I'm a haze registered Dieter, dietetic dietitian, dietitian, dietitian. Because I don't know dog health slash nutrition. I listened to my vet on having my dog lose weight. Yeah. Also, my dog has no fullness cute cute. This is the same person. He'll he'll he'll eat until he pukes and then eat the puke. Oh, God.

Unknown Speaker 41:47

That'd be like knowing that. Yeah. So you know, if if I had a dog like that, I probably and that was my only experience with a dog I probably like dogs can't intuitively like but because do these like that. And also friend of the show somewhere in an ENTJ friend of the show somewhere in and it has had a couple of dogs and she says that her dogs have been Intuitive Eating type dogs. I know you say we say intuitive eating really a dog. It's not like principle one principle to move your body but you know,

Unknown Speaker 42:19

meaning just free, free, free feeding.

Unknown Speaker 42:25

I have a fat cat. She gets shamed all the time. I tried to put her on a diet but it did nothing. So I'm letting her just live. And both of us are less stressed. I think that's a good point about the animals being stressed by it. And I know for

Unknown Speaker 42:41

we've Dougie any change in routine

Unknown Speaker 42:48

timing of things will just he's not happy about it. Like this weekend, I moved my bed to the other side of the wall so that my bed is not next to the wall of the neighbor's so that I can have more loud sex. And actually, you know what? I don't have sex that often. But really, it's actually so that if my vibrator is really loud, I don't hear it.

Unknown Speaker 43:13

So ya know, I changed it to the side of the wall. And then I switched which side of the bed I'm sleeping on. Duguay is not happy. I changed where his

Unknown Speaker 43:24

his ramp is. He has it doesn't have a ramp. He has like a poof but he jumps on to jump onto the bed is he's lost the ability to use the he's worked it out again. But now but he lost the ability to use the use a booth to jump up he was just like, whoa, hey, it's the same poof, the same bed, but it's in a slightly different location. So I cannot do it. Mother. What are you talking about? By the way, Dougie calls me mummy and mother because he doesn't understand about gender concepts. And he doesn't understand that I am a them non binary person. That's okay though. Because you know, he's a dog. So he calls my mother and mummy. So, and then during the night he's there, he's there trying to get into my where I'm sleeping. Like he's like, Get out of my spot. This is where I sleep. This is my side of the bed. And in the middle of the night just him just standing randomly like looking. And then I show him to where his side of the road is. And he's like, Okay, fine. No, this is where I'm gonna go. But anyway, so just a little thing like that. And he's like, what, what is the meaning of life? Is I'm guessing. Continuing animals have different relationships to food. And vets can be assholes. But fat pets are not oppressed. Exactly. Yeah. That pets are not oppressed, maybe fat pet owners and fat fat owners.

Unknown Speaker 44:44

And not the not the pets themselves. They need to eat they need to eat meat. dry food is terrible for them.

Unknown Speaker 44:52

I have three cats, three body types sizes. All are healthy because this wet food no restricting and

Unknown Speaker 45:00

The same for us. What do the tests say? Weight doesn't matter otherwise

Unknown Speaker 45:06

someone else says just leave fat pets alone with heart face. I free feed it absolutely works.

Unknown Speaker 45:14

Took my cat off weight loss formula ingredients were shit and making him sick and did not align with my views on fat and health. He is happier and healthier now. Love fat cats.

Unknown Speaker 45:27

Yeah, so, you know, we've got a range of opinions there. And

Unknown Speaker 45:32

I don't know I don't know. You know, I like looking at evidence and we don't have a lot of people doing research on intuitive eating and animals that I could find nothing that I could find. There's probably a lot of

Unknown Speaker 45:46

research on fatness how it's bad for for pets. But I wonder if

Unknown Speaker 45:57

I'm, you know, I don't wonder I presume that there's a lot of fat bias in there of the assumption that you know, fatness is debt is always bad. And the correlation and correlation and causation things not been thought about.

Unknown Speaker 46:12

The answer is who the fuck knows? Oh, no. He, like many come to the podcast with fucking answers. Give me Give me answers.

Unknown Speaker 46:23

You know what my expertise is in humans.

Unknown Speaker 46:28

I have a dog. I like him. He's great. He eats what he wants. And that's my experience. And, and also fatphobia anti fat bias is everywhere. And also, you know, you do you do what you think is best for your animal. And, you know, probably some things I do with Dougie, people will be like, You shouldn't do that. And other things. Other people will say you shouldn't do that, you know, like, yeah, we have we have strong opinions about how pets should be treated. Right? I know, some people will be very kind of, no, this is wrong. And that's wrong. And no, we shouldn't give them treats. And an I feel like we get very passionate about it. Right? Like, I can, I can get very good I can get I can get very judgmental when I don't like being judgmental when I see choke collars. You know, versus harnesses. And I'm always just like, oh,

Unknown Speaker 47:27

I don't think I don't think that the owner is like, I'm gonna hook this dog up, you know? And also if someone's shouting at a dog.

Unknown Speaker 47:35

Yeah, I judge them I judge people who shouted at dogs. But you know what I said to him, I said to my friend, you know what I was talking about talking about this me shout me judging people who shout and swear at dogs, because I had old neighbors from a couple of years ago who would absolute terrors. And they were eventually evicted, because they were just awful, awful, awful.

Unknown Speaker 47:57

And they would be like, shut the fuck up to the dog. And I was just like, I so was so awful. They say Shut the fuck up to the dog. And he was like, Oh, I have a parrot. And I tell my parrot to shut up. And I was like, Huh, okay, maybe, maybe they don't understand. You know, they don't understand that you're saying Shut the fuck up or fuck you or whatever.

Unknown Speaker 48:18

I don't know. I'm just I'm very sensitive. Very sensitive. And you know, I think about a lot of is

Unknown Speaker 48:26

I don't know if you saw it, but there was this thing where they had they people treated plants differently. And so they had these two plants in a school. One of the plants that said had to sign say say nice things to me. The other plan is, I'd say mean things to me. Same plant, same condition, one of the plants thrived and one with a Dwayne died. I don't know, this is something that's in my memory. I don't know how true that is. You know, I don't know if the you know, the kids would, you know, saying fuck you to the other plant and then put poisoning in one and who knows, but it just stuck with me that I wouldn't ever want to say mean things to animals or to plants. Like I say nice things to my plants, too. I'm like, You're so strong and big. Look at those beautiful leaves, just on the off chance that they're living.

Unknown Speaker 49:13

Yeah, I'm a bit of a bit of a baby. So.

Unknown Speaker 49:18

Okay, so final question, which is from Grace, who says hey, question, exclamation mark or not question mark, exclamation one. Funny question, Mark. It is me. I was wondering how to navigate family fat phobia. Fine. Thanks, says grace.

Unknown Speaker 49:37

So we've spoken about this a number of times on the show, you know what I feel like? We all forget what I've spoken about. I know I do. So I'm like, should I cover this topic? Again? I feel like I spoke about it like four years ago. Yes, of course. It's stuck in people's mind that you spoke about it like, you know, in 1982. Vinnie, you know, no, we should probably talk about it.

Unknown Speaker 50:00

Again, because it's coming up, I'm a new new listeners in the lower left. Okay, so I have a formula on how to deal with fat phobia anti fat bias in the world and with other humans. And that formula is remove, reduce, protect. So

Unknown Speaker 50:18

remove reduced protect, I have an Instagram post that has this information, I'll put it in the show notes.

Unknown Speaker 50:27

So if possible,

Unknown Speaker 50:30

we want to remove a source of anti fat bias from our life. And so what this looks like with using family as example,

Unknown Speaker 50:40

getting rid of removing that source of anti fat bias,

Unknown Speaker 50:45

does it mean that we're going to go around and murder the family? No, we're not. Today, we're going to

Unknown Speaker 50:54

aim to remove the source of anti fat bias by setting boundaries. So remove the exposure, if possible. So boundaries

Unknown Speaker 51:05

are hard. Literally, I've spent a zillion hours in therapy, getting

Unknown Speaker 51:14

confidence,

Unknown Speaker 51:16

and courage to be able to communicate with people my needs. And I think that's really important. And I'm doing that through all sorts of different ways and boundaries being one of them.

Unknown Speaker 51:28

And so with boundaries, it would be a case of hey, hey, mom, by the way.

Unknown Speaker 51:36

I don't know if you know, but you know, I'm doing this whole fat positive thing or intuitive eating thing or whatever. Or I'm learning to try and accept my body. And what I've noticed is that when people talk about their diets, or when people talk about fat as a negative, I get I get really activated and triggered by that. So I'm wondering if you could help me.

Unknown Speaker 51:57

Yes, what it is I can help with you with? Would it be possible for you to avoid talking about fat as a negative?

Unknown Speaker 52:06

And then see what happens.

Unknown Speaker 52:08

Mum, mum could be like,

Unknown Speaker 52:11

Oh, you're so sensitive. Oh, my goodness, you everything. I can't even say anything anything anymore. Or, oh my god, I'm so sorry. I'm such a bad person. And I'll try but it's just so hard. I just hate really hate myself. Or, yeah, okay. Or, you know, a million different varieties. The way that I like to frame it, this is my personal thing, but it might not work for you. Some people don't like it is saying I'm wondering if you can help me with something.

Unknown Speaker 52:40

When we frame it like that the people that we love with like ya, as long as it's not helping you move, because fuck no.

Unknown Speaker 52:47

Anyone asked me to help them to move don't care? No, no.

Unknown Speaker 52:51

No, I don't care if you're my best friend, I would pay a person to go and help you move, but I will not be doing it.

Unknown Speaker 53:00

Whenever we can help with if someone doesn't want, if you can help with something is not moving on? I'd say yes. What is it? And you could say, you know, make it like try not make it about them, if you think that they might react. And if you think you don't want to deal with it. And you can say I'm just asking everyone that I care about, not that you necessarily do this, but not talk about bodies.

Unknown Speaker 53:22

And so that might have that might be the easiest way to kind of like, gently tickle your toes into the water of boundary settings. Like making it about you. That might not be the most effective way to communicate. You know, you might decide that. No, I want to be authentic and say listen, Mom, you fucked up my life. You've, you are a giant piece of horseshit. And I hate you. I mean, that might be what feels authentic to you, that's fine, whatever.

Unknown Speaker 53:54

So can we remove the source through a boundary, you might decide to remove it by removing the person from your life.

Unknown Speaker 54:03

Sometimes that's not possible or appropriate or something you want to do. That's fine. What I've noticed is that

Unknown Speaker 54:12

many people, they'll start this journey and you know, like I mentioned before, like kind of being a teenager, you're kind of new, you're wobbly on your legs, you're like a, you know, this new skill that you're trying out and it's in it's in it's kind of difficult and your your family have known you as a dieter or somebody who doesn't like fatness for all of your life maybe. And so you come along and you say, Hey, I'm doing this new thing. And they they might think, yeah, okay, this will last 10 minutes. And so maybe your request is ignored. You might as well have never said it.

Unknown Speaker 54:45

And then you do something that's really important. And you follow up, when they when they slip up, you follow up and say, Hey, remember we had that conversation? And then you might decide, you know, I'm not I'm not set

Unknown Speaker 55:00

For this, I'm not interested, I don't want them in my life, I'm going to, I'm going to give them a consequence.

Unknown Speaker 55:06

And then they learn again, they learn, again, that you're serious about this. And the more that you keep doing this, and you could decide at any point I've had enough, you don't need to give them an unlimited amount chances. But the more they begin to know that new you as someone who doesn't put up with a shit, that someone who is not going to engage in it, right.

Unknown Speaker 55:27

You know, it's like, if you knew, you know, you, you, you go to the corner store, and you buy a pint of milk, and then you go one day and they say, we've got no milk, and then you go, Okay, we'll come back tomorrow. I told you, we've got no milk and you've learned well, you've always had milk, I've always come here for milk, and then you go, you might try again next week, listen, we've got no milk, and probably take a little time to get used to the fact that that now the corner store sells something else.

Unknown Speaker 55:54

And it's something that's more emotive than milk. So remove reduce, you might not be able to set boundaries for whatever reason, you might not be interested in that it might not be safe,

Unknown Speaker 56:05

for whatever reason. And so can you reduce your exposure to these people? Or the comments? So for example, your mum starts saying, Oh, my God, did you see how fat Sharon is? And you can say, Oh, I'm just gonna go to the toilet. Oh, the back in a second? Or? Oh, is that given me a ring? Hello, who's that on the phone?

Unknown Speaker 56:27

Or you could say, you know, go back into the move. Hey, Mom, can you not talking about how Sharon is fat. So if you go around your mom's house for the weekend, maybe you can go every other weekend. Or maybe you can spend one hour or two hours with them. And then finally protect so in this example of family,

Unknown Speaker 56:44

safe, you can't reduce, you can't remove, you can't reduce because you live with them. And they financially support you. And

Unknown Speaker 56:52

you've tried tactics, and it's not working. And so then the next thing is protect, can you protect yourself? Can you

Unknown Speaker 57:03

engage in self care? Spend time reviewing fat positive resources to feel good put headphones in? Or leave the room?

Unknown Speaker 57:12

During diet talk?

Unknown Speaker 57:15

Can you be browsing Instagram fat, positive space spaces or Facebook groups, posting in, you know, a grouping like my mum is talking about if I can have fat Sharon isn't It's getting on my tits, something like that. So protecting yourself. Yeah. So gold star is remove if possible, reduce if you can't remove and protect if you can't reduce and remove. And it could be like today that you're protecting yourself. And then tomorrow, you might decide I'm going to remove that anti fat bias, if possible. Again, not all of these are possible at all times in all circumstances and might not feel right for you. So and as well just to recognize that if you're newer to this anti fat, bias world understanding about it, then it's going to be a lot harder. For someone like me, I don't often have to set boundaries, I don't have to talk to my family and friends about not being dicks because I'm because we've we've come to, you know, the real decks in my life are no longer in my life. And people who loved and care for me and committed to having a good relationship with me are and other people were great and excited to do this. And some people were already there. And I'm like you know Vinnie, finally you're into, you know, learning about this stuff. So I have that privilege of being years into this work,

Unknown Speaker 58:38

and years into therapy, to say that this is no longer a big challenge for me. But for people who are new to this work, this is one of the main challenges. It is a huge, it is for some people, the biggest area of of difficulty in this work, like they're, they're, you know, they've done the work, they feel good. And every time they're exposed to family members, or these other friends or whatever. They're being brought down again and again and again. And that's really difficult. So you know, if that is you, then I'm sending you big, giant, big, fat, big fat hugs and love to hear and to let you know that the more that you do this work, the more that you speak about what you're doing, the easier this is going to get. And that goes for all aspects of this, of this journey. There's always going to be things that come up in our lives that trigger us and make us take a step back and, you know, feel bad and but genuinely speaking with we're, we're we're growing those muscles in our brain to be able to, to resist this bullshit and to really, really internalize that. This is not our shame to hold. This is not our shame to hold and really believe that. So I hope everyone is getting getting there and feeling good.

Unknown Speaker 1:00:00

Did somebody else is going to tell you? I don't know what it was probably something a movie then I

Unknown Speaker 1:00:08

can't remember it was. Anyway, that's the question for today if you have questions for the show, you can always email me. When you get an email from the show telling you what the show is you can just respond and be like bla bla blue blue Vinny. Show notes will be at first fatty.com forward slash 169 with a transcript. If you enjoyed the show, consider donating on kofi KOF. I link in the show notes. And if you subscribe for five American adult hairs a month you will get the size diversity resource guide the different tiers there for you if you want to

Unknown Speaker 1:00:48

donate any more money, more money, you'll get other coolship We love cool shit, right Kofi for that. Thanks for hanging around me today. Stay fares, fatty and I'll see you in a while again. I gotta be.