Episode 5 Transcript

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

You're listening to the Fierce Fatty Podcast. I'm your host, Victoria Welsby. And in this episode we are talking about how lacking self esteem can ruin your life. Oh my God, let's get into it.

This podcast is brought to you by Fierce Fatty Academy. Fierce Fatty Academy is my incredible and life changing e-course, which is only available to enroll in sporadically throughout the year. Fierce Fatty Academy is all about stepping into your power and knowing for certain that you are a fierce, strong, worthy human in all your body's glory. I will teach you my secrets, but changing your limiting negative self-beliefs about your fat body and empower you to finally feel in control around food knowing you'll never diet again. Fierce Fatty Academy is open for enrollment on November the 5th, 2019, but for a matter of days only. For more details and to get on the wait list, go to www.fiercefatty.com/academy. That's www.fiercefatty.com/academy.

So before we get into that juiciness, I've got a secret to tell you or the cat is out of the bag on social media. But in case you don't follow me on social, what the heck. Why are you not doing that? fierce.fatty on Instagram. And Fierce Fatty on Facebook and, fiercefatty_ on Twitter. Don't ask me why they're different. I'm sorry. Someone already had taken straight Fierce Fatty. Anyway, so my secret is that this badass fat bitch is going to be in a two part documentary series made by the BBC. That going to be on BBC too and actually by the time this episode is released, the show would have just come out. So the show is coming out on the 28th and 29th of October and it's called "Who are you Calling Fats".

And actually the name of it was very contentious because in the fat positive world, we don't use the O words. Overweight and obese because they're fucked up. I'll do an episode telling you why they're fucked up in a future episode. I always say this, I'm going to do an episode about this. Yeah. Cause there's so many things I need to tell you and I want to talk to you about. Anyway, so this show, what I did was this summer I actually flew to the UK and I lived in a house with 8 other people who have big bodies, bigger bodies. I won't say fat because not all of them identify with that term. Some of them think that term is a derogatory and they go by the O words. Some of them obviously are not body confident or not fat positive.

Some of them have had stomach amputation surgery. Some of them have health issues, some of us were fat positive and body positive. And in the show, I am the most fat positive into fat politics and spreading all the fatty juiciness around and it's pretty interesting as you can imagine. Oh my God. As you can. Oh my God. Like I didn't know how intense these types of shows are. Like I thought, you know, this is pretty intense. You know, filming for 10 days. But from the moment that you wake up to the moment you close your eyes, basically you have a mic on you and you have someone filming your every move, everything you're saying. And you're doing really intense activities like intense emotionally, like talking about really deep, heavy subjects and you don't have any downtime.

We didn't have Wifi there, we didn't have access to our phones. And so you don't have any time to unwind. And so this 10 days was pretty wild. And so now I know like why people, if they're ever in a like reality show or documentary might do things that they could regret. Because I'm telling you, the pressure was very, very, very intense. I came away from filming feeling I'd represented myself quite well and it was quite truthful. And I saw the show a few weeks ago, I went down to London to the production company's studio and watch them and thought, yeah, that's, that's pretty much me. Some of the editing is dramatic. There's some things in there I'm like, eh, didn't actually happen like that, but smooth technically it's true, but there's maybe a little bit, you know, of things to spice it up a little bit and to make people appear more like characters and versus, you know, these really a fully rounded human beings like we all are. And so, yes, if you're in the UK, you can check it out on the iPlayer. I'm not sure yet how much I can actually tell you about it. It's all very hush hush. Like I've been keeping this secret for ages. It's been doing my nogging in like, Oh, We couldn't post anything. Like, Oh, I'm flying to the UK. No, take it down. Like they are watching ya, the baby say, I might even be getting into trouble and if I did telling you what I've just told ya. Hopefully they're not listening. Don't know.

Don't get me in trouble. Yeah. But if I can talk to you more about the experience then I will in future episodes. A big thank you to those who left reviews for me and if you leave a review for me on iTunes or other Apple podcasts or Stitcher or anywhere else that you can leave a review. I don't know if there is anywhere else that you can leave a review. For this podcast, I will give every single person that does that a copy of my book. So you're going to get an audio copy and the ebook version as well. So if you want to read or you want to listen, I've got yet covered. So please do leave me a review for this podcast if you've been enjoying it. And bonus points, if you share about the podcast on social media, I am going to enter you to win a Fierce Fatty mug so you can be drinking your tea, drinking your coffee, and feeling like a Fierce Fatty, telling the world I don't give a fuck about what you think about my fat body. Yeah. So, do that.

So, I want you to talk about how lacking self esteem in your body, in who you are as a person can really mess with your life can really ruin your life. Because that's what happened to me is my lack of self esteem really, really made life. No, it took the joy out of life. And there might be ways that your, if you have a lack of self esteem in any areas at all how you could be being affected and you don't even rarely. So we have a download that goes along with today's episode and it's called the Your Why Guidebook. So why body confidence is important for you. So this, download goes along with the episode and you can get that by going to the show notes which is fiercefatty.com/005 for episode five.

You get that and you can go in even deeper on the today's topic. So I've categorized it into a different things here. But the first one I want to talk about is your psychology, your beliefs, your mental well being. And lacking self esteem obviously is affecting your mental health because it's a part of your mental health, but it's a real domino effect on all of the beliefs in your life. And the reason why it's a domino effect is because our beliefs about who we are form our identity and our identity really changes the way that we behave in the world and the things that we think are possible for someone like us. Whoever you think that you are? You've decided because your beliefs about the world and your beliefs about you. So if you think, Oh, fat is bad, for example, and a thinner body is more desirable, which is the common rhetoric in society, right?

So it's very understandable if you believe that. But it is a belief and a belief is something that is we have decided maybe without evidence that is true because I believe it's not a fact. A fact is 100% true, 100% of the time. So using that example of fat is bad or having a fat body is bad. It's not a fact. It's not 100% true 100% of the time, right? Has there ever been a fat body that's been good? Yeah, of course. So it's a belief. So if you have that belief that fat is bad. That I'm fat, therefore I'm bad. I'm fat, therefore my body is less worthy, it could then go on to, I'm less worthy. I am unlovable because I'm less worthy. I am undesirable. People don't like me. Maybe think of the things that can come from that belief of I am less worthy in society because I have a bigger body.

So for me, I would have beliefs of I am less worthy about my body and it will trickle into other things, other beliefs of I'm not as intelligent or I need to work harder to be a good person to make up for the fact that I'm less of an acceptable human being. So in lots of ways I'd be overachieving trying to be like the best girlfriend ever by the best friend and just never feeling like I measured up and really sucked. You might relate with this of feeling like you had to become better in other ways because you might not have liked or don't like your body, but it's a real domino effect, right? If you think that your body is not good enough, if you're suffering with a lack of self esteem, it has a domino effect in your mind and so many other things are affected.

So the second one I want to look at is your intimate relationships. The people that you are dating, the people that you're having sex with. If you have a lack of self esteem, do you think that you're going to be dating people who are your equivalent, you going to be dating people who are fuck boys, losers, people who. If you had higher self esteem, the exact same body, but if you had higher self esteem, you probably wouldn't touch with a 10 foot barge pole, right? And this has been so apparent for me because I've been single for three years now, but before that I had been in a relationship for six years. And so it was nine years ago plus I was on the dating scene previously and being back in the dating world for the last three years has been so interesting because the amount of guys that I know, I would have eagerly gone on a date with previously.

Now I can see the red flags and I'm like, no fucking way. I can see that the old version of Victoria who had lower self esteem 9 years ago would have been like, Oh, I can help him and I can help him overcome his misogyny or his you know, shady goings on. And, all of the things that are real big warnings now for me. And it's meant that before I dated loads. I'd be having dates left, right and center. And now I hardly ever go on a date because so many of the people that I encounter, I'm just like, who are? You know. The minimum amount of effort they'd be putting in, they'd just be like, yo or just send a message saying, hi and that will be it. It was Victoria before and be like, Oh my God, they said hi to me. Oh, maybe they love me. Oh my God, this is going to be my new husband.

And now Victoria is like, no, but in a bit more effort. I mean, don't you know who I am? I'm amazing, come on. And so even attracting the types of people that you might attract, but also, dating in general, like dating versus just being happy single, right? So right now I'm happy single, I'm not actively dating, which is fine, but before I would actively date, because I had a fear of being alone. I would end one relationship and move within days or weeks I'd have another boyfriend on my arm because I couldn't be single because my lack of self esteem, man, that I had to have someone to prove that I was worthy. Whereas now like this has been the longest I've been single in my whole life from when I started dating, dating at 17. So if you're in a relationship, are you staying in that relationship because you're not happy, but you're staying in it and you're not unhappy, but you're staying because you don't think that you can get someone better.

But this is the best that someone like you because you have lower self esteem can get. I remember believing that so hard, even when when I was 17 and if you'd listened to episode 2, you know my story when I was 17 I was dating and an abusive alcoholic. I even remember standing in the shower, the shower, the water hitting my head and my hands on the tiles and just thinking I want to get out of this relationship, but there's no one else that's going to love or accept someone like me because my self esteem was so low. I thought that this guy was so charitable for dating a person with a fat body and because he was quote unquote conventionally attractive. I was like, well, I've won the jackpot. I can't leave this guy because I will be single forever. And the truth is no. I only believe that because I had low self esteem that the truth was very different. Like he didn't deserve me. Like Holy shit, I wish I could just knock on the door when you know, young Victoria's having a shower, but like, Hey, listen up what you know, come on. Really, you want to see, you way to see all of the guys that you are going to have fun with in the future. You would not believe it. Oh my God. Then you know, Victoria, 17 well Victoria would have been like, ah, I don't believe you. So there's no point in me saying that to younger Victoria if I could. So your relationships, your intimate relationships, if you have lower self esteem, you really could be accepting less and as well the way that we behave when we have lower self esteem. So I remember one boyfriend, he was friends with his ex girlfriend and his ex girlfriend had cheated on him and one of my ex boyfriend had cheated on me.

And so I had this like enraged anger that how can he be friends with her? She broke his heart and I would be so mad about it and really it was low self esteem. And so I'd be like, are you texting her? And I would like look at his phone and I would be just thinking about it all the time and all of my therapy sessions, I'd be like, Oh my God, he's still in love with her and blah blah blah blah. And that was low self esteem. That behavior came from because I didn't think that I was good enough or I deserve this guy or you know, I thought he was gonna leave me and cheat on me and, and now I would no way behave like that. Like, Oh my God, looking through my partner's phone, unless like, you know, unless some shit went down, you know, but in a not normal life situation, no way because I don't need to do that type of stuff anymore because you know, if my partner is going to cheat, they're gonna cheat. Me looking through their phone is not going to change that, right? You know.

So what about the way you relate to your body? So things like exercising, moving your body. If you have lower self esteem, you might be doing things like moving your body to punish yourself, moving your body for the sole reason to lose weight versus realizing that you're a fucking glorious creature and moving your body for fun or not moving your body at all. Because really you don't like it but you're forcing yourself to do things. Because this lack of self esteem is driving you or you could be doing things like going to do exercise that is super boring. For example, I hate the gym. So boring. The only time that I had gone to the gym in the past, I've got a gym membership when I was like on a hardcore weight loss journey and I would go and the trainer would be like, okay, do this thing and it's going to lose calories and do that thing and then you're going to get, you know, more shape here and you know, no fun in it and it would just be boring, boring, boring. And so now I never go to the gym, but I do things like I dance and I ride my bike or I go to yoga or whatever things I actually enjoy. And maybe you could be doing things like not prioritizing your mental health. Maybe if you have low self esteem, maybe you believe that you don't deserve that or that you can't change things, you know. That's a domino belief about, you know, I can't change things because I'm that type of person who is going to be like forever. And what about, Oh, this is a big one.

The next category is family and friends. So when you have lower self esteem, you're less likely to do things like set boundaries, hide our boundaries are gross. Ah nah, boundaries. Boundaries used to be really, really big for me. It's still something that I'm working on. You might hear my dog in the background, Dougal, he's rubbing his face in the carpet, you know, like dogs do.

So if you hear panting in the background, that's Dougal. He's shaking himself. So not setting boundaries with friends and family and spending time with people that you don't actually lie. I was so guilty of this, Oh my God, because I was so terrified to set a boundary. I was so terrified to say to someone, Hey, can you not do that or say that? Cause I, you know, I don't like it or whatever because I was so scared that they were just going to be like, what? How dare you ask me to not do or say something? You are a piece of shit. I hate you. And so I would just not say anything because I didn't want to be rejected by them. And so I would just be hanging around with people and then I'd be the worst friend because then I'd be hanging around with people and then behind their back I'd be like, Oh my God, that girl is such a bitch.

I can't believe she did this. And then she said that and they'd babababababa and I was the worst friend because I wasn't giving people the opportunity to get close to me because instead of saying, Oh Hey, you know, when you come to my house, can you, do you mind taking your shoes off? Or something simple like that. Instead, they wouldn't know that was something that would annoy me. And then afterwards I'd be like, Oh my gosh, she didn't even take our shoes off. Can you believe it? Oh, it's terrible. I'm saying we can get close to me cause I'd be secretly angry all the time. But they had, you know, slighted me and all these different ways and it would just build up versus now I'll just be like, Oh Hey, you know, this is a shoes off house simple. And people are just be like, Oh, okay.

Like no big deal because really it's not a big deal. Oh, there might be other, you know, things that are a little bit more of a bigger deal, but when you have higher self esteem, you know, that if someone doesn't want to respect a boundary, then it's not anything to do with you. It's something to do with them. And then you can make a decision yourself of what the consequences are for them not accepting or you know, pushing one of your boundaries. But when you have lower self esteem, that's impossible really. It feels impossible to do that, to stand up for yourself because, you know, I felt grateful for any type of friendship really. Even if it was someone who was, you know, not someone I'd be friends with now.

So what about things like your social life and all of the fun and adventures that you have? Maybe you could be doing things like not going on trips or adventures, doing cool and fun things because you're worried about people judging you. You're scared of rejection maybe or maybe you're worried about what your body can or can't do. And this is all normal, by the way. This isn't, you know, you're not wrong or weird if you're any of these, you're like hmmm that's me. It's totally normal. And so are you stopping from living life because of your lower confidence? Literally missing out on fun things like not going to parties because you don't like the way that you look. You know, you're putting on lot so many different outfits and you're just like, Oh no, I look terrible. Oh, don't even want to go when you either don't go or you go in the whole night, you're thinking, Oh, people look better than me. And are they looking at my clothes and can, Oh, she looks literally fat in that or whatever. So you might go, but you're having a shit time where you might not even go and you know, come up with some excuse and it's all down to lacking confidence.

And so the next category is business and your career. So if you're lacking self esteem, you might do things like avoid asking for a promotion or a pay rise. And this was actually a big pivotal moment in my journey. I remember when I was working on my confidence and I was kind of like midway through, you know, the journey. Not that there's ever an end and I remember, gosh, I don't even know how long ago, let's say seven years ago I was working for this company and, I remember saying to the boss like and I was not making that much at all. I was making in probably less than the average person. And, I remember saying, can I was thinking maybe cause I've worked here for so long. I can maybe get a 2k pay rise question mark. Question mark. Oh my God, what are you going to say? I remember clearly and the way that I said it, I was like, Oh, but it's, you know, it's okay if you don't want to. And I'm going, well, you know, not very confident. It's all about it. But he said, Victoria, listen, you're not worth a 2k pay rise. I mean, look at the work that you've done here. Do you think that your worth 2k more and I listened to him go on making a case about how, you know, I was lucky that I even had a job, never mind a pay rise. What are you thinking?

And I remember listening to him watching his lips move and not in my head but in my brain I was thinking, no bet, no, you're wrong. I know you're wrong. And so then within two weeks I actually got another job because I was like, listen, he can't see my value. And he was right, I wasn't worth a 2k pay rise. I was worth a 12k pay rise, which is what I got up my next job and that was massive. That was really, really giant. The pay rise and the experience of, you know, when I was maybe at the beginning of my self esteem journey. That man listening to him saying those things, I would have been mortified. I would have really taken it on board and taken that as evidence that yes, I am not enough. I am, you know, unworthy.

And maybe I would have stayed in that job and been thankful that I had that job. You know, maybe I would have been too scared to look for another job. And if I did, maybe I would have then been asking for only, you know, a little bit more salary or the same salary. But because I'd worked on my self esteem and a little bit, I was able to not internalize that message. So when you have lower self esteem, you're less likely to have that confidence to follow your passions and it's harder. It's way harder if you have that lower self esteem to do those things. You know, a lot of the times we fight through it and we do it and we're fighting with our brain and saying, Oh my God, I'm not good enough and dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, but you do it anyway.

It just makes things a lot harder and say, what if you want to do something like start your own business? And if you, as someone who has their own business, it's been the biggest test of self esteem ever. Because especially if you have an online presence, you get so many people being like, you are a piece of shit. Your parents will be ashamed of you. And so if your self esteem is a little bit rocky, just existing as a human on the internet is hard. But then when you're you know, building a business and you're asking people to give you money, and if they say no, then it's very easy to be like they're saying no because of me, it's mine. They don't like me. It's about me. It's not often about you is, it's about them, right. It just makes everything harder.

And here's a final one to think about, and that is your environment. So what about things like, the clothes that you wear. The clothes that you wear? Are you holding onto things that are too small for you or that you're hoping that you're going to slim into things like, you know, your dress from your prom when you were 15, and you're like, Oh my God, one day I'm going to fit back into that and not even considering that you're a child of then, now you're an adult and you're not going to be able to fit back into it because that's not how the world works. Do you have those reminders that you are a failure just hanging around and so clothes might be one. You might also be accepting less. Like for example, you might have old tattered clothes or clothes with holes in or close where the thighs have rub together and there's big holes and you're just like, well, do I deserve to buy a new pair, you know, not ruining whatever.

It's not big deal. But maybe if you did buy something new and something that actually fit you, you'd feel better. Maybe, maybe not. Do you have things that, you know, things that are just not nice around you in regards to. I know you have a car and your windscreen is smashed and it's cracked and, you know, then you've got a dent here and you fixed it up with some tape and every time that you see your car, it's just another reminder that you're not worth, you know, fixing that lie or you know, getting a new windscreen or windshield, whatever it's called. You know, things are broken and old and doesn't necessarily have to cost money to fix. But those types of things are just, you know, more reminders that you're not that type of person that deserves a fixed light or whatever it is, or the type of person who deserves a nice new pair of jeans or whatever.

So that's not an extensive list of ideas of ways that having low self esteem could affect you. But it's still pretty huge, right. So I want it so that we can recognize the ways that lacking self esteem messes with us. Because a lot of times you can be like, isn't that big a deal? And for me, because this is my life and it's my life's calling to teach about this stuff, and for people to have high self esteem fat people to have high self esteem and get all the things that they deserve. Because when you realize that you're worthy, you're worthy no matter what, you're not worthy, no matter if you fuck up, you're worthy. If you think that you're unattractive, you're just worthy as a human being. You begin to accept more in life and you realize, Oh my God, it's way easier to get more than I thought because you just asked for it.

And a lot of times you just get it, you know, it's just mind blowing to me. The amount of times I accepted less and how easy is for me to now be like, no, I want a little bit more because I'm worthy. And that could come in, you know, to do with, you know, asking for more money or dating better people or the way that I talked to myself internally. And of course, like I'm not perfect when I said, you know, I'm on this journey and things are still challenging for me. But, overall as a whole, things are just so much easier now, but I don't have to spend so much mental energy thinking about how I'm not good enough. Now I spend my mental energy, you know, thinking, how can I make things better? Or how can I improve my business? Or when can I watch a new Netflix show or whatever.

So get that, download that where we can go deeper into this and you can really work out what is going on in your life when it comes to how this stuff is affecting you. So, go to www.fiercefatty.com/005 to get that workbook, which is called Your Why Guidebook. Why body confidence is important for you. And you're going to work out the consequences of not working on improving your confidence that you've already seen in your life and other different areas. And why do you want to work on loving your body? Why is it important for you? Because everyone's answer is different, right?

So I want to end the show with a little fact about me. I want to share some things that you can get to know me a little bit better. And my fact talking about Netflix is that one of my favorite shows. I don't ever like to say my number one favorite show because it feels like I'm being penned in or something. Top five favorite show of mine is Better Call Saul, which is the prequel prequel, is that the right word? Two Breaking Bad, which is a lot of people's favorite show, but I like Better Call Saul better. And in the last few days, the Breaking Bad movie came out El Camino and I watched that last night and it was like two hours of juiciness. It was so, it was really good and satisfying. And it means making me want to go and watch Breaking Bad all over again especially the later seasons. And it's making me so excited for Better Call Saul because, Oh my God, it's so good if you're not seeing it. I mean, check it out. It's totally different from Breaking Bad. It's all about the lawyer, Saul Goodman and where he came from and how did he get to that being that slimy sneezy lawyer because he wasn't always that. And it's really, it's really, really interesting. I love it. And it's just so entertaining and I love the characters and yeah, so that's a fact about me. One of my top five favorite shows is Better Call Saul and El Camino was good. Go check it out on Netflix. Amazing. All right.

So thank you so much for tuning in. A reminder that you should, if you want, I'm not forcing you to do anything, but if you want a copy of my book and audio version and an ebook version, leave a review on iTunes or Stitcher or anywhere else that you can leave a review. I don't think there is other places you can, but surprise me.

Leave a review and take a screenshot before you submit it and send it to me, victoria@fiercefatty.com. And once you email me with that screenshot, then I'm just gonna email back and be like, Oh my God, amazing. I love you. Here is your book, right? Easy and bonus points share on social media that you're listening to this podcast and for you to win a Fierce Fatty mug or your fatty dreams are coming true. So, Hey, thank you so much for being here. Thank you for tuning in. I so appreciate you hanging out with me. Seriously, you've made it to the end of the episode is pretty amazing because you're helping me fulfill my life's calling, which is to help shift perspectives, help fat people realize that they are worthy and deserving of love and respect and all the good things that every other human being deserves in their lives. So it is a real privilege for me to be able to be here in your ear, spreading that message. I thank you so so much for being a part of my community and listening to the very end. All right, I'll see you on the next episode, Fierce Fatty, goodbye.