Speaker 1: Hey, Rebel Eaters, Virgie here. Making this show over the
Speaker 1: past few months has been such a thrill and the
Speaker 1: best part has been hearing from you. Today, I'm going
Speaker 1: to play some of the voicemails you've sent this season.
Speaker 1: Thank you for writing and calling. We've rather or listened
Speaker 1: to every one of your messages and you were all
Speaker 1: so inspiring. A few of you had some questions for me,
Speaker 1: and I want to start with this one from an
Speaker 1: anonymous rebel Eater. I'll play part of the voicemail and
Speaker 1: then give you my very best answer. Here we go. Hi,
Speaker 1: I am new to listening to your podcast and I'm
Speaker 1: enjoying it so far. But my question or questions that
Speaker 1: I'm running into our how do you like go against
Speaker 1: the diet culture and still remain healthy? Because well, it
Speaker 1: sounds awesome to eat whatever you want, we still know
Speaker 1: that it's not healthy to have a lot of fat
Speaker 1: and heart disease and all that. And the other question
Speaker 1: I have is how do you give it a point
Speaker 1: of loving yourself at any size? That sounds wonderful, but
Speaker 1: how do you get there? Thanks so much by hello Anonymous,
Speaker 1: Thank you for this question. First, I want to point
Speaker 1: you to three very smart people who have dedicated their
Speaker 1: lives to answering the first part of this question. Number
Speaker 1: one is doctor Lindo Bacon, who wrote Health at Every Size,
Speaker 1: Number two Carolyn Dooner, who wrote the Fuck It Diet,
Speaker 1: and number three Christy Harrison, who wrote Anti Diet. Also
Speaker 1: look for resources on intuitive eating. Now here's my perspective
Speaker 1: as a person who's not a nutritionist but has spent
Speaker 1: almost a decade researching diet culture. I want to push
Speaker 1: you to consider that the framing of fear around having
Speaker 1: a lot of fat actually comes from a mentality of restriction.
Speaker 1: If fat or sugar or whatever weren't off limits, most
Speaker 1: people actually wouldn't crave it constantly. I want to stress
Speaker 1: that dieting and diet culture are not correlated with better
Speaker 1: physical or mental health outcomes. It's the opposite. Dieting is
Speaker 1: correlated with a higher likelihood of depression, stress, and anxiety,
Speaker 1: as well as weight cycling and binging. Essentially, diet culture
Speaker 1: trains us not to trust our bodies natural signals around hunger, fullness,
Speaker 1: and desire. Those signals give us important information, including when
Speaker 1: we are craving a delicious, warm cookie because we've been
Speaker 1: denied that experience for too long, or when we need water,
Speaker 1: or when we need some fiber from vegetables because our
Speaker 1: butts are sad. Your body's natural signals only come back
Speaker 1: when we stop trying to control every single thing we eat.
Speaker 1: It's certainly a bad idea to eat stuff you're deathly
Speaker 1: allergic to, or food that makes you feel pain or
Speaker 1: physical discomfort. And if you have a condition that is
Speaker 1: triggered by certain foods, don't eat those foods. Bottom line,
Speaker 1: your body is not a terrifying, monstrous thing that has
Speaker 1: to be monitored at all times. It has wisdom. There
Speaker 1: are all sorts of ways to define health, and everyone
Speaker 1: has the right to pursue their own version of it
Speaker 1: in a way that allows them dignity. If I could
Speaker 1: wave a magic wand and create a hypothetical world where
Speaker 1: diet culture never existed and everyone ate what they wanted,
Speaker 1: I would bet that the inhabitants of that world would
Speaker 1: one hundred percent be better off mentally and physically than
Speaker 1: the people who exist in the diet culture steep world
Speaker 1: we live in now. As for your question about how
Speaker 1: to love yourself at any size, this process looks different
Speaker 1: for different people. When I talk about self love, I'm
Speaker 1: not talking about an experience of being blissed out about
Speaker 1: your body every single day. I'm talking about the decision
Speaker 1: to stop waging war against your body in the form
Speaker 1: of restriction and hunger. This process might start with surrender
Speaker 1: and acceptance, saying to yourself every morning, I accept this
Speaker 1: body as it is today, tomorrow, forever. I think it
Speaker 1: could also start with changing how we think about fat people.
Speaker 1: We're taught that the worst thing that could happen to
Speaker 1: us is that we get fat, when in fact, the
Speaker 1: worst thing that could happen to us is that we
Speaker 1: live a life where we constantly feel a emotionally unstable
Speaker 1: because we're suppressing the basic human instinct to eat. I
Speaker 1: talk about some of this stuff in my new book.
Speaker 1: It's Routines, but it's also great for anyone who's new
Speaker 1: to the subject. It's called The Self Love Revolution, Radical
Speaker 1: Body Positivity for Girls of Color. It comes out me
Speaker 1: first and you can preorder it now online. Thanks for
Speaker 1: your question, Anonymous. Here's another, Hi, Virgie. My name is
Speaker 1: d and I'm from Billings, Montana, and I'm a sixty
Speaker 1: year old fat white chick and I've been fat all
Speaker 1: my life, and the conversation that I would like to
Speaker 1: change about food involves a really dear friend of mine.
Speaker 1: She's always been trim and she's just completely put together.
Speaker 1: We'll always go for a really nice meal, and I
Speaker 1: always really look forward to it. So the first thing
Speaker 1: that happens is when the twist comes and puts the
Speaker 1: food down to say, this is so much food, I'll
Speaker 1: never be able to eat it. And I look at
Speaker 1: my plate and I think, oh, you know, this is
Speaker 1: a portion of meat, a portion of potatoes. It doesn't
Speaker 1: look like this huge meal to me. But we'll have
Speaker 1: a nice conversation, and in the middle of the meal,
Speaker 1: she will always say, see, I'm gonna stop now and
Speaker 1: I'm going to have my meal boxed up, and I'm
Speaker 1: going to take it home and I'm going to have
Speaker 1: it for lunch and dinner tomorrow. And she says it
Speaker 1: as if she's giving me a lesson or telling me
Speaker 1: a trick. And I always say, you know, I'm going
Speaker 1: to do that too. The thing is, truly, now that
Speaker 1: I think about it, I think I do that because
Speaker 1: I want to say to her, see, I know the
Speaker 1: trick too, I know the skinny girl trick. Well, I'll
Speaker 1: keep doing what you're doing. I love listening. Thanks d Okay, So,
Speaker 1: first of all, what your friend is doing has a name.
Speaker 1: It's called fat shaming. Is not okay. It's hurtful. Your
Speaker 1: friend has created a situation where you don't feel safe
Speaker 1: to finish your meal. It is not all on you.
Speaker 1: It's her job to stop projecting her feelings onto you.
Speaker 1: Second of all, we have no idea what she's doing
Speaker 1: or going through, but the fact that she can't go
Speaker 1: a single meal without commenting on food makes me think
Speaker 1: she may have her own issues with food, like so
Speaker 1: many of us do. I personally would not be okay
Speaker 1: with a friend saying things like that to me. So
Speaker 1: I want to validate that you are allowed to have
Speaker 1: feelings about what she's doing, and you are also allowed
Speaker 1: to finish your damn dinner. So I want to go
Speaker 1: through three tools you might use moving forward. First, reframing,
Speaker 1: it sounds like your friend feels a lot of pressure
Speaker 1: to perform a particular kind of behavior that's expected of women.
Speaker 1: That includes not eating a lot and talking about it
Speaker 1: all the time too. Remember how Caleb talked about performance studies.
Speaker 1: Your friend is performing this skinny girl trick, and that
Speaker 1: kind of performance stifles intimacy. To me, it's a sign
Speaker 1: of pain. It's a sign that your friend is suffering.
Speaker 1: That doesn't mean she's not responsible for her behavior, but
Speaker 1: thinking about it that way may change how you see
Speaker 1: her behavior. Maybe it's not that she's got it all
Speaker 1: together and you don't. Maybe it's just a performance okay.
Speaker 1: Tool number two externally facing boundaries. These are boundaries you
Speaker 1: set with others, Like you could ask her to stop
Speaker 1: commenting on food when you're at dinner. You could just
Speaker 1: say something like, I care about our friendship. I know
Speaker 1: you do too. When you say these things, I feel judged.
Speaker 1: Can we try doing a dinner where you don't say
Speaker 1: these things? Tool number three is internally facing boundaries. These
Speaker 1: are boundaries you hold within yourself for yourself, Like, before
Speaker 1: you go out to dinner, you might decide that one
Speaker 1: of your boundaries is that you are going to finish
Speaker 1: your dinner at the table, if that's what you want
Speaker 1: to do. Also, you can make a plan before you
Speaker 1: hang out again about how you're going to take care
Speaker 1: of yourself after dinner. If she says anything like that again,
Speaker 1: good luckty. Remember you deserve to have fun at a
Speaker 1: fancy dinner. My name is Claire. I am a thirty
Speaker 1: seven year old mother of three, and I work full
Speaker 1: time as an executive director of nonprofit in Portland. I'm
Speaker 1: also recovering from an eating disorder. I entered treatment for
Speaker 1: the first time last fall, and it was one of
Speaker 1: the hardest experiences of my life. My wonderful therapist convinced
Speaker 1: me that I was sick, be I needed help, and
Speaker 1: see I needed help sooner rather than later. Because I
Speaker 1: don't look like I'm starving to death. All of my
Speaker 1: restriction went pretty much unnoticed from my entire life. People
Speaker 1: were generally shocked to hear that I had an eating disorder.
Speaker 1: On paper, I'm not gonna lie. I look like I
Speaker 1: have it altogether. I have a leadership position. I have
Speaker 1: received awards and fellowships. You know, I've done the things.
Speaker 1: It's really difficult to communicate the magnitude of this mental
Speaker 1: illness and disease with other people. I'm not gonna I've
Speaker 1: been in a very bad place as of late, between
Speaker 1: pressures from kids, work, and marriage. It's been very hard,
Speaker 1: and some days the eating disorder is just so loud
Speaker 1: I want to bang my head against the wall. But
Speaker 1: listening to the podcast has been amazing. It's like a
Speaker 1: door has been opened to a room full of people
Speaker 1: who feel exactly the same way I do. I feel like,
Speaker 1: for the first time, recovery is possible. Last night I
Speaker 1: had ice cream for the first time, and I really
Speaker 1: focused on eating it with joy. It is actually a
Speaker 1: huge breakthrough for me, and you all helped me with that.
Speaker 1: Please keep doing what you're doing on the podcast. It
Speaker 1: really matters, hi, Claire. It brought the biggest smile to
Speaker 1: my face imagining you eating that ice cream with joy.
Speaker 1: That is healing. I'm really really grateful to hear you
Speaker 1: have an amazing therapist. I might recommend asking your therapist
Speaker 1: to listen to episode three with deb Burgard and talk
Speaker 1: out what a health at every size approach to eat
Speaker 1: each treatment can look like. I believe fully in a
Speaker 1: future of recovery for you, Claire. I'm rooting for you,
Speaker 1: and I'm rooting for all of you rebel eaters. I
Speaker 1: loved tearing from you this season. I hope you'll keep
Speaker 1: calling us. I'm still listening, so if you haven't called
Speaker 1: yet and you'd like to, you're not too late. Ask
Speaker 1: me questions. Tell me about your quarantine, food life, or
Speaker 1: whatever else you want to share. I'm going to share
Speaker 1: a secret with you. We're really hoping to make a
Speaker 1: second season of Rebel Eaters Club, and we'd love to
Speaker 1: know what you want to hear. Leave a voicemail at
Speaker 1: eight six two two three one five three eight six.
Speaker 1: That's eight six two two three one five three eight six.
Speaker 1: You can write us too, Rebel Eaters Club at gmail
Speaker 1: dot com. Rebel Eaters Club is an original podcast from
Speaker 1: Transmitter Media, the podcast company that's like finding a box
Speaker 1: of cake mix in the back of your pantry. I'm
Speaker 1: Virgie tofar. This show is produced by Lacy Roberts and
Speaker 1: Jordan Bailey. Our editor is Sarah Nix. Good A Cone
Speaker 1: is Our executive producer. Dar Re Hirsch composed this season's
Speaker 1: theme song, Like what you hear on the show and
Speaker 1: want to sponsor us, Send us a note at Rebel
Speaker 1: Eaters Club at gmail dot com and let us know.
Speaker 1: And if you love the show, share it with your
Speaker 1: friends and head to your favorite podcast app and give
Speaker 1: us a review. It will help us grow the club.
Speaker 1: Thank you for being here.