Body Positivity: Health at Every Size is Possible
It’s time to investigate Body Positivity vs Fat Acceptance & HAES. Terms like body acceptance and body positivity are flying around these days, and many people feel confused about what they mean, and whether these movements even make sense.
Body positivity is a term we use to encourage people to embrace and like their bodies more; think of this term like a new more positive lens to look through– The cultural norm is to look through a lens of dissatisfaction-a lens that is always looking for what could be better about the body, vs what is good enough or even great. Body positivity feels like a helpful term for some people, but other’s would rather use a lens more aligned with body acceptance or fat acceptance. There’s definitely overlap within these terms, so explore what might feel like a helpful starting place for you!
Fat acceptance is about taking back the word “fat,” and using it as a neutral discriptor (like thin) vs using it as a “bad” descriptor of a body. HAES (Health at Every Size) is a researched approach that embraces body diversity, challenges biased and diet-centric research, and encourages health choices from a weight-neutral place. HAES incorporates fat acceptance and body acceptance and certainly would love if you felt body positive too.
Now let’s say (for instance) that you’ve experienced years of bullying that included being called “fat,” and it was far from a compliment. It makes sense why it might sound pretty bad to “just accept your body” and to describe your body as “fat” but “in a good way!” We get that these are complex words/subjects, but in this movement we want people to know that we truly don’t feel that “being fat” is bad, even though we understand why this word might still bring up yucky feelings for you. So you don’t have to describe your body as “fat” if you don’t want to- it’s your choice! Then again, you might feel empowered in saying, “you know what? I am fat! So what?!”
This onion has a lot of layers. You might be thinking- “how can I be body positive or engage in body acceptance if I don’t want to accept my body – it’s unhealthy!” I hear that a lot, so let’s talk about it.
Is Dieting the Route of All Evil When it Comes to Body Positivity and Fat Acceptance
In short, yes. Because research actually shows that long term side effects of dieting (among a few fun ones) are weight regain/cycling (which is associated with negative health outcomes) and increased risk of developing an eating disorder.
We are all products of a culture fixated on dieting, and rich in messages from media and medicine telling us that being “overweight,” is the greatest indicator of poor health. But these terms “overweight” and “obese,” are derived from the BMI (body mass index), which is simply your height divided by your weight– which tells us nothing more than…well…what your height divided by your weight equals. The BMI is problematic, and the terms “overweight” and “obese” have been applied to these BMI ranges, which again, tell us nothing about your health. The result? A bunch of people who feel badly about their bodies, who are told to diet and therefore spend years trying to “right” the so-called “wrong” of their body.
Unfortunately, we’ve all internalized these messages, and in turn, if we experience weight gain (which is a very normal part of life) or live in a body that is larger than the culture or BMI deems “acceptable,” we feel like failures, we believe we are unhealthy, and we believe we have a moral obligation to lose weight.
The stress (including weight stigma) that comes with this pressure is often debilitating, and research indicates that this (stress, body hatred) is the health issue we should be more concerned with, not the weight itself.
From a wellbeing standpoint - it’s pretty hard to like your body when you’re simultaneously focused on trying to change it. But that doesn’t mean you can’t WANT to change it. As you can read here.
What is Body Positivity and Why is it Important?
Body positivity is important because it can be an entryway into better overall well-being. In fact, research indicates that having a better image of your body is actually associated with greater physical well-being as well as mental:
Less depression
Better self-esteem
Greater intention to protect the sun from UV rays
Less unhealthy dieting behaviors
When we allow ourselves to look through a different more positive lens towards our body, turns out it is better for us. But like I said before, sometimes body positivity doesn’t feel realistic or helpful, and body acceptance or fat acceptance are great places to start too.
What is Fat Acceptance: Fat Pride, Fat Empowerment and Fat Activism
Fat acceptance, fat pride, and fat empowerment are all terms people choose to use to embrace their bodies and to stop taking part in a system that says fat is bad and therefore leaves us in shame spirals, avoiding the doctor’s office because we don’t want to be scolded for not losing weight, and dreading airplane seats that don’t fit it. People in bigger and fat bodies experience oppression and discrimination, and fat activism is working to say that this is not ok and that people of all bodies deserve equal access to resources, respect comfort, and safety just as much as anyone else does.
Is Body Positivity the Same as Fat Acceptance
Not necessarily. In my work, I use them together and sometimes separately. As an example, sometimes “body positivity” is actually unhelpful for folks working on (watch out, here’s another term) body liberation. When we are trying to improve body image, we want to start somewhere that feels helpful - the main goal is feeling freer and being more loving to ourselves.
Fat acceptance and body acceptance are sometimes easier places to start because if you’re in a state of body hatred, even the word “positive” associated with your body just feels out of reach. Acceptance on the other end is about saying “it is what it is, and even if I don’t like it, I don’t have to change it, and I can begin to be kind to my body regardless.”
Fat Acceptance vs Body Positivity: Health at Every Size
My career did not begin in the world of body acceptance. It has been a journey. I started my career working in weight loss, and after years of observing the majority of weight loss journeys ending in feelings of failure, social isolation, weight gain, and disordered eating, I started feeling like what I was taking part of and encouraging was pretty harmful, and that the fantasy of weight loss was much more enticing than the reality of the journey itself.
At the same time, I was exposed to research indicating that most dieters regain all and often more of the weight they lost within 3-5 years of losing it. And this was what I was seeing in my work too! Weight loss studies don’t follow folks long enough (more than 2 years for instance) to observe these effects, so weight loss research looks really awesome until it’s not. Furthermore, the grand majority of participants that keep weight off are not keeping off large amounts. We’re talking 5-10% of your weight! For a 200 lb person that’s 10 lbs, and it can be a LOT of effort to keep 10 lbs off.
This is where we have to ask ourselves why we think it’s ok to encourage a fat person to lose weight, count calories, and overexercise when we call this “anorexia” in a smaller person. Think about it—Fear of weight gain, excessive preoccupation with food/body, excessive exercise, very low-calorie intakes, and social issues that arise from the attempt to keep food and exercise routines in line. If I were a doctor would I prescribe a pill that had a large failure rate, and also increased the risk for eating disorders? Absolutely not.
Body positivity and fat acceptance movements give us the chance to stop hating our bodies and forcing them into diets and weight loss, only to regain the weight later and develop disordered eating behaviors, and blame ourselves for all of it!
When we move towards accepting our bodies for what they naturally want to do, then we get back to actually caring for ourselves more holistically and fully. Body positivity, fat acceptance, and body acceptance are opportunities to heal and be more fully whole.
Body Acceptance
Body acceptance is about being kind to your body, and accepting your body as is. It’s a process of letting go of what you wish you looked like, what you used to look like, to be kindly firmly in what is true for your body.
Body acceptance is deeper than body positivity to me. You can be positive about your body, but if you still are fighting it at times, and trying to get it to stay this way or be that way, you will always be at war in some way. When you accept your body, you stop focusing on fixing how it looks, and you can actually focus more holistically on how things feel and what you care about and need. In fact, you can practice Health at Every Size!
Introducing Health at Every Size (HAES)
Health at Every Size is a researched approach (with origins from the civil rights movement) that incorporates body acceptance, acknowledges the impact of weight stigma, and suggests that you can be healthy and worthy regardless of your weight.
Health at Every Size incorporates body acceptance and acknowledges body diversity. HAES takes the negative realities of diets into consideration to get to the root cause of health issues and focus on those rather than focusing on weight.
Weight is not the root cause of high cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes, or heart attacks, and health at every sizes allows us to challenge mainstream studies that love talking about the “associations” with being “overweight” or “obese” without controlling for factors like weight cycling, weight stigma, or impacts of disordered eating and eating disorders.
I’ve seen it over and over again in my work; dieting gets in the way of real and lasting health change, and weight cycling (losing and gaining weight) can create worse health outcomes than maintaining a high weight.
HAES Vs Dieting: The Benefits
Clinical trials have shown that folks who are using HAES vs. dieting show improvements in:
Blood lipids
Blood pressure
Improvements in dietary quality
Improvements in physical activity
All of these improvements are regardless of weight change! But unfortunately, weight has been associated with health issues like these, and combined with the multi-million-dollar diet industry, has led to a hyper fixation on weight loss as the answer.
Conclusion
Okay, for those of you who are cringing and raising your eyebrows...I am not saying that there aren’t substantial difficulties with living in a larger body or experiencing weight gain, especially in a culture that doesn’t accommodate all bodies. I am not saying that wanting to lose weight is crazy. We know that shifting from a weight loss focus to a body acceptance focus is difficult and brave work, which is why it requires support.
Body acceptance is not synonymous with “anti-weight loss,” it’s just weight neutral. Health at every size believes that whatever your body’s weight does as a result of improving health behaviors is the right thing for your body.
Body acceptance is also not about loving everything about your body. Instead, it is about expressing kindness and taking good care of it regardless of your feelings about how you look. It’s time to stop beating our bodies up. So, if you’re interested, tune into your body and give it some love. And please reach out for support.
If you are impacted by issues surrounding body positivity and fat acceptance please get help, and don’t hesitate to reach out to us for referrals/support.
If you’d like to learn more about the organizations doing the real work of HAES, check out ASDAH.
If you are interested in learning with me check out my monthly memberships, or my on-demand course: Weight, what? Intro to Health At Every Size (HAES)
Resources:
Mann, T., Tomiyama, A. J., Westling, E., Lew, A. M., Samuels, B., & Chatman, J. (2007). Medicare's search for effective obesity treatments: diets are not the answer. The American psychologist, 62(3), 220–233. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.62.3.220
Gillen M. M. (2015). Associations between positive body image and indicators of men's and women's mental and physical health. Body image, 13, 67–74. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2015.01.002
Miller W. C. (1999). How effective are traditional dietary and exercise interventions for weight loss?. Medicine and science in sports and exercise, 31(8), 1129–1134. https://doi.org/10.1097/00005768-199908000-00008
Bacon, L., & Aphramor, L. (2011). Weight science: evaluating the evidence for a paradigm shift. Nutrition journal, 10, 9. https://doi.org/10.1186/1475-2891-10-9
Bacon, L., Stern, J. S., Van Loan, M. D., & Keim, N. L. (2005). Size acceptance and intuitive eating improve health for obese, female chronic dieters. Journal of the American Dietetic Association, 105(6), 929–936. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jada.2005.03.011
