I stumbled across a facebook ‘memory’ from 2012 of an email i sent to a prospective Dietician. it was painful to read (as are most posts, values and ideologies from season’s past) mostly because it was written from a very disordered and unhealthy lens through which i food, my body and the world.
i am still in touch with this Dietician, Sumner Brooks. She saved my life and continues to do her work in a way that is aligned with how i navigate and conduct myself in my kitchen and in my heart. i thank the benevolence of this world for our paths to cross.
though i am not on “the other side” of disordered thoughts about food and my body, i have certainly evolved in my world view and would write a very different email today. this blog post is that new email.
the breakdown:
It’s important to me that I learn to fuel my body responsibly for my activity level while still being able to eat very clean. To me, this means not eating anything with added sugar, starch and ingredients I cannot pronounce.
It’s important to me that I honor my body’s hunger and satiety cues while also understanding eating is meant to be pleasurable and sometimes wanting more food outweighs whether or not I physically need it.
I have access to and enjoy eating a wide variety of foods, some are more processed than others.
Concerning myself with “rejecting ingredients I cannot pronounce” is both classist and ableist. I prefer not to concern myself with such criteria.
As a personal trainer, I am ADAMANT that I “walk the walk” in terms of my own health and wellbeing so I can be of more service to my industry.
As a human being who’s paid as a Movement Teacher, I value autonomy in myself and my students. My body, my health and my lived experience are not advertisements, inspiration or accountability markers for anyone else’s life journey. The only way I can be of service to my industry is to actively resist, reject and repair all parts of it rooted in racism, anti-Blackness and anti-fatness.
I am passionate about what I do, because it’s who I am.
Passion for what i do for money fluctuates regularly and I am not my streams of income.
And though, deep down, I’m very uncomfortable at the physical size I am now, I chose “sports nutrition” as an objective as apposed to “losing weight” because I trust weight loss will be inevitable if I am educated and fearless about the other aspects.
I’d like you to know I am uncomfortable in my physical body most of the time, but not all the time. This is in part because I have been a lot thinner in my life and I feel like a failure for having been unable to maintain the body I had when I was suffering with an eating disorder. I recognize this thought loop reflects my own fat-phobia, shaped by anti-fat culture and I’m committed to dismantling that as well.
though i wish it weren’t true, i understand that weight loss is not always an outcome of making necessary or minor adjustments in lifestyle. In my case, it may never be.
I’m grateful that my body is able to physically do what I ask of it everyday and I want to treat it with the same love and respect I’d give my own child (if I had a child, haha!)
I’m grateful for my ability to articulate my thoughts, feelings and concerns. My hope is you receive my words and hear my desire for personal freedom as ultimately it’s essential to collective liberation. I do not need help losing weight, I need guidance for how to respond appropriately and lovingly to my body’s cues as I am largely disconnected from them.
Most interestingly, I am a flawed, dynamic, silly, serious and introspective woman. I excel in arranging words of the English language in clever and creative ways. I am nourished by togetherness and satisfied by solitude. It’s not easy to make me laugh but when i find something really, really funny, it’s an entertaining and orgasmic sight. i value consistency and my favorite genres of literature and media are True Crime, Ethical Dilemma, Psychological Thriller...and Weekend at Bernie’s. Also, my Dad is dead.
notes - nuances - nourishment:
weight loss and the desire to lose weight is not inherently problematic nor is it indicative of an eating disorder. while only you know when your desire to be of a smaller shape and size is born from an unhealthy relationship to body, food, etc., anti-fatness rooted in anti-Blackness is a real stain on American life and affects us all, even when we don’t recognize it. Fearing the Black Body by, Sabrina Strings outlines this history beautifully.
my comment about “walking the walk” as a Personal Trainer and claiming ‘I am what I do’ is late-stage capitalist rhetoric and, when adopted as truth, (particularly in the #GirlBoss world) can be very harmful to ourselves and each other. Eula Biss explains this and so much more in her book, Having and Being Had. This book is not an examination of diet culture per se, but gives a broader context for the ways capitalism lives and thrives in crevices unknown to us.
for me, believing that weight loss is an inevitable outcome of making any number of food and lifestyle tweaks has been more psychologically damaging than the act of trying to lose weight. A big part of my personal recovery has been understanding the science of Health at Every Size. Dr. Lindo Bacon is a pioneer in this field and their work is highly backed and respected.
These are a few more wildly insightful, healing and helpful resources: podcast about The Obesity Epidemic; Maintenance Phase— a podcast debunking the junk science behind health fads, wellness scams and nonsensical nutrition advice; Sonya Renee Taylor’s interview with Brene Brown + Sonya’s book, The Body is Not an Apology; the book, What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat is very important for those of us in non-marginalized bodies.
xo,
erica jac