Body Stories I'm Tuning Into

What’s your body story?

When I work with my clients, I want to learn all about their body story.

This includes everything from what their relationship with their body has looked and felt liked over the years and what experiences they’ve had living in their body to the cultural messages they’ve internalized regarding how their body is supposed to be.

Individual body stories and the journey toward self-acceptance are the overriding themes in much of the content I consume, whether it's a book, show or podcast.

The Power of Body Stories
It’s my belief that hearing other people’s body stories, especially from a diverse group of often marginalized voices, can be a powerful part of the healing process.

Hearing others’ stories can help you feel less alone in your struggle and gain a deeper understanding of yourself and your challenges as well as the challenges other folks are navigating.

It can also help you be more accepting of and compassionate toward yourself and others, and enable you to envision what’s possible on your own body-peace journey.

Tune Into These
Following are some of the body stories I've been turning into lately. I hope you will find them as helpful, insightful and inspiring as I have.

My Body is the Right Body Because It’s Mine [YouTube]
“How would I be with my body if there was nothing to fix…except the lens I’m looking through?” asks writer and activist Adrienne Maree Brown when sharing her body story.

In addition to this moving piece, I recommend checking out all of the docu-style videos produced by Elisa Goodkind and Lily Mandelbaum, the mother-daughter duo behind StyleLikeU, especially the Embracing Curves and Redefining Fat series.

Lizzo’s Watch Out for the Big Grrrls [Prime Video]
Lizzo's empowering, uplifting show challenges harmful cultural messaging regarding body size by celebrating 13 talented performers as they audition to become one of her “Big Grrrl” backup dancers.

Full of heart and none of the toxicity many reality shows contain, this Emmy-nominated gem will leave you wanting more—more of this show as well as more programming featuring a wider range of individuals in diverse bodies living full and fulfilling lives because representation truly does matter.

Men Unscripted [Spotify]
Unfortunately, we rarely hear from men regarding their struggles with body image and disordered eating. Fortunately, this new podcast hosted by registered dietitian Aaron Flores gives men of all backgrounds an opportunity to share their story.

Perhaps by listening to body stories like these you will feel compelled to find a safe, trusted space to share your own story as doing so can truly be a liberating and healing experience.

"I love creating shapes with my body, and I love normalizing the dimples in my butt or the lumps in my thighs or my back fat or my stretch marks. I love normalizing my Black-ass elbows. I think it's beautiful."
—Lizzo

I Wanted to Toss All the Christmas Cookies

Over the holidays, I recalled a Christmas many years ago when I was visiting my parents at my childhood home.

Every year, my mom would attend a cookie exchange and return home with a giant platter full of a variety of holiday cookies.

I vividly remember standing alone over that red platter and quickly eating one cookie after another after another. Even though most of them didn’t taste very good to me, I kept eating them.

It felt like I was in a trance.

When I finally snapped to, I was so mad at myself for eating so many cookies. I felt crappy, out of control and powerless.

I certainly didn’t feel I could trust myself with those cookies.

I wanted to toss the entire platter into the trash to prevent myself from eating more but that wasn’t possible given they were meant to be shared among all my family members. I wasn’t sure how I would explain the missing cookies without a lot of lying, embarrassment and shame.

The only thing that helped was reassuring myself that I would get back on track with my eating as soon as the holidays were over.

The Cookies Weren’t the Problem
I haven’t had an eating episode like this one in years.

As I worked on healing my relationship with food and my body, I came to understand that my cookie experience and hundreds of others like it were not due to a lack of willpower or self-discipline. They were due to dieting.

Once I stopped all the restriction and rule-following and started eating unconditionally with guidance from my body’s cues, like hunger, fullness, desire and satisfaction, food lost its power over me.

Without the threat of future deprivation, I no longer had the urge to eat cookies or anything else as if it was my last supper.

Breaking up with diet culture and making peace with food and my body was one of the greatest gifts I’ve ever given myself.

Resolve to Make Peace Instead
Given the world we live in, the desire to diet is completely understandable.

It’s more tempting than ever this time of year as we’re bombarded by weight-loss company ads promising that their method is better than all the others and guaranteed to result in everlasting thinness, health and happiness—even though they don’t have any substantial, including long-term, research to back up their claims.

If you have a history of dieting (or whatever the food-restriction plan is called), you likely know all too well how this game eventually ends: weight regain, feeling like a failure, an even more messed up relationship with food and your body, and so many other undesired outcomes the diet companies don't warn you about.

What if this year, instead of hopping on the diet train, you resolve to make peace with food and your body?

How would doing so change your life?

The last two years have taught us many things, especially how precious life is.

How would you spend your one precious life if you were no longer wasting so much time, energy and headspace obsessing about what you’re eating and your weight?

What if you signed up for peace instead?