Cathy Vartuli from http://www.TheIntimacyDojo.com and Ashley Manta from http://www.AshleyManta.com talk about body image and how to deal with people who use shame to try to “fix” you.
Cathy: Hey everyone we are talking about how we can interact with people who are trying to be helpful and giving us advice and suggestions on body image when really they are more shaming and less encouraging than we would like.
I’m Cathy Vartuli from http://TheIntimacyDojo.com and this is Ashley Manta from http://AshleyManta.com.
Hey Ashley.
Ashley: Hey Cathy.
Cathy: And people do they care and they want to help and they will give you advice like I get advice about my weight all of the time from people around me. They assume that I want to lose weight, they assume that it is the right thing to do and I actually have no agenda for my body I let my body be where it is. My body seems to be happy and healthy and safe here and as I work through stuff maybe it will change and that’s okay. I don’t have an agenda for people but a lot of people have agendas for other people. What experience have you had with that?
Ashley: One of my parents is very focused on body and weight and she constantly tells me you need to lose weight, you know you are unhealthy, your boyfriend probably doesn’t want to have sex with you because you are so overweight and I’m like first of all how do you know what my boyfriend is thinking and second of all that’s none of your business but it is really unhelpful kind of I know what’s best for you so I’m going to put my views onto your body and why aren’t you more upset with how you look. It is this idea of I know what is best for you. So I’ve actually had to really set up very strong boundaries and say I don’t want you to talk about my weight. I can’t have you do that. It is not healthy for me. You know where my body is and my weight and my eating habits that is between me and me and that’s as far as it is going to go because you telling me that I’m fat or that I’m overweight or that I’m unhealthy you’re not going to shame me into losing weight.
Cathy: No.
Ashley: Even if you do and I develop an eating disorder and stop eating altogether that’s not healthy. Like you’re not inspiring me to lose weight my making me feel bad.
Cathy: No there’s so much shame out there in society magazines, TV and people in general. If shame worked we would all be a size two. Shame doesn’t work but that’s what we are kind of taught to do. Like it is socially acceptable to shame people that are overweight or that are like considered overweight or fat people. You can shame fat people just like maybe one hundred years ago you could shame someone who was African American or you could shame someone who was gay. Now it is socially acceptable. Like you wouldn’t walk up to someone who had a bad haircut normally and say oh my god that’s a horrible haircut what were you thinking but if you view someone as being too large your friends would be like yeah good job for telling that person that they should lose weight. It is kind of surprising.
So how did your parents respond to that? Is there any listening to that?
Ashley: Not well unfortunately and it came to the point where I said listen this is how it needs to be. I need you to not do this and if you respect me and they were not able to get with that and I said alright that’s where I need to draw the line and I can’t have you in my life if you are going to bring me down.
Cathy: Right.
Ashley: It was hard but like I kind of developed my own family of people that love me and support me and have been there for me no matter what and I think that family has very little to do with blood and a lot to do with the people who are loving and supportive toward you. So I sort of developed my own family and that has worked out much better.
Cathy: Wonderful congratulations. And it does help like we can expect and hope people will be safe and respectful with us but we also sometimes have to educate especially around weight related issues. There is not a lot of role modeling, there is not a lot of safe and respectful examples for people. So if a friend starts shaming you, you can very gently say hey listen I understand that this is coming from a place of concern I would like to let you know that there are a lot of studies now that show someone who is physically fit no matter what their weight they are still healthy and they can still be healthy and happy and there is nothing wrong. So educating them..because cultural…most doctors aren’t even aware of the studies that show that you can be fit and healthy no matter what your weight. It is not about the number on the scale it is about how your body is like are you moving your body, are you eating foods that are good for your body.
Ashley: Absolutely.
Cathy: So you can gently educate them and let them know what will support them. Stress does not help people lose weight, shame does not help people lose weight, loving people helps them feel happy and that’s what we can give to each other. We can’t create other things for other people in their lives.
Ashley: And it’s especially important I think to let people know that even when they are giving you compliments it can be fat shaming like when people say oh my gosh you look great have you lost weight. What they are actually saying is you looked terrible when you were heavier and now you look so much better and that’s not helpful. I have actually said don’t do that, don’t tell me you look great have you lost weight. Say you look great you look so energized or you look great have you been like doing yoga or whatever but don’t mention it in like a weight context.
Cathy: Yeah because implying that losing weight makes you prettier it says that you are not pretty and fat is not pretty whereas we all have preferences and our society has geared us towards we are constantly shown beautiful people in fascinating positions and wealth and nice clothes and stuff we are conditioned to think thin is beautiful and if we start watching television programs with a new mindset you will see that the fat people are often shown as lazy, stupid, dirty which is what they used to do…and they used to do that with African Americans and Irish before…like we have all had…our society has always had a scapegoat but we are constantly barraged with that information so we start associating or slender means that you are wealthy and beautiful and well done up and positive. Whereas that’s not the case it’s like you can be positive no matter what your weight is. You can be out there creating really beautiful things no matter what so support people where they are and love them where they are that’s all we get.
Ashley: Absolutely and if you like what we said or if you have questions please, please I encourage you to comment below and let us know what you think.
Cathy: Yea thanks very much Ashley.
Ashley: Thanks Cathy.
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