Health at Every Size is really not that complex a concept. Eat a variety of nutritious foods. Listen to your body’s cues for hunger and satiety, eat when you are hungry, stop when you are satisfied. Exercise regularly in ways you enjoy, whether that be bellydancing, swimming, walking, rock climbing, or all of the above. If those activities result in a change in weight, great. If not, great. Either way, weight is not the focus, because eating good foods and regular exercise are the keys to combating the health problems often associated with obesity, not weight loss for it’s own sake. In this framework, thin and fat become strictly cosmetic, like putting on earrings or getting a tattoo; if that’s what you are into, go for it, but if not, it’s ok, because either way you are taking care of yourself.
It’s a nice, calm, logical way to live. When I returned to work after the holidays I heard the normal groaning about holiday weight, pigging out, too many cookies, eating until they couldn’t move, blah blah ad nauseum (pun intended). I wasn’t surprised to hear it, but I was startled at how different my reaction was this year. Instead of joining in, I smiled and nodded and thought about how I couldn’t join even if I wanted to, because it wasn’t the case. I ate what I wanted to eat, when I wanted to eat it. I ate until I was satisfied, not until I was sick. Instead of eating 15 cookies and rationalizing with “the diet starts tomorrow,” I ate 2, because the diet starts never and I can eat cookies any time I want one. I didn’t have to save room for dessert, because if I was still hungry, I could eat dessert at the end of the meal, and if I wasn’t I could eat it later, or not at all if I didn’t want it. I wasn’t “bad”, because there is no “bad” or “good”. I have spent a lot of time on the diet deathmarch, and I have been a lot thinner than I am right now, and I must say, these past holidays were the best I have ever experienced. No guilt, no nausea, and the remarkable thing is, I probably ate better than I ever did in all my 20+ years of dieting.
So if it is such a nice, calm, logical way to live, then why are so many people in such screaming opposition to it? Why do I get in constant arguments with women in real life and on the internets over it? It all sounds great to most people until you get to the part where you say weight doesn’t matter, and then a normal conversation turns into “OMG like, what do you mean weight doesn’t matter? You can’t be healthy if you are FAT!”
Let’s go back to logic:
Exercise and eating a variety of good, nutritious food combat health problems. You will be healthier if you do those things.
OK.
Sometimes those behaviors will lead to weight loss.
OK
Sometimes they don’t.
OK
Therefore, one can be healthy without losing weight.
OMG! No! Like, you HAVE to lose weight because fat is gross and you have to be HEALTHY!
I give up. But at least I got to use a Buffy quote for my title.
I have been talking about this a lot with a certain someone else you know. I hope you won’t give up, though I certainly understand the desire to do so.
Love the Buffy reference.
Yes, yes and yes. Having come around to the HAES way of thinking after years of dieting and rebounding, I agree completely with everything you just wrote including the part about weight loss might or might not come. Not that it matters, but I have had great success in shaking off non-stop dieters and weight loss pursuers by ending those kinds of conversation with, “Right now, I’m not interested in dieting, I’m healing my relationship with food.” Of course, I’ll never actually resume interest in dieting, but no one needs to know that.
Wow. While I was writing my own “Office co-workers have declared war on eating” post, you were posting this.
My own holiday season was much like yours – relaxed and enjoyable, with treats here and there, and I have zero guilt and zero anxiety. Not because I deprived myself, but because I allowed myself to enjoy it. I also took walks in the bright sunshine and practised my belly dancing when the mood struck. Unlike my martyr co-workers who have come *this* close to signing a blood pact against chocolate, I am free to nibble from the gift basket sitting at reception.
I’m a newcomer to the HAES concept. Ironically, I always sort of thought that way, but I’d end my thinking with, “… but unless you are at a healthy weight for your age and height, you really need to work at it, so I need to work harder.”
And I’m realizing that “obesity” is not the epidemic – not the cause of the health problems – it’s a label. A way to describe body composition. Inactivity and poor nutrition – THOSE are the causes of so many health problems, and THAT is what I have control over in my life.
Thanks for summing it all up so nicely.
god, i love working from home.
but YES to what you said. because i still get plenty of this from family and friends, this whiny whiny whine, “i ate soooo much, i’m soooo fat, now where’s that number for 1-800-fitness because i need to get my big butt back to where it was.” well, maybe if you didn’t feel like it was the last supper, you could be saving yourself the headache.