Episode Transcript
[00:00:07] Welcome to Queers Against Diet Culture, the podcast where we unlearn toxic food rules and reclaim our bodies. I'm Raya, a queer anti diet coach and your guide to healing your relationship with food and your body in a world that profits off our self hate. We're not here to shrink, we're here to take up space. So let's get into it.
[00:00:27] Welcome back everybody.
[00:00:29] This episode is going to be a little different. In past episodes, we've done a lot of dismantling of systemic issues.
[00:00:37] We've talked a lot about why diet culture is bad, the roots of it and the problems that it's created.
[00:00:44] And we've talked a lot about not caring about what other people think and not letting your weight control your life.
[00:00:52] But what I've always meant by this is not to let yourself go or to stop caring about your health and well being entirely.
[00:01:03] What I do mean by this is that I want you to have a better relationship with food and your body and not make weight the center of your goals.
[00:01:14] I want you to care about yourself and your health, but in a much different way than you've probably been taught by society, in a way that does not center your weight or your body size. Because the pursuit of weight loss as a health goal causes way more harm than good.
[00:01:38] And weight loss has been so centered as the main health goal that most of us have never stopped to ask what we'd be working towards without it.
[00:01:52] So of course, I want to start with the tarot card and I pulled the six of cups for this one.
[00:01:58] And I want to share why I think it's such a fitting card for what we're talking about today.
[00:02:03] The six of Cups is the card of innocence and return and getting in touch with your inner child.
[00:02:12] It's about going back to something simpler and more genuine that existed before things got complicated.
[00:02:22] And I think most of us, if we're being completely honest, had a relationship with our bodies before diet culture and society's expectations got to us.
[00:02:33] That was a lot more intuitive than what we have now. Now you moved because it felt good. You ate because you were hungry. You rested when you were tired.
[00:02:46] Nobody had taught you to measure any of it yet or to only eat and sleep at certain times, because that's what you're supposed to do.
[00:02:57] So this card is inviting you back to that version of yourself, not as a regression, but as a form of reclamation.
[00:03:09] So as we move through this episode, I want you to hold that energy.
[00:03:13] What did health feel like before you were taught to track it and Turn it into a performance.
[00:03:21] That's what we're trying to get back to today.
[00:03:25] But let's talk about why weight loss became the default.
[00:03:31] The terms getting healthy and losing weight have been used interchangeably in our society. In casual conversations, in medical settings, in wellness marketing, in the advice that people give each other without giving it a second thought. The assumption is so deeply ingrained in us that most of us aren't even aware of it consciously.
[00:03:56] And this isn't accidental.
[00:03:59] It is the product of decades of deliberate cultural construction by industries that profit from people believing their bodies are problems to be solved.
[00:04:11] And I'm talking about the diet industry, the pharmaceutical industry, the fitness industry, and medical establishments.
[00:04:20] They all have financial stakes in maintaining weight loss. And as the primary framework for health.
[00:04:29] When weight loss is the goal, there's always a product to sell, or a program to join, or a procedure to consider.
[00:04:39] But when health is understood in a broader, more embodied, more self defined term, the market shrinks considerably.
[00:04:52] And now I'm not here to tell anyone what to do with their body. If you genuinely want to pursue weight loss, that's your prerogative. But I do want people to know why weight loss fails as a health goal. Because this information matters most. People who lose weight intentionally regain it back within three to five years.
[00:05:15] And it's not a matter of of willpower. It's a predictable biological response of your body defending itself against deprivation.
[00:05:27] This is why the more you restrict yourself, the harder it usually gets to actually lose weight. And it leads to weight cycling and yo yo dieting. Weight cycling, which, as you can imagine is regaining and losing weight, carries a lot of health risks, including cardiovascular strain, metabolic disruption, and also psychological harm.
[00:05:51] So the pursuit of weight loss as a health goal more often than not causes the harm that it claims to prevent.
[00:06:01] And that fact fundamentally undermines the weight loss industry's entire premise.
[00:06:07] But weight is also a poor determinant for health.
[00:06:10] Blood pressure, blood sugar, cholesterol, cardiovascular fitness, bone density, immune function, mental health, sleep quality, energy levels, digestive health, all of these can be excellent or really bad at literally any body size.
[00:06:32] And don't even get me started on bmi. Most people know by now that BMI does not make any sense and is a completely inaccurate way to measure health. Yet it's still used in medical settings.
[00:06:47] It was developed by a mathematician in the 1800s to be used as a statistics tool to describe population averages. It was never supposed to be used as a health metric.
[00:06:58] And in 1998, the NIH lowered the overweight threshold from 27 to 25.
[00:07:06] So literally overnight, 29 million Americans became considered overweight without changing a single thing about their bodies.
[00:07:17] That's not science, that's a market expansion.
[00:07:22] And speaking of a market expansion, the American diet industry is worth $72 billion each year.
[00:07:33] And it structurally depends on its products failing, because if the products worked, the diet industry would eventually run out of customers.
[00:07:43] Long term weight loss success would mean a shrinking market, but the market keeps getting larger and larger every year.
[00:07:51] The failure rate is literally a part of the business model. And this is not a conspiracy, it's a marketing strategy.
[00:08:01] But let's talk about the specifics of this in a queer context.
[00:08:05] Trans people navigating medical systems very frequently experience weight based gatekeeping for gender affirming care, being told that they have to lose weight before having access to hormones or surgery, regardless of whether weight is relevant to the care that they're asking for, which is both medically unjustified and deeply harmful.
[00:08:27] It creates extra barriers to receiving care for people who already face so many obstacles.
[00:08:35] And a little more broadly, queer folks tend to have higher rates of disordered eating habits than the general population, which comes from minority stress and trauma and body dysphoria. And because of that, weight loss as a goal can become particularly dangerous because it can activate or worsen disordered eating in a way that is socially rewarded rather than being seen for the harm that it's causing.
[00:09:05] So let's redefine what health even means, or talk about what health was always supposed to be before diet culture took it over.
[00:09:14] Health should be a practice, not a state. It's not something that you achieve or you fail at.
[00:09:21] It's something you engage with. It's ongoing. And it might look different on different days or in different seasons of your life.
[00:09:32] And it can look very different for each person.
[00:09:36] Health as a practice means that every choice you make in the direction of your own well being counts, regardless of whether it moves a number on a scale.
[00:09:45] It means that taking time to rest is is health, that pleasure is health, and stress reduction is health.
[00:09:56] Connection and community are health.
[00:09:59] And eating food that you enjoy without guilt is health.
[00:10:05] Same with moving your body in ways that feel good. None of these things require a particular body size to be real, and none of them are less valid if they don't change your weight.
[00:10:19] And this also makes space for the reality that health isn't equally accessible to everyone. Chronic illness, disability, housing, safety, income, systemic oppression, they all affect what health practices are available to any given person.
[00:10:38] And it's also Important to note that your health behaviors are not connected to your moral worth.
[00:10:46] So if we're not focusing on weight loss, what can we work on instead?
[00:10:52] Well, one option could be having energy and vitality, one of the most immediately meaningful health goals available, and one that has nothing to do with body size.
[00:11:04] How do you actually feel when you wake up in the morning? Do you have energy for the things that matter to you throughout the day?
[00:11:11] Do you crash regularly? Do you feel chronically depleted?
[00:11:16] Do you struggle to get through the afternoons?
[00:11:19] Energy levels are influenced by sleep quality, eating enough and eating regularly, hydration, movement, stress levels, social connection, and the presence or absence of underlying health conditions.
[00:11:37] So for people coming out of restriction, low energy often comes from under eating, which is the opposite of what diet culture prescribes.
[00:11:47] Another health goal that you can work towards is sleep quality.
[00:11:52] It's one of the most evidence supported health practices out there. And even though it's getting talked about more and more in wellness spaces, it's still not getting talked about enough or or taken as seriously as it should be.
[00:12:07] Temperature, light, screen time, stress levels, eating patterns, alcohol, they all affect sleep quality. Getting enough quality sleep each night is associated with having better heart health, better immune function, better metabolic regulation, mental health, cognitive function, and reduced inflammation.
[00:12:31] Chronic sleep deprivation is associated with some serious health risks across almost every system of the body.
[00:12:41] But queer folks that experience chronic sleep disruption, it's usually tied to minority stress and an unregulated nervous system.
[00:12:50] So do the best that you can. But sleep hygiene only goes so far when the stress is systemic.
[00:12:58] Another goal you can work towards is strength and functional fitness.
[00:13:03] The ability to do the physical things you want to do in your life is a genuinely meaningful health goal. Can you carry groceries without pain? Can you play with your kids or your pets? Can you hike a trail that you love?
[00:13:20] Do you want to have more stamina during sexy times?
[00:13:24] Can you move through your day without physical limitation?
[00:13:29] Can you do the physical things that bring you joy and connection?
[00:13:33] Do you want to be able to grow old but still maintain your independence?
[00:13:38] This is very different than exercising to burn calories or to earn your food, or to achieve a certain body shape. For fat people specifically, there's an assumption that exercise should be a weight loss tool which creates a complicated and painful relationship with movement.
[00:13:58] And people who exercise but don't lose weight are sometimes told that their exercise isn't working, as though the only valid outcome of movement is to change your body size.
[00:14:09] But reframing movement around strength and capability and enjoyment rather than weight loss Changes the entire relationship with physical activity.
[00:14:22] Another goal could be mental and emotional health.
[00:14:25] Mental health is health. It's not a soft addition to health, it is health. Chronic stress, anxiety, depression, trauma, they all have documented physiological effects, including immune suppression, cardiovascular strain, disrupted sleep, hormone dysregulation, and increase inflammation.
[00:14:50] So addressing mental health is foundational for physical health too.
[00:14:55] And of course, for queer folks, Mental health is particularly relevant as a health goal because the chronic psychological burden that comes from navigating discrimination, microaggressions, family rejection, and systemic hostility is at actually a documented health risk with physiological consequences.
[00:15:17] So investing in mental health supports, whether that's therapy, community setting boundaries, having a spiritual practice, or any other form of psychological care is a genuine health investment.
[00:15:35] The next one to consider is digestive health.
[00:15:38] Most of us don't think about our digestive health, but how your gut feels and how your digestion functions is a very meaningful goal.
[00:15:49] And it doesn't really get talked about enough in mainstream media, except for maybe by dietitians and nutritionists that specialize in gut health.
[00:15:59] There's a lot of research around digestive health, especially right now, that links having a healthy gut microbiome to increased immunity, better mental health, and reduced inflammation.
[00:16:13] The gut microbiome thrives on variety and fiber. So think lots of plant foods and fermented foods like kimchi and kombucha.
[00:16:24] But the gut microbiome is also harmed by restriction and stress.
[00:16:29] So having a relaxed, varied and pleasurable relationship with food contributes to your gut health.
[00:16:39] Next is cardiovascular health, which is one of the areas that's most aggressively linked to weight in mainstream medicine. But the evidence between heart health and weight is way more nuanced than that.
[00:16:55] While some studies do show associations between higher body weight and cardiovascular risk, there's other factors at play that aren't getting talked about, like fitness level, socioeconomic status, weight cycling history and chronic stress, including the stress of living in a fat phobic culture and receiving weight biased medical care. Your fitness level and animal protein consumption are the most relevant variables for cardiovascular health, not body size.
[00:17:28] Fat people that move their bodies more have better cardiovascular outcomes than thin people that are sedentary. And the research on this exists.
[00:17:38] The next one is social connection and community.
[00:17:42] Social connection is one of the most evidence supported health factors, but also one of the most consistently undervalued in western health culture.
[00:17:53] Chronic loneliness carries health risks that are comparable to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. That's not a small thing.
[00:18:02] And for queer people, having your chosen family and community are not just emotionally meaningful. But they're genuinely health protective.
[00:18:12] So finding and maintaining your queer community, building relationships with people who affirm and support support you, and having authentic connections are real health investments.
[00:18:26] Diet culture is deeply isolating, and anxiety around social eating pulls people away from the connection that food has always facilitated.
[00:18:37] Next we got stress reduction and nervous system regulation, which is huge.
[00:18:44] There are so many physiological effects of of chronic stress, including immune function, sleep digestion, cardiovascular health, hormone regulation, and as you're probably recognizing by now, all of these things are interconnected.
[00:19:03] And for queer folks, stress reduction requires acknowledging the systemic source of stress that you can't really address through your own behavior change alone.
[00:19:13] Minority stress is real and it is chronic, and it has health consequences.
[00:19:21] Managing your own stress through practices like breath, work, meditation, being in nature, moving your body, having creative outlets and social connections are so valuable. And because of systemic stress, it makes it that much more important to manage your own individual stress level goals.
[00:19:42] And the last but not least, we have flexibility, mobility and pain reduction.
[00:19:48] The ability to move your body through a full range of motion without being in pain is an incredibly valid goal to have, but nobody really talks about it. Flexibility and mobility decline with age, sedentary behavior, chronic tension, and injuries, regardless of your body size. But they can also be improved at any age and any body size. Being in chronic pain is directly related to quality of life.
[00:20:21] And while some chronic pain can't be improved no matter what you do, a lot can be so. Doing things like stretching, yoga, swimming, and of course, physical therapy can help so much with pain, chronic pain, they can also play a big role in helping heal your relationship with your body.
[00:20:42] Okay, so now that we've talked about health goals that you can have, I quickly want to touch on the intersectionality of it. Who actually gets to pursue health? Because health is not equally accessible to everyone.
[00:20:59] Income, housing, stability, food security, neighborhood safety, access to nature, environmental toxins, access to health care, discrimination.
[00:21:14] They all play a factor in people's accessibility to health.
[00:21:18] And those social determinants play out to various degrees depending on race, class, disability status and other axes of of identity.
[00:21:29] And this means that not all health goals are equally available to everyone.
[00:21:34] Stress reduction looks different for someone working three jobs to make rent than it does for someone with financial security and sleep. Quality looks different for someone in an unsafe housing situation than it does for someone in stable housing.
[00:21:51] And joyful movement can look different for someone with a physical disability than it does for someone without one.
[00:21:58] And social connection can look different for someone who has a bad relationship with their family than it would for someone with strong support networks.
[00:22:08] And health disparities are rooted in systemic racism, environmental racism, and discrimination in healthcare, which makes it not really addressable through individual behavior changes alone.
[00:22:22] And for those with disabilities or chronic illnesses, health goals look fundamentally different, but that doesn't mean they're any less valid.
[00:22:32] Okay, so let's go over some tools that you can take away from all of this, starting with asking yourself how do I want to feel?
[00:22:42] Not how do I want to look, not what number do I want to see on the scale, but how do I want to feel in my body, in my energy, in my relationship with food, in my capacity for the life that I want? It sounds so simple, but honestly, it can be life changing and it gives you back some of the control over your life.
[00:23:08] So some answers to this might look like I want to feel energized, I want to feel strong, I want to feel comfortable in my body, or I want to feel at peace around food or feel connected to other people.
[00:23:21] I want to feel rested, I want to feel like my body is capable of the things I want to do.
[00:23:31] And then setting goals that are actually within your control.
[00:23:36] Because realistically, weight loss is not reliably within your control long term.
[00:23:42] But goals like sleep practices, movement choices, eating patterns, stress management, and social connection are usually within your control.
[00:23:52] The next one is joyful movements, which is, as you can imagine, movement that you do because it feels good, not because it burns calories or earns you food.
[00:24:04] And this does not have to look like going going to the gym. It can be walking, dancing, swimming, hiking, yoga, roller skating or rock climbing.
[00:24:17] Could be playing with your dog or gardening.
[00:24:21] If your body is moving and it feels good, that's enough.
[00:24:26] The goal is finding something that you do even if it had zero effect on your body size.
[00:24:33] I also want to add that no matter your body size, you are allowed to move your body in public, in classes, on trails, wherever. Your body does not need to be a certain size before movement is allowed to belong to you. And also finding movement that you love can actually be really gender affirming too because it connects you to your body rather than disconnecting you from it.
[00:25:02] Then there's also working with a weight neutral healthcare team.
[00:25:07] Find providers who will treat your actual symptoms rather than telling you to lose weight when it's not relevant. This can be your primary care physician, but it could also be dietitians or nutritionists that practice intuitive eating and the health at every size framework rather than focusing on weight loss or therapists that are familiar with diet culture and body image issues.
[00:25:33] There are resources for finding weight neutral providers like the Health at Every Size Health Sheets and the Intuitive Eating website's Counselor Directory or just by getting community recommendations in Fat Positive and anti diet spaces online.
[00:25:50] I also want to make sure people know this. When you go to the doctor, you can opt out of being weighed or ask to not know the number.
[00:25:59] But lastly, I want to touch on intuitive eating Quick maybe doing some research on the 10 principles of intuitive eating or even possibly reading the book can be incredibly powerful. Of course, it's best to work on it with a professional if you can, but that's not accessible to everyone and learning about it on your own and starting to adopt something of the principles in your own life can really help heal your relationship with food. Maybe this is something that I'll do a separate episode about later, but that's pretty much all I got for you. And as always, I want to leave you with the quick journal prompt to help you go deeper before we end.
[00:26:40] And that's how do I want to feel in my body?
[00:26:45] Not how do I want it to look, but how do I want it to feel?
[00:26:50] What is one thing I could do this week that has nothing to do with my weight that would move me towards that feeling?
[00:27:03] Thanks for listening to this week's episode of Queers Against Diet Culture. Don't forget to rate, subscribe and share this podcast until next time. Remember, carbs are not the enemy and neither is your beautiful body. See you next week.
