Ditch post-pandemic body talk

As pandemic restrictions ease, an alarming reality emerges. Instead of feeling only relief, many of us feel self-conscious about how our bodies have changed. Let’s resist the urge to apologize for our own bodies or comment on other bodies, remove weight-centric health messages in our community and ditch diet culture’s short-term “fixes” and instead, learn to trust our bodies.

See more, be more than your body

Women internalize objectifying messages called self-objectification, but can transform the pain and shame of body image disruptions through “body image resilience” a term coined by body image researchers Dr. Lindsay Kite and Dr. Lexie Kite, to be more than body.

Ditch the weight-based resolutions

What if you didn’t “diet” in 2021? And what if you actually became healthier? No scale necessary. Learn four health behaviors to try on to honor your body and yourself without restriction, elimination, guilt, shame or “shoulds.”

Here's one Thanksgiving 'tradition' you can drop

What’s keeping us from enjoying a traditional Thanksgiving meal? Diet culture, disguised as wellness, and its simplistic, one-dimensional definition of health: that a thin body is ideal. This false and simplistic definition of “wellness” can lead to lifelong weight worry and make it difficult to feel good in our bodies - and enjoy a holiday meal - no “earning” or “burning” of food required.

Subvert The 'Body Hierarchy'

We’re barraged day after day by oppressive messages that certain bodies are more valuable than other bodies.

These messages are based on body hierarchy, a system that ranks our place on its ladder depending on our unique human characteristics. Some we’re born with; others change as we live. The list includes body size, gender, race, class, age, ability and health status. Body hierarchy is built on the belief that there’s a “right” and “wrong” way to have a body.

The solution to poor body image isn’t to fix our bodies or even to just try harder to love what we see in the mirror, making our body the problem. It’s to dismantle what’s driving it, the root cause, this system that ranks some bodies as better than others. When we embrace body diversity the system will crash and body image will be a challenge of the past. Ultimately, by celebrating the uniqueness of each human body we can create a kind, just, compassionate world for every body.