It's funny - once you start working on your health and being public about it, it seems that everyone has an opinion or interest in it. I've seen it happen to other friends, and it's happening to me now. For the most part, I don't mind. I'm confidant in the choices/process that we're undertaking right now, and I'm very willing to share. I think I've gotten past the fear of other people seeing how far I'd "failed" in caring for myself, and I'm really bothered by how many of my friends and family are taking this opportunity to admit to me just how much they feel like a failure in the self-care department, too.
Maybe it comes with getting older. Our kids are slowly, but surely, growing up and needing us less and less (or are able to help us with the ones who still need us more and more). Having a child who can help play with little ones opens up a whole new world of being able to put ourselves first for just 20 minutes here and there, and I think we're all hitting that same "look at yourself in the mirror and don't recognize who is looking back at you" moment at the same time. We all bought into the lie that we have to sacrifice our own health to be the "perfect" mom/family. Now, we're all starting to find out that it's coming back to bite us in the rear.....and there's typically a lot to chew there.
So, what am I seeing? Over and over again, someone sees something that I've posted on Instagram or Facebook, and it strikes a chord (I suppose). Then, they sent me an email or FB message, detailing their struggles and feelings, and asking if I can help point them in the direction of my coach, or give them ideas that have worked for me.
Friends, I've spent so many hours crying while writing a response to these beautiful friends. It has really, truly shaken me to the core to see women and men who I thought were so happy and emotionally healthy become so vulnerable and embarrassed.
It's taught me one thing: we are crappy at taking care of ourselves.
This is on all fronts: physical, spiritual, emotional. Health comes in so many different forms, and they're *all* important.
Our relationships aren't strengthening. Our families are still falling apart. All of the physical and emotional sacrificing isn't leaving us with the picture-perfect, magazine-worthy families and lives. We're slowly killing ourselves and our families.
I don't have the answer to how to fix all of this destruction. I really don't. I think the Church does, but that's a topic for another blog, another day.
I do want to take a minute and muse on another phenomenon that I've noticed in recent months, as I share my weight loss journey, because I think it's related: The "Diet Culture", but more specifically, the push back on the diet culture.
What is the diet culture, you might be wondering? Well, according to Kate Browne (I chose this link because I feel like it's the most clear, most succinct definition of diet culture), the diet culture "is a system of knowledge, values, and meanings that supports interpretations of personal health choices as moral character." I find this to be a very good definition, because it focuses on the things that really define the culture, without getting into pontification: that one's worth can be determined by their personal health (or lack thereof), and that it relies on a system that assigns moral values to morally neutral items (like food products: think "Doritos are bad/apples are good"). This is a very dangerous place to find yourself, especially if you've had an eating disorder in the past or are susceptible to developing one.
I fully agree with this definition and turn away from the "diet culture," in these two ways: A person's worth and value cannot be determined by their health status. A person is inherently worthy and valuable. Their health successes or struggles are not an indicator of that. Instead, it is an unchangeable fact.
Secondly, I do not believe that there are "bad foods" and "good foods".....with one caveat: moderation is key. We do not eliminate ANY foods from our diet, but we do focus on some more than others. Some of it is personal preference (we like beans and lentils, mainly because we love Indian food), and some of it is based on the mounds of research out there (like trying to include more veggies) that says that habits matter. The habit of choosing an apple over a candy bar matters - it's not that the apple is good and the candy bar is "bad."
So, "Diet Culture" at the Circus is not allowed. We make sure that the kids know that we can eat anything, we just need to be thoughtful about it. The focus is instead on developing these healthy habits (more veggies, more water, more movement), and enjoying our food.
But, I'm noticing two things in recent months. While we all seem to agree that the diet culture - and the products/shakes/supplements/programs that really seem to keep it alive - is not a healthy place to be, emotionally (and most likely, physically, too).....we aren't really looking at the whole picture.
I'm noticing that we're celebrating the commercials and ads that use "real" models. This is a good thing! It is important to start changing the conversation from "thin is good, fat is bad" to "healthy looks different for different people." Again, it's the habits that matter, not the number on the scale necessarily. This is a freeing place for a lot of people: it can lead to a recognition that their weight doesn't set their worth or value. They have an inherent dignity that's not reliant on what they look like.
But there's a hidden, dark side to focusing on this "all bodies are beautiful" that we seem to be ignoring, and I'm seeing it in these messages and emails. The problem is that we seem to have this inherent flaw in the human brain that wants to make everything an either/or mindset, and not both/and. We see it everywhere - it's the main problem with the diet culture, in my opinion.
...and it's there in the backlash against the diet culture. We're trying to avoid noticing it, but we're still focused on an "either/or." It's just framed as "diet culture is bad/not trying to lose weight is good." We are so focused on accepting all bodies as beautiful, and our worth not being found in being THIN, that we're leaving behind those of us who probably should change our habits - and yes, lose weight - for health reasons.
Friends, those people know that they're being left behind, too. They're so worried about seeming focused on vanity (and being accused of being a part of the diet culture) and assigning a false worth to their scale and weight that they are struggling. They're not happy with their lives, but they don't know where to start, because we're constantly condemning weight loss as a goal. We're so focused on being anti-counting calories/macros/etc as a philosophical argument against the diet culture, that we're forgetting to support those for whom losing weight is working, and who are doing it mindfully and without anxiety.
How do I know this?
Because I've been told it time and time again - these friends (mostly women) reach out to someone about wanting to lose weight, for whatever reason they may have, and instead of being given support, they're told "But you're beautiful just how you are!" or "You don't need to lose weight! You don't have to buy into the cultural standard!" And they don't do anything, because they don't know 1) where to start, or 2) they feel guilty that they've somehow walked into a cultural taboo, without realizing it. Those who do start, go to the only place that is actively talking about weight loss: right into the diet culture, with the unhealthy mindsets and the profitable weight loss programs.
There's no both/and in the popular culture that these women find themselves in. No "weight loss can be a good goal, and it can be done in a healthy manner." Just a "you're beautiful as you are, weight loss is an unhealthy goal" or "foods are bad and thinness is what we must attain, at all costs". Either/or, all the way.
This bothers me, big time, as I share my successes and failures, as I allow myself to become vulnerable and talk about our journey publicly. If I've gotten dozens of messages from people wanting to know more about how they can start the same journey, I've gotten at least twice the number of messages in the form of "you were beautiful before, you didn't need to lose weight" category.
And while I appreciate the sentiment (I really do!), it's a lie.
I *did* need to lose the weight.
My heart condition needs to have the least amount of stress on it as possible. While some may argue that the research isn't "sound enough" to be held up as the gold standard, the trend does seem to show that obesity and being overweight (and I was solidly in the morbidly obese category) puts me at a higher risk for a dissection. Even a risk based on maybe-not-perfect scientific literature is too big of a risk for me.
But more than anything else, friends, I needed to lose the weight for my emotional well being. I was depressed. I was unable to physically do the things that I wanted to do in life: I couldn't hike with my kids. I couldn't snow shoe because I didn't have a winter coat that fit, and I couldn't bring myself to spend the bajillion dollars on a new winter coat in such a high size, because of the cost. I couldn't chase the kids around the yard without being in pain or out of breath. I could barely make it up a flight of stairs without having to pause - and our house required a flight of stairs just to get inside! I felt miserable and had allowed it to start seeping into my spiritual life and my relationships - I just didn't care anymore.
Those well-meaning commenters didn't see it in the still pictures of Heidi with a smile on her face at gymnastics meets or concerts, but it was there, inside. I was emotionally crumbling because I could no longer do the stuff I loved to do, physically. I grew up in a place that got 300+ days of sunshine a year, and we were always outside, soaking it up. Now, I was hiding in the house because I couldn't do any of those things anymore, and it was tearing me up inside.
I'm finding now that I was not a minority. It seems there are more of us out there than I realized: Those of us who did need to change our habits, and change our mindset, and yes, change our weight, and we felt lost and left behind. Our choices were to enter into the diet culture and hope we came out alive and with better habits, or to walk away from that, smile, and tell everyone that we were happy and didn't care about our weight "as long as we were healthy." And, usually, try to build new habits in secret and without support.
We were forgetting that health is multi-faceted. Health is not about the scale, but the scale can be a part of health.
For some of us, that will mean that we need to start counting something: calories, macros, number of veggie servings per day, glasses of water a day, workouts a week. We need to start recognizing and acknowledging our habits if we want to change them. We need to stop putting blinders on and actually take an honest, reality-based look at our lives if we want to change.
And that's okay.
You see, what I've noticed in the past few months is that the backlash against diet culture (which, in principle, I agree with) has been warped. We should fight back against a moral value being assigned to food, or our worth being determined by our health status. I do not disagree with this. But what we need to realize is that we can't toss out tried-and-true methods for developing healthy habits in the process of fighting the diet culture. We need to take them back, and use them for good.
Logging your food choices might be the only way to see that you're not eating as many fruits and vegetables as you thought you were (we're really good at telling ourselves what we want to hear, and sometimes, putting it on paper/on an app is the only way we really see what the truth is).
Sticking to a strict workout schedule might be the only way to make sure that you get it done - the only way that it doesn't get eaten up by busy lives and family demands.
Removing triggers from your life - yes, including food triggers - might be the best way for you to practice being in control of food. An elimination diet works to identify allergies...why can't it work to identify emotional triggers and allow you to develop strategies for fighting those?
Sharing your successes and struggles isn't always "feeding the diet culture." We share successes and awards at work or school, right? We share our struggles with projects. Why? Because we're looking for support and encouragement, or trying to problem solve our way through them by "polling the audience." Why should weight loss be different?
The key to all of this is relationship. We need to talk to each other. We can fight the diet culture and reclaim it for good, but we can't do it without forging a relationship. How does someone know that I'm doing this for my emotional and physical health? Because we talk about it. How can they keep me in check and make sure I'm not falling into the diet culture traps? Because we talk about it. How can I encourage another mom who's feeling lost and left behind and depressed? Because I talk to her about it.
So yes, let's leave the diet culture behind, but let's do it together.
Log your food intake if you need to. Count your glasses of water. Cross off that workout check list.
But let me be a part of it with you.
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