SUMMARY KEYWORDS

drinking, people, weight, dieting, eating, food, fat phobia, diet, emotional eating, women, BMI (Body Mass Index), binge, body, culture, changing, life, alcohol, binge eating, control, big

SPEAKERS: Casey McGuire Davidson + Isabel Foxen

00:02

Welcome to the Hello Someday Podcast, the podcast for busy women who are ready to drink less and live more. I’m Casey McGuire Davidson, ex-red wine girl turned life coach helping women create lives they love without alcohol. But it wasn’t that long ago that I was anxious, overwhelmed, and drinking a bottle of wine and night to unwind. I thought that wine was the glue, holding my life together, helping me cope with my kids, my stressful job and my busy life. I didn’t realize that my love affair with drinking was making me more anxious and less able to manage my responsibilities.

In this podcast, my goal is to teach you the tried and true secrets of creating and living a life you don’t want to escape from.

Each week, I’ll bring you tools, lessons and conversations to help you drink less and live more. I’ll teach you how to navigate our drinking obsessed culture without a bus, how to sit with your emotions, when you’re lonely or angry, frustrated or overwhelmed, how to self soothe without a drink, and how to turn the decision to stop drinking from your worst case scenario to the best decision of your life.

I am so glad you’re here. Now let’s get started.

Hi there. In this episode, we are going to be talking about food and relationships with food especially among women. My guest today is Isabel Foxen. She’s the creator of stop fighting food, a video training series and masterclass for women who want to stop feeling crazy around food. After years of trying to overcome binge eating disorder through weight normative approaches, Isabel discovered the critical role of acceptance, surrender, and Social Inquiry into the binge eating and recovery process and has been sharing her insights with clients and professionals ever since. She’s a thought leader in intuitive eating and body positive movement. And I wanted to bring her on the show because I know a lot of women who struggle with alcohol, also struggle with food, body image, diet, culture, and disordered eating.

So, Isabel, thank you so much for being here.

02:19

Thank you so much for having me, this is such a treat.

Casey McGuire Davidson  02:23

Yeah, I’m excited because this is something that comes up all the time, not only with my clients who are stopping drinking and seeing what life is like without alcohol. But honestly, everywhere in my life with my friends growing up, every woman I know, has a very complicated relationship with their body and with food.

02:42

Yep, yep, I think there’s a statistic out there something like, you know, 85% of women have at one point on in their life and on some kind of diet 85% of women have had, you know, struggle with some sort of body image challenge of some kind, I wouldn’t be surprised if the number was actually higher than that. It is really embedded in our culture. And so, I think that, you know, I’m just really glad to be able to chat about it. Because I think, you know, it’s a spectrum of how much different women struggle with this, but everyone is touched by it in our culture. So, I’m very thrilled to do this.

Casey McGuire Davidson  03:15

Yeah, and I think some women, I mean, most women, I know, myself included, have gone on many diets, you know, like, over the course of our lives of like cycling up and cycling down and our weight and always trying to weightless, but sometimes, it’s so embedded that you don’t even realize that you’re editing your food choices really unconsciously based on your conditioning.

03:41

Yeah, everyone basically is told that just watching your weight, essentially, in quotes, in some way, shape, or form is just the normal way to live. That’s just how we should all be living. Yeah, it is incredible to me to think about what numbers of people live that way. And it’s just considered completely normal in our culture. And it’s very rarely questioned. It’s like, well, of course I do. The assumption is, if I’m not doing that, I will just like gain weight forever and die. And all these horrific, catastrophic things will happen to me, right? There’s a lot of fear around food in our culture increasingly. So even in the past, like 25 or so years, it’s gotten kind of more intensely fear based around this conversation.

So yeah, I mean, yeah, but this is, you know, I think there’s a really, really solid group of women, maybe even, you know, 50% of women, something like that. The exact figure, but I think there’s a good portion of women who just haven’t just been on a diet, they live chronically on some sort of low grade restrictive something.

Yeah, it’s just part of their life that they don’t even think about as being optimal.

04:42

Yeah, I think that’s true. And it’s, you know, tied in with health or what you should do. I mean, I worked at L’Oréal for years. And, you know, it was just normal that people would be like, Oh, I’m doing a juice cleanse. For this week. I do it three times a year and like five women would do it with them, or oh, I’m doing it and fasting, I don’t eat between x and y. It was not even almost considered a diet; it was just considered something one does.

05:09

Yep, exactly. That’s certainly how I felt. I mean, I remember I was, you know, part of my story is very early on, I was put on my first diet by a pediatrician when I was three, this is sort of a part of my story that I always tell it kind of always starts with, you know, me being literally a baby and being put on my on my first diet, because I was high on the baby BMI scale or whatever. And therefore, right, I don’t really have memories of not being on a diet. I mean, I think, and I have many clients in this boat, where they got the message at such a young age, that their bodies were not okay, that the way they were and that they, you know, they needed to eat less in order to control their bodies. Many women got that message at such a young age that they don’t even have a memory of having a quote unquote, truly normal relationship with food, where they just sort of eat when they’re hungry, it’s up with their fallen, don’t worry about it too much. It’s always they’ve always lived with some sort of like chronic level of trying to control probably losing control at certain points along the way, and just sort of oscillating in that sort of up and down, you know, control losing control, control losing control cycle.

Casey McGuire Davidson  06:16

Yeah, absolutely. And sort of similar to people who struggle with drinking and sort of don’t have an off switch or just drink more than they want to, it dominates like every hour of every day of your thoughts in sort of this low grade way that you don’t even realize how much brain space and emotional energy it takes.

06:35

Exactly. Like I often describe it for folks who are just sort of chronically restricting, or chronically watching their weight, or, you know, whatever kind of term you want to put in there. Right. Not everyone relates to the term dieting, but most people relate to the term. You know, oh, I’m just watching what I eat here. I’m just I’m just eating healthy. Everything is right, exactly. Yeah, most people are doing that I call it like the food ticker tape in the back of my brain at all times, right? It’s just sort of, I could be, you know, going on about my life dealing with work dealing with kids, whatever. But this versus this sort of, you know, low level, there’s ticker tape in the back, that’s just, you know, constantly they’re sort of monitoring what I’m eating or judging what I’m eating or thinking about what I’m eating or, you know, criticizing myself in the mirror or whatever, it’s just sort of the background noise to my life is this sort of like food, we noise that’s just sort of lives there in the background? Yeah, pretty constantly for a lot of women completely.

Casey McGuire Davidson  07:30

And that’s just how I went about my life. And, and still, you know, I told you, I’m not totally there yet, it still happens to me probably 25 times a day, I got introduced to your work through my sober bestie Ingrid, who’s actually been on this podcast. And, you know, we stopped drinking within two months of each other six years ago. And once we stopped drinking, you know, almost everyone who drinks has some reason that they want to check out right, or some reason they want to turn off their brain or some reason it works for them other than it’s just totally addictive. And so, we Ingrid and I both went through sort of separate struggles, support, things like that after we stopped drinking. For me, it was sort of deep anxiety and, and work and imposter syndrome, and all that stuff. And for her, she found you and loved your work. And just, you know, once she stopped drinking, the next thing she had to dig into was her lifelong struggle with body image and weight and dieting and all that stuff. She’s been educating me for the past six years. And I, you know, I almost was like, just moving through life completely and totally unconscious of diet culture, like literally just thought it was what it was, like, just Yeah, realize, and I completely bought into it. And I’m still you know, it’s like getting away from alcohol like you. You’ve been conditioned since birth to believe something. So, it’s really hard to be like,

09:03

Is that not true? You know, right. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Like the concept, the idea that fat is bad. And that is good in every single way that you could possibly experience that, right. I mean, there’s lots of different ways in which we think fat is bad, and that is good. But that sort of general sense of fat is bad and thin is good, is so pervasive, that it’s like it’s such a bias that we’re conditioned to do that. It’s hard to even It’s uncomfortable to challenge it, right. Yeah.

Casey McGuire Davidson  09:32

And you’re like you truly are like, but isn’t it that you know what I mean? Right, right. Yeah, you know, even if you know enough to know, that’s crap, you still sort of believe it, and you’re like, every time you think it, you’re like, Wait, that’s crap.

09:45

Yeah, I you know, it’s, I mean, it’s kind of like, you know, we talk a lot about, you know, this concept of wage discrimination, right, and sort of discrimination in general, regardless of what kind of discrimination you’re talking about, usually is so embedded in the culture that to some extent, You know, it never really goes away, like anybody who says I have no racial biases or no gender biases, for instance, you know, it’s kind of full of crap, you know, like, they’re probably just not totally aware of where their biases actually are, the bias is sort of always there. And our job is to kind of slowly un-peel it, you know, one onion layer at a time, it never fully goes away. There’s no human in the United States who’s completely free of racial bias or gender bias, or whatever the case may be, right.

So, I would put weight discrimination in a similar category, where it’s like, it’s really a lifelong journey to be challenging this idea that then is good and fat is bad, right? That is something that we do forever. Even I after being, you know, a professional in this work for over a decade, and still un-peeling the onion layer of my fat phobia. That’s the term we typically use for weight discrimination, and still

Casey McGuire Davidson  10:51

un-peeling my fat phobia all the time, constantly. Well, not only that, but like Ingrid said to me, and I’ve had conversations with her that like fat phobia weight discrimination is one of the last ones that like, is totally out in the open, and you can frame it as being helpful, or right constraints or whatever. Right? And it is something that, you know, clearly, in most circles, race discrimination, gender discrimination, anything else is something that like, if you think it, you’re like, fuck, you better not save it, you know, right.

11:28

Like, there’s shame we know enough to have shame about our, our there’s shame around racial and gender discrimination, for instance, which I mean, you could argue that things would be a lot easier, and people would be a lot more likely to grow and learn if they you know, kind of let the shame go and just work committed to doing the work of changing it rather than spending all their time fixes fixating on the shame. Yeah, but yeah, I mean, fat phobia is one of those things where there’s no shame about it, we’re actually really encouraged to be fat phobic, right? Like, it’s politically there are political campaigns that are encouraging fat phobia all the time, right? There’s just no mainstream recognition of fat phobia as being something that’s a problem, right? Like you go into the doctor’s office, and they’re actively promoting it as something that’s saving people’s lives. When that is not true. It’s actually hurting people and killing people. But for the most part, right, we hear this sort of message when we are internalizing fat phobic messages, we’re hearing something that we think is like a good kind of almost, you know, mission oriented, you know, save the world from the plight of obesity, you know, that’s the message that we hear. So, we actually hear the opposite of shame about fat phobia, we hear like, this idea that these sort of fat phobic ideals are, you know, kind of good for the world, even though they’re incredibly, incredibly harmful, most people are hurt. I mean, I would say the vast majority of ever, I mean, I could argue, even everyone, to some extent, in any body shape or size is ultimately hurt by fat phobia, in one way or another.

Casey McGuire Davidson  12:55

So, we like completely dived in without letting everyone know what your story is, how you came to do this work? And even what is the work you do? So, can you tell us a little bit about that?

13:07

Yeah. So, I mean, I’ll start by just sharing a little bit of my story, since I already kind of began that. But like I said, I was put on my first diet at a really, really young age. And so, from as far back as I can remember, I sort of always lived this life of my body’s not okay, I need to be actively trying to control my size, I definitely internalized a message that, you know, I just naturally have a bigger appetite that I’m supposed to have. And I kind of have to sit on my hands and try not to eat so that my body doesn’t get to become this sort of unattractive. Not okay thing, right? And sometimes I felt like my body was an unattractive, not okay, thing. In fact, most of the time, I felt that way. When I was a kid into my teenage years and into my early 20s, when I finally sort of started really working on this issue, but yeah, my whole life starting from as far back as I remember, I was constantly trying to diet trying to control my weight, trying to control my food, right? That was the primary focus was control the food, control the food, don’t eat that don’t eat this, right. You know, whatever it may be counting calories one day, cutting out carbs another day. I mean, there was always some like new thing that I was trying to try to get control over my food in my body. But ultimately, like most people, I ended up falling off of every diet wagon that I started at, that I started doing eventually, right like, there came a point where no matter what I was trying, whether it was calorie counting or you know eating person control or cutting out this macronutrient cutting out carbs, whatever the attempt, maybe whatever the lifestyle change I was trying to make would be there would come a point right at it. That would always fall off the wagon, right and as I got older, and my dieting attempts got more and more intense, the falling off of the wagon got more and more intense as well. I think about it like a pendulum swing. It’s like the more intensely I was restricting, but more intensely, I would kind of binge in the opposite direction, right until, you know, I really, you know, eventually was diagnosed with binge eating disorder, which I think is a super misunderstood issue. But you know, I really identified with this concept, I kept thinking to myself, why can’t I stick to my diet? Why can’t I keep my food under control? But again, it really reinforces this idea. There’s something wrong with me, there’s something wrong with my body, something wrong with my appetite, right? Why can’t I keep myself from, you know, eating XYZ thing. And so, this sort of pattern of desperately trying to control and then falling wildly out of control, continued and got more and more intense, until I was eventually again diagnosed with binge eating disorder and kind of went on a recovery journey.

The challenge with getting to be diagnosed with binge eating disorder, was that most people really misunderstand binge eating disorder, they think of binge eating disorder as a problem with self-control, like the issue that you can’t control yourself. The issue that you must have some deep, deep psychological problem where you’re addicted to food, much like you might, someone might be addicted to alcohol, but what they completely ignore, is that sort of restrictive dieting, that attempting to control food, which really is like fuel for the inevitable fall, right? So, there’s a relationship between binge eating and restriction, it’s like, the more intensely I pull back a bow and arrow, the more you know, intensely, it’s gonna fly in the other direction. The second I let go, right. And that’s really a great metaphor for the diet binge cycle, right, the more intensely, I’m kind of trying to control myself and trying to be good and trying to hang on. Right, the more intensely the boats gonna fly in the other in other direction. The second I like I was like, I already messed up for today, I might as well eat everything in my kitchen cabinets. And then like day one starts tomorrow, tomorrow, I’ll be good. I’ll get back on the wagon, and I’ll, you know, lose the weight. But, you know, I’ve already screwed up today. So, I may as well eat everything that isn’t nailed down.

Casey McGuire Davidson  17:06

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That’s so similar to when we drink right? I mean, I can’t tell you how many times I was like, I’ll start on Monday. Right? That’s all right. The thing is all started on Sunday. And like that goes for years for years. Like you know and I know, and I actually want to have you talk about this because a lot of women think that like giving up alcohol is similar to going on a diet, right? Like I just need to do X and it’s different completely, which most people like don’t understand. And I I’m still like I said I’m still processing and working through all my like, ingrained beliefs from my whole life. But the emotions are so similar like, why can’t I be normal? What’s wrong with me? Why don’t I have any self-control? The you know, why can’t I do X like a normal person? I’m on the wagon. I’m off the wagon. I’ll start Monday. Like, the language of beating yourself up and blaming yourself and just this isolation and shame, it is similar.

Yeah, it is. I mean, there’s a lot of similarities. I mean, the primary difference between the two is just sort of the physiological need for food. When like sobriety, it’s like, we don’t need alcohol to survive, right, you actually can cut alcohol out, which is very different, which I think like, that’s where people start to get the comparison gets complicated is when, you know, we think start to think about, you know, if we do have a moment where we think we’ve eaten too much, or binge or have some sort of shame spiral around that, or whatever the instinct is to try to eat less, yeah, perhaps, and usually attempt some sort of control, which might not be in alignment with what our bodies really need. And that’s where we start to get into this real like swings back and forth classic dive into cycling, is that the attempts that control we put around food are usually not in alignment with our natural biological instincts around food, which in that way, you know, I think of like, you know, dieting sort of is the beginning of the dysfunction, whereas, you know, I think with alcohol, like, I mean, you are more of an expert in alcohol, certainly than I am, but, you know, there’s at least sobriety ism is an option, right?

Casey McGuire Davidson  21:24

Like, you can be possibilities from food, like you just exactly and so it is, you know, the fabulous thing about stopping drinking, and I know most of the women here, don’t believe me, but it’s true, is the further you get away from drinking and trying to control alcohol, the less it absorbs your energy and thought process. And yeah, you know, like, the less that it you know, people are like, Oh my god, I just don’t want to think about drinking or not drinking forever. Is this what it’s like? And the answer is no, but you can’t get away with it. Your body needs food. It’s almost not as simple.

22:06

You know, the comparison that I kind of liked is like, Okay, so the farther you get away with drinking, the less drinking takes up your thoughts, I would say the farther away you get from dieting and restricting and trying to control your weight. And you know, the farther away you get from like the obsessing about how am I going to lose weight? How am I going to try to control my food, the farther you get away from diet culture, the less foods on your mind, the less the more easeful you feel in your life, and in turn there for binge eating drops off as well. Right? Like, if I’m not dieting, if I’m not obsessed with doing that, constantly trying to control my food, right?

If I’m not constantly I think of it as like, hanging off the side of a cliff trying not to fall, if I’m not in that posture. 24/7 You know, I’m not gonna fall, right. Like, you can only fall off of like, there’s sort of something to be said, for the less I’m dieting, and the less food is taking over my thoughts, the less likely I am to also have this reaction to dieting, which is binge eating, and to some extent, emotional eating as well. I mean, I think it would be interesting for us to talk about the difference between binge eating and emotional eating, because those two things also get kind of confused a lot, especially for folks who do have histories of addiction or histories of, you know, using various substances or behaviors as big mechanisms. Should we chat about that?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. So, binge eating is basically my definition of binge eating is, by definition, a reaction to dieting. It’s, oh my gosh, I haven’t had a piece of bread and four weeks, screw it, I’m gonna just have like every cracker in my cupboard until like, there’s not a single piece of carbohydrate left in my apartment, right? Like it’s, it’s this feeling of falling. It’s a dramatic falling off the wagon after a period of intense deprivation, or even just deprivation doesn’t even have to be intense deprivation, basically just a period of deprivation followed by some sort of rebellion. Maybe as a better way of thinking about it right sort of React or rebellious reaction against being put in a cage with food portray us as animals, we’re really not meant to be in a cage with food, we’re meant to be able to eat naturally according to what our bodies intuitively and instinctively want to eat. Emotional eating right is a little bit different. Emotional Eating is oh, I’m sad. I’m lonely, I’m anxious. I want you know; I’m going to have a cupcake to soothe myself, which is very different than Screw it. I’m going to have the whole box, right, screw it, I fell off the wagon. So, I’m going to have the whole box. So those are kind of their two, they have different energy behind them, right? There’s a different energy between. I’m kind of like, bummed out or anxious. I’m just going to kind of soothe myself with food. And this sort of falling off the wagon eating that, you know, dieters often find themselves in now. These two things can and often do intersect, right so a lot of Other times, if you are a person who is a diameter, and all of a sudden, you’re feeling like, Oh, I’m sad, I’m anxious, I’m lonely, I’m whatever, I think I’ll just, you know, I’m just gonna have a little bite of something to make myself feel better. But then all of a sudden, you go into judgment about that bite, right? You’re like, Oh, I’m so bad. I did this, I might as well eat everything. And then day one starts again, tomorrow, I’ve already broken my diet, day one starts tomorrow, emotionally eating can really quickly turn into binge eating, for people who have that mindset around food. So, I think of it as like, emotional eating doesn’t have to be the end of the world, right? Like a cupcake, when you’re sad is a lot more functional than a bottle of wine when you’re sad, right? Like, I actually think emotional eating is a relatively, you know, it’s a relatively harmless reduced coping mechanism on the spectrum of coping mechanisms. It’s not the end of the world, it’s kind of like, in the middle in terms of consequences. But if you, you know, immediately start judging yourself and beating yourself up for the fact that you had a cupcake when you’re sad, that can turn into like this much bigger dramatic thing, which ultimately, is where you start to have seen kind of bigger types of dysfunctions like bigger kind of, you know, falling off the wagon dramatic, kind of more classical binge eating, followed by oh my gosh, got to get my food under control tomorrow. Now, I’m dieting hardcore again. And the site cycle repeats. Yeah, so

26:19

does that distinction kind of makes sense? That’s a big distinction, because I think it helps people understand. You know, when I say oh, but you know, if you stop dieting, you’ll stop binge eating. A lot of people hear that say, but I’ve been when I’m sad, or I’m lonely, or I’m anxious. And kind of getting that distinction is really important. The distinction between emotional eating and binge eating, most people who have a lot of body image issues, or most people who are dieters or restrictors, or you know, will have some combination of both happening in some way, shape or form. Another thing that’s I think interesting to note about emotional eating is that emotional eating even just like pure like I’m just eating to soothe no big deal. That emotional eating in general is much more common in people who have a history of restriction. It’s almost like having had a history of dieting sets you up to be a person who finds food more comforting and more soothing, right? And there’s maybe biological reasons for that, right? Like, I’ve spent a good portion of my life, thinking that foods, you know, the food, something that needs to be controlled, or that foods like a scarce resource that I need to not eat too much of, you know, I’m probably going to have a more attached relationship to that food emotionally.

Casey McGuire Davidson  27:30

Yeah. Yeah. That’s super interesting to me, and something that I haven’t really thought about before. And I’m still kind of wrapping my head around. Yeah, yeah, one of the things that, you know, is super common when I start working with women, or even just women on this path of being sober, curious, or trying to stop drinking is, you know, it’s a really complex mix of the reason that alcohol isn’t working in their lives, right? And why they’re just sort of sick and tired. One of the things that often pushes women over the edge to say, Okay, I’m going to friggin’ stop and, and not drink right now, is actually because they don’t like the way they look. Right? They get to the point where they’re like, I gained weight, I look like shit. I don’t like myself. Like, it’s odd, because it has so many negative impacts. But that sort of surface conditioned impact is the one that often pushes women over the edge. And then, you know, when they stopped drinking, people typically begin looking better pretty quickly, like, your face, less red, your faces less bloated, your eyes are brighter, your skin is better, you know, you start looking a lot better. And of course, everyone is happy about it. Because like you look alive again, right?

You look, yeah, look happy, you have energy. And yet, a lot of women are like, Why am I not dropping pounds like crazy because they sit there and say calories in calories out a bottle plus wine a night? Is x number of calories in a week? Why is you know, why am I not dropping this weight? And so, can you talk about sort of the calorie exchange and sort of why diets kind of don’t work or why it doesn’t work that way.

29:26

So, this, I mean, basically, our bodies are actually much better at weight regulation than people think they are right? We internalize this idea from diet culture that I am in control of my weight, right that I decide how much I weigh and the way that I decide that is by controlling my food. One of the reasons why people binge when they try to control their food is because if you eat less than your body once you’re going to have symptoms of hunger crap. Right, you’re going to be just obsessed with food want to eat all the time feel like you’re insatiable, right?

I mean, our body basically increases obsession with food and increases focus on food, when it’s underweight, essentially, basically, and that could be underway by five pounds, right? That could be like, I got sick with Moto dropped some weight. And then the next week, I’m ravenous. And like, I’m like eating everything that isn’t nailed down, basically catching up on the calories I missed when I had motto for it. So, our bodies are actually constantly doing everything that they can to regulate our weight and keep our weight specifically at some kind of the term is set point weight, right, the natural set point made that our individual unique bodies want to be, here is the issue. Our natural set point weights are individual and incredibly diverse, most a good portion of people, arguably like at least half of people’s natural setpoint, we will not fit into this very, very strict definition of normal weight according to BMI calculations that are like a, you know, pretty, relatively new idea in medicine. So, we have this idea that a normal weight looks basically like a very specific type of thin person. And that is just not in alignment with what we’re seeing. When we look at the general laws of population, you know, swap populations of people, you know, there, you could have two folks who eat, who are the same size, one has to drive themselves crazy, starve themselves in order to be that way, the other person is just that way naturally, that’s their natural set point weight. They don’t have to control their food and deprive themselves and be obsessed with food and basically have disordered eating in order to maintain their weight. They just are that way that’s just their genetic, natural weight. Other people’s genetic natural weight are bigger, right?

And that is the reality of the situation, whether or not we want to believe that or not. I mean, this is just wood, there’s so much data and evidence to support this concept of wheat setpoint theory, and then we could go into all of it. I mean, there’s just a ton out there. But basically, one of the reasons why the war on obesity has failed. One of the reasons why, you know, nothing is really happening, you know, everyone’s on a diet, everyone’s trying to control their weeping. Generally speaking, weights aren’t really changing that much. And there are lots of different reasons for that, I don’t want to totally completely pin it entirely on genetics. But genetics plays a much bigger role than people would like to believe. And some people are really just bodies do actually come in different shapes and sizes. And that is the reality of the situation.

So, here’s the thing that’s interesting about like drinking, drinking, and people always say like, oh, those calories don’t count. And they kind of like I get what you’re saying it’s like calories from alcohol, or you’re not getting a ton of nutrition, obviously. But they still do count as calories, they are still going into your sort of general calorie count for what you need to maintain your set point weight. So, if you take out calories for wine, you’re probably going to have to put some calories back in. To kind of make up for those, I think that there’s actually a natural thing that happens. You know, when people if people are really heavy drinkers and they’re drinking, you know, 600-500-2000 calories a day and alcohol, those calories don’t just go away when you stop drinking, necessarily, there’s a really good chance if those calories were contributing to part of your weight set point regulation that you’re going to need food to replace that alcohol when you quit drinking. Does that make sense?

Casey McGuire Davidson  33:39

It totally does. And yeah, one thing that I you know you Okay, so I told you before we got on this call, I’m gonna say the wrong thing and I want you to correct me because I sort of knew how to do it. One thing that I heard that actually for the first time made this whole thing makes sense to me about how we’re always trying to dye it into a certain specific cultural ideal and then blaming ourselves and think we have control over it was someone mentioned that like so for example, dogs Not that I’m saying anyone’s a dog, but like, the ideal body type? Like somehow Society decided that the ideal body type is a Pomeranian right? And yeah, every like woman you see on the fitness influencer is like a Pomeranian and so you know, but maybe you’re a German Shepherd. Maybe you’re a pug. Maybe you’re like a lair. Mastiff? Yeah, if you’re a golden retriever, and like how sad it would it be if like, every Labrador spent their entire fucking life trying to not eat so they could be a Pomeranian when they’re never going to be a Pomeranian.

34:50

Exactly, exactly. And it’s funny because I feel like even when people are going through that time where they’re really being good and they’re hanging on and they’re losing weight For most people is a temporary short, you know, short term period of time before they end up kind of rebounding. But it’s like, even then you’re not a Pomeranian, you’re just a starved golden retriever. Like, and it’s just miserable. You know, it’s just like a misery. And most people cannot maintain it. Most people cannot hang on to that, right? Like, it’s like, at some point, it might feel really good in the beginning, because you’re getting praised or whatever, right? You just feel like you’re you. So, you feel so in control, which is really, I mean, talk about anxiety, right? Especially for folks who have drinking problems often have anxiety issues.

Dieting is a is a coping mechanism for anxiety, it’s a way to feel more in control about life, it’s a way to feel like everything’s gonna be okay.

Because, you know, I look great. And everyone’s gonna love me, right? Like, there’s this feeling in control when my foods in control, which is what a major way that people manage anxiety, right.

I think I said to you offline, eating disorders are essentially anxiety disorders, not too dissimilar from OCD. It’s like, as long as everything’s in control, and I’ve got my food and weight under control. I feel okay, I feel safe. Right. So yeah, I mean, even when you’re in that state, where you’re like, I got this, I feel so good, there’s gonna come a point where the impacts of self-starvation or the impacts of weight suppression, which I use those two terms interchangeably, is gonna just start to wear down on your physical and mental health and you’re going to just not be able to hold yourself back from rebounding in the other direction. And personally, I think that that’s the best case scenario. The worst case scenario is that you know, stay in that weight suppression period and really do damage to your health right. To osteoporosis, clinical eating disorder, you know, I think not rebounding is a worst case is a worst case scenario and a lot of situations because you have to get your just to starve golden retriever. You’re not a Pomeranian you’re just a starving golden retriever.

Casey McGuire Davidson  36:57

Today is like it’s all about the society we’re raised in, right because with dogs again, not that anyone’s a dog. You know, like we love fucking Golden Retrievers, like everyone has a different absolute favorite dog. Like some people are like damn corgis, or like pugs, Labradors, right. Like, we’re not like if we saw starving golden retriever, you’d be like, That’s the saddest thing I’ve ever seen.

37:25

You Yeah, it’s, I mean, it is sad. I feel that way. Often, when I know that I’m seeing somebody in my life who is intentionally going into a very strict diet and loses a bunch of weight. You know, when most of the world has been like, Great job, you look so amazing. How can I do that my heart hurts because I know what’s going on behind the scenes. And even if they feel really great to go quickly, for a short period of time, like I know that that’s, you know, not going to end well for them and that they’re ultimately kind of hurting themselves in service of this fat phobic ideal and it just makes me sad on multiple levels makes me sad for the individual. It makes me sad that for the culture that we live in, right, that this is even a situation that we’re in, you know, especially women, I mean, this is an issue that disproportionately affects women, you know, they, we spend so much of our energy, just trying to be thinner, just trying to like, shove our square pegs of a body into the round hole society dictates for us. And how miserable is that? Right? I mean, realistically, it’s like, I think this is Naomi Wolf says this is like the one thing that really holds women back. It’s like if you really want to, you know weaken women as like a gender as like a political group. Tell them they’re not thin enough, and then they’ll all just have to spend all their time dieting, they won’t get very much else done.

Casey McGuire Davidson  38:49

Yeah, I mean, that’s really interesting. And one thing that I mean so much my mind’s like racing on like seven different ways we could take this but one thing that popped up for me was when you said it’s ultimately like dieting, weight suppression, trying, trying to control it. It’s ultimately like an anxiety disorder, right? Like trying to Yeah, like everything’s going to be okay. And that you’re good Yeah, before you will be loved. And I find that like a lot of the women who listened to this and I I’m raising my hand is one of them are like this combination of this overachiever people pleaser, which is very similar, right? Like you’re running that perfectionist around. Yeah, to basically to never let a ball drop therefore you can never be criticized therefore you will be safe or some crazy combination of that. Right? When people stop dieting when folks stop dieting and be like, Okay, I just can’t live in this constant state of tension around food all the time where I’m just like constantly either, you know, you

40:01

Trying not to, you know, hanging off the side of the cliff trying not to fall over and then falling and then climbing back up the side of the cliff again, right? Like when people kind of really get that this way of living isn’t working for them and really, you know, try to stop dieting, a big, that’s when actually real feelings come up. That’s when they start to feel the pain of vulnerability. That’s when their childhood wounds come up. That’s when I mean, I would argue a lot of our body image pains or childhood wounds on lovability stuff, unworthiness, stuff, all of our dark shadowy feelings tend to come up when we stopped dieting, right? Because we actually have to be with the feeling, we have to actually be with vulnerability, we have to be with imperfection, which, you know, I think of is really important skills for life, right? But it can be uncomfortable. And this is where, you know, dieting, recovering from dieting is no joke. You know, you’re gonna go through a real emotional process of having to be with your real feelings when you stop trying to control the world through controlling your body size.

Casey McGuire Davidson  41:02

Yeah. Well, so you said that diet recovery is real work. So, like, how do you even do that work? And what’s the end goal?

41:13

So, you know, different people have different experiences. And I imagine this is very similar to drinking, right? Like some people have to, like, try getting sober 50 times before they actually get sober. Some people have to some people just like, you know, hit a bottom, that’s that and they quit drinking. And

Casey McGuire Davidson  41:29

I would say like, every single woman has to try like, hundreds of 1000s of times to like, control or moderate or stop or take a break. I mean, I don’t know, a single person who’s been like, yeah, I don’t think I like that anymore. I think I’m gonna stop. I mean, just so you know, it’s like, very similar torture relationship of like, trying and failing.

41:52

Right. So, I think it’s the same for dieting. Right? Most people, the vast majority of people edge out of dieting over time, through a process of kind of seeing the pattern, seeing how dieting hurts them, right? Just like seeing how drinking hurts them. I see Whoa, dieting hurts me. Okay, I’m going to try to let this go. Then difficult feelings come up. That’s what happened. I stopped dieting, I stopped trying to use dieting as a coping mechanism to make myself feel better and control all my emotions. All the difficult feelings come up the vulnerability, the imperfection, having to face the fact that I do have a real body and that I might actually just be a golden retriever. And all of the things that I make that mean, and society, all those feelings come up all that shadowy stuff comes up when I stopped dieting, and then maybe I get kicked back into the diet again, because I can’t handle the emotions, right? And then I go back, and I’m like, oh, no, I gotta get back right to say I imagine very similar with drinking, right? Quit drinking, gets over big feelings come up, feels overwhelming, can’t handle it, start drinking again, right, and you slowly develop the window of tolerance to be able to learn how to deal with our feelings in a different way.

Right. And there’s various things that kind of come up, we also start to become more convicted, maybe in the idea that drinking doesn’t work for us, or dieting doesn’t work for us. And that kind of motivates us to be with the big difficult feelings. But that’s sort of the process with most people with dieting, most people with dieting, they kind of try to let go of control, they try to let go of dieting, try to eat intuitively, which is, you know, the primary kind of way that people kind of attempt to stop dieting. Because a lot of people when I say, stop dieting, you’re like, what does that even mean? Like? How do I even eat? I don’t even know what it means to stop dieting. So, we’ll get into that in a second. But yeah, I think letting go of dieting is probably not too dissimilar from letting go of drinking in the sense of like, you know, you kind of attempt to do it, and then feelings come up, difficult feelings come up, you might get shoved back in, and then it doesn’t work for you and availably and then you kind of feel more convicted and letting go of dieting again. Maybe I’m smiling that you love that.

Casey McGuire Davidson  43:58

I’ve never heard that before, of like, you try to stop dieting, and you know, just have a normal relationship with food and then all these feelings come up of like, unworthy, you know, that you are like, Okay, I’m on the right path. I’m losing weight. I’m, you know, you’re suppressing food, you’re you know, and so, then you’re like, Oh my God, of course you see everything around you in society, you know, you’re trying to be okay with like, all your internal judgments about your body and your food and your worth and what it means for your career and love and everything else. And then you’re like, I can’t take these feelings anymore. I’m just gonna fucking go on another diet.

Exactly. I mean, that’s basically what the process is. I think of dieting as the primary coping mechanism. Most people think of Oh, binge eating and emotional eating. That’s the coping mechanism. I actually think that that’s sort of short sighted. It’s really dieting is the primary coping mechanism. Emotional eating and binge eating are common symptom. That often go hand in hand with dieting. But yeah, and there’s some exceptions to that. Again, of course, there are some folks who have never dieted who will sometimes eat emote, you know, sometimes have a cupcake to get a little pleasure, and that’s fine. But generally speaking, people who have quote, food issues that are actually really deleterious on their quality of life, they almost always are dieters, they like dieting is the thing that sort of predisposes us to these other behaviors, right? So, unless we kick the dieting, the chances of kicking the binge eating are really low. And even emotionally eating, you know, kicks up into way higher gear when we’re dealing with dieting because our life revolves around food, right? Like, we set for food all the time dieting predisposes you to food obsession, first and foremost.

So yeah, like, that’s sort of my kind of point of view that I think is really different, is dieting is the core coping mechanism. Like the first thing I have to do if I want to deal with my emotional eating and binge eating, the first thing I actually have to do is stop dieting, right? Because letting go of binge eating or dealing with emotional eating those things, it’s very difficult to do those things. If I’m on Atkins, it’s just very, it’s just biologically, like we’re predisposed to binge eating and emotional eating, if we’re, if we’re trying to restrict our food or try to control our weight.

Casey McGuire Davidson  46:15

Yeah, and one of the things that I hate that when Ingrid told me this, and I started like, now I’m following you know, a bunch of people on Instagram who are sort of around this, the work that you do and changing my perception on it in the same way I follow a lot of people who no longer drink just because, you know, the, the messages you receive are, are so important in shaping your beliefs. But like, a lot of people don’t even realize that they’re dieting, like it’s just so ingrained. They think they’re just quote unquote, being healthy, right? Or be moderate or what, like, you don’t even realize all the messages you’ve ingrained that are influencing your choices.

47:03

Right. I will often just say to people like, Well, are you? You know, I actually prefer terms like watching your weight. Yeah, like being you know, you know, things like that, because most people can cop to that. Most people be like, Yeah, my desire to be thin, or my desire, or my fear of fatness is influencing my decisions around food. Like, I like that word that you used editing, right. So, most people can cop to that most people can cop to the idea that in some way, shape or form, I am trying to control my food through like some intellectual choice, rather than listening to my body and let my body really my natural animal instincts around food from the show. And I think this is actually a really good like, last thing to talk about is you know, when people say, Well, if not dieting, then what? Right like What do you mean? Stop dieting. What does that even mean? To start dieting? I’m not dieting, how would I eat? Like what are the ways they’re to eat or just eat brownies all day? Yeah, the answer, right?

The answer. But the opposite of dieting is not eating brownies all day necessarily, unless you’re super underweight and starving, in which case your body might want brownies all day to just get the weight back on. But for the most part, right, generally speaking for like healthy, you know, weight restored people, right, like my day to day life. I’m not eating brownies all day. I’m listening to my body and listening to my natural instincts around food and listening to things like hunger and fullness signals. I’m listening to like, you know, what would feel good in my body? Right? Eating brownies all day isn’t gonna feel good, and my body would feel sick. At the end of the day. I’m actually listening, what does my body want? What is my body creating what would make her feel good, and choosing making decisions around food from that place, as opposed to either denying what she wants, not listening to her shutting her down, just choosing foods based on what my mind thinks will make me thin? And then of course, you know, inevitably rebelling. And usually when I’m rebelling, you know, oftentimes when I’m rebelling, I’m not thinking about her either. I’m just like, completely being like, oh my god, last chance for brownies for the rest of my life. I’m gonna eat the whole pan days do and starts tomorrow. So, the whole diet binge cycle, it’s really, it’s a strong disconnection from our bodies. Right?

And so, the opposite of dieting is, to come back to listening to our bodies rather than making decisions around food with like our shoulds and our this is what will make me thin and our other kind of, you know, Mind games that we play with food and just be like, okay, screw the mind games through the rule screw with the blog post, tell me to eat. Let me actually like feel myself let me actually come back to my hungry. What am I hungry for? How hungry am I?

Casey McGuire Davidson  49:43

And in my both ways, right? Because like, it’s hard in terms of like, okay, I feel like I should diet so I’m not going to eat the second helping or I’m not going to eat the bread with dinner. I’m just going to do the steak in the veggie, but like also, if you’re listening to your body and you’re like, Oh, I’m actually not that hungry. I’m not hungry for this. It can feel rude, right? I mean, my family eats dinner every night. And like, you know, I mean, it’s just like, if you go over to someone’s dinner and you don’t feel like eating something, or you’re not that hungry, you might eat anyway, because you feel like you’re rude or you don’t want to turn it down. Or you know what I mean? Like, it’s, it’s all fitting in and people pleasing and doing what is socially acceptable in your personal circle or whatever.

50:32

Yeah, yeah. I mean, yeah, we definitely get that on the on both sides, right, like, I should eat that, or I should need that in front of other people. I mean, that’s, that’s certainly a whole thing. You know, I have sort of mixed feelings about that. Because there’s a part of me that’s like, okay, it’s okay. If I have a little something when I’m not hungry. It’s not the end of the world, probably less harmful than not eating something. Because, you know, I’m afraid of, you know, I’m going to be judged for my weight or whatever. Right. But yeah, I think that you’re right. There’s, there’s definitely the mind games, right. That’s what I think about it, like making decisions with food based on my mind and the shoulds. And the students. Right, is pervasive in our culture on multiple levels, and so many different ways.

Yeah. And intuitive eating, right, which is, I mean, there’s a great book that’s kind of like the Bible of the anti-diet movement, or one of the Bible’s there’s a few Bibles, is, you know, really about kind of coming back to what is, my body actually really want, right? And, and what’s interesting about that, is, that is also can be a practice for coming back to my body in ways that have nothing to do with food, right? Coming back to my feelings, right? So much of anxiety management, for instance, is coming back to my body, coming back to this moment, being willing to feel difficult feelings rather than resist them. Right? That all you could argue it’s a similar skill set. It’s the skill set of being connected and attuned to my body, rather than being a floating head, which is how most of us are trained to be in this culture.

Casey McGuire Davidson  52:03

Yeah. And just believing and feeling that you’re okay, and that you will be safe and loved and valued and appreciated, regardless of all the things right, what you look like, yeah, how much you do for other people? How nice you are, how hard you work, whatever it

52:22

Mm hmm. Yeah, yeah, there’s a big there’s a lot of cultural wounding, to heal. In any of these I think, you know, addiction or addiction related or disorder, you know, mental health disorder. recovery processes. Yeah. Yeah.

Casey McGuire Davidson  52:43

One what it is sort of true, right? Like when you’re like, oh, I need to be competent myself no matter what. And believe I’m going to be accepted and loved, like, a lot of the messages you get are, you are sort of inherently smarter, better, more disciplined, more in control, prettier if you do way less, right.

53:03

Yeah. And so, this is, this is where I think, you know, we start to get into kind of, again, this reality of fat phobia, this unfortunate reality of fat phobia, this unfortunate reality of weight discrimination. And, you know, the question at that point becomes, yeah, fatphobia is real right there is, you know, not everyone is going to love me as a golden retriever. Right. I mean, that’s the truth. Right? Not everyone loves Golden Retrievers. And so, then the question becomes, how do I choose myself? Right? How do I love myself and focus on the people who do love Golden Retrievers, as my point of view is like, I want to put my energy into loving people into you know, into relationships with people who love me for who I am, rather than trying to change myself to get the approval of somebody who just isn’t going to?

Casey McGuire Davidson  53:53

Yeah, yeah, we aren’t there yet. You know, who hasn’t like, backlight? Right?

Educate people. And I know, I’m like, early on the spectrum, but right, you know, and because like we talked just briefly before we got on the call that you were a sociology major. And I was also I was at combo American History and Sociology major in college. And it’s fascinating, the influences that are within any culture that actually shaped the way everybody behaves or behaves in some way or what’s given approval. And we don’t realize that like, the way we think right now is not it’s been influenced by things right. So, the sort of thin privilege and belief that that is inherently good. That wasn’t always historically the case, right?

Nope, not at all. Not at all. Even to this day. There are you know, cultures and countries like Mauritania and Africa, I believe I want to. Hopefully, I’m getting that right. But there are still cultures in the world where fatness is considered beautiful and glory. fide and idolized. Right and that’s not to say that you know, those cultures are better than thin I, you know, thin idealization cultures, I think in general, you know, body diversity is a good thing. Let’s appreciate all the bodies. Yeah.

But yeah, but it goes to show you that you know this it is fashion, right, it’s fashion and you know, it changes all the time it’s not embedded within and then a lot of people think, Well, I just prefer thin bodies, and that’s the way it is. And that’s just how I am as if they were born that way. You weren’t born that way. You were trained into that. And you can do you can untrained, right? I mean, you may never be I don’t think it’s a realistic goal to say I can completely eradicate myself with fat phobia, just like I don’t think it’s a realistic goal to completely eradicate myself of any kind of, you know, discriminatory brainwashing that I’ve received since birth and continue to receive every day in this culture. Yeah. But we can do the work to slowly un-peel the layers of our fat phobia just the way we do the work to un-peel the layers of you know, gender discrimination, racial discrimination, etc.

Casey McGuire Davidson  56:08

Yeah, and you can even see that suddenly, I mean, I think if you look back through decades and generations, even in our American culture, and with fashion, especially, for many, many years, probably since magazines were started, or things like, that’s been, sort of, thin is better. But the degree of what was considered then has varied widely and has gone to, you know, like, Twiggy versus Marilyn Monroe versus, you know, all the other ones, right? Yep, yep.

Yep, absolutely. Even today, right? We have the sort of big booty culture, right. I mean, yeah. But the idealized body is a fashion. It’s an issue of fashion, largely, about us changing all the time, it is not embedded within us necessarily, it is part of our training. Yeah, virtual training.

Casey McGuire Davidson  56:59

And I could talk to you all day, but one question I had that that was really a revelation to me, is around that, you know, at some point in, in not so distant history, the BMI scale was sort of put out there. And then it was, like, reduced as to what is healthy or what is considered? Yes. Like, what is that? Because we’re just like, you know, you go to the doctor, and they’re like, I mean, my kids, you know, you’re in the X percentile for height and weight, right? And they heard it, and they tell you, like, you know, where you are, like, Ooh, you’re in the urinal, you’re in the 99th, for weight, but the 75th for height?

57:40

Like, oh, god forbid, right? I mean, these are really arbitrary numbers. So that so the BMI, the concept of the BMI was invented. I mean, I’m gonna get my history wrong. I’m here, I have to brush up on this. But basically, it was invented, I think, in the early 20th century by some scientist who wanted to create the idealized ma’am. He made I want to not get this history wrong. But part of me that’s like this, I think that this was there was like, like a, what’s it called when you’re like, kind of like genetically profiling people, right? Like when you’re, I forget the term when you’re just basically trying to determine like, which body literally, which bodies are better superior to other like the Superior Man who is the Superior Man. And this person was trying to like, sort of identify the ultimate Superior Man. And he decided that the ultimate Superior Man would be the sort of average weighted person. And so, he figured out he created the BMI, to basically come up with a number for what the average weight range would be, that would take into consideration weight ratio to height, right? Because if you just take the average weight, that doesn’t take into consideration, that’s not like a really good measure of what the idealized weight would be, because people are different heights, right? And so, your height to weight ratio would matter, if you were trying to figure out what the sort of average weight would be to create the idealized man. So that’s where the BMI initially came from. It was like a science experiment to figure out this, you know, to create the sort of superior I want to say this guy was German, but maybe that’s gonna make sense, right?

59:21

I wanted to create this idealized super Superman basically, like who is the Superior Man? And so, he invented the BMI basically, to come up with this average range of what is this sort of average range, and I think it was maybe a 10% range, who knows, but it was essentially like the average weight range, relative to height. That’s where BMI comes from relative to height being like sort of the operative word of what makes something BMI, versus just taking, you know, an absolute weight. So, what ended up happening was insurance companies started to see that there were correlations to different health issues. Depending on weight, right, so like higher weight people are more likely to have, you know, diabetes or heart disease, for instance, that is actually accurate, right. But the thing that I think gets complicated here is that just because somebody is heavier doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re going to have, you know, diabetes or heart disease, there’s just a correlation there. And that’s largely because to some extent, diabetes, for instance, is a really good example of something is very related to nutrition, right.

So, if you’re, if you have a, you know, a certain kind of diet, right, you’re not getting enough vegetables, you’re not getting enough protein, you’re more likely to have diabetes. And you’re also probably more likely to be to have higher weight, right to be at a higher weight range. If your blood sugar spiked all the time to real insolence up all the time, we could get deeper into the science there. But basically, right, there’s a correlation between certain kinds of illnesses and weight, not a causation, right, there are tons of people who are just genetically bigger, and they might have really healthy diets. And they’re just genetically bigger. And those people are actually not at a higher risk of diabetes or heart disease, right, unless they are genetically predisposed to diabetes and heart disease, which is also a separate thing that can happen. Right? So again, sort of a whole other conversation that maybe we’ll do a separate podcast. But insurance companies effectively just saw this relationship, right, they saw this relationship between, you know, if you are on the higher end of the weight spectrum, or higher end of the BMI spectrum, you are more likely to have these illnesses, they didn’t really get into the why or kind of talk about the difference between correlation and causation. They just sort of as a rule, just thought it would just be easiest for them, right, just straight up easy way to make money, basically, and cut their costs by just sort of, you know, going across the board that just in the UK, we see these correlations. And so, there was, I mean, this has changed.

And there’s a lot of politicizing around this about the rules, or what insurance companies are allowed to do in terms of increasing premiums based on weight or denying care based on weight. I mean, this is a whole complicated political conversation. But that’s essentially where, you know, we started to see this shift into actually using BMI in our medical system was because of this was because of this correlation that we noticed, between higher weights, and certain kinds of illnesses, right. So that’s sort of where the whole thing comes from. And again, it’s a very imperfect system, because there are tons of people who are higher weight, who are perfectly healthy, who eat vegetables, who eat well, and they’re just genetically bigger, it doesn’t necessarily they’re not necessarily at higher risk for these illnesses. But because there are some people who are higher weight that, you know, perhaps, you know, that is related potentially, to nutrition, or illnesses or other things, because this correlation exists.

You know, this is where the medical system kind of comes into play and says, Okay, we’re just going to take a broad sweeping brush and say, you know, fats not healthy, the easiest way to reduce your risk of certain illnesses is to lose weight. So that’s where we kind of get this whole thing now. So, to answer your question about how the BMI recommendations changed, when they use the sort of average BMI, as a goalpost of like, if you’re in this average BMI range, then you cut your risk relative to being in this higher BMI range. So, they’re trying to get everyone into this, you know, average man range in the 90s, I think it was in the late 80s, early 90s, I think about early 90s, is when they made this change, there was a shift in weights in the United States. So, people did get bigger in the United States in the 80s, through the early 90s. Again, probably related to things that were going on in the industrialized food system, right? I mean, to this day, right? If you go into low income populations, you know, living in food deserts, where people don’t have access, it’s 50 miles to get to a grocery store, and then, you know, living off of, you know, kind of corn chips from the liquor store.

1:04:05

Yeah, you’re gonna have increased risk of certain kinds of illnesses, as you know, as an impact of that, right. Yeah.

And so, basically, in the 90s, and in the late 80s, and early 90s, there was an average increase in weights in the United States, again, probably related to things that were going on in the industrialized food system. And so, what the United States did was, instead of addressing the issue with our industrialized food system, right, instead of actually doing things like I don’t know, maybe changing the corn subsidies or changing all the policies that created this industrialized food problem. Instead, what they did is they made it an individual responsibility issue. They were like, we’re not going to change the environment that’s making the population fatter and are sicker. What we’re going to do is we’re going to say it’s your fault that you are getting fatter. This is a personal responsibility, not an environmental issue, and What we’re gonna do is we’re gonna motivate you to lose weight by recommending by making the recommendations for average healthful, BMI lower. So literally one day once this policy went into place, you know, 10 million people in the United States woke up, they went to bed average weight, according to BMI and they woke up overweight, according to BMI because the metric change, they lowered the guidelines for healthy BMI, because they thought that that would motivate people to lose weight. Yeah.

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:05:32

Right. They literally overnight changed it. So, you went from normal to overweight or overweight to obese, and then we’re all like, oh, fuck, I’m a bad human being, you know, right? As if, like this, and this, by the way, failed miserably. Right. I mean, this did not work. This did not actually change people’s behaviors, right? I mean, people like fat phobia does not work as a motivation for changing biological imperatives, you know, so, yeah, so this was, you know, complete failure. But to this day, it hasn’t changed to this day. That’s been the case. Right? So, we have, you know, I think more than half of the population is, quote, unquote, obese. But what people don’t realize is that, if you like, look at people walking down the street, you probably there are a lot of people in that obese range that you probably wouldn’t think are obese, who probably actually look pretty normal to relatively speaking.

Yeah, but technically, they’re in this obese category, because the, the healthy weight range is relatively narrow. Now, it’s narrowed quite a bit. And it’s all it’s all random. It has to do with I mean, it’s just well, and with the idea of like, they just took the healthy range down, they just like, change the metrics into crazy and that like, no longer fits or doesn’t fit or maybe never fit most of the population. Like, what’s crazy is that, you know, most of the stores, right, they the quote, unquote, normal stores, they pay out at size 16. Right. But I’ve heard and yeah, or even lower, some of them even say that as well.

1:07:12

Yeah. And like you really can’t, most of the population, most of the American population is above that. Right. But like you can’t shop Exactly. 90% of stores. Like that’s insane. Yeah, half of the United States population can’t shop. 50% of retailers would be my guess, I think, conservative underestimate. Yeah.

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:07:39

I mean, that’s, yeah, breezy, in terms of like, sending the message that your body is bad.

1:07:45

Yeah, yeah. So, this is where this is what a really good example of what we’d call institutional fat phobia. fat phobia. That is not just oh, I’m being judged by people that will be the actually has like policy implications for what people in this country can and cannot do. Right act of discrimination that limits people’s freedoms and ability to access resources.

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:08:09

Yeah. And it’s like, in the culture, you know,

1:08:12

yeah, like people that great people don’t even question. They’re just like, Oh, I’m plus size. I can’t shop at that store. It must be my fault. Yeah, that I can’t shop at that store. That’s most people’s experience is that it’s their fault that they can’t shop at those stores. Very rarely do people think this is screwed up yet? You know, 60% of the stores in the United States don’t make clothing for half the population. Yeah. And so like, they’re the Labrador retriever, who’s like, I need to starve myself to be a Pomeranian because that’s what they sell at Abercrombie and Fitch or whatever.

1:08:46

Exactly. Exactly, exactly. So that is a perfect example of institutional fat phobia. It’s very upsetting. And you know, I will say, what, you know, when we comes when it comes to institutional access to resources, like fat phobia, being an something that, you know, affects people’s ability to access goods and services. Something that for me is even more heartbreaking, is that fat phobia is the number one reason why people can access Well, maybe not the number one reason, but it’s a very, very big reason why people can’t access basic medical care. I mean, people are actively denied surgeries, for instance, on the basis of weight, there’s an enormous amount of institutional weight discrimination that limits people’s access to goods and services that they need to live happy and healthy lives on the basis of weight. And no one very few people are talking about this as a real issue, because everyone has internalized the idea that if my doctor won’t do surgery on me because of my weight, it’s my fault.

1:09:44

Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, what’s interesting, too, is you know, my mother is 74 years old, and she, you know, needed a knee replacement and now a hip replacement and like, dude, most people need a hip replacement. At the age of 74, but her diet told her she needed to lose weight and she is not, you know, 300 pounds or anything like that. They told her she needed to lose weight before she could have a knee replacement. And I’m like, that’s insane. He’s been trying to lose weight since I was a child. You know what I mean? So, like, her knee literally does not function and she’s in daily pain, and they’re telling her do something you haven’t been able to do for 50 years before we will help you.

This is heartbreaking. Like, these types of stories like this is super unethical care. And what’s interesting about this is like, this is how I said before fat phobia kills. This is exactly what I’m talking about. Like, I’m not being dramatic, like people being denied surgery on the basis of weight is not okay, that is not ethical. It’s interesting, you bring up knees, because there’s a ton of research to support the fact that, you know, larger bodied people end up having more knee issues, because they can’t get the surgeries that they need. So, they end up continuing to walk on me is that they shouldn’t be walked on.

Right. And so, it’s actually harming their health long term. And for what right. I mean, there’s some kind of argument that, you know, fat people have a slightly higher chance of complications with surgery, which a lot of people would argue the reason that’s the case is because doctors aren’t trained as these as much to, you know, do surgeries on fat people. I mean, it’s just in the, the institutional fatphobia story just continues on and on.

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:11:26

It’s like a domino effect. Yeah. Catch 22. Right, forever. Yes. So Right. That’s super interesting. So, I literally could talk to you all day. But you mentioned earlier that because I’m learning so much, and it’s fascinating, and the whole sociological society stuff just blows my mind. But you talked about the, you know, anti-diet, Bibles, and that there were a couple of them. And if someone’s like, interested in this and wants to follow up, what are the books that you would recommend, or the people I mean, everyone, to your website, your course, tell us what that is first, but then I’d love to hear the books.

1:12:07

So, I mean, for anyone who kind of identifies with the sort of diet, binge cycling, disordered eating, food obsessions, obsession, kind of having the ticker Take, take a tape in the back of your head thinking about food all day long, definitely check out my video training series at stop fighting food calm, or my website, just isabelfoxenduke.com. The first thing you’ll see is my blog. And there’s a ton of just like, easy free information to just learn all of this, like the first three blog posts are pretty much explained, like my like, all lot of the core foundations of what we’re talking about in a really simple way. So, it’s a great place to start if you’re interested in just kind of getting the general idea, like kind of having your questions answered about some of this stuff. So, but I will also say the two core Bibles, the two core written Bibles that are probably the most popular are kind of the most foundational are in the intuitive eating book, which I’ve already mentioned, which is sort of answers the question, if not dieting, then what? And it’s not a perfect book, right?

Like, you know, people struggle with intuitive eating, and that’s why they work with Coaches. And there’s a whole community around intuitive eating and kind of coming back into normal eating and what that means, but I think Intuitive Eating is the easiest place to start for most people in terms of what does it mean to let go of restrictions, you know, how do you make decisions around food in a non-diet way? That’s the book to start with is The Intuitive Eating book by Evelyn for Boley and Elise, Rajesh, the other kind of anti-diet or diet recovery are really just, you know, anti-weight discrimination Bible is a book called Health at Every Size. So, Health at Every Size really focuses on this question that most people have, which is but what about health? Right? Isn’t fat unhealthy? Right?

We talked a little bit about that today in this episode, right kind of dismantling some of the mythology there, and kind of talking a little bit about the difference between correlation and causation and genetics and Pomeranians and golden retriever. Right. But, but that book, really, really, you know, kind of is the is the Bible when it comes to talking about, you know, what is the real scientific relationship like, where does that come from between health and weight? What is sort of assumptions or mythologies that have been driven by the sort of health insurance BMI story and where how can people of all sizes actually pursue health in an anti-diet way and probably, you know, improve their health significantly, because as we know, dieting doesn’t work very long and isn’t really a great you know, it’s not super great health medicine, considering the fact that it fails 95% of the time, and usually creates a lot of harmful side effects along the way.

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:14:50

And the staff that diets failed 90% of the time is a whole nother subject. I mean, I remember talking to Ingrid before and I you know I’ve said this to other people and like, yet, you know, quote unquote Weight Watchers did work or whatever it is did work because I’ve lost 35 or 40 pounds four times in my life, you know, like what? I know, right? And like when I was like, you know, before my definition, I was not able to keep it off.

1:15:20

No, that’s it, but like, in my mind, it works. Like I have photo like me at my wedding when I was 27. You know, at quote, unquote Pythonista don’t wait. Yeah, no shit. I was dieting for nine months. And then I gained a minute. But like, I’m like, no, no, that worked. You know, like that.

1:15:39

It works temporarily. Yeah, dieting works temporarily. But then it doesn’t right. It works until you eventually can’t take it anymore Right? Just this is the diet binge cycling right classically defined, it works at work that works towards I feel good, I feel so good. I can’t take it anymore.

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:15:53

I stopped. I gained the weight back boom rebellion readout, or the stat that like the stat that Weight Watchers brags about is like, people after a year lose 5% of their body weight on Weight Watchers, which like I got to tell you, or five pounds or something, it’s something ridiculous and paltry. And I’m like, no one fucking goes on Weight Watchers to lose five pounds. Like, let me tell you exactly, you know, but after a year, that’s what you’re gonna do after you go to all the meetings and all the food and buy all the like special bars.

1:16:24

Exactly. Like the reality of the situation is that the average weight lost on Weight Watchers is very low. And by the way, that five pounds goes to like zero pounds if you extend the timeframe, right? If you extend the timeframe from you know, I think what it’s like for one year, you know, the average weight loss and a steady will be five pounds, you sent to two years, probably like one and a half pounds. When you extend a three to five years, a lot of people actually gain more weight back than they even started. So, the average weight can even go up. Well that it is weight gain. Yeah, exactly.

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:17:01

The average weight loss is five pounds like that is that means half of the people did not lose five pounds, you know? Yeah. Yeah. What’s wrong with me? Why can’t I stick to this? You know, because the claims are the before and afters are like you should be 50 pounds down. Yeah. So, the other thing I wanted to say, and I know we need to jump up, jump off just because like, this is me being weird, but I totally looked up the most like dogs in America just for a good time. And it is like it’s Labrador Retrievers, Golden Retrievers, sheep, dogs, colleagues, etc. But here’s what’s fascinating. They did dog rankings by men and women. And women thought that the best, you know, like, literally let me show you like ranking women in the hot or not. You know, let me show you two dogs. And you tell no. Gosh, better.

I know. This is like, totally ridiculous. We can cut this part out of the interview. But the best ones for women are Shitzu, Pomeranians Bishan. Free and have these tiny, tiny, tiny ones. But men like the big ones. Yeah, totally. Men like the big ones like But Isn’t that insane? Like you could show women like dog versus Dog versus dog like in the like rank which one’s hotter or not? And it’s like the Pomeranian. That’s, that is like guys, we want to look like alright. Well, thank you so much for coming on. Will you tell us your website again?

1:18:35

Thank you. Yes. So, my website was my blog, which is a great little binge worthy blog, if you want to just get the bullet points is isabelfoxenduke.com. And then my free video training series, which you know, is just a really fun, beautiful if you prefer video and want to watch some fun videos kind of getting the general gist of this work. Stop fighting food calm, stop fighting food calm is where to watch the free video training series. So, either, both of those websites are great. I definitely recommend signing up for the video training series because it’s also gotten you on my email list. And then we can I always send out just like great little blog posts. I mean, that’s the primary use of my email list is to send out blog posts with just helpful, you know, educational, little tidbits of okay, how to feel sane around food, right, how to not feel crazy around food, how to not be obsessed with food, how to not be in a diet binge cycle. That’s my primary way of communicating with people. I don’t use social media that much. So yeah, that’s the best way to be in touch.

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:19:33

The first step in any of this is just even becoming consciously aware of it and like educating yourself a little bit and that’s the phase that I’m in after being totally, you know, clueless and just part of the you know, you mentioned fishing water like you don’t even realize, and you know, so thank you for coming on because I’m a huge fan of your work.

1:19:55

Thank you. This was so fun. Thank you so much. I’m really excited to share this. If, like, this is a “Great!” We got to cut. We covered a lot.

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:20:02

Oh my god we have like three more interviews on each subject, but this has been a great conversation.

1:20:10

Let’s for having me Casey, this is great.