Resources to help heal your body image and relationship with food
Healing your relationship with your body, food and exercise takes time and work. Part of that work involves surrounding yourself with books, articles, and social media accounts that help to change the way you think, feel and behave. We’re slowly changing your neural pathways in your brain which is why it takes time, practice and influences from many angles. I asked a bunch of wonderful people what were the most helpful resources for them when it came to healing their body image and eating and compiled many of them here. I hope you find them useful too…
Popular resources for improving your body image
This is not an exhaustive list, and not all suggestions will resonate with every individual. I encourage you to build your own list as you discover what works well for you. I’ll keep updating this list as I come across more resources…
Books
Virgie Tovar - You have the right to remain fat
Sofie Hagen - Happy Fat: Taking up space in a world that wants to shrink you
Connie Sobczak - Embody: Learning to Love Your Unique Body (and Quiet that Critical Voice!)
Kate Harding & Marianne Kirby - Screw inner beauty: Trash the diet and self-loathing and get on with your life
Elyse Resch & Evelyn Tribole - Intuitive Eating
Harriet Brown - Body of Truth: How Science, History, and Culture Drive Our Obsession with Weight--and What We Can Do about It
Rebecca Scritchfield - Body Kindness
Rick Kausman - If not dieting, then what?
ARticles
What is Health at Every Size? What do HAES supporters believe? Is it all about believing everyone can be healthy at any size? Meredith Noble from Made on a Generous Plan explains it so well here https://www.generousplan.com/what-is-health-at-every-size/
Weight science: Evaluating the evidence for a paradigm shift. A journal article by Linda (now Lindo) Bacon & Lucy Aphramor that evaluates the evidence and rationale that justifies shifting the health care paradigm from a conventional weight focus to Health at Every Size®. https://nutritionj.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1475-2891-10-9
Helpful steps for improving your body image. In this article I share some things you can do to help improve your relationship with your body. https://www.jodiearnot.com.au/blog/steps-for-improving-your-body-image
What to say to your doctor. Strategies for health professionals who are weight biased (on helpful cards). Thank you to Ragen Chastain for this work. https://danceswithfat.org/2013/04/01/what-to-say-at-the-doctors-office/
The evidence against dieting. You may have already come to the conclusion that you just can’t face dieting anymore. Or maybe you’re doubting the worth of restricting and counting and depriving? The evidence is clear* diets don’t work, and cause harm. So why then is dieting prescribed and recommended with abandon? Dr Harriet Brown explains in this article that summarises key points from her amazing book Body of Truth. https://slate.com/technology/2015/03/diets-do-not-work-the-thin-evidence-that-losing-weight-makes-you-healthier.html
What exactly is diet culture and how does it differ from diet mindset? HAES dietitian Nina Mills from Feel Good Eating explains https://feelgoodeating.com.au/diet-culture-and-diet-mentality/
How we can help kids to stay away from dieting. Writer Kasey Edwards noticed that some of her daughter’s five year old friends already were worried about their weight. Here she shares some tips for helping kids to avoid dieting. http://www.dailylife.com.au/life-and-love/parenting-and-families/how-to-stop-a-fiveyearold-from-dieting-20150720-gigd6f.html
Christy Harrison - Anti-Diet: Reclaim Your Time, Money, Well-Being and Happiness Through Intuitive Eating
Caroline Dooner - The F*ck It Diet: Eating Should Be Easy
Linda Bacon (now Lindo Bacon) & Lucy Aphramor -Body Respect: What Conventional Health Books Get Wrong, Leave Out, and Just Plain Fail to Understand about Weight
Linda Bacon (now Lindo Bacon) - Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight
Sonya Renee Taylor - The body is not an apology
Anuschka Rees - Beyond Beautiful: A Practical Guide to Being Happy, Confident, and You in a Looks-Obsessed World
Body acceptance requires grieving the thin ideal. In order to respect and accept the body we have right now, we need to let go and grieve the “dream body” we’ve chased for so long. (Or perhaps its grieving the body we had many years ago, to accept that we can’t time travel back to a previous version of our body). Meredith Noble from Made on a Generous Plan once again kicks it out of the park with this fantastic article https://www.generousplan.com/body-acceptance-grieving-thin-ideal/
How can I have thin privilege when I have body image distress / an eating disorder? Melissa A. Fabello talks about Thin Privilege and explains the difference between experiencing body image distress and experiencing size oppression. If you’ve felt uncomfortable, confused, or doubtful about the existence of thin privilege this is an excellent article to read https://everydayfeminism.com/2013/10/lets-talk-about-thin-privilege/
Navigating a wedding in our fat phobic culture. Writer Lindy West refused to diet prior to her wedding and hide during her wedding. This article has been loved by so many people I know! https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/jul/21/my-wedding-perfect-fat-woman
How weight loss attempts backfire. You’ve probably heard many times that ‘diets don’t work’, yet not many people understand the why. Here Intuitive Eating coach Meredith Noble explains it well. https://www.generousplan.com/how-weight-loss-attempts-backfire/
What does fat shaming and weight discrimination do to your health? Mandy Lee-Noble, dietitian and the secretary of Health at Every Size Australia, shares her wonderful wisdom about the impacts of weight stigma and fatphobia here. https://www.abc.net.au/life/health-impacts-of-weight-stigma-and-fatphobia/11728522
How to be a body positive role model. We can all contribute to important change. We don’t have to have thousands of social media followers, run for politics or write a book in order to make the world a more compassionate place – we can do it by living our values and treating all people with respect, including ourselves. Here are some tips for how you can be a body positive role model and make the world a kinder and safer place for bodies of all shapes, sizes, colours and abilities. https://www.jodiearnot.com.au/blog/how-to-be-a-body-positive-role-model-
It is possible to experience the freedom of body neutrality in the body you have now. Healing your body image takes time, and may need the assistance of a professional. If you would like to explore and improve your relationship with your body, I’d love to work with you.
by Jodie Arnot
Jodie is a registered counsellor with a Masters in Counselling from Monash University. She provides counselling in Melbourne or via telephone and Skype, and is passionate about supporting women to no longer be at war with themselves.
