143. Get angry at diet culture

Welcome back to the Intuitive Eating and Body Positivity Podcast! 

In this episode, I'll explore the valid anger many of us feel towards diet culture and how we can transform that anger into a powerful tool for change. This is what I’m covering in this one:

📺 Why I am blaming YouTube for my break from podcasting
😡 How dieting makes us angry
🤬 The difference between positive anger and negative anger
⏩ How to turn that anger into action
 

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Transcript

0:09

Welcome to the intuitive eating and body positivity podcast. I'm Terri and I'll be talking about all things intuitive eating, body positivity and health at every size, and shaking off weight stigma, diet culture and food rules so that we can all have a better relationship with food and our bodies. Hello, I am back. Did you miss my voice? Did you? Please say you did. Or did you not notice I was gone? Terri, Terri who? I feel like I need to give you an apology for the amount of time that I have disappeared for. So here's a little story. Let me explain. Before Christmas, I took a little break because it was mad busy. I had loads of stuff on. I took a bit of a break, needed to just kind of down tools before Christmas with regards to the podcast and stuff. And yeah, just kind of, I just kind of knew in myself that I was done until after Christmas. So then, between Christmas and New Year, I sat down and I worked out what I was gonna do with my business this year and what I wanted my little, not goals, cuz I don't like goals. But my targets, my achievements for the year, oh god, they're all goals, aren't they? Let's face it. I just don't like the word. But I wanted to map out what I wanted to do with this year and top of that priority list I wanted to keep my podcast because I love doing my podcast I've said this multiple times I love doing the podcast and I didn't want it to disappear I'd had a big milestone last year didn't I in hitting a hundred thousand followers no downloads and it was just amazing I had such a good year with the podcast and, as I always do, actually, as I always do, So I didn't want that to disappear. It was never my intention to just let it go and never come back and talk to you ever again. Then New Year came and I just didn't do it. And now we are here at the end of January and I am recording, having not touched it for a couple of months. And I feel like I owe you an apology because you are so good to me as podcast listeners. You talk to me, you email me, you message me, you feedback to me, you engage with me, if I ask questions you'll always reply, you support me and I love that. And I just disappeared, I just disappeared didn't I? So I wanted to explain. And I've been thinking about it these last couple of days. And do you know what I figured out? I have figured out that it is YouTube that is my problem. I know. So to those of you on YouTube listening to this right now, I have to apologize for the fact that I'm dissing YouTube. I'm not dissing YouTube as a platform. I really like YouTube, I get loads of great resources there, but for me, it's never been totally aligned with what I put out into the world. And I think that's kind of what I've struggled with. I thought that what I would do was to put video out on YouTube and... It just doesn't work for me, I don't think. It's actually turned out to be creating problems for me. It means I'm not getting the podcast done. And I think it's just putting lots of blocks in my way. So in order to record a podcast episode, I have been setting up the video, so setting up the camera, trying to get some lighting. I mean, don't get me wrong, my video lighting was not video lighting. I just put enough lighting on so that you could actually see me. But I was faffing around all the time just to get an episode done. Not to mention the fact that I felt like I had to make myself somewhat presentable. Now, I am absolutely an advocate of just put yourself out into the world. It doesn't matter what you look like, it really doesn't. But actually, as a professional, as somebody who wants to make the right impression, as somebody that I want you to enjoy watching, I felt like I couldn't just rock up in my pajamas with my hair scraped up, barely having had a wash, no makeup on and no, actually not no makeup on, but, you know, last night's makeup still smeared across my face, that sort of thing. That's not how I want to look on video, so it was stopping me doing it, because I was choosing to not record over preparing and recording. And so over this break and over this realization, I've decided actually I'm not doing YouTube video anymore. I don't love it. I don't love it enough to do it. I don't love the preparation. I don't love my setup. I don't have the right equipment really. And you know what I really like? I really like having thoughts, plugging my microphone in and recording. Because that's the way I always did it before I went onto YouTube. I just plug the microphone in and chat. And that's what I love. That's what I enjoy. So this will still be going on YouTube. You may well be listening to this on YouTube right now. But I'm not having video anymore, so it will just be audio. And that means that I get to put the audio back out into the world on my podcast where it was originally, where it's always been, and YouTube can be a bit of an afterthought there. And I'm not even sorry. I'm really not even sorry about that. I am doing what feels aligned to me and my business and getting the right information out to you guys and to actually getting out there and talking to you. And for me, that is not YouTube video. So, that's where I've been. That's why I have not been here because I've let these blocks get in my way instead of just plugging in my mic and going and chatting to you and that's going to stop. So we're back on track now. Okay. We're back to it. I am sat here with my hair scraped up, with no lights on, well, you know, the room lights, but no lighting, lighting. I'm actually sat here with a dab of hair colour on my elbow or you know in the crook of your elbow. What is it? What is the inner bit of your elbow? Where you know where you have blood taken from and stuff. What's that called? What part of your arm is that? Inner elbow? Anyway, I've got a hair dye there because my hairdresser's been round to do a patch test for a hair color that I haven't used before. And if I was doing video, I wouldn't be sat here looking like this right now, I can tell you. So no more guys, no more blocks. Let's, I'm just gonna rock up and talk to you. That's all I wanna do. That's what we're doing going forward. That's all I wanna do, okay? Back to what we used to have, you and I. The relationship we used to have. Right, what should we talk about? I know what we're talking about. We are talking about getting angry at diet culture. This comes up in conversation all the time. This comes up all the time when I talk to clients. In one-to-one sessions, in membership sessions, in just talking to people in general. People get very angry about the time they've wasted on dieting. And they use that word, they say I'm very angry. I'm very angry. What film's that from? What film is it where he goes, I'm very angry. It's taken a lot of therapy for me to say that, but I'm very angry. Oh, Pretty Woman. Pretty Woman. Richard Gere, Pretty Woman. And he's like, I'm very angry. That's how I feel I need to say this. Anyway, back on track. People say to me all the time how angry they are at diet culture, about how much of their life it has swallowed up, how much time they've spent dieting, how much time they spent focusing on rules about what they could or couldn't eat, the way that it's made them feel for so many years that they're just not good enough, the experiences, the memories that have been missed out on over the years. And that anger is valid, right? It's valid because diet culture takes so much from us. The diets that we do, the plans we follow, the restriction we go through, the doubt we place in ourselves, it strips such a lot from our existence and what should be our experience of life. So that anger's very valid. But what you can do is take the anger and use it as a really powerful tool for changing. You can not dwell on the past. You can take that anger, still have it, but make it a positive tool. Make it something you use to drive you forward. Diet culture makes us stuck, right? It traps us in a cycle of guilt and shame and restriction and promising a better life somehow if we can just follow the rules. But when you start to see through those empty promises, it's really natural to feel that anger, that rage in some people. Some people get really, really mad. But that spark, that anger, that rage, that is confirmation that you are ready to ditch the diets. It is confirmation that you are ready to take a new path. It is freeing, it is empowering because you use that rage and you go, right, enough is enough, I am moving forward and I am having this no more. So you can use this to look forwards, not backwards. When I think back to my years of dieting, that anger can rise up pretty quickly. I remember 1 time sitting at a family gathering and I was carefully picking apart my food so that I would avoid anything that was off plan. I could pull it apart and see what's in it, you know, see whether it looks like a decent thing to be eating on this plan or not, you know, that sort of thing. I would then, if it wasn't on plan, spend the evening obsessing over the food. Maybe over the dessert that I had had, and then I was annoyed at myself for having it, or obsessing over it because I hadn't had it. I'd forbidden it and I'd restricted it and so then I was wondering, well, I really wanted the dessert and now I haven't had it and now I'm unhappy and now I'm unsatisfied because I didn't have it and I missed out and everybody else had to say it and I didn't. I missed out on so much, on laughter, on connection, on moments with people that I really loved being with, because I was stuck in diet culture's grip. Anger at diet culture used to keep me stuck the same way that it probably keeps you stuck. It kept me negative, that anger. I always saw it as a negative. And when you're in a negative mindset about something, you can't move forward, can you? You just sit and you ruminate on it and you mull it over and you mull it over and you mull it over. So that anger has to change into something positive. It has to change into something forward driving if it is to make a change in your life, if it is to make some kind of an impact. Don't let that anger keep you stuck and keep you negative, use it. I now use it to remind myself why I've left that world behind. So I picture the me who now eats puddings without guilt, The me who doesn't obsess over calories. The me who focuses on memories and moments instead. The me who no longer cares about hitting the massive number of steps in a day. God, remember that, remember obsessing over the amount of steps you do, and how now I enjoy movement as just a part of feeling good in the day instead. That's where the looking forward comes in. It's seeing what you're leaving behind and how much you hate it and what's forward and what's to come. Because that stuff that's ahead of you is always brighter than what's behind you. You don't have to erase the anger, okay? You don't have to get rid of it completely, but instead you can turn it into better energy. You can turn it into an energy that is forward driving towards something that you actually do want instead. Use your anger to speak up. Diet culture thrives on silence, right? It tells us that our struggles with food and our struggles with our bodies are private battles, something that we need to keep hidden. Unless of course you find dieting pals, because then the diet is all you ever talk about isn't it? You know when you're going to a diet club with somebody or you're following the same diet as somebody you know at work or you've got friends on it or you've got friends on 1 diet and you're on a different diet, then it's all you talk about, it's all you talk about. There's nothing else in the world worth talking about apparently. But if you're not in that circle, then diet culture keeps you quiet. Because if you're talking about your personal challenges with food and your body, then you'll seem to be weak or whatever it is you think you're gonna be perceived as, and it makes you want to hide it. The struggles are things like dieting when you don't want to, the disordered eating habits, the reliance on unhealthy exercise habits. Diet culture doesn't want us to talk about how bad that is does it? So it makes us think that we've done something wrong, like it's your fault instead and that's what keeps us silenced. But what if you got angry at those diets? What if you got angry and used that anger to find your voice? I know that it can be really daunting thinking about standing up and speaking out on this stuff and trying to correct other people about dieting and how bad it is and their poor relationship with their fitness apps and you know whatever else you see in the world that is very disordered when it comes to exercise and food. But you can start small. You don't have to do what I do and jump on a podcast and talk to people all the time. You don't have to speak out on social media straight away. You don't have to stand up in front of a room full of people and tell them your story and tell them what the right way forward is. Do what you are comfortable with. For me, it started very small. I learned about the anti-diet movement and intuitive eating and I started to talk about it on social media. The more into it I got, the more I thought, right, I want to create some actual social media profiles dedicated to this stuff. So I set up a couple of profiles and started to post my thoughts and what I was learning and because I was still very much in the learning phase while I'd started to talk about it, it was all very much, did you know, here's what I've learnt, this is what I've found out, can you believe kind of a thing. But it did start very, very small. Just the odd post here and there. Just the odd share here and there. Before I even set up separate profiles. And again, I'm not saying you have to set up social profiles. I just knew that this is something that I wanted to talk about more and wanted to have a dedicated space for it. And then I started quietly calling out diet talk at work and saying things like, actually I'm not cutting carbs anymore, I'm just focusing on what food makes me feel good and what I'm enjoying eating. And it was terrifying at first, but each time I spoke up, I felt a little bit lighter, a little bit freer, a little bit more in control of my narrative, I guess, and what I was doing with food and exercise. And you can do the same. You can share your story with someone you trust. You can start a conversation with a friend who might be struggling as well. You can post online if you want to. You can share posts. I mean share my posts. I'd really like that if you shared my posts every now and again. But do whatever you're comfortable with. Just remember, when you speak, you never know who you're inspiring. You never know who's looking at you thinking, God, I wish I could do that. Or who you're inspiring and educating in the kind of anti-diet world, who you're encouraging to take steps out of the misery they're in. You never really know who's listening. It just takes a line here or there sometimes to make a difference to somebody. So never think your voice is small, because you just don't know, right? You never know what impact you're having on people. There was a moment early in my journey when I realized that actually anger doesn't have to hold me back. I was standing in front of a mirror. I was fuming because I tried on an outfit and I hated how I looked. I had been told all my life that I needed to shrink myself to be worthy. That's what diet culture does, right? That's what beauty standards do. They tell us that the only way to look good is to shrink and be thinner and more beautiful. And that's not how I felt when I was looking in the mirror and something in that moment shifted and I was mad and I thought no more, absolutely no more. And it's all, you know, it's part of the journey. It's part of my journey. I didn't just wake up 1 day and go, I'm gonna be body positive today. I'm going to just only talk positive things about myself. And that's not what happens. But I do vividly remember having that moment stood in front of the mirror. And I just hated how I looked. I hated how I felt about how I looked. I hated what was expected of me. And I got mad, I was like, no more of this. So from there, I started setting boundaries, both with myself and with other people. I stopped squeezing myself into uncomfortable clothes that left horrible red marks cuz they were too tight. You know when you take a waistband off and it's too tight and it leaves a horrible mark, awful. That's not good for your body, that's not respectful of your body, that's not kind to your body. So I started wearing my correct size, would you believe? I actually stopped trying to squeeze myself into a size too small and started getting clothes that were my size. Or wearing clothes that I had in the cupboard still, that were my size. And elasticated bands, what a joy are elasticated waistbands. No tight jeans anymore, thank you. Jeggings, that sort of thing. They're lovely and comfortable. Trousers that I wear to work, they have got elasticated bands, because I am sat at a desk a lot of the time. And when I'm working at home in the office, I am sat at a desk a lot of the time. When I'm doing my coaching sessions, I'm sat at a desk. And these tight waistbands are horrible if you are sat at a desk all the time. I wear elasticated waistbands. Honestly, game changer. And it's the same with all my clothes. I wear things that are comfortable. I wear things that are my size. I do not squeeze myself into clothes anymore. And that also means that I won't be pulling and tugging at them all day long. If you've got clothes that are tight and uncomfortable, you will be aware of them and that makes you think about your body. Absolutely no more. Dress for comfort. Dress in styles that you like, clothes that you like, but find things that you like to wear too, that feel good when you wear them. I told people to stop commenting on my body, because it's none of their business. I deleted the dieting apps on my phone, so things like MyFitnessPearl, that went, calorie counting apps, that went. I disabled things like Google Fit, all that sort of stuff that I was so attached to, I got rid of them. I didn't need that in my mental space anymore. I began eating foods that I enjoyed without worrying about whether they fitted into somebody else's idea of healthy. And each of these steps felt like reclaiming a little piece of myself that diet culture had taken away from me. And Every time you take a step like that, you're turning that anger into action, and that action is where the empowerment lives. No relationship with food or body is irreparable. Know that, okay? If you are feeling overwhelmed, I want you to know this. No relationship with food or body is beyond repair. You can rewrite your story, you can enjoy eating, You can learn to like your body. You can make that peace with your body. You can heal everything you feel has been broken or damaged somehow over the time you've been dieting. You can turn it all around and feel really good about things. I've seen this with 1 of my clients. Do you remember Sophia? She was on the podcast. She came on and talked to me and told her story. She used to spiral every time she walked into a cake shop. She would tell me how she couldn't go in there because if she went in there she was buying loads of cake and she was taking it home and she was binging on it. And today she goes and she has coffee and cake with her friends in those coffee shops without a second thought. She couldn't get a grip on fish and chips, she couldn't have fish and chips for her tea because it was just too much, it made her feel far too guilty afterwards. And now she happily has fish and chips with her husband on a Friday night, enjoys it, eats as much as she feels like she needs and wants and she doesn't feel guilty about it after and she doesn't worry about it. If you want to listen to that, it's episode 98. Go and listen to her story. She's so lovely. She's so lovely to listen to and she's really open about her story. And this stuff isn't magic, right? These results that Sophia has found, these results that I have found, these results that lots of my clients have found, they're not magic, it's the result of ditching diet culture and leaning into the hard work of repairing that. And it is hard work, right? I'm not pretending for a second that this stuff is easy, but it is brilliant. And if you can lean into it, if you can get stuck in, if you can get angry and use that to move you somehow, it's brilliant. So you might be feeling angry now and that's okay. In fact it's more than okay, it's powerful. It means you're ready for change. It means you know that diet culture has done you wrong and that it's not your fault. That's a key 1 as well, it's not your fault. Use it to fuel your progress. Use it to find your voice. Use it to empower yourself. Use it to move into that life where you're free from restriction and guilt. Just use it. Get angry. Recognize what dieting has done. Recognizing what the world and diet culture has suggested that you should do and forced you, in effect, to do for such a long time. Use it and use it to move you forward. How's that for some motivating words to come back to, hey? How does that feel? You know what I'm gonna do? I'm going to draw an affirmation card for you. I just sat here and I thought, do you know what, I want to end on an affirmation. I love motivating messages. I love seeing them on social media. I love people sending them to me. I've got a good friend who, every time, well not every time she sees something motivating that she thinks resonates with me, she'll send it to me and I love it because in that moment it's a little bit of empowerment, it's a little bit of positivity, it's a little bit of power, it's a little bit of something to move you forward. So, I'm going to draw an affirmation card for you. Okay. This 1 says, Okay, this 1 says, as I take on new challenges, I feel positive, calm and confident. How appropriate is that? They are new challenges. They are new challenges to move forward with. Rejecting everything that you've known for such a long time in dieting is a challenge. Finding these new ways to think about food and eat and think about your body and live in it is a challenge. They are challenges, these things. Nobody, like I said earlier, nobody thinks this is easy. It takes the work. So they're challenges. But you can take these challenges feeling positive and calm and confident. You can feel positive and good about moving forward. You can feel calm and like you've got some control and like it doesn't have to be this big turbulent journey anymore. You know how dieting is up and down, up and down, you gain you lose, you gain you lose, you feel like you have good weeks and then you feel like you have terrible weeks. It's very turbulent dieting, isn't it? That's how it feels, is it? This can feel calm. There is no turbulence because everything balances out. And you can feel confident because why would you not feel confident if you're taking control? You're taking your power back and you are embracing it and you are deciding what you want for your life. So you can have real confidence in that. What a brilliant card. That was so good, so good. Let me know what you think of that. Let me think if you felt that as well. Let me know if as I read that out, you were like, oh yeah, that's good, I need that right now. Right. Here we go. I am leaving you here. I am off to actually do group session in a minute. I love my group. I love the membership. The doors are open by the way. If you want to come and join Eat From Within, if you want to come join the membership, then now's the time. The doors are open. Take a little look. The link's in the show notes. So go hit that link and come and join us. I'd love to see you there. Got some lovely new faces in there in this month and it's a it's a great group. It's everything that this podcast episode has been about. It is support and motivation and helping you to get through the challenges and giving you the confidence and the calm and the control and all of that to move forward. So come and join us. I'd love to see you in there. Go hit the link in the show notes. Do it now before you forget, please. I'll speak to you next week, and I will speak to you next week. See you later.