In this powerful and eye opening episode, I’m joined by Cat Chappell and Jo Reader - together known as The Fat Counsellors - to talk about fat phobia in therapy and why it’s essential for therapists to explore their own internalised biases.

We discuss how anti-fat attitudes are embedded in society, how these messages seep into the therapy room, and what it takes to create fat-positive, compassionate spaces for all clients. From myth busting around BMI and health to examining the roots of body based discrimination, this conversation is both personal and deeply informative.

Whether you’re new to this work or already on the journey, this episode will challenge your thinking and offer practical ways to show up better for your clients - and yourself.

Takeaways

• How fat phobia shows up in therapy rooms
• The impact of internalised diet culture on therapists and clients
• Why BMI is not a reliable health measure
• The historical roots of anti-fat bias
• Understanding thin privilege and body shame
• Creating truly inclusive spaces for clients of all sizes
• What therapists can do today to start unpacking their own body image beliefs

I remember working with people with incredible trauma who had been through horrible things and were in a body that was seen as ideal, weight wise, and people projected that they must have a fabulous life and they found that incredibly upsetting.

But also they have what we call thin privilege, which is being able to fit in clothes, seats, life, doctors offices, whilst if you're in a fat body, you literally end metaphorically, do not fit in and you will have bias against you.

So welcome everybody, to today's Goodenough Counsellors podcast.

And I'm really delighted today to have Kat Chappell and Jo Reader with me, who are collectively the fat counsellors.

And some of you will have read that I went on their course last year and I was really keen to get them into the studio so they could share something about their work and what they do and how they help therapists to think about their own internalised fatphobia.

So really delighted to have them here with me today and I'm going to ask them to introduce themselves.

So, Jo, should I start with you?

Yes.

Hi.

Thanks for having us here, it's very exciting.

So, yeah, I'm Jo Reader and I am a psychotherapist and supervisor in private practice.

I live in North Bristol and I work with teenagers and adults, having had a previous career working with teenagers and schools and parents.

So a lot of my work is around working with teenagers and parents and all the things that come around, around that.

Yeah, and other part large part of my work is around body image and body shame.

Thank you.

And how about you, Kat?

So, yeah, hi, my name is Kat Chapel, I'm also based in Bristol, so I'm a counsellor, I'm a supervisor, also a trainer and I work mainly with people who are struggling with bodies, body image, also deans of abuse as well.

I worked at Rape crisis and Women's Aid for a number of years and more recently as I discovered my own ADHD through my client work.

I work a lot with ADHD and part of an alliance of counsellors who do the same.

Oh, brilliant.

Thank you.

So tell us a little bit about, you know, how the fat counsellors came to be and what is it all about?

Yeah, I'll start with that.

So I'm sort of the beginning of the story and Kat will tell you the end of the story, the current end of the story.

So I.

I retrained to become a counsellor in my mid-30s and having undertaken some therapy around bodywork and when it came to choosing my dissertation topic, I decided to look at whether Clients can sort of escape the weight stigma that exists in our society when they're in therapy with their therapists.

And so I did a auto ethnographical piece of research about my own story and we, we talk about having a fat body, that we are fat as we use that as a neutral descriptor and we realize that isn't the case for everybody.

That's part of the work.

Yeah.

And I've always been in, in a bigger body than my peers, which is kind of a relevant point later on, which we'll come to.

So I, so I'm very interested in.

In weight stigma.

My own journey.

Did this dissertation and a bit later on therapy SH Day asked me to write an article, an abridged article about it, which I did.

And Kat was on her training when this article came out and read it.

So I'll hand over to her to tell you the next part.

Yeah, great.

Yeah, thanks, Jo.

So over my 40 odd years of being this planet, I've sort of been fat and thin and everything in between and actually had an undiagnosed eating disorder for many years.

And so because I was never what was seen as like a size 0, my body has been scrutinized and told it wasn't good enough.

And I held that belief for about 30 years of my life.

Right.

So when I was training to be a counselor, I still really felt that I could never be a good enough counselor whilst I was still a fat person.

And reading things you mentioned when we, before we did the record, Irving Yalom and his.

That client who was Betty.

Yeah, the discussion in that.

So I was like, well, I'm just never going to be good enough.

But then I read Joe's research as she mentioned an article in therapy today.

I read a book called Shrill by an author called Lindy west.

And through that and my therapy I was like, maybe being a person isn't so bad after all.

Yeah.

So I've done a lot of work in therapy and myself lots of reading all this stuff.

All this research is relatively new in the last 20 years and I realized how much anti fat bias existed in the world, certainly.

But then through communications from peers, how much in the therapist community.

Yeah.

So it was connecting with Jo going, you know, we've connected before.

I love the article.

We need to do some training.

Jo had some done before and we started initially training for therapists because you were like, we really need to help sort of give this point of view so both the therapists and the clients can have a better experience regardless of the size of the body, but especially if you're in a fat body because of the way the world will treat you.

Yeah.

And it's worth saying this took a number of years that Kat made contact with me, as a lot of people do when they find my article, which is so heartwarming.

It's 11 years since I wrote it.

I still, every year I will get some emails.

It's just amazing.

And Cap was one of those people.

And we had a bit of a chat.

We realized we're both in Bristol and we'd sort of seen each other's name through networks and things, but we didn't meet that one.

Probably you read that.

And that in part was of this fear of, what if we do this work?

What if we.

And Kat kept saying, we should, we should, we should, we should do something.

And I had quite a bad experience of.

Of doing some training with therapists that was fat phobic.

And I was very resistant.

Kat was very persuasive.

And I don't think we knew kind of what, you know, we knew we wanted to do something.

We knew that we needed to talk about this with therapists.

I think we thought we'd probably do one off anyway.

Been doing it for two and a half years, nearly three years now.

Worked with about 150 therapists.

Yeah.

And, you know, come very highly recommended, actually, because, I mean, I came on your course because people were saying, this is such a helpful course to do.

And, I mean, your sort of first part, one of your course is really looking at our own fat phobia, isn't it?

And internalized fatphobia.

And part two is actually therapists, what you know about working with people in the room, isn't it?

So.

And it didn't start out like that, you know, initially, as Kat was just saying, we.

We thought, let's put something together with, you know, the history that we know and get people thinking about this, get therapists thinking about this.

But, you know, what we realized over time is that it's such personal work because we all have a body and there is a hierarchy of bodies in our society.

And that's when we've.

We've created two courses and split it in two so that anybody can come along to part one because it is personal development.

I mean, part two does continue that, but it is much more focused on how you work with this with clients.

Yeah.

You can't do this work without thinking of your own.

Yeah.

And how you feel about it.

Absolutely.

I mean, I'm sure you remember this from when I was on the course.

And it's interesting that you said that, you know, when you tried to do it the first time.

Time you had that sort of resistance and fat phobic response, because I experienced that in the course.

And, you know, I found myself wanting to disregard what you were saying because of my own internalized fat phobia and thinking, well, they don't know what they're talking about.

And, of course, you're exactly the right people to know what you're talking about.

I know.

I loved that.

Honesty was really helpful.

And that is what.

That is what so many people feel.

I mean, that will be why a lot of people don't even come on the Cook come anywhere near it.

Yeah.

Because we do have a huge internalized fat phobia, and we're in denial generally about it, I think.

And as therapists, we think we've done all our work, but actually, it's.

It's so ingrained in our culture, isn't.

It, that talked about on our courses.

Yeah.

It's sort of like even.

It's so ingrained that we don't even realize that we've got it.

I mean, I think that's.

It's so much prejudice out there, and I think there's some sort of, like.

It'd be probably quite helpful just to bust some of the myths at this point.

I don't know if you just tell us about what are some of the common myths that people have about fat and, you know, the sort of diet culture, that type of thing.

What would you say were the main.

It's a big question, isn't it?

But.

Well, the first one I wanted to do actually, was address that, because about.

I've been using the word fat a lot.

We call ourselves the fat counselors.

There is a part of me from years ago that still cringes and feels uncomfortable with that word.

I own it now.

For myself and Jo, it's a neutral description in the way you would say somebody is tall or, you know, they're a woman or a man or whatever, but it isn't.

And that's loaded within itself.

That.

The thing is, it's the challenge.

The first myth is that fat is bad.

Yeah.

Fat is fat.

You don't have that.

You're not with obesity.

I don't like using that word.

I think it's pathologizing.

It's Just a descriptor of your body because human beings are all very different and that is normal.

Yeah, absolutely.

I, I, you know, it's such a good point, isn't it?

And that kind of fat is bad, is like the underlying accepted fact of our society.

Yeah.

It's what I talk about on the course, how the, the rhetoric around fat is that it's unhealthy, unattractive, it means you're unfit.

It means you're potentially unintelligent, lazy, greedy.

Yeah, greedy.

Don't, you know, have good habits or self control?

You know, like those are the assumptions that are out there around fat bodies.

It is extremely challenging to think otherwise.

Like, you know, I've sat with so many people and they're just like but, but, but, but, but so many deeply ingrained and, and it is really complex to discuss.

There are lots of health, health myth, which is part of it.

There are myths around the kind of solutions to dealing with weight and extra weight, let's say in inverted commas.

And, and so there's a lot of misinformation around that.

And of course attractiveness and beauty is, you know, the media is a massive part of that, has nothing to do with health.

People will say it's to do with health, but predominantly it is not.

Health comes up as the bottom line.

I wanted to, if it's okay, sort of talk a bit about the roots of it now.

Yes, there is a lot about this and I'm going to really give you the bridge version.

I'd really recommend reading the book Fearing the Black Body by Sabrina Strings.

And essentially it gives a much more detailed version of what I'm going to give you, which is that anti fat bias is essentially rooted in racism and it's incredibly ableist and it shouldn't have a part in our society, but it does.

So the short version is that in Western Europe between 16th and 18th century, we've got the transatlantic slave trade.

And during that time race and categorization of race for humans is essentially invented, you know, say black and white and these things.

So two things white Europeans can recognize who's a slave and who's free.

And it also kind of makes this nonsense justification as to why you're enslaving millions of people and treating them as commodities and less than human.

So skin color is a really good identifier to do this.

But then after years of being in Europe and having families, there's so many more biracial people that this categorization then goes to body shape and size and food Attitudes.

There's people originally from or with heritage from African and Caribbean countries tend to have more fat in their bodies than white Europeans and generally celebrate food and eat more freely.

And at that time they're very Protestant in Europe and very minimal.

So they're like, oh well that's less than.

And we're better than the ones of power made up the rules.

Interesting.

So it was made up to decide who had power and freedom and who did not.

And it's still used now.

I thought that was a fascinating part of the course actually was learning and digging deeper into that and realizing, you know, there's a whole context here and stuff that again you just haven't examined.

And it has its root in that oppression.

And the bmi.

Oh yeah, tell us about the bmi.

Simultaneously there's this Belgian astronomer statistician called Adolphe Quetelet who is just kind of for fun, for stats, creating a formula to look at the kind of the average body.

And he creates a table of height and weight.

Sound familiar?

Of white northern European men.

It's basically men from France and Scotland.

And he creates this.

It's just for stats, just to look at a bell curve basically.

But at some point during this racist, really racist period of, during the slave trade and categorizing people's bodies like this in America, an insurance company goes, hey, here's a good formula that we could use to charge bigger people more.

And essentially that's how it starts and this formula is used.

But it's all over, like all over America different people use different versions of the formula.

So it's totally removed anyway from what, what Adolf was, was putting together.

But let's not forget that was white northern European men.

So that's all it's useful for.

And, and then once the, the insurance companies are using that, the medical community, the medical community commandeer it as well.

Because in America these things are all, you know, paid for.

Yeah.

And, and their systems.

Yeah.

It becomes something to be able to charge more people with.

And that's, that's where that stemmed from.

It's not based on any health, any sort of scientific.

It's not.

And yet it's such a rug to beat people with, isn't it?

It's not fit to show health.

It's fit to show what is your height and weight ratio.

To say that there's a small band for everyone 18 to 108, male, female, regardless, race, class, everything for everyone to fit into actually is just bananas.

Rather than just looking at a person and seeing if they're healthy or not.

By a medical professional one and going, table says wrong.

Yeah.

I mean, it is.

When you break it down, you think, yeah, how can that tell us anything about health?

Yeah.

And.

But it is used, as Kat says, you know, people are denied routinely.

You know, like, this is absolutely commonplace every time a fat person will visit.

And, I mean, not even fat people, we're talking people who just slightly fit out of those very small window of what's described as normal BMI will be denied all sorts of things.

It's absolutely rife.

Yeah.

And the other thing that sort of.

It's reminding me of is tell us about the blood pressure cuff and the way that blood pressure can be affected if you're bigger and they try and measure you with a blood pressure cuff that's smaller.

Because this is something that really sort of like, oh, my goodness.

That you told us about on the course.

A small blood pressure cuff will give you a wrong reading.

So the wrong size blood pressure cuff will give you an incorrect reading, will give you a high reading.

And it hurts.

If you have the correct size one, which.

Now Kat and I asked for our GP surgery.

There are only.

There's only one in the building, I think, so they have to go routing through drawers.

It's not.

There's not routine.

I mean, it's just bizarre.

And if you get the right one, you know, and all is well.

Yeah.

And yet if you've got the wrong one, you may have.

They might basically give you a false positive for high blood pressure.

Yeah.

And if you don't know that those exist and if you don't feel empowered enough to ask for one, you're just going to be written off as high blood pressure.

And it's going to be seen is it's because you're in a bigger body because you're fat.

And actually, sadly, everyone can get high blood pressure.

It's part of life.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, and that.

And, you know, there is no single condition that only fat people get.

So, you know, to think about those kind of myths, the idea that fat causes.

You know, there is no evidence that fat actually causes anything.

Yeah.

And, you know, there are various statistics and there's science and people will resist that idea that, like, fat.

Fat how can fat not cause stuff?

And I said, oh, I guess I can see you nodding as well.

And I remember, you know, that that is so ingrained that it's almost impossible to understand.

Yeah, yeah.

And I think one of the other things that was sort of like really blew my tiny little brain was when you talked about the benefits of fat as well.

And something that really sort of like told a lot of people about is how being fat and menopausal women is actually helps their bones be stronger.

It's sort of like you think, huh?

You know, it's sort of like, yes, our body's put on weight because that's probably going to help our bodies.

And you just sort of think, you know, we spend so much time sort of resisting weight gain and stuff as we're putting on.

And in the beginning and the end of life, weight, more weight is better than less weight.

You know, fundamentally, being human, babies that are born really underweight, you know, have.

Have a less chance of.

Of survival.

And bodies that are bigger in the end or when we get more serious conditions, the statistics say, the science says the survival rate and the recovery rate is so much better.

Not wasting away at the same time.

And also more padding, because when your bones are more brittle, if you're falling, there's more between you and the surface, so there's less chance of breakages and harm.

Yeah.

And the thing is then, you know, people go, you say it's better, and it's like, no, we're just not saying it's worth.

It's one of those things.

What's better, tall or short?

Tall.

You can reach more things, but you can't fit as into many places.

It's saying, like, it's nuance, you know, and there might be some people where their weight is interfering with their health.

It's not about saying, we love a binary, you know, and we like a simple solution, isn't it?

Because it's such a solution.

And, you know, the diet industry is worth like £316 billion at the moment.

The solution is, if you're sad, be thin.

If you feel unattractive or don't have a partner, be thin.

If you're unhealthy, be thin.

And it's like, oh, and how do we do this?

I'll just buy these things, sign up to this thing.

Actually, most of your body size determinant will be genetics.

You look at people with birth families and you look at, think you can tell what size your body is going to be.

And if it's not that family, it's normally a grandma or an aunt.

It's one of those things that most people are fighting against their genetics.

And those were genetics that fit into, you know, your, you know, what's considered the right category, go, well, it's easy.

And it's like, well, yeah, because you're just there.

It's just one of those things.

It's like, I'm not better because I'm white.

Genetic fate made me white.

And we live in a white supremacy.

Yeah, yeah.

Aubrey Corden's quote here, she said about that diets haven't worked in any decade.

Why would they start working now?

Scientific evidence suggests the contrary.

And I know people say, but they do work.

I lost weight.

And what we mean is they do work in the short term because our bodies were always designed to be able to survive the winter and famine, but they are also designed then to store when we get it back again.

And so in the short term, yes, and the first time it's quite easy to lose weight.

But every time we do it, the body will fight against it.

We often talk about it's like holding a pool float under the water.

It will pop up or holding your breath, eventually you will take an enormous breath.

And that's what happens with the body.

And, and that it changes the metabolism every time we do it.

And so this idea that the solution to all the.

If, you know, if there are health issues which we would challenge, there isn't evidence for the connection between those things.

But even if there was, the solution to it doesn't have a very good success rate.

Yeah, absolutely.

And if people are really interested in health, that the science says weight loss and the way people lose weight historically particularly isn't.

Isn't really particularly healthy.

They call it weight cycling, going up and down, up and down.

Yeah.

The best thing is to be generally consistent.

And then often, you know, you drop a dramatic amount of weight.

Often that's a precursor for illness.

Yeah, yeah.

If you haven't, there's no intention to do that.

Absolutely.

Yeah, yeah.

It's absolutely fascinating.

Can we think about.

So how does this come into the therapy room?

Tell me about something about your work with therapists, helping them to sort of think about their attitudes within the therapy room.

Because Cap and I were just talking about the famous Irving Yalom thing, you know, when he talks to Betty and he never lets on that he's, you know, so fat phobic.

And then at the end, you know, she calls him out, says I always knew you were.

So let's talk about in the therapy room and how it, how sort of, you know, our diet, culture and fat phobia impacts our relationships with clients.

Yeah, I mean it's, this is so important and I think, you know, however much we talk about all those myths and whatever, it's, it's useful to understand that because I think that's the sort of, it's the gateway into kind of going, I need to understand this a bit more.

But, but ultimately our job in the room is not to be assessing our clients health at all.

I mean that's just not, I mean mental health, of course we're working with that, but judging and whatever, that's not, that's not what we're there to do.

And so it's bringing people back to that.

Unfortunately, what happens because we haven't done our work on this is that we can, it can seep into the room and Irving Yellow is a great example of how it seeps into the room and your client will know.

Yeah.

And you know, that's, we all have bodies.

There is a hierarchy of bodies in our society.

Let's not pretend we are not noticing that.

And there is, there's a, there was a study written about how particularly because I think this is a really interesting concept.

The sort of one sidedness of the work that we do, which is how it should be, means that we're not revealing, you know, very much personal information.

And so it results in our bodies acquiring a particular significance in particular.

And so there's a whole kind of thing there which we've got time to go into today around how we're being perceived and trusted.

There's all of that going on and not talk to them.

And I guess the main part of our work is about how counsellors unconscious bias because of all the things we've just talked about mean that they will, they can accidentally collude talking about how much they ate over Christmas, all that kind of stuff.

You know how it's, it's very innocently done, often well intentioned.

So there's, there's, there's things like that, that go on.

And the other thing I think we don't, we're not aware of and we have started to see in our work is that attitudes about weight eating and dieting present in all our female clients.

Yeah.

Irrespective of size, irrespective of age, culture, backgrounds.

And you know, we, we really see that, don't we, in our workshops, Kat, how, you know, what was really surpr.

How many different types of bodies come along and not.

And not anyone doesn't have a story about how the body isn't good enough.

Yeah, yeah.

They haven't been mistreated due to their size or had a disordered relationship with food.

Yeah.

I think another danger is, is missing eating disorders and disordered eating because there is a thing that.

It's a bit of a crass term, but it's what they call swag, which is.

Stands an acronym for skinny white affluent girls.

Those are the only ones with eating disorders.

When actually I think it's a very small percentage and I wish I had the percent with me.

Six percent of people with eating disorders are in bodies that are deemed underweight.

Oh, right.

Okay.

Yes.

So it's actually.

So the vast majority of people are actually not in these skinny bodies.

Yeah.

Right.

It's not about the body size.

It's about the relationship with food and how it's making them feel.

And we have our bodies in the room.

So like you said, it might be a bit different with online if you're anything from head to sort of mid chest, but your body is in the room and it's saying something to the client and what that might communicate might not.

So if you are in a smaller body than your client, the client will feel that generally that there is privilege there or that your life is better.

Those sorts of things that you're judging them.

And it's important.

We always say this is one of the biggest pieces of advice.

Just name that when somebody's like, I don't like my body.

I feel it's X, Y and Z.

Just to go.

And how is it to talk about that with me in the body that I'm in?

And you don't have to put a judgment of it because, you know, I know if I said a fat body, you know, people feel.

Because I'm a fat person.

I notice clients feel like.

And they're like, oh, no, I love Lizzo, it's fine.

I just.

And you know, that's where I have to go.

Look, I understand I'm in a fat body.

I have done my work with that.

You can say whatever you want and I will not be upset.

I want you to really, honestly be with your experience, even if it feels it's negative or it might impact me.

Well, and it's.

It's that like, whatever body you're in, it's saying that, how is it.

Just bring it into it.

How is that discussing it with me in the body I'm in?

You know, we know it's a comparison, so, you know, but, but it's, it's allowing for that discussion because it will be there.

It's.

It will be going on.

Yeah, whatever.

Whatever body type.

I remember working with people with incredible trauma.

It had been through horrible things and were in, in a body that was seen as ideal weight wise, and people projected that they must have a fabulous life and they found that incredibly upsetting.

Yeah.

But also what they didn't experience, which is what people in bigger bodies do, they have what we call sin privilege, which is be able to fit in clothes, seats, life, doctor's offices, whilst if you're in a fat body, you literally and metaphorically do not fit in.

And you will have bias against you.

And it's also recognizing in the way that, you know, we need to do training around LGBT community, around race, around all of these determinants.

It's important for you to recognize and know the social pressures and the environment that your client is in.

Yeah.

Because, I mean, you know, we don't know what we don't know or what we haven't experienced.

And I'm, I'm always struck happy.

We do one of the things we do on the, on part one courses.

Look at all the ways that people who are fat are stigmatized in daily life.

Yeah.

And I'm always struck how people are like, I did not know that.

You know, I did not know.

Blood pressure cuff is a great example.

But even gowns in hospital, they just don't fit.

It's so undignified.

You can't get eye laser surgery if you're over a certain weight and it's quite low because the machine's just not, it's not been designed for that weight.

You know, there is, and that's just health stuff.

Never mind just trying to go to the theater or get on a bus or it's, it's, you know, or watching telly, you know, and how people are portrayed and the messages in the adverts and stuff.

You know, it is everywhere, as Aubrey Gordon says.

You know, it's in the, the water we swim in, you know, it's the air that we breathe.

It is just there.

Yeah.

We can't, we can't afford to ignore it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And that's what all our work is about, is raising this awareness.

And it is really difficult to face you know, we don't want to look at this.

Yeah, yeah.

And there's a lady called Laura Brown who.

Who was the only book I found when I was doing my dissertation.

And.

And she recognizes this is, like, a uniquely difficult and painful task because we are asking people to call into question things that they.

They have governed their entire life and their mother's life and their grandmother's life.

That's about all the time.

It is.

It's part of.

And there's a statistic that says this is what women bond over the most.

And I know it affects other genders, but it's predominantly a real female problem.

It has been historically, but it's what they bond over the most, which is kind of sad, isn't it?

But that conversation about food and eating and dieting of bodies is what people kind of gravitate towards.

Absolutely.

I always remember a friend of mine, years ago, she said, because she doesn't believe in diets, and she said, you know what?

You can't get together with a group of women without somebody being on a diet.

It's just.

It's so endemic, isn't it?

Yeah.

I definitely can't get together with people without, you know, there being some.

Some diet talk or some excuse about the food you're eating.

Yeah.

I used to notice that, particularly in office culture, or eating their lunch and making an excuse about whether I didn't have much breakfast or, you know, when there's cake on birthdays, which is lovely way to celebrate.

People kind of go, oh, well, I can have a piece of cake because.

Or I won't.

You know that.

That's what we mean about it just being sewn into every day, like.

Yeah.

And to just.

Just say a bit more about that kind of finding a space where that doesn't talk.

That is the other thing that really comes out of our, like.

Like almost every feedback we get is it was so amazing to be among.

Especially with people who are fat, in a community of people where we can talk about this and it's understood.

Like, completely understood, and they don't have to explain or worry about, you know, and it's beautiful to have created that, really.

It's such an honor.

Yeah.

It's a sort of safe space effectively, isn't it?

And yet that.

That is what we should be doing with our clients, shouldn't it?

I mean, you know, that's what we would want to create for us, our clients, to give them that.

It's hard.

It is really hard.

Like, we have there is the way we run our courses with so much compassion and absolutely no shame.

Anybody's views or.

And I hope you would.

You can vouch for that.

Yeah, you know, we.

We really encourage people to be able to voice that because it's only through doing that that we can start to dismantle it and think differently about it.

Yeah, it is really, really challenging.

Yeah.

To go there and.

And stop and kind of go, huh?

Yeah.

Maybe not.

All I've been told is truth.

Yeah.

It's interesting, actually, because what I've realized recently is how, I guess, sort of like how I've used weight, how I've tried to use my weight to control other people's opinions of me.

You know, it's sort of part of that sort of pleasing people thing and sort of like that sense, of course I can't control that, but how restricted I've been in my.

In my being in what I do, because I want to control people according to this standard of what's acceptable in terms of weight.

And it's just really hit me recently that's, you know, something that I've done.

And also, I think as I've moved into being bigger, it's just like you say, you sort of realize how you've had that thin privilege, you know, like clothes always fitting me and that sort of stuff.

And so it's really.

It's been quite interesting to sort of work with you and also to see this coming out in my own, you know, sense of self, really, and letting go of that.

I think it's been fascinating.

And the letting go, like we know as therapists are letting go of anything brings all sorts up, doesn't it?

You know, we want to hold on to the things that, like you say, the things that have helped us control and navigate all sorts of things in life.

Who wouldn't want to be more accepted by everyone and everything and have more access and to get better treatment?

You know, it's so understandable that we.

Would want to do that.

And.

Yeah, it's so awful as well that there are people who are excluded from that because of our societal sort of attitudes.

Isn't it like I was saying, you know, when.

Before she did the work and reading the Irvingalom story, just how ashamed it made her feel to read these awful words that he says about things.

And I guess, you know, I hadn't considered really the impact that that could have on somebody, you know, to read something like that.

Yeah, yeah.

So I remember now, actually, in the training, because it's interesting.

I'm back doing the training, back where I started.

Yeah.

They had these seats with arms that at the time, I could just about fit into.

Yeah.

And we were doing some sort of gestalt experiment, and they were like, just see how you feel sat in this chair.

How do you feel?

And I just.

I think I just burnt out.

I went, I don't fit.

I was always in pain.

But of course, I'd never say anything because people might notice I was fat and that'd be shameful.

And I was just like, oh, I don't fit.

And I feel awful and I feel ashamed.

And people were like, oh, but you're, like, really pretty, but, like, you know, you've run so much, you'll probably be fine.

And people were trying to be kind, but actually, that wasn't the point.

The point is the chairs are wrong.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Chairs are wrong.

And so everything that I've done now, you know, I'm 10 years later, I'm able to walk in there and go, these chairs aren't right, and this is too big and I don't fit here.

And that's taken a lot to do that.

But before, I was so ashamed.

People notice.

It's that thing of we're told to compete for size and, you know, to fit in.

I remember when my daughter was saying, oh, it's hard to sit on the carpet because this kid is bigger.

And I said, maybe the carpet's too small.

Yeah.

And she's like, oh, yeah, yeah.

You know, I think it's that thing.

All these little things have an impact and they notice.

I remember I had a counselor where I was with this stuff, and I think I criticized myself for being fat because something else had happened.

And I said, and I know it's not my fault.

And I noticed an eye roll.

Oh, gosh.

Yeah.

And then I shut down.

I was like, okay, you're not safe.

I am never going to talk about that again.

Yeah, because you think it is.

Yeah.

And they were in quite a thin body.

And I was like, yeah, I don't trust you.

Yeah.

But I wasn't as confident as I am now to walk off.

Like, now when I go to see a practitioner, I say, I'm fat, and that's fine.

And I don't want you to talk to me about diets.

Yeah.

And then if anyone's a bit.

Well, I'm like, no.

Okay, bye.

Bye.

But you Know, I couldn't do that 10 years ago and many people can't and understandably so.

And it shouldn't have to be that.

You have to, you know, aggressively advocate for yourself every time you do anything.

Actually explicitly say, I am not going to talk to you about diets.

It's just sort of like, oh, yeah, it's awful really, isn't it, to think that that would be, you know, you have to defend yourself against that sort of thing.

But I mean, that's happened to me too.

And this is why we do this work, because we have.

Oh, my God.

And everyone has a story when we start talking about this.

I saw a counsellors many years ago now and I was talking about work issues and I happened to mention.

Oh, I just.

I came back from the gym, which I go to at lunchtime, because it was like something to do, and.

And she said, and what about your weight?

Just like that.

And I was like, what, what, what.

Sorry, what about my weight?

And quite a long time ago, and I hadn't.

I started on my journey.

And she was like, well, you know, let's talk about it.

And I was like, let's not.

And she was like, no, but you're going to the gym and you're trying to work on it.

And I was like, no, no, I just go to the gym because it's like underneath work and I get it free and I like to move.

And she was like, yeah, and how much weight have you like?

I was like, no, I'm not, no.

But look at the.

Oh, it's horrible.

I never went back and look at the assumption.

She couldn't even see.

She couldn't even see what she was doing.

And that's just.

It's just so common.

And that's why this work.

Yeah.

And let's pick up a bit about what Kat was saying there.

This, and this is what comes to.

Comes into the therapy room, which we, you know, must pay attention to, is that everybody thinks it's their fault if you are fat or even just in that kind of overweight category, which actually just isn't in remotely anywhere, like a big body.

I'm told you are.

Yeah, but you're told you are.

You think it's your fault.

The rhetoric says you have caused this because.

Because that's what, you know, that's what we've been told from the beginning.

And so as Kat was saying, and I felt this too, I never talked about it with anyone because of the shame of having done this to myself.

Yeah, too.

Too strong and I couldn't, couldn't bear any, anyone else saying that to me.

And, and when I started doing this work I was like, I haven't done anything to create this.

I just, just like existing, doing what everyone else does.

And I remember as a teenager being like, I don't really understand why I'm bigger, you know, like I just eat the same as everyone else and yeah, really scrutinizing what were in people's lunchbox.

I'm like, same, except my mum's already put me on a diet.

But then, and you know, like now I know it's just my genetic destiny and the shame and stigma.

And if we want to talk about health, shame and stigma, discrimination causes a lot of health issues.

We know that about other issues and there is a lot of talk about how if there is a correlation between fat and health, could it be old stigma and discrimination.

And that is the thing as therapists we absolutely need to be aware of, people will be coming with that and that is what we need to pay attention to.

And if we also, if we collude and think, well it is your fault we won't help them.

Yeah.

And it's also ableist, I think we live in a ableist society which is this assumption that you must be healthy and if you're not, you're like, you have a moral deficit.

So essentially trashes all disabled people, anyone with chronic illness and essentially if you are a human in a body with cells, you're going to get ill and things are going to happen and that's scary.

And what's useful is to go, but if I do all the things, the protective totems, you know, of be thin apparently, you know, do the exercise, do these things, then I will be safe.

And it's like some of those things can up your odds a little.

But the more you are in the world and especially given whatever your genetic determinants, especially stuff like, you know, diabetes essentially not a sugar caused thing, it's a genetic mainly and it happens to thin people, you know it's gonna happen and that sucks.

And wouldn't it be nice to be able to do something to prevent it?

Yeah.

And the knowledge that you can't, you know, they say, well it says on the NHS website and I'm like, it does.

But if you look at the words, it says weight loss may help symptoms.

This may.

It never says definitively, never says.

It's really interesting once you look, it never says it will because actually there is absolutely no scientific proof that it will really.

There is none if anything, the outcomes say there are worse outcomes if you lose weight.

For example, with diabetes, there is a great.

We signpost people, too, something called the Hayes Health Sheets, and that's H A E S, which stands for health at every size, which is an interesting concept.

The Hayes Health Sheets will.

Will talk through all of these kind of common conditions that are thought to be caused by weight or that weight loss will improve.

It's a great resource.

That's definitely one I think I'm going.

To go and have a look at.

Yeah, well, I think there's this myth that if you are thinner, you will feel better.

And there is something in that because you will be treated better.

Yeah.

And you will treat yourself better and.

And feel generally from being treated well and fitting clothes and people going, hey, you look great.

I had that.

I lost a significant amount of weight just because I was incredibly unwell.

Like, oh, that suits you.

And I'm like, no, I'm horrible.

I don't have an appetite.

I feel really awful.

And, you know, so it's that thing when a client's like, I want to lose weight now.

I'm not going to be like, no, you must stay your size.

And you're not allowed to do these things.

No, never.

You never do that as you would with anything.

You go, okay, well, tell me more.

What does that actually mean when you're in this body of this determinate size?

What will that mean for your life?

Actually, is.

Can you do those things now?

Is that actually stopping you?

Because sometimes, yes, it is.

As in getting a medical treatment where you've got to have a bmi.

Is it actually, I can't go out.

I can't date.

I'm not allowed these things then.

No.

Maybe you could just do it then.

Yeah, Actually, how do we get to your goal?

Well, yeah, and there are.

There's two things.

One, often people who have lost weight will say, I wasn't any happier.

Yes, there may be better treatment, but actually our problems don't actually go away because you're smaller.

People will also say, but I feel better when I lose weight.

And there are two reasons for that.

One is it's actually really hard to go against nature and restrict.

And there can be real pride in that willpower.

Yeah, I mean, I get that.

But also, there's.

And cat names, this statistic.

I think there is something scientific that happens when we.

Oh, yes, it's.

It's.

It's nature.

So if we were in famine, it gives us this boost so that we'll go and hunt A bit more food, we'll go and find it.

So we don't just wither away.

So we do get this sense of euphoria when we initially lose weight.

Yeah.

So it's evolutionary, it's fantastic.

I mean, our bodies are so, so incredible, the way it responds like that.

But it isn't because, oh, now I'm healthier.

It's so.

It's so convenient, isn't it, to connect it to that.

Yeah, yeah.

I think it looks to a wider capitalist thing of, you know, there's a pride in denying our needs of, like, I don't need to go to the doctor, I don't need to eat very much, I don't need.

Why?

You know, it's like, oh, if I need to eat a lot, if I feel I'm addicted to food.

And it's like, if you hold your breath, as soon as you unhold it, you go, am I addicted to her?

Yes, because otherwise I will die.

Well, yeah.

And we don't do the same things around drinking water.

We don't say, do you know, I'm not going to drink as much today, I'm going to abstain and see how long I can go.

Or, you know, and we wouldn't say we were addicted to water.

And yet food, you know, we do talk about that.

We need food.

It's not, you know, and I know that there are obviously some people who.

Who feel out of control with food.

Food.

I do understand that.

But it.

Again, it's always worth asking what people mean when they say that, because they might say, I eat four biscuits instead of just none.

Or, you know, and sometimes it's much more extreme.

But I always just say, tell me a bit about what you mean about overeating or being addicted to food.

Because it's not.

Not really.

It really reminds me of a quote that sticks with Me by Dr.

Deb Burgard, which is, in order for us to effectively treat eating disorders, we first must make it safe to be fat.

So tell us a little bit about when's your next course coming up, if people would like to come along and how can people find you?

Yeah, thanks, Jo.

We run our Part 1 course in the autumn.

We do a weekly.

Well, currently we do weekly six weeks on Friday lunchtime to try and fit around people's work.

It's for an hour and a half and so that next one is starting on the 12th of September.

And you can go to our website, which is thefatcounsellors.co.uk and find everything there that you need to sign up.

Yeah.

And then we run part two in, in January and February.

Yeah.

And we've also got a one off in person workshop coming up.

It's in Bristol, hosted by Network, which is therapy and training center.

The details are also on the website that is for part one.

So that's in June.

Yeah.

And also we have a video version of part one that you can buy from the site and you can use that anytime.

Yeah.

And it's, you know, it's up to four hours cpd, which is.

And it's great.

And you can do it in your own time.

You can break it up, it's in sections so you can do it.

Just do it your own time.

Which for a lot of people coming into a group and talking about this is too much.

But they want to do the work.

So that's why we'll say from having attended the Friday lunchtime ones, it's also very powerful to be in the group as well, isn't it?

And I certainly found it really helpful to listen to other people's experiences and yeah, I just.

It was really eye opening actually to hear how other people experience life really.

And seeing people, all sorts of different people, and hearing the commonality and learning things you don't know and feeling so safe.

It is amazing.

I think you're right.

I think for some people being able to do it at home is right.

But some people have said they felt they've missed the opportunity to do it together.

And of course some people also want to do it in person.

So that's why we try and create as many options as possible for everybody's needs.

As for me, because it was the first time I delved into this whole sort of subject.

It was so interesting and helpful and really, you know, made me think a lot about my own attitudes, you know, to others, but also my attitude towards myself as well.

And I think it's.

It's sort of ongoing work.

It, you know, it did impact you, didn't it?

I know that you did a post afterwards about your clothes.

That's right.

I sold them all on vintage, all my thin clothes.

That's so like.

It was great.

Like you again, it's that let's not just stare at the clothes that don't fit anymore and fall back.

How did that feel?

Oh, a huge relief actually.

Yeah.

You know, just to let go of them and.

And to let someone else enjoy them as well.

Because I think that's sort of.

Sometimes you sort of look at clothes, you think, oh, I really loved wearing that.

And Then you think, yeah, it doesn't fit me anymore, so let's send it off to somebody who can have equal pleasure from wearing it.

But, you know, when we're children, we grow out all the time.

It's natural, isn't it?

You grow out of clothes, they don't fit.

And it's sad.

I give quite a few of mine to cats.

Cats.

Little children younger than mine, and they go, it's nice.

I get to see them worn again.

But there's no shame.

There's sadness sometimes in giving.

There's a shame in that.

And I think it's a really interesting way to think about, if things don't fit us anymore, gift them to someone else who can enjoy.

Yeah.

There's this brilliant article, and it's Ann Patchett, and she says she shares it every year in January.

And there's two things that I think were really lovely.

She says when she sees her.

She used to see her therapist and she'd say to a therapist, I'm going to go on a diet.

And the therapist would say, great.

How much weight do you want to put on?

It's absolutely brilliant.

And then eventually, you know, she did.

She did all the work.

She didn't say any longer, but.

And then the other thing that she said is, you know, why do you let a pair of trousers have an opinion about you?

If they don't fit, you know, don't wear them.

Oh, I love that.

And you can say the same about a number.

Why do we let it define, you know, define our.

Ourselves and be ashamed about.

I had a client recently who say, I couldn't buy that size.

Even though it fitted beautiful, look great in it.

Couldn't buy that size.

Yeah.

I've said before, cut the label out if you need to.

Yeah, yeah.

And if weighing is distressing, don't weigh yourself.

Unless you've been anesthetized or launched into space.

You don't need to know how much you weigh.

Yeah.

You know, you just really don't.

It's very rarely that that's a useful number.

And it can be so triggering.

There's so many judgments about it.

So why don't you just free yourself from that?

Yeah.

Yes.

This idea of having everyone having scales in their house, you don't really need it.

You can tell if there's any clothes will tell you very quickly if there's been a shift.

Yeah.

You know, and I think the idea about if it was a health measure, it's a great.

It's an easy way to have in your home.

To check, but because it isn't and it.

What it does is triggers those, you know, much more awful feelings.

Usually it doesn't.

People don't feel good usually standing on scale.

Just don't have them in the house.

Yeah, you don't need to know.

Yeah, absolutely.

I know we could go on talking about this for ages, but I know that.

So certainly some of you've got other things to go on too.

So thank you so much.

It's been absolutely fascinating to have you on the podcast and I will put the.

Your details in the show notes as well.

People can find them, but, you know, we've just sort of like touched the tip of the iceberg, really, and what we've talked about today.

So thank you so much for coming and just maybe opening up the subject for people and maybe encouraging them to think about it some more for their sakes and for the sakes of their clients as well.

So thank you.

Well, thank you for letting us talk about it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I love having the opportunity.

Help spread the word.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

Such an important thing.

Thank you.

Thanks for listening.

Do come and join my Facebook community.

Good enough.

Counsellors.

And for more information about how I can help you develop your private practice, please Visit my website, JosephineHughes.com if you found this episode helpful, I'd love it if you could share it with a fellow therapist or leave a review on your podcast app.

And in closing, I'd love to remind you that every single step you make gets you closer to your dream.

I really believe you can do it.