I got a great question from a reader yesterday about the nature of Health at Every Size:
While I think HAES is the best option for fat people right now, the whole natural organic from scratch thing really rubs me the wrong way and keeps me from fully embracing the movement. I love going out and I love my processed food. And nothing is going to change that. So not to try and derail but where is there room in HAES for someone like me? I have plenty of options and I’m making the deliberate choice to eat the foods I love and that make me happy. So does that element of preachiness I’m detecting from HAES really exist, or am I just being oversensitive?
I have definitely experienced people who consider themselves Health at Every Size practitioners and also seem to feel like theirs is the gospel of health. I find this to be not only obnoxious, but also antithetical to a HAES perspective.
I firmly believe that Health at Every Size is about a paradigm change (from a weight-centered paradigm to a health-centered paradigm) and not about specific foods or behaviors that are “right” for everyone. Let’s look at the two paradigms first:
Weight Centered Paradigm
- Weight is used as a proxy for health
- It is believed that in order to be healthy, bodies must be within a specific weight range
- Body size interventions are given for health problems (ie: if a fat patient presents with a health problem they are prescribed weight loss, if a thin patient presents with the same health problem they are given an intervention that is not weight loss)
- If people are above the specific weight range (or concerned about becoming so) food and exercise are seen as ways to manipulate body size, often using very specific rules and restrictions, and with success being judged by body size
Health at Every Size
- Health is seen as multi-dimensional and not entirely within our control. Health is assessed through a variety of measurements including health markers (blood glucose, blood pressure) and quality of life with a clear understanding that it’s about what you can do, with what you have, where you are
- It is believed that bodies can be healthy at a variety of sizes
- Health interventions are given for health problems (regardless of the size of the patient, the intervention for a given health problem is the same and based on evidence)
- Eating is seen as a part of life and people are encouraged to take into consideration nutrients, pleasure, and their own internal cues of satiety and fullness
While there are excellent professionals who help people eat from a Health at Every Size perspective, (Michelle at The Fat Nutritionist is one of my favorites), HAES itself is not a specific set of foods or food choices and it drives me nuts when people want to spout out general advice “everyone feels better eating blah blah blah” or “nobody should be eating blah blah blah”. When we talk about food choices we should stick to telling our own stories and making our own choices, health/food/exercise/is not a one size fits all situation.
My firm belief is that people get to prioritize their health however they want and they get to choose their path to health. Our job, if public health is important to us, is to make sure that people have access to the foods that they want to eat and safe movement options in which they want to partake (if any), and the best in evidence-based education and healthcare. Then we butt the hell out and let people make choices.
A separate issue can be the pressure that HAES practitioners can feel (and perhaps put on each other) to be “perfect” in our habits, and I’ll talk about that in tomorrow’s blog.
Can you help Robert?
The brilliant Marilyn Wann let me know about a gentleman named Robert Gibbs has made a heart-wrenching YouTube plea for help He is a fat man with mobility problems who wants to lead a better life. I’m hoping that there may be some HAES professionals reading this who could help him out. I’ve heard rumors that Dr. Phil and Dr. Oz are looking to get involved. Weight-based interventions have failed him repeatedly (and statistics say that they will keep failing him) and I would love to see the HAES community come together to offer help and support whether it’s expert advice or just an encouraging comment on his YouTube video.
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Dances With Fat 
Left a comment for Robert. Thank you for bringing this to our attention. Tomorrow I’ll share w/Twitter & FB and ask others to post encouraging comments, too. Hopefully we can overrun the haters.
I don’t believe healthism is consistent with a HAES (SM) approach. As a registered dietitian, I counsel about and speak about this. In fact, this evening for National Nutrition Month I am speaking about how the diet industry, fitness industry, and the alternative health industry has created much confusion about healthful eating. Thanks for the post.
Hi Ragen,
I think your statement of the two health paradigms is excellent and would be extremely helpful to people shopping for a new doctor (or trying to explain to a current doc what they mean by ‘but can’t you treat my problem without getting distracted by my body size?’).
I would suggest that it would be great for people to have a printable version of the two paradigms as listed with an introduction to a generalized doctor or nurse. Just a thought. I know we’re always trying to find ways to help people talk to doctors, which is difficult for nearly everyone, and especially difficult for fat people.
I think that’s an excellent idea. I just made my appointment for my yearly physical, so docs are on my mind. (Mine is not new and is already good at not making weight an issue for me.) Still, I might print them out to her and see what she says, just as sort of a “test case.”
“I have plenty of options and I’m making the deliberate choice to eat the foods I love and that make me happy.”
There is absolutely room for someone like your reader! Making choices that work for you and are not dictacted by the diet industry or a weight loss approach, but dictated by what your body tells you it wants and needs is part of the HAES model.
Thanks for the shout-out Ragen! I wasn’t expecting to see that when I read this post, but I appreciate it.
I am moved to reply to your reader – this misconception of HAES is a really common one, and totally understandable. But it is just that – a misconception.
HAES does not (and should not) seek to make absolute rules about eating. Nutrition is INCREDIBLY individual, based on both a person’s social context and their medical needs. There are literally people in the world for whom it makes the most sense, medically, to eat as many milkshakes as possible (I saw this A LOT when working at a cancer hospital.) There are people for whom it makes the most sense to eat more vegetables, or eat more protein, or eat more fibre, or whatever. There are people for whom it is dangerous to eat gluten, and other people who could not live a healthy life without it. And for people with certain diseases, eating tons of vegetables could be deadly or incredibly painful (kidney disease and Crohn’s disease are two that come to mind.)
One thing that really bothers me about ALL nutrition discourse is the inherent classism. And that is exactly what your reader is talking about in that comment – the idea that “processed” food or restaurant food is BAD AND WRONG, that everyone can and should cook from scratch, using as many vegetables as they can get out of their CSA boxes, preferably raw with the dirt still attached.
This is bullshit, to put it mildly. Processed food is absolutely essential for lots of people – we live in the REAL WORLD here, and not everyone has the time, or the resources, or the skills, or the physical energy to cook from scratch. Making people feel bad about doing the best they can with their food choices is, in my mind, right along the spectrum of kicking puppies.
It doesn’t do any good, and you’re just hurting an innocent person. Shaming people for their food choices doesn’t help them to tune into their bodies and figure out what foods are right for THEM – it’s just a way people try to feel superior to others, and then pat themselves on the back for their benevolent oppression.
You can eat a perfectly healthy diet that includes restaurant foods and processed foods – and, you know what? For some people, “healthiness” is not their top priority when it comes to choosing food, nor need it be.
The idea that we all need to be making THE MOST HEALTHY POSSIBLE CHOICE AT ALL TIMES is not only totally impractical (food surveys consistently show that people’s #1 reason for choosing food is TASTINESS – human nature being what it is, that’s not likely to change) but also betrays the fact that “health” has become another status symbol in our culture. It’s a way of proving that you’re “better” than someone else by virtue of the food you eat, the activity you do, and then whether or not you get sick – even though supposedly “healthy” people get sick all the time, and sometimes people who live the most “unhealthy” lifestyles stay well far into old age.
It also downloads the responsibility of health onto the individual, convenient ignoring the social determinants and societal structures that have a far greater impact on people’s health than any food choices they might make.
Sorry for the novel – but this is a topic dear to my heart.
Preach it!! 🙂 (I love your blog too, by the way)
One of my least favorite things is when people go on and on about “real food” versus processed food which they call it “chemicals/crap/poison.” Like I’ve finally achieved stable eating competence with food after so many years of misery and you’re going to try and make me feel like I’m doing something horrible if I’m eating, I don’t know, some gummy bears or something? If people want to and are invested in 24/7 natural, organic eating all the power to them but I don’t have the luxury of time/money and have more pressing things to deal with most of the time. To me that is the best thing about HAES is that it is flexible to the person and their individual needs and circumstances…
I love this response. I am so tempted to print it out and secretly post it around my school…
I just picked up my CSA share (something I hate to do actually because everything is cold and wet), and I realized that I was picking up food for my friend and my roommate (who I share the box with) and not me because I haven’t been making much with our share, for a variety of reasons. I keep getting roped into this stuff because I think I “should” do it to force myself to eat more veggies that are organic and good. I realized last night, that I need to not get these boxes anymore. I don’t get to choose what I want to eat (and winter vegetables are some of my least favorite). From now on, I’ll head to the grocery store in the winter and the farmers markets in the summer and choose what I like, not get the “good girl” CSA boxes that I end up not finishing.
On that note, if anyone wants carrots, parsnips or potatoes and lives in Portland, OR, we have SO MANY!!
I’ll take them off your hands.
Honestly, I garden and do the farmer’s market from time to time, but the absolute staple in my house are frozen vegetables of all kinds. Preparing a CSA share requires time, effort, and creativity. Then if you have a busy week, you let the food go to waste, and that’s really a shame. I think CSAs are great for farmers, and for the people they work for, but I get pretty upset when someone tries to prod or guilt me into that kind of thing.
I love cooking, it’s a great hobby of mine, and when I have the time I cook, dry, can, freeze, etc. But graduate school is long hours and it’s stressful, . I love cooking, and I reasonably can’t make the kind effort commitment something like a CSA entails, I can only imagine that it’s even rougher on the 80% of people that like cooking less than I do. LOL
But yeah, CSA shares are expensive, drop that baby quick if you are just pawning the stuff you don’t like off on other people and it winds up being the bulk of it.
Also if you still want to do more organic, but maybe less local, food coops and naturally oriented supermarkets sell tons of frozen and canned organic veggies.
DeAun~ Thank you for bringing this up… I have been doing a bi-weekly CSA delivery for many months now. There have been a few times I was happy to have been motivated to try a vegetable I wouldn’t have chosen, but most often I am feeling guilty for letting food go to waste after the best intentions to cook and eat it, or giving stuff away and wondering why I am spending the money on it. I keep thinking I am going to cancel it, but then get forgetful and miss the deadline for that week, so I stick it out a bit longer. And yes, there is that “good girl” image I realize I am trying to cling to. I want to be the hip organic groovy gal who cooks, and the truth is I do enjoy cooking sometimes, but also have a busy life and whole weeks go by without setting aside time and energy for cooking something that is “raw and with the dirt still attached” (thank you, Fat Nutritionist). I got a bunch of beets in yesterday’s box with huge green tops attached (like 2 feet long). I guess you can cook them and eat them but I’m not going to! I felt wasteful tearing them off and throwing them away. I love beets, but we’ll see if I manage to cook these and eat them. I do want to eat healthily and don’t dislike vegetables, but most often feel very low motivation to cook and eat them at home. If someone else fixes them–great! At home, I am much more likely to boil up some pasta and cover it with butter and parmesan. Mmmm…
My housemate loves to cook, but is in med school too, so it doesn’t always happen. I’ll eat what he cooks in a New York minute though, it is so tasty!
This particular share was pre-paid through April, so when we are done we are done. I think in the future I’ll stick with the amazing variety of organic options in the stores, farmers markets, or what I grow.
Amen to that and a special amen to the Fat Nutritionist.
I can see how this can be a tough subject. I think, in great part it stems from the assumption that “you’re fat, you’re therefore unhealthy/eating unhealthy foods”. No one believes that “normal” weight or slim people ever do anything “wrong” when it comes to food. It’s almost willful blindness. People literally don’t see a slim person chowing down on McDonald’s fries. But if you have love-handles, or a chubby face or whatever –baby, you’re busted. You have sinned and if you just ate “healthily” all would be well and you’d be slim.
Please allow me to tell a funny, personal story.
I came to intuitive eating (and eventually HAES) thanks to Brussels sprouts. I have suffered from a chronic cough for many years. I have been through countless tests, tried puffers, Chinese herbal medicine, homeopathy, yoga, acupuncture, you name it and the cough (or at least the tickle) is still there. It’s worse when I’m under a lot of stress, but even at the cottage in the beautiful fresh mountain air, the cough persists, though perhaps a bit less.
Of course, I have had allergy tests too. I went to two different allergists. The first one found nothing. The second one (a conventional MD, but with a definite “alternative medicine” point of view), told me I had to cut out a host of foods and drink something like 8 litres of water a day (that’s 32 cups of water for a woman who’s 4’8″!). Brussels sprouts were on the list of banned foods. For me, this was the final straw. It was also the day I started applying the principles of intuitive eating.
The result has been a very minimal weight loss (about 6%), that I have managed to maintain fairly easily. If I go any lower, my body brings me back up in short order.
I generally eat what I consider to be “healthy” foods. That’s the way I’m bringing up my kids and that’s the way our family eats. I admit, I wouldn’t be happy living on a steady diet of McD’s, but I don’t turn blue and run away screaming if someone offers me a few fries.
For me (yes, me, not you or you or you), the word I live by is “moderation”. I have yet to make the sign of the cross or string up garlic when I see a baguette. In fact, I’ll probably eat some of it. I love cheese, I eat red meat and a small amount of dark chocolate is part of my life almost every day. I also love veg (including–shudder–Brussels sprouts) and fruit. I have a soft spot for most sweets and I admit, I don’t keep many around the house, though I have never binged in my life.
Moderation, that’s what it’s all about…for me.
You’ve probably already considered these, but a couple of thoughts about your cough/tickle… Asthma? GERD? Chronic sinus infection? “Nervous” Tic?
I really hate to bring this up, but the last person I knew who had a chronic, unexplained cough for years turned out to have pulmonary fibrosis. D:
We’ve ruled out asthma, GERD, sinus problems.
Pulmonary fibrosis? What does that eat in winter (as they say in French)? I probably don’t have it though, since I’ve had a bronchoscopy and I’m sure that would have shown something.
I am so guilty of preaching the healthy food thing. Especially avoiding high fructose corn syrup and processed meats. Actually not from a diet stand point but because I feel like our entire country has become a science experiment for the food industry and we are just blindly following along. I will need to watch myself!
But I also feel the need to speak about healthy eating because I still feel bad about being FAT and NOT ON A DIET! There, I said it. I wonder how many other people who want off the diet roller coaster feel the same way?!
Seriously, I get an iced tea from McDonald’s almost every day. When I get out of my car with it, I always think, “the neighbors are probably judging me for being at McDonald’s again…” Even though I know I rarely eat the food there. Even though I know they have better things to do that wait for me to get home and judge me!
Sonic has happy hour every afternoon and drinks are half priced and I frequently get an iced tea and I want tell everyone who sees me that it’s iced tea and not soda. Even if they believe it’s iced tea, I’m sure a lot them think it’s sweetened, which I find totally unappealing.
I craft with a bunch of older ladies who think it’s their job to comment on how much other people weigh, I shudder to think what they say about me when I’m not there, so I totally get your point of view.
I can totally sympathize with the impulse to want to offset the judgment that people lay on you when you’re a visibly fat person who is not visibly dieting.
And I have plenty of problems with the food industry myself – I think there are too many effed-up subsidies and too many shenanigans big companies can get away with. But I also feel like it’s worthwhile to be careful when making Big, Absolute Pronouncements about things.
And also to keep things in context – yes, our food system is messed up in many serious ways, but on the other hand, those of us who live in industrialized countries and have enough money not to need public assistance actually eat better than much of the world, have better health, and enjoy longer lifespans. So the panic-mongering is REALLY out of proportion to the reality of the situation.
I think concern, and activism, and making individual choices that make sense to you and align with your values is very important. But I think panicking out of all proportion to what’s going on, and then spreading that panic to other people via shaming their food and life choices…I think that’s even more messed up. And it doesn’t work anyway! I have never seen a single client of mine whose eating competence got better as a result of being TERRIFIED OF FOOD.
I have the hardest time with this too– mostly with my partner, who is a 3-can-of-Coke-per-day kind of guy, and also tends to skip cooking and hit up fast food instead, especially when he’s busy (which is often).
Not my body, not my business, but I care about him so it’s hard not to nag him to eat something green, especially when my body responds so positively to eating something green and he’s tired all the time.
Healthism sneaks up on me.
I really like your response to her. I definitely see a lot of healthism and preachiness coming from some advocates of HAES but I never see it here.
As for Robert, I really hope Dr. Phil and Oz stay away. He needs actual help, not to be humiliated by these people who will exploit him.
I think it’s fine that you like processed foods and dining out. I do, too. Your eating choices are your own decision to make. I am tired of everyone lecturing/being lectured. Just try to make yourself happy!
I’m a HAES follower, and I get preachy about real food because 1) I’m a chef and food is important to me; and 2) Our food system is out of control and filled with chemicals and artificial crap that should not be considered edible. Modern food processing is also stressing our environment and bordering on unethical. Not to mention, reliance on processed foods is killing our cooking heritage and the tradition of the family meal. Food is very much linked to health, and in that regard we have a considerable amount of control. If we continue to live our lives around fast food and processed meals, we’re sending a message to the food industry and the government that we don’t want things to change–that we don’t want fair and affordable access to healthy, traditional real foods, and I can’t abide by that! Sorry if that that ticks some people off. Eating real food and cooking the majority of your meals at home doesn’t have to be difficult, time consuming, or expensive, and it sends a very clear message to the power structures around you–and to yourself–that you value authenticity and health above the false promises of the industrial food complex. I don’t consider this an elitist approach–that’s pretty laughable really considering that the industrial food complex is the direct offspring of 20th century affluence. My goal is get people thinking about how important food is to their health–because it is important–and how far-reaching their food choices become. The consequences of your food choices spiral far beyond what’s on your plate. Too much thinking for most people? Maybe, but refusing to consider change to your eating habits; refusing to possibly cook more meals at home; refusing to learn about food and cooking; refusing to think about your role in industrialized America and its consequences to health and well being is an easy excuse to use to stay comfortable with your head in the sand. I am unapologetically political and fervent about food and its importance to our health and well-being. As the foundation of life, food deserves our utmost respect and consideration.
The person who asked this question likes the ideas of HAES, but doesn’t want to give up her processed food? Sounds to me like she wants the benefits without having to think too much about the consequences of her past choices and behavior, and without having to do any actual work to amass those benefits.
Please be careful about assuming this is about simple “refusal.” Many, many cofactors go into what people eat, sometimes including hidden food intolerances (and yes, people can have serious problems processing fruits, veggies, and whole grains), and whether or not they have the time, money, energy, and ability to cook. I cook a LOT, far more than the average person, and I like it, and I eat a crap-ton of fiber, but I never assume everyone has the same choices and advantages that I do. Because not long ago, I didn’t have them, either.
A lot of it is simple refusal though. Too many people want choosing and eating food to be easy. No mess, no fuss, no thought is their primary objective. One meal, one food is the same as any other. I have serious objections to that type of thinking. Having food allergies is something else entirely. I have food allergies myself, and that’s a major reason that I cook most of my own food. Being homeless or living in extreme poverty is also an entirely different situation than what I’m seeing with co-workers and the average U.S. citizen. I advocate for quality in the food we are eating and that we take control over that quality by cooking and being discerning food shoppers with our money.
You don’t have to be a religious follower of organics to eat well. Hell, most of the time, I buy what’s on sale in the produce aisles. In the winter, I buy a lot of frozen vegetables because frozen is most of the time better than fresh in the Winter. Very little of what I buy is actually organic (with the exception of my meat–because I think ethically and humanely raised meat is worth the cost–but I always go for sales and bargains), but it’s fresh and it’s real, and a lot of it is local. I cook it simply, but deliciously. I don’t care for fussy food. My slow-cooker is my favorite kitchen appliance. I actually don’t like going out that often, because most of what I get pales in comparison to what I can make at home for myself.
Wow, Roxanne, could you be any more condescending? For cripe’s sake, grown adults are capable of deciding what to eat. Make the choices you feel are best for yourself, but presuming to know absolutes about what’s “right” for anybody else is delusional at best and extremely offensive to boot.
Printing out this post & Michelle’s reply to share with everyone I know 🙂
Roxanne, you buy your vegetables at a GROCERY STORE?! OMG, fail! [/sarcasm]
Seriously, do you want me actually ragging on you for not doing traditional foods right because you don’t buy only from farmer’s markets? Or grow them yourself? Or anything else? How would that feel? Probably much the same as others feel here. Condescended to.
I can understand your passion. But while I joke about begin preachy in my personal discussion in my earlier comments I actually do hope I have learned to convey this passion without making people feel like they are failing. I try to save my indignation about what others do for fighting for food rights (in the wake of milk raids and garden bans). No matter how I choose to eat, EVERYONE has to have a choice. I try to get involved in making more choices available to everyone (supporting farmers markets and community gardens in poor urban areas, for example), but I’m not going to tell people what to choose.
Roxanne,
The tone of your comment suggests to me that you are under the impression that you are the person to tell the rest of us what we should think, how we should act, and what meaning our actions have when it comes to food. I will only speak for myself to say that, to clarify, you are not that person for me. I believe in your right to your opinion as it relates to your body alone and I would gladly fight for your access to the foods that you would choose. That said, the number of times that you used the pronoun “your” in this comment, as if you have any right to tell anyone else how to live, is a bit astounding. The idea that you should be telling me what message my actions send to me is ridiculous beyond all reason.
I take extreme offense to the last paragraph of your comment, written as if you have the right to judge people’s behavior and kick them of the HAES island. There is a place in HAES for all kinds of lifestyles and choices and it’s nobody’s job to judge anyone else’s practice. Attitudes like this are exactly the reason that people feel the same rejection from the HAES community that they feel from a fat-phobic society – other people’s HAES practices are not yours to dictate or judge.
It doesn’t matter why other people make their food choices or how they practice HAES, it’s none of anyone else’s business, EVER. Just like it’s none of our business if people get enough sleep or keep their stress down or look both ways before they cross the street. People trying to define health, healthy habits, and prioritize health in other people’s lives is exactly what got us into our current mess and I will not stand by and watch people tear down the HAES community by utilizing an over-exaggerated sense of self-importance to make themselves feel superior/better/elite/right/whatever by being judgmental of other members in the community.
~Ragen
You know, I have the right to be preachy and advocate for something I really care about. Whether you realize it or not, Regan, you do the same thing with this blog. I’m not forcing anybody to agree with me, and I’m not forcing anybody to do what I want. I am simply strongly advocating for a cause that I think is extremely important in this country right now. I’m under no illusions that everyone will agree with me or even follow me.
Roxanne,
You have the right to say whatever you want (although that right doesn’t extend to saying whatever you want unchallenged in a forum that I created). I disagree that you and I do the same thing. I advocate for people’s civil rights, including the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness – which, as I have stated many times, includes the right to do things that I would not choose like weight loss diets and stomach amputation. I do not believe that fighting against the suppression of other people’s civil rights is the same thing as telling everyone that they should eat the way that I think is best. I believe that advocating for a cause and telling other people how to live are very different things. I also liberally use phrases like “I think” and “I believe”, rather than adopting a tone of authority, because I am aware of the difference between my opinion and fact, and I think it’s important to be clear that I know the difference between the two. I specifically try to give options without telling anyone how to live and perhaps sometimes I fail but it’s always my goal and I have, upon being challenged, changed my mind and my message where I was wrong.
~Ragen
Yes, I want more people to cook at home, eat real food, and not base their every day eating habits on fast food and processed meals. I’m not under any impression that anyone will just based on what I blog about and what spews out of my mouth, but I strongly believe these things are important. If that ticks you off, and you think it makes me judgmental of people…Well, I’m not responsible for what you think, but you put this post out into the world, so don’t expect there not to be differing opinions and passionate rhetoric. I don’t believe in keeping my mouth shut just to avoid stepping on people’s toes.
Also, I get preachy about food because too many people believe that fast food, processed food, and eating out equals a homemade meal in freshness and nutritional quality, and that is just plain not true. I work with so many families, mothers, who are astonished to learn the true differences between real food and the processed frozen dinners they were feeding their families. Too many are mislead by the food manufacturing associations and the National Restaurant Association into believing that their foods are the same as what you cook yourself. That’s a big fat lie. I am so passionate about giving people the truth. Yes, food is a personal decision, but dammit, you cannot exercise your civil rights and make truly informed decisions without the truth. I’m trying to wake up people out their food comas!
@Roxanne:
So, in other words, you want to bring people to “the Truth” that you alone possess because they’re too stupid to separate fact from advertising and make decisions for themselves? So stupid that you compare them to people in COMAS?
If you want to attract people to your cause, you need to find a less arrogant tone, because the one you’re using now is having the exact opposite effect.
I think this is incredibly condescending, somewhat classist, and very much at odds with my own view on HAES.
Roxanne, if you take nothing else away from this, maybe you’d like to consider why someone like yourself referring to “eating real food” might be read as elitist.
Also, the best “family meal” I ever had was in a cleaned-out family home which had just been sold. We sat on a blanket in the kitchen and shared a gigantic bucket of KFC. Sod your “traditions”.
As a Traditional Foodie I probably do get preachy on real food and localvorism in my personal life (like FB) and my homesteading writing (hence I’ll link to that blog here LOL). As a personal trainer coming form a HAES perspective, my concern with my clients’ food begins and ends with making sure they have been eating (working out with low blood sugar isn’t safe). If a client was nutrition advice, I actually do send them to The Fat Nutritionist’s site as I have yet to find a nearby HAES nutritionist to send them to. If they want to talk about real local food options, I happy to do that “off the clock.”
I do think that eating real food our great-great-great-grandmother’s (or someones, we don’t have to stay just within our ethnicity) with as much bought at a local level (and even grown ourselves) is something that can heal the body, soul, economy and world. But I also believe in free will and it’s not my place to expect anyone to change themselves. I am, sometimes, flabbergasted when I realized a homesteader I met was making luscious meals from vegetables and animals her family raises for her entire family except herself. Because she felt she needed to lose weight she would instead eat prepackaged diet meals.(I’ve been thinking about this a lot since your earlier post) I have also found that the best way to guide someone interested in getting into traditional foods is slowly. It’s a lot easier to change a few things at a time. I know many people who were only going to just do their summer veggie shopping at a farmer’s market who a few years later haven’t bought a vegetable from the supermarket all year and are not only growing some of their own plant food but canning it as well. After all, once you taste how good real food is….~;p
So I don’t see an entwinemet of HAES and Traditional Food, although I might be passionate about both philosophies. They can go well together, but that’s a personal choice.
As for Mr. Gibbs, I hope he does opt to take help from the HAES front and keep those two showmen and their ilk at bay.
I do think that eating real food our great-great-great-grandmother’s (or someones, we don’t have to stay just within our ethnicity) with as much bought at a local level (and even grown ourselves) is something that can heal the body, soul, economy and world. But I also believe in free will and it’s not my place to expect anyone to change themselves.
This, I can get behind. You get to educate yourself about what you think is the best way to eat, and then you get to choose what to do based on costs and benefits – and then you let other people do the same, even if they come to different conclusions than you.
Thank you.
Thank you!
I just popped back here because I keep thinking that I needed to mention one reason I think that the idea of HAES and the traditional food movement being hand-in-hand struck me as so odd is that so many in the traditional food movement are so stuck in the weight centered paradigm. Since this post was made I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve seen something come across my FB feed or my blog feeds about how traditional food diets lead to weight loss. *facepalm* It’s sadly pervasive in the movement and I feel it hurts the movement. Like with everything else, if that’s the focus when it doesn’t work people feel like failures and give up something that might have actually been working to make them feel better.
To me this brings home the point here, that the wrong message is the wrong message no matter what it’s connected to.
I have a summary of what HAES is in the About on my blog. I’d like to quote the weight-centered vs. HAES section of this in that area, with credit given (of course) and linkback to here. Is that alright?
Of course, I’m honored that you like it enough to quote it 🙂
Thanks!
~Ragen
Hey, i so agree whit you about how shitty this whole Weight Centered Paradigm is.
I just read a book, a novel categorized as “chick lit” titled “Big Girls Don’t Cry” by Francesca Clementis.
Its about a fat girl meeting a scientist who has discover a pill capable of making you loose weight.immediatly no matter what you eat.
Before finding out about the pill the girl enrolls herself in a fat acceptance community name “5F”. Every girl in the group is apparently “happy” with the body they have and dont care about social pressure to be thin.
The thing is, as soon as the scientist hear about the group and offer them the pill,they all accept to be part of the experiemnt in a bit.
Dont know if you’ve heard about this novel but i dont think it sends a good message about what fat acceptance is really about.
Sounds like fat acceptance woman settle for fat just because they cant be thin.
Sounds like you wont have a happy ending unless you loose weight,
its sad,
love your blog.
You know what? I love my fresh, organic veggies from the CSA, and I cook a lot, and I have a library of cookbooks that would make Julia Child salivate. I work from home, so I have plenty of time to cook. I’ve been cooking since I was a small child, so I have the knowledge and skill to cook everything I eat myself.
But right this minute? I’m heating up a frozen Stouffer’s stuffed peppers meal for lunch.
I always keep a stash of frozen meals in the freezer because some days I get caught up in stuff and just plain don’t notice the time until I’m already very, VERY hungry. At that point, eating is more important to me than eating something I have to cook from scratch myself.
Oh, and I went and ate up some delicious Cadbury caramel eggs last week, simply because I find them tasty.
Different bodies do better on different kinds of food and different eating schedules. HAES does make room for these two facts. It leaves the choices up to the individual, whether they prefer/can manage an all-organic vegan diet, a locavore carnivore’s delight, or purely processed victuals. I firmly support all efforts to bring fresh food to food deserts so that even those on an extremely limited income have the option to choose fresh fruits and whole grains.
But in the end, it comes down to what makes you feel good, what you have access to, what you like to eat, and what you are capable (both in terms of skill and resources) of eating.
If anyone asks me, I’m more than happy to evangelize about my CSA… but in the end, I’m not the one living in your body. You are. And you get to make up your own mind how best to feed that body.
I’m a bit confused. Why shouldn’t HAES, being a HEALTH movement, not promote eating real foods over processed foods? It’s well known that eating real food, in whatever shape you want to take it, is health promoting–especially in the long term. It’s also well known that diets heavy in processed foods are health degenerating in the long term. If the goal is health, then logic says you choose real whole foods over processed ones.
If someone doesn’t want to give up processed foods, then don’t choose HAES. Make up your own movement, or hell, don’t follow a movement at all and live by your own rules. This person is also free to take what they want from HAES and discard the rest. Seems logical to me.
My argument is that it’s because HAES is not a set of behaviors, it’s a paradigm that says that if people are interested in health (and they don’t have to be) then the focus is properly put on health and not weight. HAES neither dictates how highly someone prioritizes their health or the path that they choose to pursue it. Being part of the HAES community means that you agree that a health-based, rather than weight-based, approach is best – not that you get to dictate how other people live their lives or whether they identify as part of the HAES community.
~Ragen
Gracie, like I just commented to Roxanne above – what the heck is “real food”? Isn’t it just a way of saying “I’m going to police what people eat by implying that any kind of processing is BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAD”? Or does frozen mac’n’cheese no long contain any calories, carbs, fat, protein, calcium?
I think I need to start a petition to have Ragen change her first name to awesome. She could keep Ragen as her middle name :). I am the author of the original question, and I almost cried when I read this blog post. I can’t thank you enough Ragen for not only answering my question, but doing it with such depth and class. I am also pleased that so many of the commenters see where I’m coming from. For my own sanity I need to ignore those who don’t. It fills me with shock and horror that there are people out there who think it’s actually okay to comment on the type of food anyone eats, ever. To do so is tanamount to one person telling another, “I know what you need better than you do.” Sorry, no you don’t.
Regarding Robert’s youtube video- that just makes me feel really, really sad. It’s not his weight, it’s the fact that it’s very, very difficult to become that large in non-medical situations, and he’s obviously fallen into that very real problem of needing help but being unable to get it from the medical community. Obviously, some people are naturally very very large, or prone to gain a huge amount of weight, but when a person hits over 600 pounds, I always have to ask- WHERE ARE THE TESTS to check out this guy’s endocrine and hormonal systems? Where is the empirical, non-judgmental health screening to help him get a good idea of what is going on in his body? Cushing’s disease, undiagnosed hormone-secreting tumors, metabolic syndrome X and other disorders are well-documented as causing huge amounts of weight gain even on top of being naturally a large person.
Something tells me that if this guy were to get to the doctor, he’d be fat-shamed and told to stop eating “so much” to lose weight. This also makes me sad, because even though I’m nowhere near his size, I was treated the exact same way when I gained over 50 pounds in a matter of months when my PCOS symptoms went into overdrive. I even had doctors tell me that it was ALL IN MY HEAD when I explained the problem, and most of them just wanted to give me medications to treat the symptoms I was having instead of investigating an underlying cause (or helping me work to an actual diagnosis- it took my own research and insistance on specific tests that I had to insist they give me before I got the rightful and scientifically determined diagnosis). And when you see someone like this poor man, he’s even more likely to run into that sort of unacceptable behavior from doctors.
There is no “easy” or “permanent” way to lose weight, and as this blog (and my own experiences) as evidence, there is pretty much no way to lose weight in the long term once your body hits a setpoint. But if there’s a medical problem that’s overtaxing the system and causing unnatural weight gain or fat accumulation, the very least we can do as a society is compassionately and empirically look for the reasons behind that problem and then do our best to treat or resolve the problem, regardless of whether the patient then loses weight- the problem is the health issue and if we treat the weight instead of that issue, then the problem is just going to persist, and believe me, it’s not going to be the “fat” that kills him- it’s going to be the damn health problem that the doctors refuse to properly diagnose and treat for in the first place!
I mean think of it this way, if a person started having head swelling and water retention in the cranial cavity, the doctor isn’t going to tell the patient to just “stop drinking so much water and the problem will go away.” It’s medically and ethically irresponsible and downright heinous to blame health problems on weight alone.
Sing it, sister.
I also had rapid weight gain and was told to stop eating so much, even though I was barely eating anything at all. I was also told no one gains weight at the rate I was without overeating. I also had to fight to get tests for underlying problems and I still do.
I can hardly stand to eat any produce that isn’t organic. (I grew up eating fruits and vegetables from my mom’s garden, so I can taste the pesticides. They have a nasty bitter flavor.) I choose whole grain breads and pastas. I avoid processed foods, corn syrups, hydrogenated oils, etc. etc. etc.
Do you know what people who sit around preaching about food with their condescending attitudes, make me want to do? Go straight down to the local fast food place and order the biggest most expensive meal they have, just to defy the food police and their obnoxious attitudes.
Nobody has any right to tell anybody else in this world what to put in their mouth or what to do with their body. Society needs to stop right now with this attitude that bodies are public property.
I read Linda Bacon’s book. Not once did she judge foods or get preachy about what we should be eating. I recall her stating that making foods off limits only makes you want to eat them more? Yes, she mentions that whole, natural foods are the most healthy choice, but she does not once ever say that you are obligated to eat them. If I remember correctly, there was even a study she mentioned that suggested that if you don’t enjoy the food you eat, your body doesn’t adsorb the nutrients in it properly anyway.
-Accepting and respecting the natural diversity of body sizes and shapes.
-Eating in a flexible manner that values pleasure and honors internal cues of hunger, satiety, and appetite.
– Finding the joy in moving one’s body and becoming more physically vital.
…those are the things HAES encourages, copied straight from the website. I don’t see anything that justifies judging the eating habits of other people there?
I don’t judge what other people eat, but, for me, I do judge what I eat. If I’m going to practice HAES, then I must acknowledge and accept that certain foods are more health promoting than others. To me, this is just fact and I ignore it at my own peril. In the interest of being as healthy as I can possibly be, it is important for me to make health promoting food choices. That means, for me, eating as much of a whole foods diet as possible, avoiding processed foods and limiting foods not prepared by me.
I don’t feel I would be practicing HAES if I was hedonically eating a diet containing an abundance of foods which negatively impact my health and wellbeing.
I guess what I’m trying to say is the first word in HAES is health and I’m not convinced that I get to define health solely in my own terms. There are objective measures of health. I know what foods are good for me and I limit or entirely avoid foods which aren’t.
One shouldn’t feel obligated to be a part of the HAES movement. It’s totally fine to be movement-less. But if a person chooses to follow HAES, then I think it’s OK to say the focus is on health and what one eats does have an impact on their health. Same with movement.
It’s fine for a person to make the choice to be sedentary. It’s fine for a person to choose to eat unhealthfully. But I think it’s kind of silly to do those things and then identify as a HAES’er. I apologize for the judginess but this is where I am where the rubber meets the road, so to speak.
It might be cool to think that your definition of health should be everyone’s definition, but becomes it becomes less fun really fast when someone tells you that being a vegan is the only healthy lifestyle so since you’re not vegan your not practicing HAES, and someone else says that Intuitive Eating is the only valid path and since you’re not following that you’re not practicing HAES, and someone says that you have to workout at least 30 minutes 5 days a week or you’re not following HAES, and someone else says that yoga doesn’t count as exercise so those who practice yoga aren’t practicing HAES or that if you’re not getting 8 hours of sleep a night you shouldn’t consider yourself a HAES practitioner because you’re not prioritizing your health. You are the boss of your HAES underpants and I am the boss of mine – nobody is the HAES overlord who gets to tell people if they are “doing it right” or “HAES enough”. I think that attitude is a holdover from the diet mentality and I think it’s important that we let it go as soon as possible.
HAES is about the belief in a health-centered paradigm as opposed to a weight-centered paradigm. Practicing HAES does not require a specific prioritization of health or a specific set of behaviors. Each person’s practice of HAES will be informed by their body, circumstance, priorities, goals, and their interpretation of the research. You mentioned that you “not convinced that you get to define health solely in my own terms” but that’s exactly what you are doing – you are choosing what foods you believe are “good for you” and you are choosing to “limit or entirely avoid” those that you feel aren’t good for you. You are welcome to believe that there are foods that are “good for you” and you are welcome to “limit or entirely avoid” those foods that you feel aren’t as part of your health practice. That does not have anything to do with what anyone else has to choose as part of their HAES practice. For example, for some people the idea of having “fear foods” or “restricted foods” leads to binging and food obsession which is not healthy for them.
In Linda Bacon’s definition of HAES she uses:
Accepting and respecting the natural diversity of body sizes and shapes.
Eating in a flexible manner that values pleasure and honors internal cues of hunger, satiety, and appetite.
Finding the joy in moving one’s body and becoming more physically vital.
Based on that definition eating hedonically (for pleasure) is valued. (By the way, I think that sometimes the word “hedonically”, which you chose, carries a negative connotation but I’m going to assume that you simply meant “for pleasure”. If not, that’s a whole other discussion.) There are many health practices that discourage the separating of foods into good and bad. Where the rubber meets the road is that nobody gets to tell others what health should mean to them, how highly to prioritize it, how to go about it, or whether or not their practices constitute a HAES lifestyle. I think there are three things that we can do if we are interested in health:
Fight for access for everyone
Make choices for ourselves
Respect the choices of others
~Ragen
You said:
“It might be cool to think that your definition of health should be everyone’s definition”
I never said that and it is pretty insulting for you to put words in my mouth when I specifically said I was referring to me and me alone.
Honestly, your reply to me feels like a smackdown and I can’t see how my post, which talks about my own experience, deserves that.
Hi Adele,
It’s certainly possible that I misread your comment and overreacted. I felt like you started off talking about yourself, but then you started talking about everyone else:
I read those phrases as you attempting to say how other people should practice HAES and that your definition was what should be used as a benchmark. If I was wrong – if you were saying that everyone is allowed to define, prioritize, and practice health for themselves by their own definition under the umbrella of HAES – then I was wrong and apologize.
~Ragen
nobody is the HAES overlord who gets to tell people if they are “doing it right” or “HAES enough”. I think that attitude is a holdover from the diet mentality and I think it’s important that we let it go as soon as possible.
Ragen, this is an excellent, excellent point. HAES will never be a viable substitute for the dieting lifestyle if it ends up mimicking the diet mentality.
In that, though, I think it’s key to understand that “health” encompasses facets such as mental and emotional health in addition to physical health and also that physical health encompasses more than simply nutrition. For example, I have a chronic pain condition that affects my ability to cook about 3 days of any 5. On my worst pain days, I am not safe to use our stove or oven, to cut things with a sharp knife, or to reach up or bend down to grab our heavy pots, pans, and/or crock pot. (I do try to plan for this as much as possible by pre-cooking on my better days and by splitting the cooking with my partner, but the proverbial shit doth happen.) When that happens, I tend to have 3 categories of options:
1) Cook anyway, even though I may do something like pass out into the stove (from pain) or slice my finger deeply (from painkillers) in the process.
2) Make an “endo day convenience meal,” which generally involves microwaving some kind of packaged food. (Occasionally, it means eating peanut butter on a spoon and/or banana, depending on the household availability of bananas.)
3) Turn it over to my partner. On truly late-notice days (which are the ones that slip through the pre-cooking cracks), that tends to involve microwaving aforementioned packaged food or obtaining some other form of carry-out.
I would maintain that not only are options 2 and 3 vastly healthier for me than is option 1, but that none of the options mean that I am de-prioritizing even my physical health.
Great reply. Your comment shows that there is more to our health than food and exercise. Things like money, access, family structures, stress in our lives,health conditions, can all have an impact on what food and exercise choices we find best. If you’re a single mom working two minimum wage jobs to support your kids, you may not have time, energy, money to make your own baby food from scratch or cook nice meals from local foods. there are many reasons why people can’t/won’t follow a whole foods lifestyle some or all of the time, and it is OK to have other priorities(like not endangering yourself in the kitchen!) I love to cook great meals from scratch, but sometimes I don’t have time, or I’m exhausted, or I just want to order a pizza, dammit! It’s OK not to be superwoman.:)
You said it first! For me health includes mental health – mine & my family’s. Mental health is priority #1 here. I have fibro so it’s physically impossible to cook most days. We have tons of allergies so we do as much fresh & organic as a fam of 4 on one salary can afford. My husband cooks fresh stuff to have the next day (and likes to) but he’s busy working to support us so it doesn’t always happen. If I try to cook when he hasn’t made something (or when my 4.5 year olds eat it all), I’m in such pain I scream at everyone for the rest of the day and probably a few days after. Then there’s the whole not being able to get out of bed thing – hard for a SAHM of 2 busy boys. Or I can put a pizza in the oven & be relatively pleasant the rest of the day. In our situation oven pizza or fast food is the most healthy choice sometimes. We all are mentally healthy and can enjoy each other! I resent being told that frozen or fast food is always the wrong choice.
Great discussion, I especially appreciate the last two comments, & of course the wonderful wisdom of Ragen, Twistie, & the Fat Nutritionist. I do practice HAES in my OWN way, &, as you so often remind us, Ragen, it is no one’s business but mine what way that is. It is the same for all of us &, yes, we CAN practice HAES while having vastly differing lifestyles & eating habits. It is called being individual human beings, not zombies. I can cook, I do cook, but I also have nothing against ‘processed’ foods, & cooking is also ‘processing.’ And I find all this outcry interesting too in light of the fact that, as we have had more processed foods available, Americans have become overall healthier & average lifespan has increased greatly. People usually grew their own food & cooked from scratch in 1850, too, but most of them were lucky to live to be 50 years old.
And there is nothing wrong with ordering (or making at home) pizza. Pizza IS real food & it can contain all of the major food groups. There are as many ways of being well-nourished as there are foods &, as Michelle pointed out, not only do we have different likes & tastes, each body actually has different NEEDS. I would hope that we can understand & respect that fact & each be content to be the boss of our own underpants & no one else’s.
Okay, I can understand that some people don’t like overly processed foods, and they don’t care for typical fast foods.
But I don’t understand why the antagonism towards eating out. There are just SO many kinds of restaurants, at a huge range of prices and with all kinds of cuisines, how do you just make a blanket statement like that? Sometimes a person just wants a change from the usual and a taste of samosa or sushi or summer rolls might be just the thing. Or maybe just a wholesome nourishing American-style dinner that someone else has cooked, giving you a break.
What’s wrong with eating out?