I hope everyone who is reading this is doing as well as possible given what’s going on. I want to be honest that I’m struggling a bit about what to blog about recently (with everything else that’s going on, I’m just not sure what the most helpful thing for me to write about is…) so if there’s something you’d like me to blog about it would be awesome if you would either leave it in the comments, or e-mail me at ragen at danceswithfat dot org.
I’ve been doing some other writing that I’m excited to share with you when it’s published, and I’ve also been doing some fun video stuff. As I wrote about here before, I had started dabbling in Stand-up Comedy before coronavirus sent me home to stay for a while. So I decided to do some quick bits of comedy (kind of a one-woman open mic) from home.
You can see the ones I’ve done so far here, starting with my bit about Weight Watchers. (It would also be super awesome if you wanted to subscribe to my YouTube Channel)
I was also honored to be highlighted in a series by the Olympic Channel called “Body+” You can see all of the athlete’s videos (including mine!) here
Finally, I did an interview with Jessica Richman, the CEO of The Visible Collective which advises companies on how to better serve fat customers. We talked about how fitness companies can be more inclusive of fat people. You can check that out here!
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I’m (still!) training for an Iron-distance triathlon! You can follow my journey at www.IronFat.com .
Dances With Fat 
Hi Ragen,
Jen here, just got on when your blog post popped up. I hope you are doing well too. We are OK here, Spokane, WA.
You know a strange thought occurred to me as I walked back from the grocery store. Aside from 2/3 of the people not wearing masks… Is I got glared at by people in masks and people not wearing masks. As a very fat woman, this is, well, life, but I wonder how people not used to random hate glares are dealing…
As for topics of interest. I personally would like to know more about you. Where your from, how you came to start the blog, how your family relates, if at all. How you deal with all the off loading BS from happy to haters I can’t even imagine.
Saw a new WW commercial, apparently a major (more important) concern for people who just signed up for their abuse sessions and prepackaged pseudo foods are worried about gaining back weight they have lost. I’d be willing to bet, in less than a month there will be routines, programs, real serious talk and some medically based/biased “help” being distributed about how not to get fat during a social distancing time.
.
The Freshman Fifteen will become The Plague Plumping. How Not To Derail Your Hard Won Fitness Goals During A Global Pandemic. “I Lost Five Family Members, But Didn’t Gain A Pound.” The COVID DIET. How Not To Turn Into A Couch Potato During A Shut Down. Cut Back Your Chow Ask Me How.
You know it is coming. It isn’t Death and Taxes anymore. It’s Death and Dieting…
Cause the only thing worse than death….
I’m so glad to here that you are ok! Thanks for the suggestions and I agree with you about what’s coming next. Also “Death and Dieting” is so real (especially for the uber-wealthy in the US who don’t seem to be subjected to taxes at all.) Ugh. So much work to do!
The videos that really cracked me up were the Problems with Learning a Language in Quarantine, Misunderstood Southernisms, and the “My dog has a cardiologist” line. I also liked the Olympic video and can relate quite a bit to the “picking big goals you can fail to reach” part. Excellent!
I needed some good jokes today, too. I kept getting surprise fatphobia ambushes yesterday (beyond the usual “background noise” kind that are still wrong but so common you just expect them). Had a Good Cop lament that since there wasn’t any sensitive way to address “childhood ob*sity” it had to be done insensitively because the alternative of letting fat kids have childhoods like thin kids get was just too awful to contemplate. Had a *completely different* Good Cop go on the standard “Blah blah unhealthy blah overeating blah lazy blah I know you don’t want to hear this Tough Love but you’ll be Better For It in the long run blah” spiel like it was Enlightening Wisdom and not a collection of decades-old diet culture catch-phrases I’d heard a bazillion times before haphazardly sewn together like some Frankenstein’s monster of bullshit. Went to one of my favorite old humor sites to try to take my mind off it. First entry was a fat joke. Didn’t bother reading the second entry.
Waking up to WTF Weight Watchers after that was… very nice.
Thanks for the kind words about the videos. I’m so sorry for all the “good cops” out there spreading truly terrible ideas! “Frankenstein monster of bullshit” made me laugh out loud (#lolsob) I always so appreciate the incredibly insightful comments you leave here, I’m just glad I could give you back a few laughs!