Teaching a message of loving every last bit of you
Whitney Thore’s popular TLC show My Big Fat Fabulous Life is receiving massive amount of press recently as it kicks off its second season, and for those of you who have never seen an episode or an interview with Miss Thore, let me start out by saying how absolutely lovable she is.
Her laugh is infectious, her honesty and open vulnerability are admirable, and her message of self-affirmed worth is one that deserves spreading.
Being a plus-sized person is not easy. We are a society with a deeply ingrained weight stigma, and unfortunately, as someone in the field of dietetics, I find that a lot of my peers view the world as black or white, thin or fat, healthy or unhealthy. It just isn’t so.
Whitney appeared on the Dr. Oz show today to share her optimism, her spirit of self-love, and her affirmation that holistic health encompasses self-worth and happiness just as much as it does physical health. I firmly believe that mental and physical health go hand in hand, and in order for progress to be made towards overall well-being, you need to work on and nurture both.
Self-love is an integral part of overall health. It is not the end-goal of losing weight; it is the driving force for leading a fulfilling and happy life. You do not take care of your body because you need to force it into looking a certain way; you take care of yourself because you deserve it. This is the opposite of telling people to lose weight because we say so. It’s the difference between shoving someone over a finish line and grabbing their hand to help them reach that goal that they desire and deserve.
Whitney gained a significant amount of weight after being diagnosed with PCOS (Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome) and now shares her story with the world to show that “positively fabulous” does not have a look; any person of any size, shape, color, and background deserves to feel as fabulous as he or she truly is. Whitney was recently diagnosed with pre-diabetes and responded not with defeat or denial or disappointment but with an even stronger desire to focus on her wonderful self, improve her diet to reverse the diagnosis, and increase her already active lifestyle to try to lose weight. She responded by empowering herself. This empowerment is exactly what the wellness field-- and the world at large-- needs.
Take a minute to check out Whitney’s No Body Shame Campaign (click that lovely link!) that we can help end any type of shaming and focus on loving ourselves. The first step towards overall wellness is embracing our self-worth and feeling empowered to conquer our obstacles. It’s time to put an end to shaming and to focus on fostering a spirit of empowerment!
