| Title | : | Anti-Diet: Reclaim Your Time, Money, Well-Being, and Happiness Through Intuitive Eating |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0316420352 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780316420358 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Hardcover |
| Number of Pages | : | 336 |
| Publication | : | First published December 24, 2019 |
Anti-Diet: Reclaim Your Time, Money, Well-Being, and Happiness Through Intuitive Eating Reviews
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I don't usually review books about health, diet, and fitness. Oh, I've read quite a few in my life. As a matter of fact, what don't I know about diets? Mom put me on my first diet when I was twelve years old! I was at that growth spurt time when kids get chubby and then, seemingly overnight, reach their full height and become teenagers. I recall the diet involved not having fruit, and I loved fruit.
At fourteen I was dieting again. Twiggy was in; curves were out. The charts said I was overweight. A friend gave me an exercise book with calories to count. I lost thirty pounds, gained it back; tried Weight Watchers, lost nothing; gained more weight at college; got married and went on a diet and lost thirty pounds again.
I was twenty-one and eating 1000 calories a day and couldn't lose more weight. The weight charts said I was twenty-five-pound overweight! Looking back, I realize I had an eating problem and I was at a healthy weight.
The rest of my life went like that. Calorie counting. Eat Well, Be Well, The Zone. Vegetarian diets. Liquid supplements. All I accomplished was to get bigger on fewer calories.
A year ago, I committed to losing weight. I had gained 40 pounds in five years. I had my Fitbit and my Lose It app and my scale. I was prepared.
I underwent extensive testing and discovered my heart is great and committed to 30 minutes of cardio a day. A nutritionist told me to cut animal fats, meat, and dairy. We eat red meat at most once or twice a month, but I do I love butter on my toast. Goodbye, butter.
I lost thirty-four pounds and then plateaued even though I was burning more calories a day than I was eating.
I joined Silver and Fit and went to the fitness center to use machines for muscle tone and balance. The counselor said I was starving myself and told me to eat 6 meals a day. And more protein.
I am gaining strength and balance with the fitness plan. My bad knee can take the stairs better than they have in years.
But I had vertigo. The treadmill made me dizzy. I walked down the street like a drunk. So I went to the doctor. She saw me bend to tie my shoe and asked, "Can you DO that? It's not vertigo, it's your blood pressure." So she reduced my blood pressure meds. My BP is still in the good zone.
I told the doctor about my weight loss struggle. She is the first doctor to NOT tell me I was risking my life and to "Join a gym," or "Have you considered bariatric surgery?" or even, "I know it's hard to lose weight but keep trying."
Instead, she told me, "I'm not concerned about weight. There are more important things, like the quality of life."
WHAT???? I am 67 years old and a doctor told me what---that endless dieting and exercise is not supposed to be the goal of life?
So I saw this book, Anti-Diet, and thought, I need to know more about this.
Harrison had a food obsession. She was a life-long dieter and a journalist who wrote for Gourmet Magazine. She earned a degree as a nutritionist. Her personal journey led to exactly what millions of us have experienced: Diets. Don't. Work.
Harrison pushes back against the Diet Culture--the paradigm we have been sold that tells us there are good and bad foods, that weight is a moral and life-threatening issue, and if we don't look like some media ideal we are unloveable, ignorant, lazy, and dispensible.
Studies show that diets don't work, people gain the weight back, and in fact, diets seem to cause, not alleviate, health issues.
The bulk of the book traces our food attitudes through history and the rise of the diet culture and its human cost. Although well presented and interesting, I quickly read through this section--I'd come across it all before, in bits and pieces over 60 years. I was eager to get to her alternative.
Setting boundaries "might mean putting a moratorium on diet talk with your mother" set alarms off in my head! In my late 20s, when I had reached what I now know is my ideal weight, my mother fell into her old habit of saying, "you'd be...if only you lost weight." I shot back, "I like myself." "You like yourself fat?" she marveled. "I like who I am regardless of what weight I am." That night, Mom had a self-reckoning. She came to me in tears the next morning, apologetic, realizing she was imitating her own mother's behavior when she was growing up.
I also was glad to read Harrison's support of strength-building for all sizes as an alternative to blaming joint problems on weight alone. I keep up my cardio exercise of walking and am working with a fitness coach to improve muscle tone and balance. Thankfully, the fitness center is filled with older people like me and people of all body sizes. Sure, there are the buff men around and matchstick thin gals, but I don't stand out as much as I feared I would.
The idea of intuitive eating is simple. Listen to your body. My husband grew up with a dad who encouraged over-eating. He never developed a recognition to stop eating when he was full. It's his biggest challenge as an adult because he doesn't recognize 'full'.
She promotes the goal of "Health at Every Size" and liberation from an obsession on body size. Her mantra is "self-care, not self-control." Trying to control our body size is self-defeating, physically and mentally. But, she dismisses my FitBit and Lose-It app and fitness center visits and advises to just move.
Harrison quotes scads of scientific research. Still, I would love to read about specific and detailed case studies of how people like me, whose metabolism has been impacted by weight-loss diets over decades, can use this approach successfully.
I'll see what happens over the next year as I endeavor to not eat more than I burn while eating thoughtfully and working on strength and muscle building.
I made apple pies this week. There are no 'good' or 'bad' foods according to Harrison. But, boy, that pie was GOOD.
I was given access to a free egalley by the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review. -
This book blew me away. If you’ve ever struggled with your weight or body image, regardless of your size, you need to read this book. So that’s probably everyone. It’s well-researched, well-written, and here to take diet culture down.
Listen, my loves. It’s almost the beginning of a new year. I know so many of you are planning to go on a diet. Low carb, keto, paleo, intermittent fasting? Weight Watchers? A Whole30 “reset”? Whatever bullshit “it’s not a diet it��s a lifestyle change!” thing being sold to you in your feed right now? I know. I’ve done them all. And they all worked! Until they didn’t. They backfired. Every single one. I used to beat myself up. I said the meanest things to myself. But Christy Harrison is here, and she’s written a book with the science to back up what we’ve long suspected: diets don’t work. DIETS. DON’T. WORK.
Diets have a 95+% failure rate over 5 years. That’s peer-reviewed, scientific evidence, repeated in multiple studies. The diet industry makes $72 BILLION in the US alone every year. Could the industry make so much money if what they were selling actually WORKED? We’d all eat less, move more, be thin, the end. But the science proves that our bodies just don’t work that way. The industry makes money by telling you it’s YOUR fault when your biology kicks in and the latest diet eventually fails you, but fear not! They have just the thing! Download their app and sign up for only $9.99 a month! It’s not a diet this time, it’s a LIFESTYLE! 😡 No. It’s bullshit is what it is.
Go into 2020 being kinder to yourself. If you need to move more, move more. If your body is telling you you need more veggies and less pizza, listen to it. Take care of yourself and your health. Your body is wise and knows what it needs, certainly more than MyFitness Pal does. Let’s all stop listening to the cultural messages that say we must be thin at all costs, that we must be thin in order to be worthy of love and belonging. That’s just not true. You are worthy, just as you are. You deserve respect. You can be healthy and (gasp!) fat. Truly. Read this book and have a happy new year, and a much happier life. And fuck diet culture. There, I said it. -
Thoroughly researched and well-written, I hope this book gets a ton of readers. The historical context on dieting is fascinating and it's an eye-opener to realize that diets are pretty much guaranteed to fail, that only 2% of dieters succeed in keeping weight off. Dieters blame themselves of course when this happens, and this is exactly what the industry banks on. Format of this book makes it readable, with anecdotes and personal stories interspersed with information about the myriad of ways that the diet and "wellness" industries rob us of self-esteem, health, time, and money. The book doesn't stop at a mere expose though. Readers are given guidelines on how to eat intuitively and stop the diet treadmill, to extricate themselves from being a money-making machine for the diet industry.
Everyone should read this book. -
"But upwards of 90% of people who intentionally lose weight gain it back within five years."
This is one of the, if not the biggest reasons that people argue against dieting. But it's a shitty reason. Know why?
Because when many people reach their goal weight, they stop following the rules that enabled them to lose weight in the first place, and gain that weight back. It happened to me.
It wasn't the food's fault. It wasn't diet culture's fault. It was my own fault for making the mistake so many other people made, slacking off on the behaviors that helped me lose weight. So I had to work on losing weight again, and then maintaining most of the rules of my diet so I wouldn't have to worry about the weight coming back.
Maintaining healthy weight is a lifelong struggle/commitment. Not a fad or something you do on a temporary basis. So yes, being obsessed with diet culture is not healthy, but the word 'diet' is not a four-letter word as this book makes out. 'Intuitive eating' will never be as good as portion control and calorie/sugar/etc counting.
One of the worst things about this book is the fact that the author actually encourages people with food allergies to eat said foods, if they have a craving for said foods. Because your body is yours to do with as you wish, as the author says.
That is a dangerous and misleading statement. Technically, the author might be correct, but that doesn't mean your body will respond well to what you do with it, and there are some things you just should never do to your body regardless of cravings. Some people crave self-harm, doesn't mean they should do it.
Many parts of this book just come across as a rant, and a really long-winded one.
TLDR - this is not an actual health book. Do not read this book if you're serious about taking care of yourself. The "information" in this book is not only biased, it is misleading and even potentially LETHAL.
Yes, lethal. You could literally die if you followed the "advice" in this book.
Also, the author bitches a lot about diet culture, but says nothing about the damage caused by fast-food culture. So many HAES/Fat Acceptance proponents bitch about how the big, bad Diet Industry makes billions of dollars per year on diet fads, pills, etc etc. But the same people refuse to acknowledge that fast food/snack companies rake in FAR many more billions than the diet industry does. How many commercials do you see that shil for McDonald's and other fast/snack foods on a regular basis? TV, magazines, billboards, online advertising, etc etc. So the real problem here is not the bogeyman of 'diet culture', but HAES/the Fat Acceptance movement itself and the way they demonize anything that doesn't feed into their delusion of HAES, to the fucking point where obese people are told to fucking disregard their doctor's advice and their own obesity-related health issues in the name of so-called "body positivity" or ignore doctor-mandated diets in favor of "intuitive" eating.
ETA - There's another reason to avoid this book. Ragen Chastain - a HUGE (pun intended) FA/HAES advocate - praises this book. Review here
www.goodreads.com/review/show/3143076795
Ragen claims to be an expert researcher, which was proven more than once to be a lie. The fact that she says this book is well-researched shows the opposite. She REEEEES about so-called research bias when she skews all of her own "research" in favor of HAES/FA, ignoring the effects her shitty choices have on her body.
Ragen Chastain also calls herself an "elite" athlete despite all evidence pointing to the contrary, and has been caught in countless lies about her supposed health and exercise level. It's like having a heavy smoker shill for cigarettes saying that the cigarette is what is helping them with their health. Check out the 'Dances with Facts' blog which tracks the lies Ragen tells, or check out the r/ragenchastain sub on Reddit. -
To start, I read this both for myself, as well as for my clinical practice as a registered dietitian. For myself, as someone 10 years into recovery from my eating disorder. For my practice, as someone trying to learn more about HAES and intuitive eating to use with my long-term care patients. While there were many excellent points in this book and I loved the history of dieting/society’s ideals for bodies, the actual discussion of intuitive eating was lacking.
For a book about taking back your life by using intuitive eating, it lacked the practical steps needed to actually put it into practice. Instead, we hear the same arguments over and over again about how weight loss is never permanent, any form of dieting/lifestyle change is going to suck the soul out of you, and so on.
For the former....yes, when you’re on a diet, 98% of diets fail because you gain the weight you’ve lost back (and often then some) within 2 years. But when someone does a lifestyle change, weight loss can be permanent, and it’s very discouraging to hear how no matter what, it’ll fail. Yes, the scale isn’t indicative of your health status, and your body size shouldn’t dictate how you feel about yourself. But take for example myself-due to medical issues I’ve had, my husband and I were eating out 3-5 nights a week because of the fatigue I was experiencing. Now that I am able to cook more and eating out has become a once a week thing, I’m losing weight, simply because I don’t cook with as many rich ingredients as restaurants do. It’s inevitable I’m going to lose weight because our lifestyle has changed, and that’s okay. To hear over and over in this book that I’m going to gain all the weight back is discouraging and misleading.
As far as the idea that dieting or lifestyle changes will take so much out of your life-yes, many do. Keto/paleo/calorie tracking/etc. require an obsessive, all-consuming mindset. But there are times when “diets” (I use quotations, because I don’t like the connotation that comes with the word) are appropriate. When someone is a type 1 diabetic, being aware of their carb intake to dose insulin is a must. If you have congestive heart failure, being cognizant of your sodium intake to prevent fluid overload is very important. If you’ve just had a heart attack, being more mindful of your saturated fat intake is going to benefit you. You can do these things without obsessing or letting them control you, which I think the author doesn’t want to acknowledge.
Anti-Diet is on one end of the spectrum, diet culture is on the other; I wholeheartedly believe there is a happy middle ground where you can live life unchained to diet culture and obsession with what you eat or how much you weigh, while still making choices that help you live the healthiest life you can. -
My mind has been completely blown by Anti-Diet. I want to hug Christy Harrison, then go reread this book.
This was my first time reading a book about intuitive eating. I have followed some of the intuitive eating registered dietician (RD) community on instagram and even met with an intuitive eating RD earlier this year, but I still needed a primer like this. Intuitive eating involves letting go of the diet rules that control many of our lives, and learning to listen to your body and your mind to know when and what to eat. As Christy points out, this doesn’t just mean eating when you’re hungry and stopping when you’re full. It also includes eating cake at a birthday party, eating in preparation for a long meeting, etc.
This book is divided into two parts. In Part I: The Life Thief (aka diet culture), Christy reviews how weight has become such a big focus in our society, including the racist and misogynistic roots of the dieting industry, how the diet industry has morphed into the “Wellness Industry,” and how weight stigma and diet cycling have been shown to cause increased health problems (though weight itself has only proven to be correlated, not causative).
In Part II: Life Beyond Diet Culture, Christy discusses the philosophies of Intuitive Eating and Health at Every Size, and provides guidance for how you can heal from diet culture and change your habits. I found myself wanting exact rules and guidelines to follow, but I think that’s just because I’m so used to diet rules. I look forward to picking up books recommended at the end of the book to continue to learn more about these concepts.
I have already called multiple family members about this book, and I’m planning to gently put it in their hands as soon as it comes out. I like that Christy cites a lot of research, but still manages to make these concepts very accessible. My only hesitation with passing it on is Ms. Harrison’s colloquial language (using words like “literally” and “sec,” as well as cursing). This is pretty common in the self-help industry these days, but I worry that it may make it a little more challenging to get people entrenched in the diet industry to trust the author and her research.
One side note: I really appreciated that Christy did not use veganism as an example in the book. Many people, myself included, are vegans for environmental and ethical reasons rather than weight-related ones.
Thank you to NetGalley and Little, Brown Spark for the free advanced copy in exchange for my honest review! -
This book is very well researched, and I appreciated the extensive footnotes to use in future arguments with “weight loss is healthy” friends. I highlighted so many passages, and have been sharing quotes on Instagram right and left.
I wish I’d had the info in this book when I was 15, before I started down the road of roller coaster weight loss and gain, over exercise, and disordered eating. I felt like a failure for 25 years before I finally sought therapy for my “binge eating” (which was in reality higher weight anorexia). -
It’s taken me 42 years to get here, but I’m ready to join Christy Harrison and the HAES/anti-diet community in burning diet culture to the ground!
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I think the general message of the book is a necessary and helpful one, but she sacrifices historical accuracy and scientific rigor to get there. First off, we did not just now start restricting food. As long as human society has been around, we've had food taboos and diets. It is by no means a purely American phenomenon that started with diet gurus. Also, she overplays the part about how diet culture is associated with racism--she blamed pseudo racial science on Charles Darwin, which is really confusing because that's just not at all true. She seems to have a grand theory and wants to make history fit into it. Also, she just dismisses any health and weight concerns, which I understand might be essential for people who are food obsessed or are disordered eaters, but also, my great aunts and great grandmothers who were not American or dieters have always linked food to health. That's just really obvious. Not diet foods, but healthy foods. She seems to want to push back against the distinction between "good" and "bad" foods and say that's all diet culture. But it's not. Everyone knows that it's better for your body to have a real dinner (whatever that is) than have a box of oreos and a pack of beer for dinner. I don't think it is "diet culture" that makes us feel that it's a mistake to eat the latter day after day. It is not diet culture, but our blood pressure and cholesterol that requires we cut out certain things from our diet.
I understand the core message of the book and wholeheartedly agree--we have fat stigma and that should stop. "wellness" and "clean eating" and all the other stuff are just the new face of the old diet and it does lead people to become obsessed. Also, all of us are built to come in different sizes and people can be big and perfectly healthy and yet our culture pushes people to think of the thin body as ideal. These are all true and I think counselors should be out there helping people who do not feel good about themselves or their bodies with just this sort of book, but you don't need to twist history and science to make this claim. -
This book is extraordinary. Thoroughly researched, and also inclusive of the personal stories that research biases can leave out, Anti-diet is packed with the answers to all the questions people have about diet culture and intuitive eating, and serves as an expose on the industries that create harmful myths around size, health, and fitness, and then prey on their victims for profit. This book provides such clarity, and reading it is felt like coming up for air!
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I used to work with a woman who was perpetually trying a new diet and who wanted to try each fad device that came along. I finally told her that if they actually worked, they wouldn't be relegated to small ads in the back of magazines, they would be trumpeted on the cover of Time magazine. I doubt she paid much attention to me as she was very caught up in her magical thinking. I should know, I've spent years of my life pursuing the goal of weight loss. If losing weight was easy, trust me, no one would be fat.
We've all heard the news that diets don't work. In fact dieting seems to be the best way to gain weight, as you mess with your metabolism, slowing it down. Our bodies are very good at maintaining energy balance if left alone. I speak as someone who has dieted, on and off, since I was about 11 years old. The sad thing is that I look back at photos of myself back then and I realize that I was far from fat. However, I often couldn't find clothing to fit my body and ended up wearing women's sizes much earlier than I was comfortable with. Instead of blaming the clothing manufacturers, I blamed my body. Things are much different today, although its still more difficult to find plus-sized clothing that I actually like.
We are unaware that we are surrounded by Diet Culture just as fish are surrounded by water. The weight loss industry has realized that dieting has been discredited and they have changed to “lifestyles" and “healthy living.” Since I've been reading this book, I've really become aware of how bombarded we are by exhortations to eat healthily. Which would be okay if it wasn't designed to drive us into the arms of the weight loss industry.
Does this mean that I will abandon spinach and beans in favour of soda and chips? Absolutely not! The health benefits of real food are not limited to the weight issues. We need vitamins, minerals, and fiber to maintain our bodies and psychological health. However, I'll continue to insist on tasty, satisfying food. I decided long ago not to eat anything that I don't like, no matter how healthy it is reputed to be (I'm looking at you, kale).
Although the book doesn't discuss this, it seems to me that there is a strong push in our society, urging women to be perfect: thin through a perfect diet & exercise plan, contributing perfectly at work, raising the happiest, healthiest children, maintaining a perfect house-beautiful living space. No wonder so many women are so bloody tired!
And just as a final note, I have a cousin who is an artist and sometimes when we spend time together she asks if she can draw me. I've always felt a bit awkward about this and finally told her so. She said the most wonderful thing: “I like drawing you, you're comfortable in your body.”
Cross posted at my blog:
https://wanda-thenextfifty.blogspot.c...
With my cousin's permission:
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A social justice warrior writes a book on dieting! You'll learn the very concept of dieting is racist; saying there is an unhealthy weight is racist; saying weight can negatively impact health is racist, saying that eating nothing but McDonald's isn't good for one's health is racist; saying it is best if you eat whole foods and veggies is racist; saying one should practice moderation and self-control is racist and of course, it is the patriarchy--those loathsome straight white males who are behind all of these evil and nefarious concepts.
You will learn that there is nothing unhealthy about being 400lbs, no evidence at all there is anything unhealthy about being "obese" (notice the scare quotes please), the only reason why there is a correlation (which, remember, isn't proof of causation) of being overweight and multitudes of illnesses, is because of the weight stigma, fat-shaming, cultural discrimination from those apart of the racist diet culture. THESE things alone CAUSE all the health problems correlated with being overweight, so embrace your weight! Eat junk food all you want, and rage and show your righteous anger against all who are part of the diet culture, they are the THEM, the other, they are the enemy, so hate, rage FIGHT them, don't back down, they're nazis!!! They've ruined your life, they've caused all your problems, so be furious and outraged!
But do remember you cannot fraternize with the enemy, you should feel shame for wanting to lose weight, you should feel shame for not being comfortable in your body. Yes, SHAME ON YOU for wanting to eat healthily! Ugg... you better feel guilty for practicing self-control! Have no part with the enemy, embrace the fat, there is nothing you can do to lose weight, it is impossible to keep off the pounds, so grab the potato chips, eat the entire carton of ice-cream, eat until you throw up and then eat some more, and keep raging against those racist nazis that dare to say otherwise! Those racist white men mustn't be allowed oppress us. Unite against them, unite feminist, unite!!!! -
This subject is very important for everyone to hear and I was glad to read more about it. It has helped me become more mindful about the dangers of diet culture, and for that I am grateful. However, I did find quite a few inconveniences.
The general message of this book is as necessary as it is helpful, but the author sacrifices scientific rigor to get there. For example, when she mentions Social Darwinism (without name it as such), she blatantly criticizes Charles Darwin for this school of thought. However, Charles Darwin never endorsed this movement, not did he believe it should ever be applied to humans.
The arguments felt forceful and almost like preaching (dogmatic even). There is definitely a willingness to convince the reader to “burn the diet culture to the ground”, and while I do understand and agree with the importance of that, it felt like I was attending a cult meeting.
I don’t think this subject should be reduced to an all-or-nothing type of reasoning, and the author forcefully attempts to push this way of thinking to the reader. I think that there is a middle ground wherein lies a more unbiased truth to this complex matter.
The title of the book is also very misleading as this is not at all a book about intuitive eating. The author barely presents what intuitive eating is (maybe one or two pages?). The bulk of the book is mostly a rant where the same arguments are repeated throughout the pages. -
It's hard to put into words how much I LOVED this book. I'm so glad I pre-ordered it instead of getting it from the library. It's highlighted and underlined all over and I know there are so many things I will go back to in the future and re-read and will lend it to friends. I already feel more confident as I read the book to share with my friends and family the anti-diet message. It's so validating and freeing to be able to recognize diet culture and how it influences our body image and mental and physical wellbeing and actively decide to not allow it to cause us any more harm. I love that the book explicity addresses concerns on sugar, nutrition, and exercise as well as the 'food-activist movement' (as a person who has read several Michael Pollan books this was very intriguing and surprising). I also love how she frames diet-culture as being rooted in white supremacy, patriarchy, elitism and colonization. It truly is a social justice issue.
She also has a lot of actionable steps which I appreciate! 10/10 recommend to anyone who has ever gone on a diet/"cleanse"/"lifestyle change", felt bad about their body size, judged others as unhealthy or healthy due to their weight, obsessed about which foods are "good" or "bad", done extremely intense exercise in a self-punishing way to "make up" for what you ate earlier in the day. Thank you Christy Harrison!!! -
Christy is such a great researcher and writer. She has written a book that is so important in the intense diet culture we live in. I'm so grateful for this work and will be recommending it often. It's a very fun read with stories and the way it is organized. Read it in full, you will learn so much. I did! Even if you listen to her podcast Food Psych, this book is overflowing with more information and anecdotes that i did not know even though I feel pretty knowledgeable on the subject from years of listening to her podcast. I learned so much new information that I keep sharing in conversation. Trust me, buy it for yourself, buy it for everyone you know! I loved every ounce.
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As someone in the field of eating disorder recovery, body trust, healing, and sexuality, I adored this book. Despite being a certified provider and activist who has read many books and studies around health, diets, and wellness, there was so much to soak up and learn here.
It's a fantastic look at the historical context of diet culture and it's ties to other systems of oppression, and Christy drives home at regular intervals how the problem is NOT our bodies but instead the culture we are swimming inside of.
While some readers have commented that they found it repetitive, as someone who works with people that are struggling to prioritize joy, pleasure, healing, and self-compassion, repetitive and regular reminders of your value, worth, and inherent wisdom are a big part of the journey.
Part 1 is a deep dive into medical studies that debunk nearly all of the pop culture and fatphobic "wisdom" around diets, weight, and bodies. Part 2 offers a way forward and gives all of us tools for learning how to begin the practice of finding peace with ourselves, our food, and our lives.
I will be recommending this book to nearly all of my clients and certainly all of my friends and family. It's a rich addition to an ever-growing field and I'm excited at the lengths Christy went to to make the language inclusive and to not shy away from difficult and big topics.
I will say that for people who are still deeply embedded in diet culture (especially people who profit off of encouraging others to lose weight or "get fit"), this book may feel tremendously unsettling and threatening. It is a destabilizing read and that is exactly why I think it's so important.
If you find yourself struggling with shame or defensiveness, reach out to a Health at Every Size informed therapist or provider for support. There is so much pleasure and joy to be found when we begin trusting our bodies and healing our trauma. -
“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, we need to burn diet culture to the ground.”
I think this quote sums us what Christy Harrison aims to do throughout this book and in her work in the anti-diet space. Ms. Harrison teaches us so much in this important book that it is difficult to summarize in a review. We learn about the history of diet culture, and how it has gained attention over the decades. We learn about important concepts such as intuitive eating and Health at Every Size. We learn about the importance of community and social justice around body acceptance and liberation. We learn that health is not a moral obligation and that weight is not a determinant of our health outcomes, as many would have us believe. We learn how to support others and ourselves on this journey to freedom from the chains of The Life Thief (aka diet culture).
I highly recommend this book to anyone who has ever questioned why intentional weight loss rarely works or has been stigmatized for their body size or shape. Honestly, it will open your mind and make you mad all at the same time. But then there is a peace that comes where you feel heard and seen. I loved everything about this book, well except the dig at baths :) I appreciated the footnote but I stand firm on my stance as a bubble bath lover :) .
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the advanced copy of this wonderful book. -
Not surprisingly, I have a lot of mixed feelings on this book. Let's see if I can write something coherent.
First, I think the core message of the book is great and awesome and important. As somebody who's lost a significant amount of weight and managed to keep it off (so far) for about two years, I related to a lot of the disordered behavior in the book, which is part of why I sought it out. I think, at its core, the messaging is good, and it gave me a lot of food for though and things to think about and work towards. But there were a lot of sweeping generalizations throughout, and also a lot of minimizing or misconstruing of things that I don't *actually* think she needed to misconstrue to make her point.
1. A lot of the way she talks about people who have lost weight rubbed me the wrong way, because it seemed to paint everybody with the same brush. She even goes off on exercise, which I understand her point, but some people just actually enjoy planned exercise, and shouldn't have to feel bad if they get genuine release and enjoyment from lifting weights. It was frustrating to have this generalization of "everybody who is doing X behavior often associated with diet culture is ONLY doing it because of diet culture and they should give it up and be happier." It made me feel less open to her points because it felt like she left no room for people having a variety of interests, and also came across as quite condescending, like she was an enlightened being and all of us doing exercise are foolish hamsters.
2. I totally get her argument on "clean" eating and wellness culture, I'm on board. BUT I really think there could have been room for her to mention that some people (like me) try to mostly eat unprocessed, locally grown food from a sustainability and waste-reduction standpoint, not because they think it's more nutritionally virtuous. The shit happening to our planet is kind of a big deal and, again, painting everybody who eats minimally processed foods with the diet-culture brush did seem like it was completely ignoring a different and valid reason for doing so. Similar, NO mention of people who eat vegetarian or vegan from an ethical standpoint, and that felt really conspicuous in a book all about what you eat.
3. She did, eventually, at the very end, in a very short section, touch upon the privilege of weaning yourself from diet culture and going all in, but it didn't quite satisfy. That's great that you think we should eat until satiated and let our bodies settle into whatever size they want, but not everybody can afford to 1. buy all that food and 2. buy new clothes to accommodate size fluctuations.
4. She spends a lot of time saying that there's no really good evidence that higher weights *cause* poor health outcomes, and I just... don't buy it. I understood her arguments, and I don't think they're non-existent, but I think they're super fucking flimsy, and it weakens the book overall. Because as she also says throughout, being healthy isn't a moral imperative. Being less healthy doesn't make you a worse person or less deserving of all the good things. And I absolutely believe that the other non-weight risk factors heavily contribute to those poor health outcomes, but so does weight.
5. As somebody who has lost a lot of weight after spending my entire life super fat, I found it a bit offensive that she seemed to think there was no good reason to lose weight? My health (the thing she said my weight wasn't affecting) increased, my diabetes went away (the disease that has severely negatively impacted my mother's quality of life) and I can physically do the things I've always wanted to be able to do. And no, I couldn't fucking do them when I was 350lbs, I fucking tried. Yes, I was absolutely influence by our culture of anti-fatness, but I was also influenced by health and mobility. She says that our bodies will naturally reach a set point after eating intuitively and not dieting for years. Here's the thing. Before losing my weight, I didn't diet for 10+ years. truly, legitimately, I didn't diet, I didn't restrict. In some ways, yes, my relationship with food was better than it is now, which is something i want to work on. But are you telling my my natural body weight should be 350lbs? Because I cannot believe that.
6. The above points were particularly hard for me to stomach coming from somebody who has possessed thin privilege their entire life. Which doesn't invalidate her experiences or her point of view. But I've been fat, spent most of my life fat, and, frankly, I don't want to to hear some thin white lady telling me to not diet because losing weight is impossible and just accept where your body ends up. When your body has a set weight that falls within the "normal" BMI range, I have a really fucking hard time hearing you tell me that I should just learn how to be happy fat.
UGH, see, this makes it sound like I hated the book , and I didn't! As I said, the core message of the book is great and important, but it was really hard for me to get past some of this sticking points. -
This should be required reading. For someone who is science-hungry like me, this book ticked all of the boxes. There are extensively cited sources, and the author really breaks down the problems with much of the science around dieting and weight loss (such as poorly structured studies, compromised scientists, incomplete understanding of results, and more). I found this to be strongly based in reality, fact, and science, and as a former journalist, Harrison really goes full investigative reporter. And this is NECESSARY, because it is extremely hard for even believers of the anti-diet movement and Health at Every Size to get past conventional wisdom and what we've been told for years and years. You really need a powerful set of facts to get past the concept of "high weight = unhealthy," and I felt Harrison accomplished that.
The book focuses on dismantling diet culture - the Life Thief - and nicely ties in a lot of concepts along the way, including that weight stigma actually harms your health more than your weight, and the fallibility of so much of the generally accepted science. Harrison also devotes several chapters to the concept of "OK, I no longer believe in diets - now what do I do?", which I also found extremely helpful and necessary, because it can be really hard to live rule-free around food, activity, and body image when you are used to structure and rules for decades and decades.
I found this book to be an emotional read because of my own history and ongoing recovery, but felt very empowered, satisfied, and inspired. It's well-written, well-researched, and well-intended, and I'm so glad I read it! I'd highly recommend it for anyone wanting to learn more about anti-dieting, Health at Every Size, or because you just want more science and knowledge. -
Ya’ll I CANNOT recommend this book enough! I have recently become interested in the anti-diet movement but I was curious to learn more and this book was the perfect place to do that.
I love how Christy Harrison uses a social justice lens to explore diet culture. I was very impressed and happy to see that she included transgender and nonconforming folks in the conversation as well.
A large part of this book that really resonated with me was Harrison’s argument against the privileged and controlling aspects of the “clean eating, non-processed movement” because I have fallen prey to that before. I personally believe that clean eating and being mindful of processed foods is okay in moderation but for so many it becomes another form of a diet that can take over one’s life.
Anyways, I could go on and on. Highly recommend this book, will probably be my favorite book of the year. I recommended everyone read it and that we spread the word as much as we can! -
If is time to reclaim your time and energy and kick the Life Thief to the curb! Who is the Life Thief? Diet culture. The messages that your body isn't small enough; that weight and being healthy are linked (fact check: they are NOT); and the disconnect too many of us are experiencing from living truly present and full lives. I admire Christy Harrison greatly. She incorporates immense research that dismantles many of the claims from the health and "wellness" industry. She speaks to the social justice aspect of dismantling diet culture. Other thought leaders in HAES and body liberation share their own personal journeys into intuitive eating and breaking free from a life of disordered eating. I cannot recommend this book enough to anyone who has felt that they needed to lose weight, exercise in a certain way, or harbors fatphobic beliefs. Which, sadly, is most of us.
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4.0 Stars
A great holistic health book that dissects the toxic nature of diet culture, while introducing the basics of intuitive eating and HAES. -
A true revelation! If you have ever been on a diet/wanted to be on a diet/tried to implement a “lifestyle change”/thought there was something wrong with you because you couldn’t make your body smaller...which is to say all of us...then I highly recommend. I wish everyone would read this book, especially the history behind diet culture, which shows quite clearly the oppressive beginnings of “The Life Thief” as Harrison calls it. You get an in depth look at the forms diet culture has taken to steal our time, money, mental space, happiness, etc. etc. constantly evolving to make you feel like YOU are the problem. If you are passionate in the slightest about fighting inequality in its various forms or fighting for social justice, this book will spark anger and rage (in the best way possible). I think this book would be helpful to all genders, but especially to women, who are inundated with body shaming messages every minute of every day. To quote the book “it’s hard to smash the patriarchy on an empty stomach”.
All of us likely have a long way to go to heal from diet culture, but no matter where you are in tour journey, this book is an excellent resource in recovery. -
I think this book is going to be a game changer for me. The concepts presented in this book make perfect sense. Restriction and deprivation -- as tools to lose weight -- just don't work. I've been on some sort of diet since I was 5 or 6 -- once my pediatrician told my mom I was too heavy for my height (height/weight chart) I was basically told not to eat. Diet culture was introduced to me very early. But this year I said no more -- I just can't go on another diet only to binge and sneak all the foods I tell myself I can't eat. I'm not going to lie, unlearning diet culture seems like a daunting task -- it's ingrained in everything I do. But I'm going to work at it one thought at a time.
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This book is so culturally important!!!!! I cannot stress that enough. Harrison combines a myriad of scientific evidence, anecdotal evidence from herself, clients, and others in the field, and common sense into the masterpiece of Anti-Diet. This is information everyone needs to have, and I wish I had learned much earlier in my life. If you’ve ever “failed” on a diet, been not okay with your body, been told to lose weight instead of given real medical treatment, or just care strongly about social justice- read this!
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Christy is dropping a lot of truth bombs in this book, but what I appreciate the most is how compassionate and respectful to the reader she is. I felt cared for while reading this book; the validation she provides is a really important tool to recovering from immersion in toxic diet culture. She is shining a light on the dark origins of diet culture (racism, patriarchy). So grateful for the work she is doing to burn diet culture to the ground.
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Доста провокативна книга. В смисъл, буквално прави на пух и прах всичко, което досега си чувал и приемал като истина относно размерите на телата ни. Мисля, че доста хора биха намерили книгата дори радикална, тъй като наистина обръща всичко що знаеш за света с главата нагоре. Обаче връщане назад няма.
Още не знам как се чувствам относно всичко, което се изсипа отгоре ми и прочетох, но едно знам - няма връщане назад, определено. От първите страници, започнах да забелязвам наистина как елементарни неща около мен са направени да служат определен стандартен размер, който всички знаем, че не съществува. Отиваш до магазина за дънки и си тръгваш, чувствайки се отвратително, че нищо не ти е станало, независимо какъв размер си, просто защото дънките са направени за несъществуваща жена. Всякакви такива малки неща се прокрадват в съзнанието ми и унищожават всичко, в което досега съм вярвала. Не мога да спра да виждам как светът ни наистина е подчинен на диетичната култура и колко грешно е това. Просто не можеш да спреш да виждаш тези неща, след като един път някой ти ги е показвал, че са около теб и са грешни в основата си.
Няма и да крия обаче, звучи отчайващо да не може да се промениш. Цялото ти съществуване се крепи на идеята, че промяната е възможна и накрая някой ти сервира, че за съжаление не е така и по-добре не си губи времето и парите. Мда... ще ми трябва известно време да си поскърбя.
Книгата е безспорно интересна и различна. Отваря нов свят пред теб, но дали си готов за него, е друга тема на разговор. Това, което ме дразнеше адски много и заради, което си взех звездички беше:
Първо, твърде политически коректна беше в писането си авторката, а аз не си падам по тези неща, тъй като е излишно изхабено мастило и мозъчна енергия да си завъртиш мозъка какво се опитват да ти кажат. Концепцията беше достатъчно трудна за прегълтане сама по-себе си, че да бъде утежнена с "правилното" и "модерно" изразяване.
Второ, авторката е журналист, но книгата се чувстваше твърде натъпкана, препълнена и тежка като текст. Повтаряше се толкова много на места, че ми се губеха редове.
По-добро писане със сигурност щеше да помогне на тази книга да бъде по-добра, както и по-малко политическа коректност.
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