Imagine you’ve experienced something powerful – something wonderful, tragic, challenging, or transcendent. Something that has profoundly affected and shaped the course of your life. Now imagine being told your experience was wrong. You didn’t do it right, what you say happened (and how you felt about it) wasn’t true. You’re probably lying to the world and to yourself about your experience.
Ridiculous, right? You probably have a tough time imagining telling someone that their experience wasn’t valid, wasn’t right. After all, you didn’t experience it, they did. Sadly, when it comes to our bodies, we are told all the time that our experiences aren’t valid.
I wear a 5 1/2. Wanna try them on?
Here’s an example of what I mean. The other day I kind of got into it with a guy on Twitter. I was following him because his Twitter handle made it seem like he was all about health, but it turns out, he was mostly about skinny. What caught my eye was a list he wrote: He said that if people would follow this list of suggestions, they would no longer be fat. It probably won’t surprise you to know that I was already doing all the things on his list. Of course I had to engage him in a discussion about it. He’s a personal trainer, and the thought of him fat shaming clients because he refuses to believe their experiences sent me into a bit of a tizzy.
I started by asking him what he says to people who are already following his suggestions, but are still fat. He countered by saying only a very small percentage of people have “genetic abnormalities” that cause them to be fat, such as Prader-Willi Syndrome (if you’re unfamiliar, this is a genetic disorder that, among other things, is “frequently associated with an extreme and insatiable appetite, often resulting in morbid obesity.” Ah, yes, the ol’ gem about how fat people are all just eating too much! At this point, my head exploded and I nearly abandoned the conversation. But I’m a glutton for punishment, so I soldiered on.
I told him that I work out 5-6 days a week, watch what I eat, and am still fat. He went on to say that there were several reasons why people are fat that can be overcome, such as “hormones, allergies, depression, etc.” Finally, I said: “Well, that statement pretty much invalidates my lived experience.”
And that’s the kicker: Why is it that so many “professionals” – doctors, nurses, dietitians, personal trainers, etc. – who have never been fat consider themselves experts on my body? Oh, sure, there are the Jillian Michaels “I was a fat teenager” stories (with only one photo to prove it), but how many “experts” have ever struggled to lose 50, 100, 200 pounds? How many of them have spent their entire lives yo-yo dieting, physically punishing themselves, even going under the knife in pursuit of thinness? Bob Harper and this guy on Twitter and even Dr. Oz have absolutely zero understanding of my body and what I do with it. You can have a medical degree and extensive understanding of how the human body is supposed to work, but why should that trump what I have experienced by, you know, living in my actual body?
Maybe I just hallucinated these medals!
When a thin person tells me to “just” eat this or stop eating that, to “just” burn more than I eat, to “just” do this or that workout, they are – like my Twitter pal – invalidating my lived experience. They are not with me when I step into the gym or the pool. They are not with me when I train for and complete a half marathon. They do not sit with me for every meal. And yet they are sure I am doing something (or many things) wrong, because otherwise I would obviously be thin, like them.
How about we all stop making assumptions about each other’s bodies? How about we start respecting each other’s lived experiences? Either that, or you can slip on your swimsuit and lace up your trainers, and stop by the gym. I’ll be there.
