Who taught you to dislike your body? And when did we start believing that our weight determines our worth? In Part 1 of this conversation on PCOS Unfiltered: Nourish, Heal, Thrive, I'm joined by Paula D. Atkinson, a liberation psychotherapist, educator, and advocate for body acceptance who has spent more than 15 years helping people navigate disordered eating, food obsession, exercise addiction, and body dissatisfaction. Paula brings a fascinating perspective to a conversation so many women need to hear: Where did diet culture come from, and why have we been taught to distrust our own bodies? Together, we explore the history of dieting, society's obsession with thinness, and how generations of weight-loss messaging have shaped our beliefs about food, health, and what our bodies should look like. From the rise of commercial dieting and Weight Watchers to calorie counting, BMI, and today's weight-loss medications, we discuss how cultural standards have influenced the way women see themselves. We also question something that often goes unchallenged: Why do we continue to measure health, success, and even self-worth by the number on a scale? For women navigating PCOS/PMOS, weight concerns, and years of being told to eat less, exercise more, or try another diet, this conversation offers an opportunity to look at those messages differently. Because what if the way you've learned to think about your body didn't actually start with you? What if learning to trust your body begins with questioning what you've been taught about it?
Listening is a great place to start, but lasting change happens when you begin putting these ideas into practice.
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This week, I want you to get curious about ONE belief you have about your body, your weight, or the foods you eat.
Maybe it's:
❤️ Believing you need to lose weight before you can feel confident
❤️ Feeling guilty after eating certain foods
❤️ Thinking you have to earn your food through exercise
❤️ Believing the number on the scale determines whether you're healthy
❤️ Comparing your body to what you see on social media
❤️ Feeling like you've failed when you can't stick to a diet
❤️ Thinking your body needs to look a certain way to be accepted
Instead of judging yourself for having these thoughts, I want you to ask:
Where did I learn this belief?
Was it something you heard growing up?
Something you saw in magazines or advertisements?
A comment from someone you trusted?
Or perhaps a message you've heard so many times that it eventually became your own?
Then ask yourself:
Is this belief actually helping me care for my body?
You don't have to change everything today.
Paula D. Atkinson is a liberation psychotherapist, educator, and advocate for body acceptance who has spent more than 15 years working with individuals experiencing disordered eating, food obsession, exercise addiction, and body dissatisfaction.
As a former professor of Weight & Society at George Washington University, Paula developed and taught a course exploring the history of fatphobia and society's cultural preference for thinness.
Her work focuses on challenging harmful cultural beliefs about food, weight, and body image while helping individuals and organizations create more compassionate approaches to body acceptance.
Paula also trains healthcare professionals, clinics, and organizations on reducing weight stigma and harm in a weight-focused culture.
Her perspectives have been featured on NPR, numerous podcasts, and in national publications. She also appeared on Jubilee Media's Surrounded: 1 Health Expert vs. 20 Body Positivity Activists, participating in a conversation about body justice alongside Jillian Michaels.
Want to learn more about Paula and her work?
🌐 Website:
http://pauladatkinson.com/
🔗 Connect with Paula:
https://linktr.ee/pauladatkinson
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❤️ Share this episode with someone who feels stuck or is ready for a fresh perspective.
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Remember:
Your life isn't determined by your past, your diagnosis, or your circumstances. The stories you believe shape the choices you make—and every new choice is an opportunity to create a different future.
⚠️ Podcast Disclaimer
This podcast is for informational and educational purposes only and is not intended as medical advice. Always consult with a qualified healthcare professional before making any changes to your health routine.
(0:00) Millions of people fell asleep in a normal-sized body and woke up the next (0:05) day in an obese body because they changed the metrics based again on the (0:10) BMI which is nonsense but you know changed the metrics and again call me a (0:14) conspiracy theorist but also on that day a new there were several new weight loss (0:22) drugs that came on the market that you could get coverage for if you were obese (0:27) that you couldn't get coverage for if you were in a normal body whatever any (0:32) of that means because none of that's real that's sort of when that all (0:35) happened and then it was more and more of these companies buying up you know I (0:39) love to remind people that like the same company owns Duncan Hines Ben and Jerry's (0:44) and Jenny Craig. Welcome back to PCOS unfiltered where we help you understand (0:50) what your body has been trying to tell you all along. I'm your host Lindsey (0:54) nurse-turned-health coach two-time author and your body wisdom guide.(0:59) Today's conversation is a little different from some of the (1:02) conversations we've had here and I think it's going to make you look at dieting (1:06) weight and maybe even some of your own beliefs about your body in a completely (1:10) different way. My guest is Paula Atkinson a psychotherapist who has spent more (1:16) than 15 years working with people struggling with disordered eating food (1:20) obsession exercise addiction and body hatred. Paula has also taught university (1:26) level coursework exploring the history of fat phobia, diet culture, and society's (1:31) relationship with body size and she trains professionals and organizations on (1:37) creating more body inclusive approaches to health and care.And today we're (1:41) pulling back the curtain on something many of us have probably never stopped (1:44) to ask where did all these rules about our bodies actually come from? We go back (1:50) through the history of dieting from some of the earliest diet trends to (1:54) Weight Watchers, calorie counting, low-fat diets, Atkins, keto, all the way to today's (2:00) GLP-1 era. But underneath all of that is a much bigger conversation about what (2:06) happens when we spend years believing that someone or something outside of us (2:12) knows our bodies better than we do. And I think that's where this conversation (2:15) connects so strongly with body wisdom.Because maybe instead of constantly asking (2:21) how do I make my body look different we can begin asking how do I actually feel (2:26) living in this body? What does it need? And how can I support it instead of (2:31) constantly trying to control it? You may agree with some of what you hear today, (2:36) you may disagree with some of it, and some of Paula's perspectives challenge (2:40) conventional approaches to weight and health. I encourage you to listen with (2:43) curiosity, ask questions, and continue making your own informed decisions with (2:48) qualified healthcare professionals. And if these are the kinds of conversations (2:52) you've been craving, I'd love to have you inside my free Healthy Ever After (2:57) community where we continue exploring nutrition, body wisdom, nervous system (3:01) support, and sustainable health without another list of impossible rules.You'll (3:05) find a link to join in the show notes. As always, this podcast is intended for (3:09) educational and informational purposes only and shouldn't be considered medical (3:13) advice. Now go ahead, grab your favorite beverage, get comfortable, and let's dive (3:18) in.Here is my conversation with Paula Atkinson. (3:27) Hello and welcome. Welcome back to the show and welcome to Paula.I am super (3:35) super excited to dive into this. This is, I think, something unique for this show. (3:41) You know, I feel like there's always some overlapping things with different (3:46) guests, but this, I think, it's gonna be in its own little world.So welcome. Thank (3:53) you. So we want to talk about the history of dieting.Yeah. And, oh my gosh, I mean, (4:03) even thinking back to my personal experiences and just, you know, even (4:08) around my current messaging, right? Like, yes, we don't need to diet. Like, when did (4:12) it get so complicated? Right.You know, and I think for women with PCOS. Yes. EMOS.(4:20) No, I'm still using those interchangeably, but it's, yeah, there's so many things out (4:26) there that they see, you know, do this diet, try this supplement, do this thing, (4:31) whatever, whatever the latest craze is. Yeah. So let's just kind of start, I guess, (4:38) from the beginning.Okay. I mean, you're gonna have to rate. I taught a college, (4:43) you know, I created and then taught a university course on this.Yeah. So you're gonna have to (4:48) rein me in or shut me down or shut me up at some point. Because I could talk about this forever.(4:54) Yeah. I'm so grateful to be here. I have, I work mostly with, you know, a body liberation (5:01) therapist.So I work mostly with people who have been in larger bodies, are currently in larger (5:07) bodies. And of course, a lot of my clients are, you know, AFAB people who have been diagnosed. (5:13) I have so many clients who didn't know they had PCOS, didn't know they had PMOS until I was like, (5:20) have you ever gotten your hormones? You know? And so for them to get diagnosed and then go through (5:28) the journey of metformin or not metformin, GLP-1s or not GLP-1, like all of these things.(5:33) Birth control. Yeah. All the things.Right. I've been on birth control since I was 10. (5:38) Should I be off birth control? All of the things.So yeah, I'm grateful to be here and to (5:44) talk to this specific population. I mean, I love the question, when did it get so complicated? That (5:50) is a really, I think that's a more brilliant question than you think, Lindsay, because (5:56) one of the things I say to my clients a lot is like, you know, what would your great, great, (6:00) great grandmother say to do? Like, what would she tell you to eat? What would she tell you to do? (6:06) She'd probably say like, go to bed, like drink some water, have a piece of toast and go to bed, (6:12) which is probably what we should all be doing. But yeah, so I teach a course called, or I used (6:18) to, I don't teach anymore, but I created a course called Weight and Society.And my favorite class (6:24) that I taught, the favorite day of school was the history of diets class. So, you know, you may, (6:31) it may not be surprising to you or your listeners that it got really complicated when people realized (6:36) they could make money off of making it really complicated. Shocking.Shocking. (6:42) The light bulbs are like flashing, right? Yeah. So it was about, you know, it was the late 1800s, (6:50) and this is the intersection of capitalism and fat phobia and white supremacy and colonialism and (6:57) all the things that, and patriarchy and all the things that I'm yelling about all the time.But, (7:03) you know, when we started getting women's magazines and specifically in the United States, (7:11) when, you know, a lot of people who were the descendants of enslaved people were moving north (7:18) and were being in the north, it became very important for white people, racist white people, (7:28) to be able to distinguish themselves, people of purely European descent, to distinguish themselves (7:35) from people who, their skin may not look like they were of African descent, but a lot of times in (7:41) their body shape, we could tell whether or not they were, you know, purely, right, and this is the (7:46) eugenics, this is the influence of eugenics in the late 1700s, early 1800s into now, into, (7:54) you know, and we're still dealing with it, right? So a lot of the magazines that were happening in (7:59) the United States were being fashioned after the magazine, the women's magazines for rich white (8:06) ladies in France. And a lot of, so a lot of the same messaging of like, you should be eating as (8:13) little as possible, you should be being as slim as possible, such that European suitors can (8:21) distinguish whether or not there is any, you know, any enslaved people in your ancestry, right? (8:30) This is why I'm always screaming about how fatphobia is white supremacy, it is racism. (8:37) And so from there, and then the Industrial Revolution, and then, bam, early 1900s, (8:44) specifically the 1920s, we talk about a lot, you know, is when we start, there's more and (8:50) more advertisements, there's more and more magazines, there's more, there's theater, (8:55) there's places where people are going, people are traveling a lot more, they're not just like (8:59) living in their own little villages and, you know, generations upon generations of people in (9:03) their same little town.And that's when we start realizing that, or people start realizing they can (9:11) make money off of convincing people that people have 100% control over their body shape 100% of (9:19) the time, which you and I know is absolutely false, and is scientifically false. But they (9:25) have convinced us of that. And so we've been doing this for about, for a little over 100 years, this (9:31) whole diet cycle, the next new diet, the next thing that's going to make some rich white man (9:36) even richer, by convincing us that we should be controlling our body shape.(9:43) Yeah, I guess I didn't realize, like, you know, you're saying like 100 years, I was thinking more (9:47) like the 80s, I think, maybe 70s, 80s, I guess I was thinking. (9:55) No, it's been happening a lot. In fact, I wish I mean, I have a whole slideshow I can (10:00) get into, it's really fun, actually, to teach, you know, I taught to the children, and it was (10:05) really fun to show them like diet advertisements from the 20s, from the 30s, you know, you might (10:12) not be surprised that like, like the 20s was like the flapper era, right.And so that was one of the (10:18) first wave of women need to be as slim as possible. Yeah. And we don't have to get into it.But I will (10:26) just say as a kind of a side note is like, sociologically speaking, it's fun. It's fun for (10:31) me. It's not very fun.But it's fun for me to look at, like, what's happening politically with women (10:38) at this end, and what the body ideals are at that particular time, right. So, so in the 1920s, (10:45) women got the right to vote. It was also that 1921, where the legislation passed that if a woman (10:51) divorced her husband, she would not immediately lose custody of her kids.So before 1921, (10:58) in the United States, if you divorce your husband, you also give up rights to your children. (11:04) Wow. So anytime a woman have gained any little bit of political power, immediately, (11:11) the body ideals become, I would call them relatively childlike, you know, whenever women (11:19) get a little bit of space politically, we are, we are taught that our bodies should be very, (11:24) very small.So that's, so it was the 1920s, when we first saw the advertisements that were like, (11:30) reach for a cigarette instead of a sweet, right. And it was like, you can just smoke and you can (11:35) be super thin, which is like, so horrifying. Right.But they were still doing that advertisement (11:42) up until the 80s, right? I remember that one. Yeah. Totally.But yeah, and so then, you know, (11:48) it's really fascinating to watch it and to, and again, sociologically speaking, to see that like, (11:55) you know, in the, in the 30s, you didn't want to look slim, because that was the depression. (11:59) And that meant that you were probably a victim of the depression. So you wanted to look rich.(12:05) So then there's like, there's all these weight gain advertisements from the 30s. And then, (12:10) you know, in the, in the 40s, you don't want to look too slim, right? Because the men are off to (12:15) war, and you don't want to look like you have to work, you want to, you know, I mean, it's just (12:19) always fascinating to like, to look at, and no matter what it is, they have something to sell (12:24) you. No matter what it is, what your body shape is supposed to look like, they have something to (12:28) you know, and then, and then I'll get to the 60s.And again, 60s is when we got, (12:34) again, you're gonna have to shut me up if you want me to. But like the 60s is when, (12:40) you know, women get birth control. And all of a sudden, we're all supposed to look like Twiggy, (12:44) right? It's just fascinating to look at it and see that like, this is none of this is new.(12:49) And I think when you look at it, historically, it, for me, it gives me and I and hopefully most (12:56) of my students, it gave them so much perspective on like, oh, this is just they're going to keep (13:02) doing this. It's not none of this is new. And every time they're like, you know, this new way (13:07) of doing it.It's not that new. They've been doing this for years. Yeah, yeah.Well, and I want to (13:12) so you touched on the Industrial Revolution, because that's something I touch on, you know, (13:18) with my clients, too. So if you want to break that down more, I mean, I know, obviously, that made (13:23) foods more, yes, readily available, and, you know, able to be transported for longer periods of time. (13:31) But it also came with its own share of side effects, I guess you want to say? (13:38) Well, yeah, I mean, it was like, yeah, yeah, I mean, people had people had to, (13:45) or people didn't have to work as hard to get their food, which is great in some ways.But, (13:50) but again, like, if you, you know, my, my students would, would kind of have a joke that, like, (13:55) if I asked the question, like, and why do you think that is, like, by the second class, (13:59) they'd be like, money was always the answer. Because it is always the answer. But yeah, (14:06) right.Like, it makes a lot of people a lot of money to package foods so that they, they can be, (14:13) you know, transported from California all the way to, you know, New York City. And then, right. And (14:18) then also, it make it frees up, you know, the majority of women, it frees up women to be able (14:24) to do more work, right.And to be able to do more things, and it frees up our bodies to not have to (14:30) move as much as they were moving before, which is morally neutral. I want to emphasize, but also, (14:36) like, just interesting that like, you know, and also, I talk so often with my clients about (14:42) clothing, right. That like, it used to be that all, every item of clothing that you wore, you (14:48) made, or your mother made, or your aunt made, or something.There was no industrialized clothing (14:55) sizes. There was no, I had, you know, people didn't know all these numbers that we're supposed (15:00) to know, right. Like, people didn't know how much they weighed.People didn't know what size they (15:04) wore. You know, they just, and a lot of the clothes had to last a long time. So, you know, I love (15:11) talking about the corsets that women wore.Yes, they were to make your waist look small, but mostly (15:18) they were to hold your clothes up, because you had a huge skirt and a huge tunic, and then you, (15:24) and then your corset changed size, because they knew over the course of a year, a woman's body (15:28) would change size a lot. So, it was not really, it wasn't so much about like, looking as small as (15:32) possible, as much as it was keeping your clothes on. Yeah.You had this thing to tie it to your body. (15:38) Oh my gosh. Because they didn't, they assumed that over the course of a year, a woman's body's (15:43) shape would shift a lot, which makes so much sense, and it's not at all what we're, now if (15:49) somebody's body, you know, we're taught that all the bodies should stay the same shape over the (15:54) course of a year, over the course of a lifetime, which is such a bizarre idea.Yeah, yeah. Well, (15:58) and I mean, just, you know, I've heard it before, like for a long time ago, but we could all weigh (16:03) the same and still look so different. So different, absolutely.Yeah, but we focus so (16:10) much on that number, and you just want to see the point of the number of your dress size, (16:15) or the number on the scale. All of these numbers, so silly. Yeah, and the idea that, you know, (16:21) and I taught about the history of weight even, you know, that like weight was never a thing.(16:26) First of all, nobody weighed themselves, and nobody had scales in their house. That is a (16:31) very new phenomenon, and that it was only when the insurance companies decided (16:37) that weight was a way in which they could deny people insurance, did doctors decide to start (16:45) weighing people, right? So it's not, it was never doctors or their medical field saying like weight (16:51) is a brilliant measure of health, because it's not. It's inherently a lazy, absurd measure of (16:57) health, but it was the insurance companies who decided.It was the insurance companies who (17:01) decided to use BMI. That was not the, there was no doctor who was behind, that thought that was a (17:06) good idea. So yeah, all of these things that like the industrial revolution switched our relationships (17:12) with food, our relationships with our bodies, our relationship with movement, our relationship with (17:16) work so profoundly, and I feel like it just made these, there were these big open spaces that I (17:25) feel like capitalism just like swooped right in and was like, we can, we can fix that for you, (17:30) we can fix that for you, we can fix that for you, right? But like there was nothing to fix.Yeah. (17:35) Yeah. Yeah.Well, and then, you know, I mean, I talk so much about stress on my podcast with my (17:42) clients, you know, all of that stuff, right? And I feel like that's probably where some of it might (17:47) have started as well, because then you had, you had people working around the clock. You had (17:52) mid shifts, night shifts, right? You know, and, and then, like you said, our lifestyles changed (17:58) because we weren't out having to worry about food and all that stuff. Yeah.So I feel like it could (18:06) have originated somewhere around there too. Yeah. I had a client a long time ago.She was so funny. (18:12) I loved her, but she, you know, she hated her body her whole life and we worked together for (18:17) a long time and there, she went to a, like a, a little family reunion. It was like her mom and (18:23) her aunt and her other aunt.And she just looked around the room and she was like, we're supposed (18:28) to be scything wheat. Like, look at us women. These are, these are not tiny women.Like we're, (18:34) we're not meant to, you know, be, that's not, that's not what my ancestors did. You know, (18:39) we're not supposed to sit around and look at a screen all day. Like we're supposed to be outside, (18:43) you know, doing manual labor.That's what these shoulders are for. Um, and I, I just love that, (18:50) that realization that like, oh yeah, probably there's nothing wrong with your body. But, (18:56) you know, for hundreds and hundreds of years, the people of your family were doing very physical (19:02) things all day long and yeah, not doing what your body is doing on a daily basis now.Yeah, (19:08) yeah, exactly. So let's kind of, now I'm curious to, you know, bring it forward more. (19:14) Sure.Um, because I'm thinking about, especially like with my nursing background and, you know, (19:20) the drug companies and, uh, like where did that kind of start playing a role? Because you hear, (19:26) you hear theories like, I don't know, you know, if you want to say conspiracy theories, but I mean, (19:31) I, there, there is proven stuff out there, but where the drug companies and the food companies (19:36) started working together, right. To kind of make you sick, make you heavier, to get you to diet. (19:45) And now of course we know with the, the rise of GLP ones and all of that stuff too.So when did (19:50) that kind of start coming up? Yeah, it was around the nineties. Well, I mean, I, I feel like there's (19:57) all these things, all these things that are overlapping in the, in the like mid, mid to late (20:02) nineties. Like, you know, the, the, um, world horse health organization decided that obesity was (20:10) a disease and I'll put all of that in quotes cause it's not anything.Fatness is not a disease. Um, (20:16) and then, you know, then overnight I can, again, I taught my class for so long. I have all these (20:22) dates in my head, June 7th, 1998, um, millions of people fell asleep in a normal sized body and (20:29) woke up the next day in an obese body because they changed the metrics based again on the BMI, (20:36) which is nonsense, but you know, changed the metrics.And again, call me a conspiracy theorist, (20:41) but also on that day, a new, there were several new weight loss drugs that came on the market (20:49) that you could get coverage for if you were obese, that you couldn't get coverage for if you were in (20:55) a normal body, whatever any of that means. Cause none of that's real. It's all completely, (21:00) you know, absurd and nonsense.But you know, a lot of these things happened. It was like, (21:05) you know, the, the, the medicalization of fatness, the, the, um, uh, drug companies, um, overlapping (21:13) with the medical industry. You know, I liked, I'm not, I'm, I'm not saying I want to make sure I, (21:21) you know, say that like, I don't think whatever I'm not like that, you know, somebody who's (21:27) 900 pounds is healthy.I'm not trying to say that, but it's just good to be curious about these (21:34) ideas. And it's also good to just recognize that there was, there was the bias against fat people (21:40) before there was the medical, the medicalization of obesity in the same way that there was the (21:46) hatred of gay people before homosexuality was labeled as a mental illness. Right.So it's just, (21:54) I'm not against science. I'm not an anti-vaxxer, but I just want everybody to be curious about the (22:00) fact that like a lot of times there is bias first and then there is quote unquote science that backs (22:06) the bias. Right.So, so yeah, so that's sort of when that all happened. And then it was more and (22:13) more of these companies buying up, you know, I love to remind people that like the same company (22:17) owns Duncan Hines, Ben and Jerry's and Jenny Craig, same company owns all of those things. (22:25) So it was just good to remind yourself that like, you know, my, I had a podcast for a long time and (22:31) my cohost would always be like, Paula wants to remind you that they don't care about your health.(22:36) And so I would like to remind you that they don't care about your health. Jenny Craig doesn't care (22:40) about your health. You know, the, the people who make JLP ones don't care about your, they don't (22:45) care about your health and you can take JLP one.I'm not against them, but I'm just, it's always (22:50) good to be reminded that like these people, these CEOs, these, you know, these rich white men, (22:55) they don't care about our health. They only care about the bottom line. Yeah.Yeah. I mean, it's, (23:01) no, it's good to pull back the curtain on that stuff. Right.Like, because when you, (23:05) it's out there, like if you start doing the research, you can go down a rabbit hole with (23:09) all of the things, right? Absolutely. Yes. Yeah.And I, and I'm steering clear of like the super (23:17) Maha stuff, but we can do, we can be honest with ourselves about, about food and about our, (23:25) how our food is made and about what our body wants to ingest and what our body doesn't want, (23:29) doesn't want to ingest without fully going into kind of crazed lunatic conspiracy theories, (23:37) right? Like we can be lovingly curious about all of this. Yes. Yes.So, so, I mean, (23:43) you mentioned Jenny Craig, I know like one, one popular diet program that most of the people (23:52) that I talked to have tried is Weight Watchers. Yeah. Yeah.But like when, what was kind of the (23:58) first, the first really big diet craze? Like what, yeah, what was that? I mean, yeah, I felt like it (24:06) was a little bit like nuance, you know, but it was like, I mean, there was like, there's something (24:11) called obesity soap where you like was supposed to like just wash your body with soap and it would (24:15) melt your fat. I mean, I've never heard of that. This is before the FDA.Yeah. Not that the FDA is (24:22) really doing a great job right now, but before the FDA. Yeah.So it really was, it was, I have (24:27) like a whole timeline that I taught and it was, it's so fascinating, but it really was around (24:35) the, the turn of the century is when there was a real overlap in like not even remotely suggesting, (24:42) but completely promoting that there was a moral imperative to be thin. And this is when there (24:48) were like, you could go away to the, you know, sanitarium and you could do calisthenics all day (24:56) and eat, and there was a real push. And there's, I teach a whole class on it too, about the (25:01) intersection of like Christianity and purity culture and thinness.And we see this a lot right (25:08) now in the Maha world. Right. Of like, there, there were books that came out.It really was (25:14) like the early sixties. There were books that came out called like health, the devil wants me fat (25:18) and like, Oh my, you know, God, please help me stay away from the refrigerator. And he's very (25:22) like overlapping.And again, we see like the white supremacist purity vibrations around thinness. (25:30) Weight Watchers was the first like huge money making, and it was started by a woman in 1962. (25:37) That was the first one that it was like, and I think she was smart in that she, you know, (25:44) was the first one to be like, I don't think it's like necessarily one food that's the problem.(25:49) And she was smart to like add in the support group vibration to it. Of course it's horrifying, (25:57) but I always say that like, um, Weight Watchers of all of the diets is the, like the least (26:02) offensive one to my soul, because I think that there is this sense of like, please eat what food (26:08) you can afford, please eat what food, you know, and also that there was like a supportive aspect. (26:14) Weighing children in front of adults in some church basement is horrifying and absolutely (26:21) a violation of everybody's, you know, consent.However, you know, again, when I look at the (26:26) history of dieting, it is the least offensive one, but yeah, it really was the sixties, (26:30) which is interesting because the sixties is when the, the fat acceptance movement started. So the (26:38) fat acceptance movement started in the sixties in New York city, and it was actually part of the (26:42) civil rights. It was part of the whole civil rights movement.And then it went really underground in (26:48) the seventies and then really underground in the eighties when the, when things got darker and (26:54) darker. And then, you know, the body positive positivity movement of like 10, 15 years ago (26:59) was kind of like an offshoot of the fat acceptance movement, but fat acceptance movement has been (27:04) around since the sixties. Yeah.Yeah. I mean, that makes sense because like I said, I've talked to (27:10) so many people that have tried Weight Watchers. I feel like that was like the OG.It really was. (27:15) Yeah. She was kind of a genius in the, you know, not great way, but yeah, it really was.And, (27:22) and most people, you know, if you, if you say something about points or something that, you (27:28) know, at least two women in the room are going to know what you're talking about. I do feel like (27:32) it's, it's pretty common, but yeah. Yeah.So that started then. And then, you know, as we've seen (27:37) over the, at least the last 10 years, right. Then Oprah bought stock in it and now it's kind of gone.(27:44) Now it's fully just selling GLP ones. It's real dark. Yeah.Yeah. That's what I've, I've heard (27:50) that. So they, they're not doing anything around the point system anymore or is it a little (27:55) combination? I think it's a little combination of both, but they pivoted specifically when they (28:00) realized that, like, I think they realized that everyone realized that dieting is a scam and that, (28:06) you know, people make a lot of money off of you starving yourself.So yeah, I think they've (28:12) pivoted mostly into just selling GLP ones now. Yeah. Yeah.Interesting. So is that where the (28:18) calories in versus calories out kind of came from too, from Weight Watchers? Like, did that (28:24) kind of happen? Oh, great question. So calories, I don't know how far back you want me to know, (28:30) want me to go in the history of calories, but like, calories, people started to, (28:38) scientists, I will put that, I use that term very loosely, started to like, look at the, (28:44) the amount of energy that was in certain foods in the 1800s.Again, this is, a lot of this has (28:50) to do with eugenics. So a lot of it has kind of a dark, dark history, but then it was in the very (28:55) late 1800s that a man named Wilbur Atwater, I don't know why that man's name is etched in my (29:01) consciousness, but it is. And he had a little lab in his basement in New York City and he burnt up (29:09) oil, flour, sugar, all of these things.And he tested how much heat is released (29:16) when you burn up these things. And that's what a calorie is. So a calorie is how much heat is (29:22) released when you burn up this thing.Fascinating that like, we still use those same counts today, (29:29) even though food is grown very differently, food is manufactured differently. But if you (29:35) look at the side of a Ritz crackers box, we're still using those same counts that (29:39) Wilbur Atwater came up with, you know, over a hundred years ago. It was not really talked (29:44) about all that much.It was actually a woman doctor, her name was Dr. Lulu Hunter. She, (29:50) or Hunts, something like that. She came up with a little pamphlet in the, in the 1920s called (29:57) calories, your secret to control or something like that.And it was like 5 cents and all the money (30:03) went to the Red Cross. And then she put out a book that said something about like, you, you will (30:10) no longer eat food, you will only eat calories, which is so gross and so horrendous and goes (30:16) against everything that I believe. And then, and then it got really popular.So then it was, it (30:22) took about 40 years before Weight Watchers, but there was this talk of like calories, but at that (30:27) point you, there were not calorie counts on things, you know, you didn't know how many calories were (30:32) in things. But we still have this bizarre idea today that, that calories in, calories out is real, (30:38) which is, that's totally insane and it's so anti-scientific. Like, yes, digestion is such a (30:45) like mysterious, nuanced, complicated thing that there's no way of knowing how much, (30:52) how many calories a body is absorbing and how many calories a body is not absorbing.You just, (30:57) there's no way to know that. It's just insane. Yeah.Like, like, I feel like maybe, I mean, (31:02) maybe back then it might've been so cut and dry, but now, because like we've talked about with (31:07) the addition of all the stressors and how our food has changed and how some of it's not even (31:14) true food anymore, right? Like then, yeah, it's, it's not that simple. And it's, it's one thing I (31:22) hear from so many women too, when they go to the doctor and the doctor says, you need to lose (31:27) weight. Okay.But they don't know how. And the doctor says, Oh, just eat less, move more, you (31:32) know? And that's not, it's just not real. And it's like, there are, you know, like 1500 genes and, (31:42) you know, countless hormones that are involved in the digestion system of every person and every (31:49) person's digestion system is totally different and has mostly to do with your DNA and not (31:55) anything you eat or don't eat.And it might just be your, you know, your ancestors got really good (32:02) at eating as little as possible and surviving. And that just might be your DNA. You know, it's like, (32:08) it's, it's so shockingly oversimplified and it's so it's, it's to me, it's like offensive because (32:15) I think you can see that there are, I mean, if anybody has ever met a teenage boy who can eat (32:22) 20 to a hundred thousand calories a day.And we all, we all know that we all see that. And yet (32:30) we think if the person is, is fat or we think a person's body is too big that like they can just (32:36) cut calories. And it's like, if that can exist, the other end can exist.Like, it's just not, (32:41) it's not that simple. It's such a silly idea that the body is so dumb that you, it, (32:46) I also get so angry about the idea that like your, my body is so dumb that it doesn't know the (32:50) difference between, you know, an apple and, you know, Sour Patch Kids. I think my body knows (32:57) the difference between an apple and Sour Patch Kids.Like how, how ridiculous. That's silly. (33:02) Yeah.Yeah. (33:04) What a conversation. And I think if there's one thing I want you to take away from this conversation (33:09) with Paula today, it's this.Get curious about where your beliefs about your body came from. (33:16) Who taught you what your body was supposed to look like? Who taught you what you were allowed (33:21) to eat? Where did you learn that a number on a scale determined whether you were healthy or (33:26) successful or worthy? And maybe most importantly, are those beliefs actually serving you anymore? (33:32) You don't have to leave this episode agreeing with everything Paula or I said. That's never (33:37) what this podcast is about, but I hope you leave asking questions because the more we understand (33:42) where some of these messages came from, the easier it can become to separate what we've been told our (33:48) bodies need from what our bodies may actually be asking for.And that is such a big part of (33:53) body wisdom. If you want a place to continue exploring conversations like this, come join (33:58) us inside my free Healthy Ever After community. It's a space where we can talk about nutrition, (34:03) our relationship with food, nervous system support, hormones, and what sustainable health (34:08) can actually look like in real life.You'll find the link to join in the show notes, and I'll also (34:14) link Paula's information there if you'd like to learn more about her work and resources. And I'd (34:19) love to hear what this episode brought up for you. What belief about food, weight, or your body are (34:24) you starting to question? If you enjoyed today's episode, make sure you're subscribed, leave a (34:28) review, and share it with someone who might appreciate this conversation.Because healing (34:32) doesn't come from doing more, it comes from understanding better. I'm sending you so much (34:37) love, and I'll see you on the next episode of PCOS Unfiltered, Nourish, Heal, Thrive.