Lessons from the Fat-o-sphere: Quit Dieting and Declare a Truce with Your Body

by Kate Harding, Marianne Kirby

From the leading bloggers in the fat-acceptance movement comes an empowering guide to body image- no matter what the scales say.

When it comes to body image, women can be their own worst enemies, aided and abetted by society and the media. But Harding and Kirby, the leading bloggers in the fatosphere, the online community of the fat acceptance movement, have written a book to help readers achieve admiration for-or at least a truce with-their bodies. The authors believe in health at every size-the idea that weight does not necessarily determine well-being and that exercise and eating healthfully are beneficial, regardless of whether they cause weight loss. They point to errors in the media, misunderstood and ignored research, as well as stories from real women around the world to underscore their message. In the up-front and honest style that has become the trademark of their blogs, they share with readers twenty-seven ways to reframe notions of dieting and weight, including: accepting that diets don't work, practicing intuitive eating, finding body-positive doctors, not judging other women, and finding a hobby that has nothing to do with one's weight.

Genres: Nonfiction, Feminism, Health, Self Help, Fat Studies, Fat, Fat Acceptance

272 pages, Paperback

First published May 5, 2009

About the author

Kate Harding is author of Asking for It: The Alarming Rise of Rape Culture—and What We Can Do About It. She co-authored The Book of Jezebel and Lessons from the Fat-o-Sphere: Quit Dieting and Declare a Truce with Your Body and founded what was for a time the internet’s most popular body acceptance blog, Shapely Prose. She has contributed to numerous online publications, including Salon, Jezebel, The Guardian, and the L.A. Times, and published essays in the anthologies Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and a World Without Rape (a Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2009), Feed Me: Writers Dish About Food, Eating, Weight and Body Image, and Madonna and Me: Women Writers on the Queen of Pop.

A graduate of the University of Toronto and the MFA in writing program at Vermont College of Fine Arts, Kate is currently a Ph.D. candidate in the low-residency creative writing program at Bath Spa University. She lives in Minneapolis with her husband and two dogs.

Reviews

[Mbarkle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been reading Kate Harding's blog for several months, and really like her writing about fat acceptance and calling the media on their biases and degradation of fat people. So, when she posted that her book was published, I put it on my Kindle right away and sat down and read it the same day.

For me, this book is confirming exactly what I've come to believe from my own experience. Diets don't work. I am a Lifetime Member of Weight Watchers. I lost 40 pounds 13 years ago, put it all back on, tried again and again, each time failing and gaining back more weight. So I stopped doing this to myself and decided to be happy where I am. The authors cite evidence that yo yo dieting or *weight cycling* is more detrimental to your health than carrying extra weight.

I had a Jazzercise teacher back in the 1990s who used to subscribe to principles in a book called *Fit or Fat* which basically implies that the two are mutually exclusive. This book promotes Health at Any Size which says that yes, fatties can also be fit and strong. Once you give up the idea that the only reason to exercise is to become thin, then you can enjoy doing it.

Next comes Intuitive Eating, where you give your body what it wants, when it wants it. I started doing this a couple of years ago and my weight finally settled. Probably not where other people think it should, but I feel pretty good these days and deny myself nothing.

Other sections on the book are about mental health, (particularly depression, finding a body positive physician (I really need to do this), obsessing over exercise and the scale), Socializing (surrounding yourself with positive people and partners, finding hobbies and things to help you focus on other things, stop judging other women).

The fourth part is about avoiding negativity. This includes staying away from friends who criticize your weight or their own, or who talk obsessively about diets.

I loved part five, *Getting Dressed.* It includes a section about learning to sew! It also includes, buying for your true size and not keeping clothes that don't fit you.

Part six is about the Media, learning how to read diet articles critcally and sometimes to just stop watching the images on TV.

Part seven, *Getting Your Head on Straight* basically says it's not all about you, defend yourself as you would a friend, some days are better than others, and don't put off your life until you're thin.

There are many resources and links in the back of the book.

My only criticism of the book is the consistent use of expletives. I would love to give this book to my mother and my 12 yo daughter, but having the F word show up on every other page is a problem. I've come to expect it in blogs, but when it appears in a book, it makes it seem less authoritative and I lose respect for the authors and their ability to express themselves. (Otherwise the writing is wonderful.) You can still be funny without saying f%$k, ladies.

The things that hit home for me, and that I need to work on, are finding an exercise I like, and staying away from diet talk. I gave up Curves a couple of years ago, out of boredom. I started doing some letterboxing and geocaching, which involve hiking outside, but I have a hard time doing them consistently because of the weather. I might just check out the new Jazzercise that opened nearby, I used to love moving to music.

Staying away from diet talk is difficult. Every time you get a group of women together, the conversation heads that way, and then, there you are. I'm going to have to work on changing the subject or absenting myself when it comes up.

To summarize, fantastic book for anyone who wants to leave the diet treadmill and start living their life today instead of after losing that last 20 (or 200!) pounds.

[CC · Rating 5 out of 5]

Yo-yo dieting causes more health problems than solutions. The vast majority (95% - not kidding, do your research) of people who lose weight on diets gain it back (and then some) in 5 years - and, yes, extreme "lifestyle changes" are diets, too. Are you tired of trying to navigate a media that conflates losing weight with gaining health, even while promoting weight loss through unhealthy means (pills, extreme diets, etc)? Do you want to make peace with your body, and be as healthy as you can be? This book will teach you how to stop obsessing about weight, how to improve your health & well-being, and how to get off the dieting roller coaster that is ruining your physical health & self-esteem. Learn about intuitive eating, fatphobia, and exercising for enjoyment & pleasure. If you hold the oft-repeated belief that overweight = unhealthy and weight loss = improved health, you need to do your research & re-evaluate the toxic media which has caused you to internalize & project these scientifically unsupported lies. Wake up!

I will add that this is definitely a book for newcomers to Health At Every Size & fat acceptance bloggers - if you've been reading Kate Harding or Marianne Kirby for years now, this probably isn't for you, because you've read it before!

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book puts forward the life-changing idea that perhaps you ought to accept your fat self and put away the mirage that one day you will be thin and perfect. The authors, who are both fat-acceptance bloggers, go some way to dismantle misinformation about the health risks of fat and the so-called obesity crisis. Their first and major point is that diets don't work. The vast majority of people are unable to lose weight and keep it off for more than five years, so why are we being continually told that it is our first duty as fat human beings to shed the weight? They advocate the idea of "health at every size": don't be fooled into thinking that you can't be healthy as a fat person, don't let your doctor blame everything on your weight, listen to your body when it comes to eating, find an exercise that you actually like to do, and don't assume you are unattractive or unlovable because of your weight. To accept their ideas would be a major shift in outlook, but incredibly life affirming.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not really in the target audience for this book, but I thought it was really well written and an excellent read. It's got a really awesome message about being body positive both for yourself and for the people around you.

I've absorbed a lot of the dangerous media messages they discuss, and this book really made me think about a lot of pre-conceptions. It's a great resource, and I'm glad I read it.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

I only knew my weight from the times I went to the doctor. Mostly, I just knew if my clothes were fitting or not. If they weren't, and I was to cheap to go buy new ones, I would hop on the treadmill just a little bit more than usual. Then I discovered online food tracking and "helpful diet hints". While I got down to a skinny weight, I ended up gaining it back (plus more when I had thyroid surgery and my meds got out of whack). Even though I've never been obese, or even heavy, I beat myself up on a regular basis. 5 more pounds, 10 more pounds....

After starting the Biggest Loser at work and having to weigh myself every week, I got even more down about myself. Two and a half months of diet and exercise and I lost 1 pound. Seeing my doc, we discovered my thyroid meds were again messed up so my metabolism was messed up. Bloody hell. At this point, I decided I wasn't dieting anymore. I missed cooking my big feasts and baking and well....eating. I love food, dammit. I didn't want to throw exercise out the window because I actually like my treadmill and feeling good afterwards. I liked the extra energy because obviously my thyroid meds weren't going to help me there.

Lo and behold, I found a review for this book, which is all about accepting your body for what it is. Bless you authors. The 2 ladies go over all the reasons to give up dieting and wishing for a body that you just don't have. Major studies have shown that your body will do what it needs to do, meaning it will stay in the weight range it's meant to be in, regardless of how much you yo-yo and push it to change. Diets don't work. Anything that alters how you eat, portion control, calorie restrictions, etc, just don't work. At least not long term. So why put your body through that?

This book encourages learning how to be healthy at any size, doing exercise that you enjoy doing and eating when you're hungry and stopping when you're full. Revolutionary! They also emphasize that food is neutral, it's not bad or good. It's whatever you want. There are too many messages from our culture out there telling women (and men) how they should look if they want to win at life and frankly, they're just wrong. Not everyone is meant to be a size zero and people shouldn't be humiliated to be the size they just are.

The authors don't want you to give up on yourself. They're just asking you to be kind to yourself and go out and quit worry about that last 10 or 15 pounds. You are perfect the way you are.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read a lot of self-help books - I mean, A LOT. And I've come to the conclusion that what makes a self-help book helpful doesn't really have much to do with the actual content; for me, at least, it's more about the author's voice. Are they giving me the information in such a way that it resonates with me? This one really worked for me. The recurring basic theme is that there's no morality inherent in one's weight, eating habits, exercise habits, etc; that is to say, you're not "bad" or "good" based on what you eat, how often you work out, or what you weigh, and there are no virtuous or sinful foods. As usual, these are all things I know rationally, but are always good to be reminded of, and Harding and Kirby do so in that gentle-yet-unyielding way, the way you expect your best friends to talk to you, without denying the reality that making these sort of mental shifts is hard work that takes a long time.

[G · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved Kate Harding's essay in Yes Means Yes, so I rushed to buy Lessons frm the Fat-O-Sphere as soon as it came out. Harding and Kirby are fun, engaging writers who have written a book with a message that isn't heard often enough. This is a light, quick read that I enjoyed, though for the most part I don't think I'm its target audience. For sure, there are good lessons for anyone to take out of the book, but it's mostly written for the benefit of larger readers.

There isn't a tremendous amount of information here, and for the most part it doesn't contain much that people don't already know. For those in need of a self-esteem pep talk, it's probably a good resource. I would, however, love to see every health professional forced to read the chapters on medical care for fat people.

[Gnomad · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a good, quick read, though I expected to like it more than I did since I'm already a big fan of Kate's website.

My major complaint is that they talked like they were writing a blog, which is great if you're, you know, writing a blog, but I when I'm reading a book I need and expect arguments to be a little more rigorous. For example, I hated that they would spend several pages going off about how most diet research doesn't do a long enough follow up (true), but then quote from research supporting their point on a different topic that only had a 2 year follow up.

I like the HAES movement overall and I'm with them on much of what they say in this book about it, but if I weren't already convinced of its worth I don't think this book would've pushed me along.

[Katie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This would be a good book for large and in charge ladies (or ladies who feel bad about their bodies). I would have welcomed this when I was in college and I still had some of my lingering fat prejudice challenged, but it was too self-helpy for me. Not the most fair critique since it is a self-help book. I started to skim about half way through and didn't end up finishing it.

[JA · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a nice little book, and I feel kind of bad about not rating it higher, but "it was OK" is a pretty accurate statement of how it worked for me. I think I'm just not quite the target audience.

This would be great for someone who has had limited or no exposure to Health at Every Size concepts, and seems geared particularly to younger women -- which is fine, just not exactly me.

[Nikki · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wrote a much longer review, but goodreads somehow didn’t save it. So, short and sweet:

The book provides scientific evidence that diets don’t work.

It points out the many super-toxic messages we receive about body size on a daily basis. It shows how sad and twisted it is that we grow up bonding with each other over fad diets and hating on our bodies.

I was familiar with a lot of the Health at Every Size info. Still, it’s always, ALWAYS good to interact with materials that interrupt the cycle of self-loathing.

One pet peeve I had is that they presume finding a romantic partner is a priority for everyone. There are so many happily un-partnered people, and this assumption felt weird for a self-acceptance book.

[Emma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lessons from the Fat-o-sphere is a book by two of the main voices in the fat acceptance blog movement. It touches on health at any size and talks about how to live, love and accept yourself as a fat person.

This book is a short read. It focuses more on anecdotes and is heavily biased towards female fat acceptance, which is both fair and not fair as women arguably bear the brunt of society's obsession with weight loss and the stigma attached to fat bodies but being a fat man is far from stigma free. There were nods made at a more balanced approach but not a lot of follow through.

This book is obviously revolutionary if you haven't come across fat acceptance before. It's based on the idea that basically diets don't work and yoyo dieting may well do you more harm than good. That instead you should focus on living you life and enjoying yourself at the size you are. They also talk about health at any size which is a movement that focuses on healthy self image, exercising for joy and intuitive eating with the aim of improved health, not reduced weight.

The book takes a very informal tone, similar to a blog. This might make it more accessable for the first time reader but I would have prefered something more formal. They also repeat points a lot. The entire book can be summed up at 'be nice to yourslef and stop worrying'.

[Melinda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loving this book! Full of information that I already know about fat acceptance but written in such a fun, kick-ass fashion that I'm reading it all the time.

I finally finished reading this book and it has really reinspired me to take charge of my health. What I find the most interesting about this book is the focus on health and not weight loss. I appreciate that the authors are challenging the idea that you can't be fat and healthly by telling their stories and passing on tools for dealing with doctors and society. I'm a fan!

Like I said earlier if you are further along in your fat acceptance journey then a lot of what the authors discuss will be old to you but it's still interesting and entertaining. Fat acceptance like I always wanted it to be!

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this little book quickly as part of my quest to learn everything I can about weight stigma, anti-fat bias, and (as these authors hilariously call it) why THE OBESITY EPIDEMIC BOOGA BOOGA BOOGA is actually not a thing. I’m not the reader the authors had in mind, having always existed in a smaller body, and while anyone at any size can benefit from a lot of the actual facts in here as well as the body confidence advice, it’s important to mention that someone like me recommending this book to other smaller bodied people is kind of like feeling relieved to see people in larger bodies than yours promoting body confidence on Instagram. The point of the anti-diet, anti-weight-stigma, Health At Every Size movement is not to make us feel better about ourselves because “at least we’re not that fat.”

For people who truly want to get an idea of what it’s like to move through the world in a bigger body, I would recommend “What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat” by Aubrey Gordon. It’s newer, therefore not mentioned in this book, and it’s not about self-help - it’s about social justice. If you want lots of reasons why getting off the body-bashing train helps you and everyone around you, Lessons from the Fat-O-Sphere is a good start.

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book after seeing it in Lindy West’s book Shrill. It was interesting and a fun read. This idea of Health at Every Size was new to me. I felt like I was really out of touch since I live overseas. I tried to find a lot of the blogs and sites listed at the end of the book, but most of them are not there anymore.

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this book is a really great beginner's resource for anyone interested in fat acceptance. For me it was a lot of "yes I know this," but that's due to the work I've already done, not a failing of the book. The writing is really approachable and I enjoyed the small essays added in by other authors. The topics the book covers are fairly wide ranging.

[Kathryn Kania · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ooooooof some of this was hard to read and though there's some stuff that could be updated, I needed this book. Marianne has already had a huge impact on how I view myself and this book was like listening to her hardest but best advice.

[Shelley Jennings · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this book. The information was not new to me, but had I been at the beginning of my self-acceptance journey this would have been a revelation. My only disappointment was thinking I still had a ways to go, only to run smack into the appendices/acknowledgements.

[pianogal · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this one. I didn't completely agree with everything they said, but I liked their style. After all, us fat girls have to stick together.

[Cambria · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love these fantastic writers.

[Jess · Rating 5 out of 5]

Currently, my new favorite book! I loved it! As a fat bodied woman, I am excited to use what they wrote in my life. Highly recommended!

[Another · Rating 3 out of 5]

ok, but I lost interest about half way through

[Mckenzie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Reads like a blog or a self help. I would have liked more science and more academic argument.

[Rachel B]

I don't review galleys until their pub dates (for the most part). BUT I will say that this is a funny, genius, important little book, and I'm sending good vibes its way.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good if you’re new to HAES and anti-diet. However, beware—there are some moral references to food so clearly the authors hadn’t yet discovered intuitive eating.

[Lydia Bestul · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another book read for therapy, it made some good points & was thought provoking.

[Wileyoneone · Rating 3 out of 5]

Book -no longer have

[Ana Mardoll · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lessons from the Fat-O-Sphere / 0-399-53497-0

A perfect introduction to fat acceptance (FA) in particular and self acceptance in general, this book is a wonderful read for beginners and veterans alike. The writing is witty, direct, and insightful; never do you feel that the authors are being less than honest with you or that they are blowing smoke in your direction. The incisive writing is seasoned with a deep empathy for the reader - Kate Harding and Marianne Kirby speak to the reader like a tough-but-fair friend, able to bring reassurance and understanding without condescension and pity; exhortations and encouragement without being insensitive or cruel.

"Lessons" contains a little bit of everything: useful scientific data that even the veterans of FA may not have memorized (and so easy to whip out in paperback form to show the family!), tender and insightful dating advice, and practical exhortations (and blessings!) to live and enjoy life now, as you are. Excerpts from guest bloggers are included and are always up to the high writing standards of the authors: an African-American blogger gently points out the dangers of assuming that other cultures are more accepting than yours (and especially the downfalls of making those assumptions based on a small sample data of popular music and movies); a Fashionista blogger points out the silent despair behind the "buy clothes you can't wear as motivation" phenomenon; another blogger rips apart the serious and unacceptable dangers of fat-hating within the medical community and what harm and be wrought by doctors who tell patients they have no right to proper health care until they pass an arbitrary weight limit.

More than anything, "Lessons" is worth having, reading, and keeping because of the much-needed and strong feelings of camaraderie and acceptance that it provides. "You are not alone," the book assures readers, "and you are not a morally bad person simply because of your genetic makeup." Embracing fully the purest principles of self-acceptance, the authors never make the mistake of falling into different types of hate - instead they strongly exclaim the importance of gender-acceptance, race-acceptance, body-acceptance, and even fashion-acceptance. You cannot, they insist, truly love yourself if you are constantly judging others based on their hair, clothes, body shape, or anything else, as though those aspects of their physical person yield some kind of insight on their overall worth as a person. And, for that message alone, these "Lessons" are for everyone - no matter how fat or thin the reader may be.

~ Ana Mardoll

[Beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Highly recommended.
I'm a huge fan of the blog created by one of this book's authors, Shapely Prose (kateharding.net), so naturally I'm predisposed to like this book. But I really think it is a groundbreaking work. It's well-written, witty, at times hilarious, and yet powerful, insightful, and a blow to society's fatphobia and woman-hating forces. It will make many readers rethink their assumptions about themselves, about fat, about the "science" of "obesity." This book encourages you to question the messages you get everyday, do the research, think critically. It also celebrates what it's like to stop dieting and start loving your body, while also being realistic about how hard it is to do that. The co-authors share their personal experiences, and they admit to still having doubts and bad days, just like everybody. Their smart writing and sense of humor shine throughout the book. My only criticism: they needed some kind of communication at the beginning that they're mostly talking to and about women, since they often make statements that make it clear they're assuming the reader is female. It's not that there isn't stuff in here for everybody, regardless of gender, but there's still a lot of "we women" messages. It's only a weakness in the sense that they needed to be a little more upfront about it. A minor drawback of an otherwise terrific book.

[Kirsten Griffith · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first few chapters of this book are full of true laugh-out-loud moments. If you're familiar with either Kate's or Marianne's online personality, you can often tell whose words you're reading. Reading this is like sitting down for a late lunch with your best girlfriends, with pitchers of margaritas kept full at all times.[return]Like that same late lunch where, once a few cocktails have been thrown back and the lighthearted catching up is out of the way, you get into the real nitty gritty of what's going on in your lives, the book takes a turn for the more intense in the last third or so. I felt truly overwhelmed by much of what was discussed in the last few chapters in particular, and upon finishing, I wanted to go immediately back and begin again, annotating as I went. This is not just an anti-diet book. This is not just a fat-positive book. This is not just a feminist book. This is a couple of best friends whispering everything you need to hear about your value as a person, in black and white in front of your face. You know that scene in Good Will Hunting where Robin Williams's character says "It's not your fault," over and over and OVER until Will finally breaks down? That's what this book is like. Highly recommended for anyone who has ever suffered from low self-image or self-worth because of body image issues. Otherwise known as "everyone."