Episode 83: The Truth About Weight Loss with Ragen Chastain
Episode 83: The Truth About Weight Loss With Ragen Chastain
In this episode we sit down with....Ragen Chastain.
Ragen Chastain is a Speaker, Writer, Certified Health Coach, and thought leader in the fields of Body Image, Health at Every Size, Fitness, Corporate Wellness, and Weight Stigma. Ragen is a sought-after speaker on the corporate, conference, and college circuits where she has brought her signature mix of humor and hard facts to diverse stages from Google Headquarters to Dartmouth to the Diabetes Education Specialists National Conference. Author of the popular blog: danceswithfat, the book Fat: The Owner's Manual, and editor of the anthology The Politics of Size. Ragen is frequently featured as an expert in print, radio, television, and documentary film. Ragen is a three-time National dance champion and two-time marathoner who holds the Guinness World Record for Heaviest Woman to Complete a Marathon, and co-founded the Fit Fatties Forum which has grown to over 10,000 members. Ragen lives in LA with her partner Julianne and their two adorable dogs.
In this conversation we talk about:
Ragen’s personal body image story- her eating disorder journey
Her experiences being a fat dancer
The importance of continued education on privilege
Our bodies as a civil rights issue
Practical tools for setting boundaries in educational social conversations
Ragen’s radical shift around her body movement intentions
Connect with our guest...
Resources we mention in this episode…
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TRANSCRIPTION
Episode 83: The Truth About Weight Loss with Ragen Chastain
Katelyn:
Ragen Chastain! Thank you for being here. I'm so excited to sit down and talk with you. This is truly an honor.
Ragen:
Katelyn Parsons, thank you for having me. I am super-duper excited to be here. So thanks for having me here.
Katelyn:
Thank you for meeting my excitement level. Let's just dive in, because I have so many questions that I can't wait to ask you and so many things that I can't wait to learn about you. So, the first question that we ask every guest on the show is your first body awareness moment. What did that moment look for look like for you where you realized I'm in a body and this means something in the world that I'm living in? What the F? How did you navigate that in that moment, and also, moving forward with your relationship with your body and or food? Just share your story with us if you wouldn't mind.
Ragen (body image story):
Sure. So, I was thinking about this. And really the first awareness I have, I was young, before kindergarten, and I was a chunky Baby, I was a chunky toddler, I've always been kind of a fat person. And relative was telling me that I should, you know, be careful about that. Because when they were in school, they would have been cruel to me. And they were sort of telling me, the first message I got was like, you should really change yourself to suit your bullies. Oh, wow. Because I would have bullied you as a kid. And I've come full circle from that. And I, you know, was on a journey for a long time. My you know, in my childhood, it was kind of a strange thing, because like I said, I was always bigger than my classmates. But I was also a pretty successful athlete. And I didn't get as much body shaming as I think I might have otherwise. And then a friend's mom, my junior year of high school, who was I am certain well intentioned, sort of repeated that moment and told me, you know, you're going to lose that weight, right? Like, you don't want to go to college fat, do you. And that repeat of that sort of original moment triggered in me, path that went all the way to a full-blown eating disorder. I went from not really thinking about food, and you know, body size and stuff to thinking about it almost all the time. And, in my recovery from that is how I ended up moving into a size acceptance and Health at Every Size place. But it was a long, hard road. And now like looking back on that I can see all the forces that were working both of those moments that informed those people to believe what they were saying to me was some kind of good advice, but also how important it is that we be clear that it's not our obligation to change our picture to fit our bully’s frames.
Katelyn:
So, I'm curious from the first moment that you described, up until the second triggering moment, which launched you into this eating disorder, you mentioned that you were an athlete, were you doing a lot of team sports?
Ragen:
Yeah, I did. So, we moved around a lot when I was a kid. And I did kind of whatever sports were popular where I was, so volleyball was a constant. And then I play I was a cheerleading was it was a constant, both of those, I started in like fourth or fifth grade. And then I did soccer, I did figure skating. I did musical theater, anything that had a stage and a spotlight and that kind of thing. But, you know, that was sort of my thing.
Katelyn:
So, a lot of the sports that you just mentioned, are really aesthetic sports. How do you attribute your level of resiliency during these really impressionable times? What do you attribute that to, especially you mentioned, being in a larger body growing up? Kids aren't nice, but also, there's the culture that we're living in as well, too. And I'm also just thinking about the bookends of this time in your life of these two moments and what came in between- what do you attribute to this level of confidence and just self-acceptance and resilience to?
Ragen:
I mean a lot of it is a combination of privilege and personality, kind of luck of the draw stuff. I also have this incredible mom who's supportive of me was unwavering. And it helped I went we moved around a lot and predominantly in very rural areas. And I went to very small schools. And one of the advantages of small schools is that you can do as many things as you want. When I went to college at the University of Texas, my friends were like, Oh, yeah, I had to choose between playing a sport and being in band. And that's not how it works at small schools. They don't have enough kids for that, so that you can be in the play. choir, the band, the volleyball team, the French public, whatever. And I think that having those opportunities in places where I was in a pretty small pond was helpful as well. And then I just sort of always had a confidence about me and I'm gonna do what I want to do kind of attitude. And my mom really nurtured that in a way that I think allowed me to have better experiences, you know, to this day.
Katelyn:
That's fabulous. So, then this moment later, in your story, this second moment that you're referring to, what do you feel like really shook that confidence? What do you attribute it to knowing what you know, now? I know you've mentioned the culture, but it seems like there was a lot of changes for you going into college, and just a really tricky time in life in general. But what do you think were some of the things that that really triggered you to go into your eating disorder?
Ragen:
I think I mean, like I said, my graduating class in high school had, I think, 37 kids in it. And I was going to the University of Texas at Austin, which was the largest college in the country at the time. And I was fearless about that. I just could not wait to get out. Like, this is what I waited 18 years for. But I think her saying that, and then me thinking about like, oh is this gonna become a thing? And is it preventable? Because I, you know, I'd been sold more aggressively than anything in my life, except white supremacy and racism, this idea that I could be thin if I wanted to. And if I worked hard enough, even though I have pretty clear evidence that that was not the case. Right? I played a lot of sports, I worked out really hard. I ate the same as kids my age. And yeah, I was just always a little bigger. But I sort of thought, Well, yeah, why don't I try to do this now. And then I cannot have to deal with any of the stuff that comes along with being in a bigger body, you know, when I get to college, and so I think that that was what kind of tripped it in. And I my experience was that, you know, people talk about the idea that you have the predisposition and then the switch flips. And that was kind of my experience with it.
Katelyn:
Yeah, it sounds like you're, you're touching on this aspect of avoidance like, I'll just manipulate my body so that I can avoid any potential pain or discomfort or shame, or any of these possibilities that might be coming up, especially by way of what you're getting. You're getting told by your family member at the time to kind of this foreshadowing,
Ragen:
Right. And I was going on a scholarship for orchestral performer clarinet performance. And I was doing a nontraditional major, and I you know, there was all of this stuff. And I was like, Well, here's one thing, I can just get this out of the way and then not have to deal with it kind of thing.
Katelyn:
Meaning, losing weight, you'll get that out of the way?
Ragen:
Yeah.
Katelyn:
Yeah. If you're comfortable, could you share a little bit about this time- some of the really pivotal moments for you that led you down this eating disorder path? What did that look like for you and how long did it last? Just what did this chapter look like for you?
Ragen:
So, it was a really intense time, but not a super long time. For me, I was extremely lucky and a lot of this and I'll share that. But basically, I started to diet. And it was like the usual sort of eat less exercise more kind of situation. And I am hyper competitive. And extremely like charting and tracking focused. And I was like, well, I can just eat less and less, and I can just exercise more and more. And then I got to a point where it was, you know, felt like more of a compulsion to me and I became a I became a group fitness instructor, because that made it normal to be in the gym as much as I was, I will say I have never been as praised for my body as I was during the time when I was the sickest with my eating disorder. And I just ran my body down and eventually in the gym, I collapsed on a treadmill and was taken to the hospital and My recovery was really fast, very atypical. I was able to move out of the behaviors and get myself to a better mental space, which is lucky because my doctors I was still even hospitalized and even this undernourished I was still quote unquote too heavy based on the tables they used at the time. And my doctors were telling me that I still had to lose weight to be healthy. And I remember a doctor saying, I mean, don't go crazy, like you did before, but you're just a bigger person naturally. So, you're gonna have to worry about this for your whole life. Which isn't What you tell someone in eating disorder treatment, right, but it happens a lot, the amount of weight stigma with an eating disorder treatment is a huge issue. And mixes also with racism and transphobia, and homophobia within that community as well. But yeah, so I was then for a period of years was being put on diets by doctors, and I was dutifully doing them. And I would lose weight short term and gain that back long term, which is what I learned, almost everybody does. But I was so lucky that I never triggered a full-blown relapse. And part of that was, when I started to get into the behaviors that I like, I could feel that on the edges, I was able to pull back but that again, complete luck. A lot of people have a lot of worse experiences than
Katelyn:
Were you getting support at the time too? Were you seeing a therapist or any kind of counselor or coach or any anybody to kind of help prevent the relapse?
Ragen:
I didn't really tell my friends and stuff. At the time, I was kind of embarrassed about it, I didn't want to be a thing. And I had kind of built a persona at the time of self-deprecating fat jokes. So, I was gonna be the first one to make the joke, so nobody else could. And it didn't really jive with that sort of narrative. And I had made for myself, and that kind of exoskeleton that I have created that created with humor. And there was a support group that I was part of that was, again, we've come a really long way. And again, they were very well meaning but it basically was like, let's get together and Loki share eating disorder tips, while this counselor well immediately tries to get us to not do this. Right. It wasn't great. So, I again, I credit. It's pure luck and privilege that I ended up the way that I did.
Katelyn:
Yeah, I think that's really interesting that you mentioned that Reagan, I also feel like we're in this culture right now, that is doing that in a really problematic way while trying to be well meaning but you know, talking about specifics within eating disorders, and especially, depending on the community that you're speaking to, as well. But we're just in this moment in our culture where it's so easy to access tips and things like that, even though if it is just sharing whether it's these documentaries coming out on Netflix about eating disorders, or you know, Instagram recovery accounts, some of them are just really problematic and whatnot. What are your thoughts?
Ragen:
Yeah, I think we're gaining awareness. And there are people who have been advocating for this for years and who have been shouted down. And a big part of that is the censoring of voices that are been white sis het, typically younger women within eating disorders. And so that community has been centered in all of those privileges have been centered. And we've not been listening to the people in other communities who've been saying for a long time how harmful This is, and how many people are being left behind. And it becomes a thing where, you know, people are posting their before and after pictures, and they end up becoming like, quote, unquote, you know, inspiration for people and really dangerous ways are people post about their behaviors, and they want to tell their stories, which is completely understandable. But without the lens of understanding how that can impact other people who are reading it can be really dangerous as well. And I think that we have to really take responsibility for that and say, where's an appropriate place? It's important and mental health care is not easy to find an eating disorder, treatment is not easy to find, and less. So, for those with less privilege. And it's important that we create spaces where people can authentically and honestly share their story and talk about what they want to talk about. But the whole world is not that place. And I think we have to understand and be responsible for that.
Katelyn:
Yeah. So where is the line? I'm always curious about people's opinions about this, especially professionals in the Health at Every Size industry. Because this is a storytelling podcast. And I think that there's so much power in storytelling. And just like you and I were saying before we hit record, we set boundaries for this podcast, there's definitely a level of awareness around the community that we're speaking to and the safety that we're trying to create in this container, as well as trying to keep things really real and authentic, because it is real life. So, when do you get the feeling like that's just a little too far? How, how do you guide yourself? Or how would you guide someone else who is at a point where they do maybe want to share a little bit more or are in spaces where it's relevant to share recovery stories and whatnot? What are some pieces of advice you might offer?
Ragen:
For me, it's all about setting expectations and boundaries. So that can take the form of content notes, trigger warnings, show notes that explain you know, a page that explains what you can expect on a podcast or on a page or on an Instagram? It can, I think a lot of it is about educating ourselves. Looking beyond our experience, one of the things that privilege does it's so harmful is it creates a situation where we don't know what we don't know. Right? You'll see the fatphobia, with an eating disorder community, you know, you'll see people say, you know, I was treated so badly, or I felt terrible about my body, and I wasn't even horribly fat. And I'm like, let's examine horribly fat as a concept. Like, that's not a real thing. That's, again, the fatphobia that drove your eating disorder and an opportunity for you to do some work. But it's really hard, you know? That kind of thing. looking beyond our experience and understanding how does the way that I'm conceptualizing this, how is it driven by things like fat phobia, and racism, and transphobia and homophobia and ageism? And what can I do about that? And what are people asking? To me, there's a lot that we can do in our own education just by following and reading people whose experiences are outside of our experiences. Mm hmm. And then just really working hard to set expectations to set boundaries, and then to stay within those boundaries.
Katelyn:
Yeah, I think that's really brilliant. And just that continued education as well to you. I mean, this is totally my perfectionism, my recovering perfectionism showing, always like, Oh, I get it now. And then something else will come up. And I'm like, Oh, my God, I feel like all my work has been unraveled. And now I need to go back and learn all this. It really is surrendering to the fact that there's always a next level, there's always something to learn, in educating from a Health at Every Size and just social justice lens as well, too.
Ragen:
Oh, yeah, solidarity. I mean, the first protest I ever led was in kindergarten, but I started doing civil rights work in earnest in college. And I did mostly queer and trans liberation work, as I'm also a queer woman, in addition to being fat. And when I look at the things that I did, I wrote the original curriculum for the University of Texas Safe Space Program, which was a program to train faculty and staff to create safe spaces for queer and trans students. I was a sophomore in college at the time, and when I look back at the way that I was training, and it was the best knowledge that we had at the time, but where we are now, we, you know, I think, to do this work is to be humbled by the fact that we are always going to be making mistakes, and it's our responsibility to make as few as possible by doing as much of our own work as we can possibly do. And then just in a constant, you know, to paraphrase Maya Angelou know, better do better situation.
Katelyn:
Mm hmm. I mean, I fully need to hear that, you know, I think that's a that's such an important reminder, because it can feel so defeating sometimes when you realize, Oh, crap, I get it, I got it wrong, was that harmful, especially when you go back? I mean, I'm speaking for myself here. When I go back, and I read some of the things or watch some things that I put out at times and thinking like God, this needs to be deleted forever. This is, this is just not helping anyone. But then having that major self-compassion and those moments and continuing to move forward. Otherwise, we're not going to create change if we're just stuck in our own paralysis of getting it right.
Ragen:
Yeah. And I feel like I'm still making mistakes. And I have to say, there's no justification or excuse for this, I should have known better, I'm sorry for the harm. Here's, you know, what I can do to repair that according to the people who I've harmed, and here's what I'm going to do moving forward. And, you know, then do that and compensate everybody along the way who helps
Katelyn:
That responsibility- I think it's so important. Let's weave back into your body image story. Because I do want to know, you're doing social justice work in college, and you've been protesting since you were in kindergarten, which I freaking love. But what was that moment like for you, where you realize that something had to change with your relationship with your body? And how did you begin to correlate it with activism and social justice and politics? Was that all woven together? Did it come at different times? What did the path out of the eating disorder looked like for you?
Ragen:
It came in sort of a thread. I was doing a medically supervised weight loss program, and I was eating per the program, less than I had eaten at the worst part of my eating disorder, but I wasn't allowed to do any kind of exercise. And that should have been a huge waving red flag Blinky light thing, but it was not for me because I just felt like, Look, the only thing I know about this at this time is that I cannot make decisions for me, right? I was too fat and then eating disorder and I just can't get this, right. But I was gaining weight on this program. And I was like, this is clearly ridiculous. And I waited and I said, I quit. And they said, Oh, you can't quit. And I was like, No, no, I'm pretty sure I can. And they took me into this little room with this huge poster about not quitting, it was literally, the kitten hanging on a rope that says, hang in there, baby, right? So, it's in the Hang in there, baby kitten. And then this woman comes in with a binder and it's full of pictures of fat women just kind of hanging out being fat starts just flipping through. And she says, maybe you don't know it. But this is what you look like. And these women are going to die alone on the couch eating Bom bonds? And is that what you really want for your life? And Aren't you tired of hating your body? And that's a horrific thing to happen. But some cool things happen from it. Wow. So, first of all, I was like, wait, that's what I look like, like, I had no problem with these women's bodies. And so, you know, I thought I looked so much quote unquote, worse than they did. And it was that first inkling of like, well, if I don't pay their bodies, like why do I hate my own so much, and certainly that I was not far along the path. But it was my first kind of thought there. I again, went to school in very rural places had no idea what a bomb was. So that went straight over my head. But I was like, yeah, you know what, I am tired of hating my body. Like I'm exhausted. From hating my body. I had spent years hating my body like it was a job. Like I was getting paid for it. And I hadn't gotten healthier. I hadn't gotten thinner. I haven't been happier. I was just tired. I said, you know what, thank you very much. And she said, Oh, you're welcome. You can pick up your bars and stuff. And I was like, No, no, I quit. You and the kitten can hang in, I'm out. But um, thank you. And I walked out to my car, and I sat down, and I decided to do a two-part plan, I was going to figure out how to love my body at any size. Because this whole, like, lose weight to love myself was not working out for me. And then but then I was gonna figure out how to lose weight to be healthy, because I thought that that's what you had to do. And the first part, I literally was sitting in my car trying to think because I had no idea how to get this done. I just decided I was going to do it. And I was like, I'll go to all the lectures, put crystals under my tongue, meditate, read books, I will do anything it takes, I'm going to make this happen. And, and so the first thought that hit me, out of sort of nowhere was that I had spent so much time hating my body for not looking like a photoshopped picture of somebody else, that I hadn't had a second’s worth of gratitude for what my body did for me. And I went home, and I got a notebook and a college rule. And I wrote pages, like more than 50 pages of single line things that I could think of that my body did for me. And I got granular breathing, blinking cell division, waste management, right? smiling, waving. And then I started to become really conscious of my thoughts about my body. And when I would have a negative thought, I would replace it with something from the list anything from the list? I'd be like, I hate this body part, like no, no, thank you for breathing, because you're killing that, and I appreciate it. And this sounds hokey, and it probably is hokey. But within a few months, it fundamentally changed my relationship with my body. Because I started to realize how much my body did for me, I started to look at my body as a partner and a friend that deserved my full support. Right? And I would never let somebody talk about my friends, the way that I let people or the way that I personally talked about my body. And knowing that I really was able to shift and then I started to look into, like, where did I get these messages about my body and who is profiting from these messages that I got about my body. And so that journey got me to a really good place with, in terms of my relationship with my body. And then it came time like, okay, now I feel good about this, I love my body, any size. Now it's time to lose weight to be healthy. And my, I ended up deciding that I did not want to be a professional clarinet player. The reality of the life of that job was very different than what I had imagined. And it just wasn't what I wanted for myself. And so, I switched to social work. But I focused on Macro Social Work community and policy and leadership and focus specifically on research methods and statistics. And so, I realized, I have never read any of the studies about any diet, any doctors described to me, I just did whatever they said. I was like, what I'm going to do is a literature review, I'm gonna go through all the research I can find about weight loss, and I'm gonna find the diet that works the most, the best, and that's what I'm going to do. And I read through every study I could find, and I was so shocked and disbelieving but what I found that I went back, and I read through them again, and I was checking things doing calculations by hand, because what I found was that there was not a single study, were more than a tiny fraction of people were succeeding at long term significant weight loss. What was happening is people would lose weight short term, and then either they'd stopped tracking them, or they if they did track them long term, they gain it back. within two to five years, often gaining back more than they lost. And while there's nothing wrong with being fat or fatter, there is something wrong with prescribing something that has the opposite of the intended effect the majority of the time. And so then as a fan of like math and logic, I was like, Oh, this, I'm not going to do this forever. You know, with all these lists I had of things I was going to do when I became thin. And really at that point, for my own health started looking for okay, what is there to support my health if dieting, isn't it? And that's when I started to find the Health at Every Size literature. And at this point, I still didn't even know there was a community that existed, right? I was sort of on my own with this. And then, you know, so how is that changed my relationship with my body? If I'm not like a thin person trapped in a fat body? If I'm a fat person, what does that mean?
Katelyn:
Yeah, I have so many questions. The first big question that's coming to my mind is, well, first of all, thank God, you found statistics. And I mean, I could not think of a further thing from my own college experience. And I am so grateful we have people like yourself, who did find their zone of genius, in this particular area, but I'm just imagining you in these libraries in college, frantically researching this and not being able to stop reading and whatnot- who are you telling? I can imagine there's a million light bulbs going off in your mind and thinking how do more people not know about this? Were you going to professors with this information, or your classmates or your friends, your family? It seems like you kind of found this magic key to uncover all of this bullshit that we've been sold in our culture. What were you doing with that information?
Ragen:
At the time, literally nothing. So, I still thought of this is like a personal journey. I wasn't at a place looking back now. I'm like, where was the outrage? Where were the calls to my previous doctors you know battling everyone I've ever met? This is the Live Journal era of the internet. Right? So, blogs were really a huge thing at this time. And it was like 2007ish that I was starting to research this. And it wasn't quite like it is now. And what happened was, I started to, I guess, actually is before 2007 that I was researching this, I'm sorry, I'm terrible with dates and times. I'm like, there's now before now and after now, that's what I got. But I started to dance I've started to do I'm competitive ballroom dance as an adult. And my dance partner and I have been going out for fun to country western dance lessons at a gay bar. And then we decided we heard that you could compete, and we decided we wanted to compete. And it was a whirlwind to get ready, we got to coach we learned, you know, five other dances, choreography, costumes, all this. So, we got to the first competition and I naively thought it was going to be about my dancing. And then judges said things to me, what a waste of talent at your size, you're going to lose weight, right? Or I can't, I don't feel like I can give you a higher score until you lose weight. Because just you know, you're just not a good role model. And then I was at this competition, it was not too many competitions in, and I was sick. And so, I did all my dances. And I just felt terrible, right? And I'm gathering up all my dresses and makeup and shoes and stuff. And I'm just wanting to get back to my hotel room, take a shower and go to sleep. And I get to the elevator and I turn, and this judge is charging me and so, I'm now up against the elevator. And she's like, we have to talk about your walls. And I was like, yeah, it was not a good day. And she said, No, no, it was that dress. And I had just gotten a new dress. It's gorgeous. It's I still have it. It's a I'm like this beautiful velvet dress with red embroidery and spaghetti straps. And she said, and I'm like thinking my dress like I can I'm sick and I can't really make the jump. And she goes, I couldn't stand to look at you. And had that moment of like, Do I go off on this person? Or do I be like, quote unquote, classy and honestly, I was just tired. So, what I said was, okay. And she escalated her anger. One level was like, I couldn't stand to look at you. And I said, Okay. And she said it a couple more times. And then she put her finger in my face. And she was like, you have no business wearing spaghetti straps. And this light was like, this has nothing to do with me. Right? This is her and her body issues and she's trying to give them to me, and I wanted like a Wi for Christmas that year. So, I was not willing to accept her body image issues as a gift. And she said, you know, I talked to your coach and he said, I could talk to you about this. And I was like, well, you don't need to ask permission to talk to me. I said in truth I probably won't choose to change the dress, but I appreciate you taking the time to tell me it's such a problem for you. And her face got so red. I legitimately thought she was going to take a swing at me, and I was like just Should I drop my stuff like, and she just she turned on her heel and walked away. And in that moment is the time when I realized like, Oh, this isn't personal, this is fat people, as a group are facing systemic oppression. This is, you know, I could see the parallels, although there are different types of oppression between what I faced as a queer woman coming out in the mid 90s, in Texas, and what I have faced as a fat person, but I hadn't really thought of it like that before. And that's when I started the dances with that blog. And that's when I started thinking on a bigger scale about these things. And again, I still was not hooked in. So, there's a bunch of very embarrassing blog posts at the beginning of my blog where I didn't know anybody else was thinking these things. Which is super embarrassing and ridiculous. But then I, you know, got, I got connected to the committee, somebody said, I said something about the only things you can talk about somebody's body size, or what their size is and what your stereotypes about them are. And someone was like, oh, Mariela, Juan already said that, and I was like, who now and then that was my introduction into the world. And now I always credit Maryland when I say that quote, but um, but yeah, so that was that moment. I wanted to be a fat dancer as all I wanted to do, but I realized I was gonna have to be a fat activist to get that done.
Katelyn:
God, wow. That is such…I mean, what's the emotion that you're feeling now? just telling the story?
Ragen:
Well, so I've, I've told this story a lot. It's one of those things where, when you have a story that you've processed through and so now, it's just an interesting story that explains something in your life. But for other people, it's super traumatic. So, because they are living it for the first time through, you're telling it? So, I'm kind of aware of that. Yeah. When I tell the story that people are absolutely horrified. And well, they should be that this person did this. But yeah, I mean, for me, I, you know, it was horrible. And what I did, so I then told everyone, I suddenly had a second burst of energy and told everyone who would listen to what she had said to me.
Katelyn:
Okay, so this is the moment that I was waiting for in the library, like, this is the moment where you're like, screw this. Everyone needs to know this. How do I let go of any shame that's lingering around me actually sharing this and just get this information out to people in my life, not even the general public, but just people?
Ragen:
Exactly. I started my blog, and I think six people, including my mom are reading it. But no athlete dance competition itself, I was like, you will not believe what just happened to me. And it turns out, she was doing this to a lot of people. Wow. But everybody was too ashamed to say anything. And I was very, so I, one of the things with beginning dancers is that they're beginners, right? So often, they are not very entertaining, because they're just trying to get through, they're counting out loud, maybe you're in their head, or whatever. But I had this background of dance and performance. And I was a beginner at dancing, but not at performing. I was winking and smiling and performing. And I had a lot of crowd support. People were really supportive of my work. And when I said that this happened, I got tremendous support. And again, this is a lucky and privileged thing. Not everybody who says, hey, I've experienced that phobia gets the kind of support I did. But people were like, do you want us to try to get her off the judging panels Do you want like, what do you want us to do? Do you want us to say something from the podium when we're announcing? And I had this immediate support, which felt really great, and which was really helpful. And I don't think I would have necessarily not become an activist if that hadn't happened. But it was just a nice thing to happen the first time I was like, enough, and to have people say, like, No, you're right, that's, that should never have happened to you. So that validation, I feel very lucky and grateful for.
Katelyn:
I was just gonna say that- validation is so powerful, and I can understand the gratitude that you're expressing as well, too. But, man, I'm so glad that you got that validation to really kind of catapult you into this next chapter of your story. I'm curious what this looked like for you. Was this after college, Regan, or this was during your school? The day after the dance- were you also in statistics at the time? Were you dancing full time? What was the career that you were kind of creating for yourself at that time in your life?
Ragen:
I had taken my sort of process and procedure brain and I had stumbled into being an operations consultant for businesses. So, systems, processes, procedures, creation, efficiency, that kind of thing.
Katelyn:
Okay, cool. And then you were dancing on the side. You were starting this blog. So how did you start getting plugged into that activism, learning about just the politics, body politics in general, like what were some key moments that really stood out to you- key resources or people that you connected with or just events you attended?
Ragen:
So definitely, when somebody first mentioned Marilyn Wann and the book FAT!SO? that was the first that I had heard. And then, um, I had been finding studies that showed that habits were a better predictor of future health and body size, but I hadn't gotten the concept of Health at Every Size yet. And I came across Lindo Bacon's study, and that was sort of my bridge into that. And then that combined with Marilyn, and I'm finding out about Asda and NASA, and other organizations. I'm like, oh, there's a whole community. And then with my blog, I wrote, I basically counted for 20 in a very nonscientific way. I counted for 24 hours, the number of negative messages I got about my body and multiply that out by a what it would be in a year was like 300, and something 1000. And somebody saw that and submitted it to decibel magazine. And they contacted me and said, can we reprint this, and I said, Sure, not thinking at the time, I didn't even have a subscribe button on my blog. So, I got like, 10,000 hits in one day, which was more hits than I thought I would get in my lifetime. And I had no way to subscribe, connect with me no email address. Oh, and luckily, they asked for a follow up piece. And by that time, I sort of have myself together. But like, I just want like, this is a consistent problem for me- I'm not great with the marketing. I just want to say this stuff, and I want people to hear it. And so yeah, this is a consistent issue in my life. So, I did the follow up and started to build followers that way, and then started to connect and learn. And then you know, learning more about like, Sonya, Renee Taylor's work that came along a little later in my development, but learning more about than learning from folks within black fat activism community, the ways that racism had been perpetuated from the beginning was embedded in the community and what that meant, and like, those were incredibly valuable experiences and understandings for a dime eternally grateful for. So yeah, that was sort of the progression. And then I, sort of moved from I originally was just talking about my own experience as a dancer, and then have been moving to talk about this more as a civil rights issue. And so that kind of was the progression.
Katelyn:
Okay, so let's pause here in your own story. And let's talk about this as a civil rights issue. Can you give the CliffsNotes version for everybody who's listening? If anybody is just like, I never knew this before, I never thought of equating our body size as a civil rights issue or considered the possibility that body size and politics there is an equation there. How would you educate somebody on this in like, two minutes?
Ragen:
Sure. So, the idea of fat oppression is hard for some folks. The fact is, people in larger bodies are hired and hired less paid and promoted less than similarly qualified than people, we face staggering inequalities in health care, inequalities in accommodation, everything from seats at a restaurant to the ability to get a flight for the same price that a thin person would fly, etc. And the idea is that, Oh, well, fat people can become thin. And so, it's okay to oppress them. Right? Like, if you don't want to pay for two seats on the plane, then you should become thin, you know, whatever arbitrary size the airline has made the seat, that kind of thing. If you want good health care, then you should become thin, and then healthcare will be accessible to you. And in truth, that is not accurate. That's not how social justice works. Right. And as a queer person, I definitely saw the parallels to when I first came out, and they were like, Oh, well, if you don't like experiencing homophobia, just be straight. Right? And if you can't be straight and act straight, right. I can remember people saying, it’s like being an alcoholic, right? You're never not gay, but you don't have to act it. And then you won't be subject to homophobia. And so again, very different oppressions. But as someone is a member of both communities, I definitely saw those parallels. And so size acceptance is very simple. It says fat people have the right to exist without shame, stigma, bullying or oppression, it doesn't matter why we're fat. It doesn't matter what the quote unquote consequences of being fat might mean, it doesn't matter if we could or want to become thin. The rights to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness is not and should not be size dependent.
Katelyn:
Amen. Mic drop. I mean, it's so important, and we could keep talking about this, but I do have some more questions that I want to ask you. And I also am curious, about your opinion on why are we not making a quicker change based on the evidence and the research that you were describing before in all of your statistics research in not finding a single research paper that that showed the long-term success of weight loss. Why is that not more widely known in the medical profession and in our society at large? What's limiting it from us? Is it just our, our bias against wanting to know that information? Is it a lack of people saying it? What are some of the things that are really standing in the way?
Ragen:
Yeah, so it's, I mean, the weight loss industry has done an unbelievable job at taking a product that doesn't work and not just making it more marketable, right? They have they made $20 billion in 2012, which is a ridiculous amount of money, they made $72 billion in 2018. And you can't have that kind of exponential growth if your weight loss product actually works, because people lose weight, and then they don't come back, right. It's built on our feet business model. And what they've done is create this narrative where they take credit for the first part of the biological response to weight loss attempts, which is the short-term weight loss, and then they blame their clients and get their clients and everyone else to blame them when they have the second part of the same biological response, which is that they gain back the weight. And we know that our bodies respond to potential weight loss attempts by changing biologically to become weight, gaining weight, maintaining machines, we there's, you know, good evidence about that. But it's become such a cultural belief that we no longer look at proof. When you look at the research on weight and weight loss, it's appalling, right research that would have gotten me failed in first semester, freshmen research method is being published in peer reviewed health journals. And without questioning, and that drives the issue within health care, because that's what doctors are relying on. I do a lot of talking to healthcare practitioners about the research. And they're often incredibly surprised to learn what the research actually says, because what they're hearing is, you know, the conclusion of this study is every diet works. But what's true is that 68% of the study dropped out before the eighth week, and the remaining people lost about five pounds in two years. But there's this belief that, oh, if somebody can lose a little bit of weight short term, then anybody can lose any amount of weight given enough time and hard work. And that's simply not what's accurate. And the weight loss industry, including within the medical community has sold a false narrative for so long, so hard that it's become ingrained in our cultural ethos and belief. And it serves a lot of people because they get to, you know, blame that people for the cost of health care and for their own issues. And they get to, you know, feel better than people who are fatter than them. It serves a lot of cultural issues, too. But it's a complex issue.
Katelyn:
It's systemic. And I mean, it's, it's been going on for generations, too. So, it's deeply problematic, and really, really hard to untangle.
Ragen:
I would have actually, before we go on because I think I maybe haven't made this clear, I want to be super-duper clear: health is a really amorphous concept. We kind of act sometimes like you can throw a dart and hit health. It's not an obligation. It's not a barometer of worthiness. It's not entirely within our control. And I want to be clear fat people have the right to exist without shame, stigma, bullying and oppression, regardless of health or health status, or what health could be. I never want to intermingle those two things or conflate them.
Katelyn:
Thank you for saying that. I think that alone is such an important conversation that we should be having, and the worthiness piece around how we are putting health on a pedestal right now. And the confusion around what health is, in general, and just how it's treated in our culture as well, too. It's such an individual, deeply personal choice that is separate from how we should be treated in our society as well to your body. And I think that really just goes back to body autonomy and body politics.
Ragen:
Yeah, for sure. And understanding. I mean, our cultural idea about health is just that anybody can be healthy by whatever definition someone's using if they try hard enough. And again, that's not accurate. And it's important that we are always clear about that, because otherwise we end up either adding to or using health ism in addition to weight stigma, which does not make it a better look.
Katelyn:
Agreed. And I appreciate you saying that. Can you briefly touch on that Reagan? What are some other variables that are that we're not factoring into health & healthism? If you want to go into socioeconomic status or cultural bias or anything that you feel like is really relevant.
Ragen:
Sure. There are so many things that contribute to our whatever we're calling health or well-being. There are things called social determinants of health and those are the conditions into which we are born. We age that impact our health. And it's everything from access to clean air and clean water, to experience of oppression and marginalization, to wages and vacation time, which can be affected by privilege and marginalized status as well. And all of these things, and so those are impacting our health, our genetics are impacting our health. And some research has said that as little as 25% of our actual health and well-being is really within our control, and it's less so for people who have we're dealing with things like chronic pain, chronic illness, mental illness that affects their ability to, to do things that they might want to do, or that affects their body's systems in different ways. I's a really complicated thing that we try to make very simple because simple cells.
Katelyn:
Yeah and that's the problem in itself- the simple cells. We try to reduce somebody's lived experience without considering the full picture. And the systemic and generational picture that we've got to be talking about as well, too.
Ragen:
And it's a mistake I used to make, I used to give my own personal metabolic health numbers. And what's true is that that doesn't matter. I think it's important that we be clear that if people want to support their health, there are ways to do that outside of a weight loss paradigm that are evidence based. But we always have to be clear when we're talking about that, that those things are not obligations, that they're not guaranteed, and that nobody is obligated to do any of them in order to be treated with basic human respect.
Katelyn:
So we're making that clear right here and right now. And if somebody is curious about what some of those health promoting behaviors are, how would you describe them to anybody who's curious.
Ragen:
So, the health promoting behaviors include things like being able to get enough sleep, which not everybody's able to do because of job situations and kid’s situations and everything. social connection, there's research that shows that social connection is more linked to health markers than smoking or high blood pressure. We often don't talk about that, there's hydration, there's self-care by which I don't just mean mani-pedi’s, or massages or whatever somebody is talking about, that those things can be very important. But the ability to have time for oneself the ability to make enough money and have enough vacation time to really care for oneself. There's movement, which we talk a lot in Health at Every Size, about joyful movement. But in fact, for some folks, there are benefits to movement, either for their physical or mental well-being, but that they prefer to get even though they don't necessarily enjoy movement. And that's also a valid choice. And I think that the idea of joyful movement can create too much pressure for folks.
Katelyn:
Mm hmm. Right. How do you think that's problematic? I totally agree. And I'm so curious about your take on it.
Ragen:
Yeah. So, there's nothing wrong with joyful movement. If you're moving because you enjoy it, that's fine. If you're not moving, that's awesome. I've done both, I can tell you for sure. Having a Netflix marathon and completing a marathon are morally equivalent activities, right? If you go slow enough, both away to waste an entire Sunday. But it's this idea of joyful movement creates this idea that if you're not enjoying it, then there's no valid reason to do it. Right. And for some folks, and let me be clear, what I'm not saying is ditch your meds and do yoga, right? I know that people with chronic health problems are often told, just do movement when that is the last thing that is accessible to them, right? So that's not what I'm saying at all. But there are people who have found that for a health condition that they have or for their own mental health, they find movement is helpful and supportive of them. But they don't find it joyful. Right, just like I don't find doing dishes joyful, but I do it because it's better than just dishes everywhere, no clean dishes, right? So, it's something that they do to support themselves, but they don't have that pressure that is this joyful can be too much pressure. Same time in working. You know, I talked to a lot of people who have had messy breakups with movement, right? I'm looking at you dodgeball president’s physical fitness test, asshole, junior high school gym teachers. Coming back to that on your own terms. To me, the important thing is on your own terms, so if you want to keep trying stuff till you find something that you love valid, if you're like, I just want to find the thing I hate less and knock out the time that I need to do to support my body valid. Right? If you're like, this is not low hanging fruit for me. I'm not about this. I don't want to reconcile my relationship. I want a divorce with movement. Valid. Right, but making sure people have all the options available and accessible to them. That's to me what's important.
Katelyn:
All the options? Yeah, I think that's so important as well to your own lived experience. Let's segue back into your story because I mean, movement- you're like the queen of movement and movement in a really inspiring way as well, too. I mean, you're this fabulous dancer and marathon running. And you also hold a Guinness World Record as well, too. So, where do you even want to start with this? You gave this fabulous story about the dance competition- is that something that you still do today?
Ragen:
Um, no, I haven't. I've gotten away from dance. I moved out to LA and left my coaching partner behind and kind of, and then I injured my neck, which is what got me into doing the first marathon I did with my best friend. But the first thing I want to say is that there's this thing called the good Fatty, bad fatty dichotomy. Yeah, talk about it, please. It's this idea that fat people who do like the quote unquote, healthy things, whether that's what they eat, or that they engage in movement deserve to be treated better than fat people who do other things with their time. And the good Fatty, bad fatty dichotomy needs to die, and I want to help kill it, kill it, kill it. And at the same time, I want to be clear, I am privileged by it. Right because I do I enjoy doing fitness see things as part of just like my own personality. It doesn't fitness participation doesn't make us better or worse than people who do other things with their time. And too often we act like fitness or movement or health by whatever it is like morality. And again, that's not the case. I enjoy doing fitness the things, I like challenges. And in 2013, I injured my neck and a freak accident. And my doctor said all the things you like to do, because I'm what sort of known as a fast twitch athlete, I like explosive movement. I like working really hard for a short period of time. I like lifting heavy things. So yeah, he's like, you know, all the things you like, don't do any of those things. He's like, your neck can support it. It's like, you can go for walks. And I was like, wow, that does not sound like fun to me at all. I need some kind of goal, or I'm not going to do this. And I was kind of looking around online. And I got this idea of a marathon. I was like, I wonder like if people my size are doing this. And the first thing I found was a doctor was like, you shouldn't even try to do a marathon if you're not, you know, within, like you said, 10% of your ideal weight. And I was like, Alright, I'm doing it. And I emailed my best friend, I was like, I found out that 20 weeks, which was my recovery time from then there was a marathon in Seattle where my best friend lives. I emailed him and I was like, do you want to do a marathon with me and like the best friend he is email back I'm in. And so that's how I started to do that was just like to have some reason to go on these walks are supposed to go on because I knew that I was not going to motivate myself without some kind of big goal. That's just my personality. And then I finished it. And I learned after that I could have set the Guinness World Record for heavy Sullivan to complete a marathon. I was like, that's great. I'll send it my time. They'll send me a medal. It'll be no, you can't do it retroactively, you have a ton of hoops to jump through to get a Guinness record.
Katelyn:
I was wondering about that when I saw that you held the Guinness World Record. What are those hoops? Tell us the process- I want the behind the scenes. So, you have to apply for the record first? Just like at guinessworldrecord.com?
Ragen:
Yes, exactly. And so, the process is not terribly difficult to apply. But you have to see. There was a record for that a man held. And I was like, well, let's do at least one more category. And I would like to see them do a non-binary category as well. But currently, there's heaviest man and heaviest woman. And so, I applied to separate the category to create a woman category and then applied to set the record. And they come up with all of the guidelines and everything. And it was like we had to have witnesses. But they could only be there for two hours, they couldn't be related to it to us or each other. They had to fill out a form, in their own words of what they witnessed the way and had to be on a scale that would we need to the gram, which is about the weight of a paperclip. And it had to be a health professional and one other person who were the way in team. And then we had to calculate this specific gravitational pull at that latitude and longitude point. So, my packet included, we got a physics professor involved. And he like there's an equation in my packet that I don't understand at all that I submitted to Guinness and then you can have an adjudicator come out, but that cost 1000s of dollars, which I didn't have. So that's why we had to have the witnesses, and we had a video of the whole thing. So, I wore a GoPro the whole time and my partner Juliann was sitting in a van. And y'all It was 40 degrees. They were 20 mile an hour winds and it rained the whole day on the marathon on my marathon. Yeah. Oh my god. And it was a loop course. Every two miles I would pass the van and she would switch out the GoPro for one with a fresh battery. And then I would take off and so like somebody, again is apparently watch 10 hours of me heavy breathing, and it was on my chest. So, they're just watching my arms go and looking at my view of the same two-mile loop 14 times. But yeah, so you have all of these requirements to get the Guinness I ended up writing an article for a medium publication called better humans. And now I get really fun emails from people like I'm trying to break the record for most jumps on a unicycle. Can you help me?
Katelyn:
That's a fun fact. I think it's so amazing. Do you still run marathons today?
Ragen:
So in finding out I had to do a second marathon I could not get myself motivated because like we had telework and I named ourselves team dead last and then when we finish team never again, right? It was miserable. And I was trying to get myself psyched up. And I started to read books and listen to audiobooks from people who had done endurance stuff to try to psych myself up and a bunch of them had done Ironman triathlons. And I got this idea that, you know, because what I learned as part of this marathon journey is that I have always played sports, but I only ever played sports that I was good at right away. I played basketball, I think one time in fifth grade, I suck that it never again. And I am glacially slow. At marathon, my first marathon took me 12 and a half hours a second took me 10 It's a long time to be out there. And I also became this journey of what is it like to, you know, be fat and part of the quote unquote stereotype even though stereotypes the problem is that they exist, not that people happen to fill it in them, but what is it like to struggle as an athlete at something that I just am not good at, and I'm not really getting better at, even though I'm working really hard. And so, the Iron Man, it's so an iron distance triathlon is a 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike ride, and then a marathon all in a row. That sounds that really is a strange choice. But I was like, that seems like the ultimate expression of this experiment, right to suck at three sports over a really long distance, a period of time. And so, I've been pursuing that now. I think I'm in my eighth year, I can't tell you how much stuff has gone wrong. And this iron distance triathlon journey that I'm on, including COVID, we were preparing, it was gonna be in May of last year, and then we locked down in March. And so then after a year of lockdown, and not trained, like, I'm gonna have to start again, starting training again, you know, from scratch, basically, having lost all of my endurance fitness. So that's what I'm doing right now is, but I've decided I am trying to do this, there are very strict time limits. And you have to travel, it's very expensive. And I realized, it just wasn't working for me. And so, I have a blog about it, iron fat calm, I just decided all I wanted to do is do this 140.6. And then I got all wrapped up in, like the sport and the branded events. And I was like, I'm just gonna do this at home. On my home turf, I'm just going to create my own iron distance course and do it. And so that's now what I'm pursuing. Wow.
Katelyn:
That's amazing. Is there an official date when you are competing in this?
Ragen:
Yeah. So, I have to book this. I have to decide because I'm just doing it myself. And currently, I'm looking at doing it April 29 of next year, which would be a year from my spinal surgery date.
Katelyn:
Wow. Oh, my God, that's amazing- we’ll have to cheer you on. I'm really curious how movement fits into your life right now. Because this isn't just going for a walk or taking a class every now and then this is really intense, vigorous movement that for a lot of people could very easily get tangled up into disordered movement and distorted ways of thinking and what not. So how do you keep a pulse on that for yourself? Was there a time period where you really had to distinguish between the two? What does that look like in terms of your WHY behind how you move your body now and when you know it's becoming something else, or when it's gone too far?
Ragen:
Yeah, when I was still at a weight loss paradigm, I really felt like I could feel my eating disorder on the edges, kind of trying to creep in. But once I separated body size, once I stopped trying to manipulate my body size, I haven't felt that that eating disorder on the edges kind of creeping up on me kind of situation. And I do take precautions. I am trying to make sure I don't feel compelled to do this. If I need a day off, I take a day off. I don't feel like I have to do every single workout and if I don't I've failed, and so that kind of compulsive feeling. I have sort of safeguards against that, but really the thing for me was that I'm not doing this to manipulate my body size. I'm doing this because I want to travel this distance. You know, in this way?
Katelyn:
Yeah. So, a radical shift for the intention around doing movement for yourself.
Ragen:
And just so I'm clear since this is public, this isn't about my health at all. Yeah, this idea, it's, we talk, I talk about this, like, athletes don't need to play sports, and yet they play sports, they hurt themselves, and they get health care, right. The NFL is literally arranged around people risking their short- and long-term health, both physical and mental, in the hopes that they will someday score enough points to win a piece of jewelry. And we sort of think that's fine. But this idea that if fat people don't engage in health, the way that people think they should, then they deserve to be treated poorly, is ridiculous and completely hypocritical to the way that we treat people who put their bodies and health on the line for athletic pursuits. This is about me wanting to accomplish something that's honestly pretty ridiculous.
Katelyn:
It's not about health at all, which I think is important to distinguish, especially in this community of many, many people coming out of diet culture, and truly a pretty radical way of shifting our thoughts and beliefs and just values in general, there's so much that we have to untangle when we do this work. And it's a, it's a long journey as well, too. And it I think the education piece- it's a constant journey for me. And that's been one of the biggest tools in my toolkit as well. Like I mentioned before, just continuing to learn continuing to educate myself continuing to get support and whatnot. I want to go back to something that you just said, separating your body, what do you feel like were some of the key parts of your journey that really gave you the permission to do that, and especially coming out of this deep belief system of trying to manipulate your body size for society standards, and just your journey with your eating disorder, recovery and whatnot, when you were kind of on those shaky waters at first, what brought you back mantra I am separating myself from my body size? When you felt triggered, what were some things that you've really held on to that go you through those hard times?
Ragen:
Through the first part of my journey, when I was in my two-part plan, I was just like, I will worry about weight loss later, right? Like, I'm gonna get a positive, healthy relationship with my body and learn to love at any size first, and then so I could just when I had like, the thoughts about weight loss, I was like that is for later, right. And then when I went to when it became later, and I did the research, that was, honestly the thing that grounded me the most. And it's, again, it's another big area of privilege where, because I happened to have this knowledge of research methods and statistics, I was able to read the studies and understand them. It wasn't like somebody had told me Oh, dieting doesn't work. It was like, I did hours and hours of work to prove to myself that this is the case. And I would just keep going back to like, oh this is not the truth you're being lied to. And fomenting your righteous anger about that helped a lot. And then I kind of created a little saying that I would use so my personal saying is, hey, that's bullshit. But I know other people use like, nope, nope, nope. Not this time that whenever I would see diet culture, I would think to my consciously think to myself, hey, that's bullshit. So, whether it was a billboard with like, freeze your fat off, or you know, amputate your stomach or join off the fast or whatever ridiculous thing. I was like, nope, no pain, that's bullshit. And at this point, I've been doing it for so long, that it forms like an exoskeleton, so the messages don't even get in. And so that dedicated practice is what really helped me. But honestly, the thing that helped me the most was having done that literature review, I continue, obviously, to keep up with the research and read and break down studies and I teach this stuff to healthcare practitioners, so I have to be really on my game with that. But that helps me the most, because that's just my personality. Right? Even if I wanted to be thin, and I always want to be clear, fat phobia is real. It's not in our heads. And it's systemic. So, we can't self-love our way into a seat that doesn't accommodate us. We can't self-love our way into a promotion that we're not getting because we're fat. I am being harmed actively right now by fat phobia. But what I decided was that I spent years fighting my body on behalf of fat phobia and weight stigma. And instead, I'm going to fight fat phobia and weight stigma on behalf of my body. And that's the difference.
Katelyn:
Yeah, I mean, that's such a radical shift and a mindset, and a deep belief that's being formed for yourself as well, too. And one that I think will really resonate with our community here today, just like how you said it's a practice. And it's a process. And I think that when we go through this journey with our body and dismantling these beliefs, and really educating on systems of oppression and forming new beliefs, it is building a new skill, and it is practicing and going through a process and just the journey with all of that as well, too. So, I appreciate hearing yours. What are some of the questions that you get asked the most when you educate doctors or some of the groups that you speak with? Are there any just reoccurring themes that stand out to you lately?
Ragen:
When I talked to doctors, the very first question is always going to be where did you go to medical school? And my answer is always I didn’t. If I went to medical school, I would believe the same things that you do. I had to go outside of academia in order to be able to do this work. And they're not happy with it, but it's the truth. It's not something I made up. And when I started in fitness, I was selling weight loss, right? I sold an MLM for a while. So, it's not like I was fully in these beliefs. And so, I'm like, if you disagree with me, that's great. But this is an invitation to show me the evidence for what you believe. We're not all. So usually not anything in that moment. But there's, it's, it's hard because there's this, first of all, the belief and we're seeing this more like in our culture that everybody knows, or my sincerely held belief is the same thing as your evidence or expertise. And overcoming that it's hard. Everybody knows that, you know, whatever, knee surgeries have worse outcomes for fat patients, everybody knows that. Okay, well, have you looked at the studies? Everybody knows that if you get if you have weight loss before surgery, the outcomes are better. Okay. But have you looked at the studies? Because a lot of it is based on assumption. And with healthcare practitioners, it's sort of a ladder that you take them through from like fat patients, or people who deserve respectful treatment and health care to like how do I advocate for the things that we I need to give the best possible care to my fat patients? And there are levels to that. But yeah, so you know, the question I probably get asked the most is, like, if this is true, what you're saying about the research, how are we also fooled. Right, and so then, like, we go into the breakdowns of like assumptions and poor research, and, you know, spurious conclusion drawing, right, that if fat people experience a health issue more often than people, then their body size must be the problem and making them smaller must be the solution. You can't draw that conclusion like that. Right? You have to look at confounding variables like weight stigma, like weight cycling, like staggering inequalities in health care, and how that impacts that bodies rather than saying, Oh, well, if we make fat people thin, obviously, they'll have the same outcomes that been people who've always been thin do, and Deborah Guard has done incredible work in this space. And I rely on lean on her work a lot. And other scholars as well. But um, but yeah, so you have to it's hard because I was talking with john Robeson one time, who's one of the people who created that concept of health, every size worked on it in the early days. And I think he has a PhD in three master's degrees. brilliant guy. And we were talking about because we get booked to do these debates, right, where we're debating someone who believes in the weight loss paradigm. And he's like, they get there 20 minutes to say everything you think is true. And we get the same 20 minutes to say, all right, let's start at the beginning. Everything you've been told is wrong. Oh, it's so hard because it's a complicated situation that requires nuance and listening. And it's not as easy as saying like, eat less and exercise more or whatever we're saying to people, is it's being claimed as the truth around weight and health. I think that's what makes it so tough.
Katelyn:
It's so complex. It's so complicated. For everybody who is listening and also for myself included, what is one thing that you want everybody to take away from this conversation? Let's just say that we're not statisticians or researchers and or debaters- what would your arm somebody with to go out into this world and feel prepared if a conversation like this comes up, and they do feel like they want to educate a little bit more. Especially around families, you know, I get this question a lot with, with clients as well, in terms of just boundary setting and families kind of getting up in arms and wanting to know the research and feeling kind of debilitated with being able to provide facts and figures for people. And you're talking to doctors- this is just moms and dads for the most part and aunts and uncles. What are some ways that we can navigate some of these social conversations in a really intentional and educational way?
Ragen:
Sure. I want to acknowledge moms and dads are sometimes harder than doctors, right? Because I don't have to, that doctor is not related to me. I think it's important to understand even if you have more information, someone else you're not obligated to educate them. So, you can choose to educate. And if you do, that's a courtesy that you're doing them, right, because they could find that education on their own. So, understand that you're not obligated to educate them. And you can't control the outcome of the education. And to me, as an activist, that's so important, all I can choose is when I prefer is when I engage in education or activism, I can't make that person, believe me change their mind act differently. And I think the core to me of dealing with family and friends is that boundary setting, right, and I use three steps. Step one: state your need- your boundaries. Step two: explain the consequence if it's broken. And step three: follow through. And the consequence can be something really little, it just has to be something that you know, you can do. So, you know, hey, every time we get together for a family meal, we talked about my weight and my food, and that's not going to be okay anymore. And if that happens, I'm just gonna have to take my plate and eat in the other room. And then if it happens, oh, we talked about this, this isn't okay. So, like I said, I'm going to take my plate and eat in the other room. So, understand that it's okay, you have a right to keep yourself safe and set boundaries. And you can also choose to like roll your eyes and let it go. It's up to you, you get to make those choices. If you do decide to educate, you don't need to do all the work. And you don't need to center yourself as an expert in a way that makes you feel uncomfortable. So, you can also center the voices of other people. And in particular, look at people who are coming from multiple marginalization, right black fat, queer, trans activists, disabled fat activists, etc. and center their voices share their resources. One resource that I think is helpful, our that I helped create is called HAES Health Sheets. And they are diagnosis specific weight neutral health care guides that are for practitioners and patients and advocates. But also, there's a research and resource bank. So, if you're looking for research to some people, that's a good place to go. But look at The Body is not an Apology, Sony Renae Taylor site, she has amazing stuff. If you're talking about clothing, access, Saucye West has amazing work around that. So, as you're following people, you can sort of collect your own little research bank. And then whether it's in a Facebook conversation or an email conversation, you can share that. And you can also ask for more time, face to face, it can be really hard I just again, luck and privilege, I keep a lot of numbers and statistics and studies in my head. That's not something that's accessible to everyone. And don't feel like you have to- that's not a skill anybody is required to have. Right? So, you can say let me email you about this. You can give yourself space and time you're not you know; it's you're not push a button get education just because somebody wants it.
Katelyn:
This is so great. I think these are great facts. You literally just filled our toolbox up I so appreciate that. And you just gave so much value to this conversation with your truth with your expertise, just you and the work that you're doing and all of these resources that you've shared. I can't thank you enough. Where can everybody connect with you, Ragen? You will absolutely have to come back on the show as well too, because there's a whole other list of things that I want to get into with you, but I want to be mindful of time. So where can people find you? And you've got so many resources and all of your places too.
Ragen:
Well, I will be happy to come back any time. The easiest place to start connecting with me is danceswithfat.org and you'll see along the top as all my social media and then I do a monthly workshop. It's online and I have a video library of password shops and all of those come with a pay what you can afford option. And then you can see past blog posts and kind of search so that's kind of the central place to start. And then if you want to follow me on Instagram or Twitter or whatever, you can find it that way.
Katelyn:
Fabulous. We'll link it all in the show notes too for everybody to keep it super simple. Thank you so much. This was so great. I just cannot say enough good things. I appreciate you.
Ragen:
Oh, thank you and right back at you. You do amazing work, and I am grateful to be a little part of it today. So seriously, thank you