A Guide to Surviving Weight Stigma During the Holidays
Image Description: A diverse group of friends clink their glasses together as they sit in a well-lit living space that has brightly-colored furniture and plants. Photo by AllGo - An App for Plus Size People via Unsplash.
The holidays often whip up a storm of weight stigma and diet culture. From family and friends who want to comment on our bodies and food choices, to peer comments about break room goodies and parties fraught with diet culture, to an endless stream of weight loss ads across every conceivable media platform, it’s hard to avoid these lines of thinking.
Of course, while many people, cultures, and religions celebrate holidays during the winter season, many people don’t. Still, not celebrating any holidays is not necessarily protection from this maelstrom—hereinafter referred to as “The Nonsense”—this time of year.
How we respond to this can depend on a lot of factors: the balance of power and privilege between us and the perpetrator(s), how much energy we have to deal with this on any given day, our personal, family, and culture style around conversation and conflict, and more. I want to stress that however you choose to handle The Nonsense is valid. The most important thing to remember is that while this may rapidly become your problem, it is not your fault. If you can establish space between you and The Nonsense, it will help protect you from internalizing it.
It also helps to have some go-to lines in your toolkit so you don’t have to think of something new to say each time The Nonsense arises. You do not have to respond. As with all of the advice in this article, feel free to make it work for you and change the wording, skip steps, or add steps The following is just a framework.
First, acknowledge what is happening. You might think, “OK, this is weight stigma/diet culture. It’s becoming my problem right now, but it’s not my fault.” Next you can use a phrase that seems innocuous to the person to whom you're speaking, but that you understand is a response to their poor behavior. Some examples include phrases like “thanks for sharing,” “sure thing,” or “bless your heart.” You could give them a double thumbs up.
When you have some time to yourself or with a supportive friend, you might replay the situation. Say or write down a different response, i.e. what you might have wanted to say or thought of later. You can roleplay it, write it in a letter or email that you do or don’t send. Do whatever it takes to make sure that you're not blaming yourself for the inappropriate behavior of other people.
How to Respond to The Nonsense During the Holidays (and Year-Round)
Interactions with family and friends can be tough because of history, culture, and/or familial expectations. Interactions with co-workers can be fraught because of company politics and corporate hierarchies.
The Nonsense can be overt with direct comments about your weight or questions about your food choices like, “Have you gained weight?” or “Do you really need seconds of that?” It can also be more vague, like an unsolicited “gift” of a gym membership or weight loss cookbook, or a comment about how dressing differently would be more “flattering”—i.e., create an optical illusion to make your body look closer to a standard of beauty based on thin, white, cisgender, heterosexual, non-disabled youth.
So what can we do?
If someone you know is a repeat offender, one option is to talk to them before seeing them at holiday celebrations. You can do this in person, on Zoom, in text, or over phone—whatever works best for you and them. I recommend a three step boundary-setting process.
1. State Your Boundaries
Tell the person what you need. For example, “You may not realize, but each time I see you at the holidays, you [talk about what I eat, make comments about my weight, etc.]. I need you to stop doing that so that I can enjoy your company and my holiday.”
You can choose to explain yourself—i.e. “I’m working on my body image,” or “My therapist says that kind of treatment is harmful for me”—but you aren’t obligated. You don’t owe anyone an explanation.
2. State the Consequences of Violating Your Boundaries
Remember that boundary-setting isn’t about us controlling their behavior. We can’t do that. Instead, it’s about our actions. If someone treads on your boundaries, the consequence should only involve your behavior. It doesn’t have to be something big; it just has to be something you can follow through on.
So you can say, “If [you talk about what I eat] this year, I’ll take my dinner to another room,” or “I’ll stop interacting with you,” or “I’ll head home and we can try again next year.” Choose something that makes sense for you and clearly define it.
3. Follow Through
If your boundaries are not respected, follow through with the consequences and be clear that their boundary-treading caused your response. For example, consider stating, “We talked about this and you chose not to respect my boundary. Like I said, I’m going to [go home now]. Hopefully, you’ll do better next time.”
Unfortunately, it’s not always possible to set boundaries ahead of time, especially if your holiday celebrations include guests or people you don’t know very well. It’s a good idea to have some responses at hand in case someone spews The Nonsense unexpectedly.
If someone talks about your weight or your food choices, here are some mix and match responses:
That’s inappropriate and offensive.
What I eat is none of your business.
I have absolutely no interest in discussing my weight or food choices with you.
I’m not soliciting opinions about my health or food choices.
Please don’t comment on my weight or food choices.
Your comment is unacceptable.
We can talk about something else, or I can leave.
I can’t imagine what made you think that was OK to say, but it wasn’t.
The key to these responses is to practice. If you get foggy and tongue-tied in these situations (which is completely normal and valid!), practicing can empower you to handle these interactions more easily and with more confidence.
What about weight loss ads?
One option for dealing with weight loss ads is to create a slogan that you think or say to yourself whenever you see one of these ads. This can help you create space between you and the ad so that you don’t internalize The Nonsense.
Some examples include: “Nope, nope, nope,” “Not today, Satan,” and my personal slogan, “Hey, that’s bullshit!” On social media, you can report ads as misleading or spam.
How to Handle People Talking About Body-Based New Year’s Resolutions
Image Description: Three fat people sit at a table chatting and working on laptops in an open office space. Photo by AllGo - An App for Plus Size People via Unsplash.
People are allowed to do what they want with their bodies, and we are allowed to decide whether or not we want to be involved in conversations about it.
We can decide that when they talk about their diet, we talk about our weight-neutral health practice. We can set a boundary like, “That kind of talk is harmful to me. I’d love to spend time with you as long as we can talk about something else.” We can also decide that we want to ignore it and/or remove ourselves if we can’t or don’t want to respond.
Many people opt out of New Year’s Resolutions, but there are other options as well. We could decide to create a personal New Year’s Revolution. We could resolve to stop talking negatively about bodies, including ours! We could resolve to start or end each day with some body gratitude. We could choose any resolution that pushes back against The Nonsense.
Finally, we can lean on our communities both in-person and online. That might mean having gatherings with people who have similar feelings, or turning to a small group to vent and get support.
As the holidays approach, it can be helpful to prepare ourselves for The Nonsense, always remembering that while it may become our problem in the moment, it is never our fault.
We deserve a world without diet culture and weight stigma year-round.
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