{"id":7162,"date":"2019-03-08T11:46:58","date_gmt":"2019-03-08T11:46:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fitproblog.mysites.io\/what-fat-may-mean\/"},"modified":"2019-03-08T11:46:58","modified_gmt":"2019-03-08T11:46:58","slug":"what-fat-may-mean","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fitpro.com\/blog\/what-fat-may-mean\/","title":{"rendered":"What fat may mean"},"content":{"rendered":"

Your client wants to lose weight, but have you considered that they might really want to stay exactly as they are? Olivia Hubbard explores fat as a feminist issue.<\/strong><\/p>\n

According to the National Centre for Eating Disorders, by the age of 10, most girls have established a fear of becoming fat.<\/p>\n

Young men are troubled, too. In 2016, advertising \u2018think tank\u2019 Credos surveyed 1,000 18-year-olds, 53% of whom revealed that they felt pressured by the media to look a certain way1<\/sup>. Negative body image is nothing new and, for most men and women, how they see themselves and how they feel begins in adolescence and can last a lifetime.<\/p>\n

Early theories of body image seem to originate from the 1930s in the work of psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Paul Ferdinand Schilder. Schilder believed that body image was a reflection of attitudes and interactions with others. In short, it is socially constructed. He was particularly interested in the \u2018elasticity\u2019 of body image, reasons for the fluctuations in perceived body size, feelings of lightness and heaviness, and the effects of body on interactions with others. Schilder defined body image as, \u201cThe picture of our own body that we form in our mind, that is to say the way in which the body appears to ourselves2<\/sup>.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the last 100 years, British women appear to have been under considerable pressure to conform to a particular body type. A century ago, the idealised female form was perhaps the opposite of what is depicted in the media today \u2013 dimpled flesh and today\u2019s cellulite was viewed as beautiful. Back then, fatness was regarded as a sign of energy and health; the thin silhouette was considered sickly. At the turn of the century, slenderness became more fashionable, although it would be considered fat by today\u2019s standards3<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

By the 1920s, the Victorian hourglass gave way to the thin flapper who bound her breasts to achieve the washboard profile that looked good doing the Charleston; and the 1960s saw the arrival of Twiggy, who weighed in at 91lbs3<\/sup>. \u201cSlimness came to exemplify unconventionality, freedom, youthfulness and a \u2018ticket to\u2019 a jet-set life in 1960s\u2019 Britain, and was adapted as the ideal by women of all social classes,\u201d says psychotherapist, feminist, activist and author, Susie Orbach4<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

Our clients\u2019 relationship with fat<\/h3>\n

A client may say that their goal is to lose weight. As a personal trainer, have you considered precisely what being overweight might really mean to each client?<\/p>\n

In Susie Orbach\u2019s book, Fat is a Feminist Issue <\/em>(FIFI), Orbach suggests that being fat \u2013 and each individual\u2019s socially constructed view of themselves associated with this \u2013 can mean many things. She says, \u201cIf an individual is fat, that may well be a statement of self-dislike, a desire to be distinguished from the crowd, a test, a rebellion5<\/sup>.\u201d In other words, what does \u2018being fat\u2019 represent? Does it mean loneliness? Emotional hunger? Protection? Substance?<\/p>\n

Orbach continues, \u201cBody image and protection are very important. In our self-help groups, we try to address these two problems; group members are encouraged to accept the physical aspects of being fat. Self-acceptance is the key task in the group; without it, weight loss and breaking the addiction can only be temporary5<\/sup>.\u201d<\/p>\n

What Orbach tells individuals is that they first must own something before they are able to give it up; they must own their fat. She notes that most compulsive eaters are very aware of how their face looks, but not in relation to the rest of their body. Orbach tells FitPro, \u201cWeight loss is only weight loss. It isn\u2019t a new life. It can be good for you, if you have learnt to eat in a way that reflects your hunger and satisfaction. It gives you a basis for knowing about other needs that might be struggles in your life.\u201d<\/p>\n

The self-help techniques explored in Fat is a Feminist Issue <\/em>are interesting. Orbach reveals the importance of seeing your body in its entirety when conducting self-help mirror-work exercises, instead of focusing on the little bit that you want fixing. The aim of the self-help exercise is to alter the sequence from me:fat:world, and replace it with me:world.<\/p>\n

Professor in health psychology at the University of Surrey, Jane Ogden, who conducted the study Successful weight loss<\/em> maintenance and a shift in identity: From the restriction to a new<\/em> liberated self<\/em>, told FitPro, \u201cIt is difficult for individuals to permanently change habits that are often entrenched from their childhood and to sustain any changes in the longer term. Yet, factors that may help are devising coping strategies that don\u2019t involve food. There is the sense of hope that there is a new future for individuals, a sense of investment and a recognition of the struggle involved in any initial weight loss \u2013 rather than still being the old person inside a temporary body.\u201d<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Susie Orbach would seem to agree. She describes a number of self-help exercises in FIFI that she believes can help, including:<\/h3>\n