79 - How Kami Believed Her Body Is Art w/ guest Kami Orange

The month of February we are focusing on boundaries. I've brought on boundary expert and coach Kami Orange to share her knowledge with us.  I found Kami through a friend who suggested I check her out on TikTok and when I did I loved her. 

Kami Orange (she/her) is a Boundary Coach helping people “say the thing” in a kind direct way. She's a fat, queer, autistic, white cis woman from Utah, United States with over 17 years of 1-to-1 client experience, 294k followers on TikTok, and a boundary book coming out in November 2023! 

You can find Kami at:

https://kamiorange.com/

TikTok @kami_orange

Instagram @kamiorange

I did the interview with Kami a bit differently because I wanted to make sure these episodes were easy to consume. So rather than throwing the entire interview at you and overwhelming you with boundary talk, I've separated it into three episodes.

In the first episode Kami and I talk about her journey to body acceptance and viewing her body as art.

The second episode focuses on the nuts and bolts of boundaries. What they are, why they are good. AND You aren't a jerk if you set a boundary.

The third episode is super fun, I polled the community and Kami answers boundary concerns from listeners. She first shares how she would respond and then how someone new to boundaries might respond. 

Transcript

Sabrina Rogers  0:00  
Hey and welcome back to the show. In this episode, I am joined by boundary expert, Cami orange, and she's going to share with us how she came to a weight neutral place rather than focusing on her weight as something that needed to be controlled and we're shameful Welcome to the emotional eating therapist Show. I'm your host Sabrina Rogers, a licensed mental health counselor, intuitive eating and body image expert, and recovering perfectionist. After healing my own disordered eating and body image issues. I'm helping women let go the guilt and shame around eating, feel at peace around food and befriend the image they see in the mirror. In this podcast, we chat about all things food, body and mental health so that you can stop dieting, let go of perfectionism. And finally, feel confident in all areas of your life. If you want to connect with me on social media, I'm on Instagram, Facebook and Tik Tok at Sabrina Rogers lmhc. And if you enjoy listening to this podcast, please leave a review on iTunes or wherever you're listening. This helps other women find and learn about the podcast, so they too can change their relationship with food and body. Let's get ready to stay off the diet roller coaster and live healthily ever after. Hey, friend, I'm glad you're here today. Over the next three episodes, I'm doing things a little different because I'm bringing on a guest but we're separating her interview into three parts. Over the next three episodes, I am joined by CAMI orange. Cami is a boundary coach helping people say the thing in a kind direct way. She's fat, queer, autistic white sis woman from Utah, United States with over 17 years of one to one client experience 294,000 followers on Tiktok and a boundary book coming out in November of 2023. In this first episode, we learn all about camis journey to weight neutrality, how she stopped looking at her weight as something that was very shameful and needed to be controlled to her body being art. So let's dive into this episode and hear all about camis journey. Cami I am so excited to bring you on the emotional eating and therapist show when my friend shared your content on Tik Tok with me, I instantly fell in love with you. So thank you so much for being here.

Kami  2:40  
Thank you for inviting me, I'm so excited to be here.

Unknown Speaker  2:43  
In this first section, we're gonna talk about camis journey of gaining some weight, what that was like, and then finding some neutrality within that. So Kami, I'm gonna give it to you.

Kami  2:57  
Yeah, I would love to. So I like a lot of people always thought that I was you know, fats, I would look at that, like part of my body. That's the you know, where your uterus my uterus like pushes against my skin. I was like, Oh, I feel lose weight here because I didn't know it was like literally my internal organs. And I just was really unhappy with my body. And then I had gotten married. And I, he left for six months of military training. And I had a complete, come apart and just ate like coconut milk ice cream every single day because I couldn't eat anything else. And I very rapidly put on 65 pounds in six months. And I think because it was such a rapid transition from like, oh, you know, I'm tall. I'm five, nine, but like, I just like jumped up like multiple sizes. None of my clothes fit. Suddenly, I went from like, oh, I can run up the stairs like Oh, I'm out of breath when I go up the stairs. Like all like the changes happen so rapidly that I had to get really serious with myself and I said okay, I want to be so okay with this. I want to be so in love with my body that if this never changes that I'm going to be okay, that was the goal that I set for myself. Because to say, Oh, I'm going to lose weight or I'm going to hate this forever change this that seems like a recipe for sadness. And so I was like, Okay, I want to love my body so much. It never changes I'm going to be okay. And so I made a list of things I could do to try to accomplish that. And one of those things on the list was I printed off like I went on instagram i unfollowed all the skinny fitness people that I have been following and I only followed fat activist plus size models, people who are really really comfortable and confident in their large bodies, and to suddenly mine newsfeed, you know, I would go on there and scroll through and be like, oh, yeah, this is okay. This is okay. I found beautiful photos of fat people and printed them off. And I hung them all over my house. And I just really immersed myself in this like, oh, yeah, this is this is okay. Like, I'm, I am beautiful. They are beautiful. We're okay. And one of my favorite things I did though that was a big turning point in my journey, is I answered an ad from the local college where they have art students, and they're looking for models. And so I went my pose nude for a figure drawing class, which was way outside my comfort zone. Never done that before. And one of the artists said something that profoundly changed my life. And he's like, I'm so glad that you're here. I was like, You're welcome. Like, I'm, I'm laying there naked. Like, I was like, You're welcome. Like, this is super awkward. And he said, I love drawing bodies like yours, because they are so interesting. Like, what does that mean? He's like, they look different. Like, they're so interesting. It's art. And I had this moment, it was like, this switch flipped in my brain that I was like, Oh, I am art. My body is art. Because I was trying to move from like, I don't like my body body negativity stuff. And the jump all the way up to body positivity. It was like too far, right? Like you're trying to skip four steps. And I was like, my legs are just not that long. Like, I cannot do this. And this midpoint of, oh, my body is art. And so as I got used to it, Oh, my stomach rolls over, and there's a crease there now, or, you know, my shirts fit differently, or, you know, just so many adjustments when your body size changes. I was, you know, my arms juggle, like, all the things I realized was like, Okay, this is art, let's find the art in this. And that, for me was a powerful step towards body neutrality. And for me, personally, I, I mean, people always say like, oh, I don't want to glorify OBC I was like, glorify it, like, like, we can be whatever we want to be. But for me, I'm at the point where, you know, bodies or bodies, whatever body you have, like, we're above ground and breathing for another day, like, like, that's, that's kind of my take on it. And so, I kind of had adopted that as a body neutrality stance, and yeah, my body is art. And since then, I've gained more weight. So I'm even bigger now than I was then. And I'm so happy with it. Like, I'm so comfortable with my body. And my fatness, and I love the word fat. I'm really comfortable using the word fat. It's kind of weird to me and be like, well, you're just fat. And I'm also tall. Like, I have sandy blond hair and blue eyes. Yes, these are all neutral descriptive terms. And so I am, I'm just art and I'm happy with that. And that's, that has been this beautiful journey of just like, Yeah, this is okay. Like, I'm I kept following those social media people, I keep how I mean, I have fat art in my home, like I kept on this journey. But for the most part, I'm just, I would say for the last like, six years or so like, just kind of settled into this happiness. And it's not something that I think about on a regular basis, or a daily basis at all. It doesn't bother me, like, this is me, this is my body, and I'm happy camper.

Sabrina Rogers  8:48  
We backtrack before your partner left on leave, and you gained the weight. Were there periods where you were really afraid of gaining weight? Because I hear that a lot of like, Oh, I'd love to just be neutral. But I don't want to gain weight.

Kami  9:09  
Hmm. I at that period, I thought I was fat. So my focus wasn't, Oh, I'm afraid of gaining weight. My focus was like, Oh, I gotta lose weight. I had a unrealistic expectation for I was really attached to the numbers. Because I was like, oh, I need to be under these numbers. But I somehow my brain could not connect like, ma'am, you are five, nine, you will never be under these numbers. That's not like, I come from large boned people like we're, we're not frail petite people were substantially size people. And so to be like, Oh, I've got to be under this number. And so I was really attached to this idea of trying to get below a certain number, when that was not even realistic. For my body type at the time, you'll probably never be realistic for my body like that would be too thin. And so I wasn't as scared of gaining weight. Because my focus was the other direction. I was really like, oh, I have this fat, like I thought my natural non muscular, fleshy arms were so fat, or I thought that like where my uterus sticks out was fat. And I have photos of myself, like from that time, and I was like, This is ridiculous. I can see literally all of my ribs like this. Like, this is not fat, like I just had unrealistic ideas of what I wanted to tall, like, I wanted to tall, thin petite body type, if that makes sense. Like I wanted supermodel proportions, that was never gonna happen. That's just not my body type. And so yeah, I was less afraid of gain weight, because I was really focused on losing what I thought I needed to lose to get under a certain very arbitrary number that maybe would work if I was like five foot, but not five, nine.

Sabrina Rogers  11:05  
So there was never really this, like, oh, gosh, I have to do whatever I can to not gain weight.

Kami  11:12  
I was. So without getting too much into it, I was starved as a small child, I went through a long period of food insecurity. And so it I've never eaten enough. And so like gaining weight, that's my gaining weight was such a like shock. Because I'd never gained a lot of weight in a short period of time. I very rarely gained weight, I had a steady weight from by the time I like was probably 16 or 17. All the way up until this experience, like my weight may be fluctuated five pounds one way or the other, but like on a monthly cyclical basis, but it was the same number the whole time. So I didn't do my weight didn't ever Yo yo, until I gained a whole bunch of weight in six months. 65 pounds. And then since then I probably got another I don't know, like 40 or 50 pounds. I don't weigh myself anymore. But I yeah, I'm at least over 100 pounds more than I was at that time.

Sabrina Rogers  12:12  
How did you come to this, like body neutrality? Space? Because yeah, being in this place where you have to always get under that arbitrary number isn't coming necessarily from a place of love or neutrality. It's like, No, I have to be this.

Kami  12:26  
Yeah. I think realizing, because I gained so much weight so fast. I was like, Oh, my options are, I can deeply hate this. And just like sink into the body loathing. And that seemed really miserable to me. Because I was like, Oh, I'm already starting in this like negative place. And if I tap on like, oh my gosh, now I'm fat monster. Like I was like, this is not that, that just seems so like, terrible for my mental health. And I. And so this idea of I don't know if this will change, because I didn't do this on purpose to make it happen. So I don't know if I can make it unhappen. And so my goal was, I want to love my body so much that if it never changes, I'm okay. And you know, I do like, and so when I've, you know, since gained an additional like 40 plus pounds, I was like, Yeah, this is totally fine. Like, I don't have any problem with that. I love my body so much that if it never changes, I'm okay.

Sabrina Rogers  13:38  
I had a very similar experience of like coming to that space of, you know, ditching diet culture. And then my body did gain weight. And there. I mean, other than knowing that my clothes were fitting differently, I didn't know that I was gaining weight because I'm like you I don't weigh myself. It doesn't. It doesn't matter what that number is, until my clothes started to fit differently. And I remember going, Oh, hmm. Okay, I guess it's time to buy bigger pants. But I know, a lot of people don't necessarily have that. Or they're afraid of that happening. And then like, Oh, but I think working on that acceptance wherever your body is at right now. Wherever you are at right now of you don't have to love every part of your body all the time. Yeah. Yeah, that's a big ask.

Kami  14:37  
Well, maybe that's an unrealistic ask. And I know like, for me, the more I followed, you know, plus sized influencers fat activists really familiarize myself with like, what is the what is the cultural and systemic basis behind like fat phobia and anti fat bias and the harm what's being done to the BMI? Like, I kind of like, I went on my personal journey first. And then I was able to create space to be educated on these things. And I was like, Oh, this is all like, weird. Like, forget my bullshit, like, this is this is messed up. I don't want to be part of that club. I don't want to be part of this group of people who are like, Hey, you only have value if you are smaller, like, those are not those are not the people I want to hang out with. And so I people are, you know, they gain weight when they come to a space about a neutrality. And that's really normal. And most likely they were underweight for where their body was, like they were artificially forcing themselves to be underweight. And then their, their weight will level out. It's not like you come to body neutrality, and then you just like gain weight forever until you become 1000 pound blimp and explode. That's how this works. Yeah, you might put on 510 1520 pounds. But like, if that's your body's current set, point, you are fighting that all the time. And so yeah, it's normal to gain weight when you like, achieve body neutrality. And it's so much better. Like I just tell him, like, I promise, when you stop paying attention to this, your life is more full. Because I don't ever talk about weight with friends. When I'm talking about diets. Nobody is like, oh, we should or shouldn't eat that. Like, it's just, we're just like living happy, lovely lives. And weight loss is so, so boring to me at this point. It's like I get that it's a lot of people's religion, and they are really hyper focused on it. And they pray to that scale every day. And that's that it makes sense for where they've been in their journey. I used to be that way. I was like, Oh my gosh, I gotta weigh myself all the time. I'm like, once you leave that, it's so boring. Like, I gained three pounds. I lost five pounds. Oh my god. I'm like, I thought we get new hobbies. Have you heard of kink? Like, have you ever read paranormal erotica, like, I have some great books just to suggest like, Let's do fun things. Let's you know, to paint pouring.

Sabrina Rogers  17:28  
That was one of the things that I never expected to happen when I ditched diets and quit talking about weight loss or macros or whatever was, like how much my business took off. And how much more confident I felt even though I had an extra 50 some pounds from where I would you know, where I would have been at where I thought I was fat before?

Kami  17:52  
Yeah, yeah, I, because I'm so comfortable with my body, and I'm comfortable with my weights. Like, you know, I'm I was married at the time when that happened, you know, we got divorced. And so in this year since then, like, I do just great for myself, as far as dating men and partners. I don't just date men, I'm queer, but like, you know, mostly men. And, like, I do a lot of nude photo shoots of myself at this point, because I think it's fun. And I think I'm delicious. And it's not to send to anybody else. I don't post them anywhere. But like, it's fun. Um, you know, finding things that I feel really comfortable wearing for my body. There's, there's a lot of options that are opened when you stop focusing on your size, all the time. And a big piece for me was the my body is art. And then I would say the next really big piece was realizing that like, Oh, my weight is similar to my height. And I kind of approach it in that sense, where I'm like, can you imagine if I was like, constantly, constantly, like, oh my gosh, I gotta be taller, I gotta be taller, gotta be taller. What can I do? Like, I will go to all these extremes to be taller, or I've got to be shorter, I've got to be shorter and shorter. I've got like, I got a shrink down, I got a crush myself. And I was like, This is ridiculous. Like, it just is what it is like.

Sabrina Rogers  19:22  
These things are usually predetermined to a big extent, given what genes you have, and we can't do anything about that.

Kami  19:30  
Yeah, and I have other things I would rather focus on. I'm much happier focusing on other things besides trying to put all of this time and energy into shrinking my body or shrinking my height or growing my height. Like I was like, This is what I've got, like, I'm out here rocking my, you know, I don't even know how much I weigh. So like realizing that like, Oh, I'm fat like I'm tall and I'm not that much Changing was a third pay or the second piece. I haven't seen the third big piece I dated this man who him and his son are there. They do wrestling, they do football. They love football, I'd never spent time around football people before. And they're constantly talking about the height and weight of the football players in a very positive way. Like a very normal like, this is like athletic statistics type way. Oh, like this dude is six, four and 300 pounds. This dude is this this is like, and I was like, huh, how about we're all over here, like, Oh my gosh. And I was like, This is ridiculous. Like, well, just how come this is celebrated in this arena, and spoken about with total neutrality, like, Oh, you're gonna go up against this guy, and you're gonna wrestle him. And he's in this weight class, and you're in that weight class level. Like, nobody is least the people I was spending time with. They're not fat shaming, they're just very matter of fact, like, oh, yeah, there's this one guy, and he's this much and blah, blah, blah. And I was like, hmm, I think I'm gonna adopt this attitude, like, Yeah, this is my weight class, can you handle it? Like?

Sabrina Rogers  21:16  
I love that philosophy.

Kami  21:22  
I have my preferences. You know, and I, something that has been an interesting side effect with partners, specifically dating sis men, is I gave a lot of big men, you know, six for 450 pounds, you know, like 615 100 pounds. Like, I did some big, big men. And so it's, like, reset my parameters of what big is. And so it's funny, because I had this gentleman who was like, Oh, I'm just like, really fat. And I'm, like, how tall are you? And he's like, Well, I'm six, two. And I was like, Okay, I was like, how much you weigh. And he's like, Oh, I'm like, two and 245 pounds. And I was like, You didn't even crack 300?

Like, it's so arbitrary. Like, it's so arbitrary. Or it's all about perception. And, like, at this point, if somebody is over, like, 454 75, I'm like, okay, like, substantial. But like, it just, I used to think that like, oh my gosh, if you're over 150 pounds, you're so fat. And now I'm like, Oh, if you're over 475 count your fat legs. I mean, we're all fat. There's varying types of fat in fit, you know what I mean? Like, small, fat, mid fat Infinidat all the things but like, I just he's, like, so unhappy with his body, because he thinks he's so fat and a size that I was like, Oh, I passed that, like six years ago, and I have easily 40 Maybe 50 pounds on you like, it's, it's so random. It's so random. To me. It's really wild

Sabrina Rogers  23:14  
to see how about different perspectives are given? Yeah, for sure. Like, what we've been doing in the world and what we've been consuming, because yeah, we might weigh the exact same, and you might think that you're fat where I think I'm like, Yeah, I'm fat. But I'm also like, hot.

Kami  23:34  
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I, I want to be really clear, like, I'm not dating large men, because it's like a fat fetish or anything, I just genuinely find them attractive. And I'm good with that. Um, and so it's, it's very random. And for me, when I let all of that go, I just have so much more time and bandwidth. Like, I don't think about my size when I get dressed. I don't think about like, I very rarely think about my size. At this point. The only time it comes up, is when I get approached by a potential partner. And they're like, I'm all muscley and skinny. And I'm like, What are you like? 145? Like? I didn't know what to squish you if I climb on top. Just checking. You realize I'm like, way curvy here.

Unknown Speaker  24:25  
 Yeah, comes back to what you said earlier. This is my weight class. Can you handle it?

Kami  24:30  
Yes, yes, exactly. So like that's when it comes up. But besides that, like, I just don't, it doesn't really matter to me. Like if I go out with friends, I recently went out to a restaurant and we're like, Oh, do we want like table with chairs? Or do we want a booth? And you know, quick glance will tell you that the booths are? How do I say this? Like they're nailed to the floor and the tables are nailed to the floor. So it's not that friendly, because there's not enough a big gap, like, you can't put somebody with a stomach, like in that spot. And so I, so we got to table like, and that's totally fine. So like, that's when it comes up. But my thought process isn't, oh my gosh, we're too fat for the booths, my thought processes like they are not fat friendly, this is not an accessible binding place like we might not come back like, and that's, you know, they businesses have an obligation to be accommodating. Same thing when you like, take an airplane and people are like, Oh my gosh, like need a seatbelt extender or like you need two seats. It's not my fault. The airplane is small, like the airline has an has an ethical responsibility to be accommodating. I didn't do anything wrong. Don't get mad at me get mad at the airline, I refuse to take individual responsibility for systemic problems. And I refuse to go home like bathing and body shame. Because the systemic problems, I did not design the restaurant, I do not have an obligation to make my body smaller to accommodate a restaurant that is inaccessible. That's bullshit. I refuse to do that. So I have very strong feelings and people like Oh, women, you should lose weight. And I was like, Maybe we should solve systemic anti fatness and stop discriminating against people.  

Sabrina Rogers  26:23  
Amen. So one of the ways that you kind of came to this weight neutrality piece of shifting your perspective on I can either be fat and to be miserable, shaming myself for gaining weight. Or I can say hey, this is what my body did. I'm gonna I'm gonna love it through it. shifting your perspective on Hey, fats, not bad fats, just a descriptor. And then  I think part of that shift was doing that nude modeling, and then really taking on this idea that my body is art. Yeah. And there were some other little action steps of you know, removing all the fitspo and following more fat friendly accounts. And we can do all those fun action steps but really, where the beauty and where the like real magic happens is in our thought processes in our perspectives, and that's where I like to focus. 

That's it for this episode, friend. In the next episode coming out next Thursday, if you're listening in real time, kami and I are talking about specifically what boundaries are so that we all have a clearer idea of what they are what they are not. So stick around, because I think it's another good good episode.