Fighting Body Shaming: A Tale of Empowerment and Acceptance with Anne Poirier

Ever felt trapped by your own body image? Let's shake things up a bit as we engage in a bold revelation with the author of The Body Joyful and Not a Fat Annie, Anne Poirier. This episode is your chance to explore her journey with an eating disorder, dieting, and body image issues. A vivid recount of her struggle with food and exercise over the years, the memoir and self-help book, The Body Joyful, makes for quite a ride. As we journey further, her second book introduces us to Allie Rose, a 10-year old body shamed and bullied for her weight. Through this tale, our guest sketches the inter-generational echo of dieting and body image issues.

But, the conversation does not stop at sharing experiences. We delve into the power of patience and consistent effort to shed the ingrained negative thoughts that often hold us hostage. Our guest guides us through the practical application of these skills, slowly becoming second nature. We also turn the spotlight on the importance of body acceptance and empowerment as an antidote to bullying and body shaming. The conversation is a doorway to understand how to take control of our own thoughts and actions to foster a positive self-image. Regardless of your age, there's a valuable takeaway for everyone. So, gear up for this enlightening journey towards body neutrality and acceptance.


Mentioned on this episode:

Books by Anne Poirier
The Body Joyful
Not a Fat Annie

Chapters

• 0:49 Not a Fat Annie
• 10:34 Shifting Thoughts and Finding Body Neutrality
• 23:19 Promoting Body Acceptance and Empowerment

Transcript

Sabrina: 0:50

Anne thank you so much for coming back on the show. I know we had you on, oh gosh like a year or two years ago. It's been a while and I know there's been a lot of really exciting things going on in your world as well as our world. So before we dive into why we're actually here today, can you just remind the listeners who you are, what you do, how you got here?

Anne: 1:16

Sure, you know, and I'm so happy to be back, serena, I really am to be chatting with you about this. So yeah, it was about two years ago because my first book came out a couple of years ago called the Body Joyful my Journey from Self Loading to Self-Acceptance, and that was really a story about my. It was a memoir slash kind of self-help-ish book. So I had a needing disorder as a tween In the 70s, before really there was a whole lot of understanding or knowledge about a needing disorder. My mother was relentless in getting me help, so I talk about that piece. But it was help enough to get me sort of better right.

Anne: 1:57

But then I struggled with food and eating binge eating, emotional eating, as well as exercise, compulsive exercise, so binge cycle, and just never really got became comfortable with who I was in my own skin and that lasted until I was about 50. So a lot of years of dieting and a lot of years of on and off the you know, on and off the diet train, buying in fully to diet culture. I was a fitness professional. I was part of the problem. I talk a lot about that in the book and until I just I think I just had enough and I was tired, and that's when I went back to school and I, you know, I got my certification in eating disorders and decided that people need to know you know, some of the research around why diets don't work and how we get ourselves caught in these cycles and the shame cycle and the you know all of the things that just tear us up from the inside, and so that's what my first journey was kind of all about, and now I'm here with a second journey for you.

Sabrina: 3:12

Yeah. So when you reached out to me oh gosh, when was that? Six ish months ago Maybe? And said, hey, I'm writing another book, will you reread it for me and let me know your thoughts? I was like total fangirl moment of this is amazing, wow. And I just I devoured it as quickly as I could, partly cause I wanted to give you really good feedback and get it ready for, you know, future editing and publishing, but also cause it was really good and I've really just loved watching a lot of the behind the scenes work. As you, you know, put these characters together and made this whole formal story and walked us through this beautiful story within Annie's life. And then what? Just watching, like all of the going through and picking the cover and all of that stuff it was just really neat to watch and it's not something that, you know, normally we think about from the reader's end. So what is the title of your new book and how? How did this come to be? Why this book?

Anne: 4:28

This, the name of this book, is not a fat Annie. It had started out as fat Annie and then, through processing, it was not a fat Annie and it's a little bit of a play on words because it seems to, it appears to be a story about me, but it's really. It's not. It's a fiction. It's a fiction book and it is.

Anne: 4:48

I wrote this story for my 10 year old and, you know, for your 10 year old and for a series of different 10 year olds that were, you know, sent to, quote unquote, fat camp right when they were 10 years old, or dragged along to Weight Watchers with their mothers at, you know, at that age. And so I created just a story, a fiction, you know. So it's. The main characters name is Allie Rose and she loves musicals and she is, lives in a larger sized body and when she starts her fifth grade, yeah, kids aren't very nice to her. So it tackles some bullying, body shaming you know there's connection to weight stigma and then Allie just internalizes the dialogue and that becomes, I think, the main storyline is how simple it is to all of a sudden see yourself completely different and just fall into this trap of negative self-worth and negative self-esteem and beating yourself up.

Sabrina: 6:03

So and what I loved about not only like the storyline and like Allie Rose is just such a lovable character and relatable, like I could see myself as her when I was in fifth grade, but her best friend and her little sister and her mom, like you did such a really good job of really just identifying what goes on in different personalities and how we each show up in each other's lives.

Anne: 6:34

I did use some real life people in my story. You know some of my best friends from elementary school and we parted ways, you know, pretty shortly after middle school and have just basically reconnected. It's so funny because I reached out to her with this book because I just wanted her to know that you know the best friend's kind of a little bit of her in it. So that's very cool and I did want to share, as you know, this multi-generational effect that all of this stuff can have dieting and diet culture as one, but also body image and negative self-talk, all of those things.

Sabrina: 7:17

Yeah, and I think you did it beautifully of portraying how mom's self-talk got transferred on to Allie Rose. And then there's this wonderful snippet where she, allie Rose, watches her little sister have these big body image moments and talking to herself and like that was the light bulb, I think, for Allie Rose was that oh, she's saying the same things that I'm saying about me to her and I don't think that about her at all.

Anne: 7:46

Right, yay, that's exactly what I wanted.

Sabrina: 7:52

Yeah, and I think what I was saying before we hit the record button was like this is great, whether you're 12 or 42 or 62, in that looking at how our thoughts really affect how we feel and how we show up in the world and putting it into a 10, 12-year-old mentality really highlights how simple it is. It's not easy, let's be clear. It's not easy, but it is really simple in noticing how our thoughts are happening in our heads and how we're reacting to those, and then how we show up in the world and then, if we start to shift some of those thoughts, everything else just has this ripple effect.

Anne: 8:37

Yeah, we show up so much differently when we start to feel better about ourselves and I think, about you.

Anne: 8:45

Know, when we don't feel good, if we're walking down the street and people are looking at you and you don't feel good about yourself, you have all kinds of stories going on in your head about what they're saying or what they're thinking and all those kind of things. Even though they're not even looking at you, you assume that they must be doing this and they're like, oh, the whole story thing that we all create. And when we are walking down the street feeling good about ourselves, we just did something and it was really cool, or had a good conversation, or did you know? We're walking down the street, we don't see any of that, we don't think of any of that, it's just, it's like non-existent and it's all within the thoughts in our head. And how differently we can, like you said, not easy. And those old thoughts, the old criticism, pull you back. You know, are pretty magnetic and you just have to keep fighting forward and fighting forward and fighting forward to change the way you see yourself. Right.

Sabrina: 9:44

How did you, without giving away a lot of the story and some of the wonderful shifts within Allie Rose, how did you portray that mental shift within?

Anne: 9:54

Allie, I think it was the back and forth of the dialogue. You know, she did a journal, she had a journal, so she wrote a lot of stuff in her journal. She had a supportive friend that was very helpful. And then this flipping back and forth and just realizing that she actually had the ability to change her thought was, you know that, just how does that happen? And it does happen because she saw how detrimental it was for somebody that she loves and then all of a sudden it makes an impact to flip the switch a little bit and then not to say that she doesn't go back. And I think it's. I think that's that's where some of this understanding that it takes time and it's patience and it's consistent effort to change the way we think.

Sabrina: 10:46

Yeah, and that's such a good reminder of that. We can do all of the work, we can feel like we're completely healed from our disordered eating or body image and then suddenly, out of nowhere it seems, one of those old thoughts comes back. And what I see in like in my sessions with individuals is there's a lot of this oh my gosh, like I've totally failed, I haven't healed at all. What in the world is wrong with me? No, no, that's, that's pretty normal. Like these old thoughts, they're still there. Every once in a while Some old thought will be triggered and then those negative, critical thoughts come back. Yeah, and it's just refreshing to hear another professional say like, yeah, they're not going to be gone forever, it's not a all or nothing.

Anne: 11:31

Right, right, I mean, they've been there for a long time. I use the analogy of a race. If you're training for a marathon, you're training, training, training, training, training. And those critical voices have been training a lot of years. The newer, supportive, compassionate voices they're just in their couch to 5K, right there, learning what to say, learning what to do, and the older thoughts are familiar. They are more comfortable, believe it or not sometimes, and so it's just a matter of becoming aware and not beating yourself up again because you've thought something. They're hardwired and they're pretty deep and it's just a matter of continuing to go. Nope, that's not helpful for me right now.

Sabrina: 12:19

And without giving, like specific counseling, mental health, medical advice, but what would be one way that listeners can start to shift their thoughts.

Anne: 12:34

The biggest thing is to become aware of them, right? If we're not aware of the negative voice, then we can't change it. And so in the body joyful, I called it my mini-me. So I had this mini-me voice, which was the critical voice, and I was able to pull the mini-me voices kind of out of my head and write them down on a notebook page or a post-it note and go, okay, well, what's a different way? I could say that.

Anne: 12:59

And so just really is the one step at a time, but becoming aware of the negative voice and what triggers it and where it comes up, and then just going, okay, how can I talk to myself differently? If Sabrina was saying that to me, what would I say? How would I respond? Because that's not true or that's crazy. But I would just be very compassionate and like, oh, I'm sorry, you're feeling like that or something that's horrible and let's talk through it and what's going on. And anyway, I don't know if that's but that talking to our best friend or talking to a good friend and trying to use that language for ourselves.

Sabrina: 13:45

So the first step is to become aware, notice that there is this critical voice, this critical part that I think that's probably one of the hardest things to do is because it feels so ingrained and it's just a part of us. And while I agree with that, it is part of us, it isn't us.

Anne: 14:08

Right, right and separating it a little bit. Yes, and I love taking some deep breaths.

Sabrina: 14:14

I love how you separated it and gave it a name and called it Mini-Me. A lot of the training that I've done has been, yes, naming that part. Doing a lot more internal family systems work and training of like we have lots of parts. So naming all of these different parts of ourselves so that we can notice when that part is in control or in the driver's seat, and then we can say, oh, I don't like where you're going, you need to get out from behind the wheel so that I can take us where we need to go.

Anne: 14:47

Love that analogy. Yeah, I love that analogy. Move to the back of the bus.

Sabrina: 14:52

Yep, you are not welcome in the driver's seat. You do not have your license. Get out of here. And then yeah, when we do give it sort of that persona, we can start to notice a little bit easier when that part is talking, because they do, they have a very clear voice, they have a clear way of talking.

Anne: 15:13

Yeah, yeah, and there's a tone that comes with it, and so I think that there's all of just shifting the tone with the exact same words can change the meaning completely. You know, why did you do that versus huh? Why did I do that?

Sabrina: 15:33

Right, it's a whole other feel yeah, yeah that judgment versus curiosity.

Anne: 15:39

Yeah, exactly, yeah, that awareness is the first piece, and then it's just a matter of taking. I say, take a deep breath, right, abc, take a deep breath and now choose something different or, you know, think about something different. Yeah, so yeah, it impacts everything. Like you said, it impacts how we show up to our family and to our friends and to our work.

Sabrina: 16:05

Everywhere. I was meeting with a client this week and actually I think it was in my Eating Confidence group, and we were talking about how we do. One thing is how we do everything, and so one of the gals was like, oh my gosh, I can see how I can use the skill that we're practicing within the membership to apply it to my relationship with my partner, to apply it to this, to apply it it's not just about the food. I'm like, yes, that's exactly it.

Anne: 16:36

We want to celebrate that.

Sabrina: 16:37

Yeah, like yes we're focusing on food and body image right now, but all of these skills that I'm teaching you are applicable to all areas of your life. They transfer easily. You just got to practice them.

Anne: 16:50

Yeah, right, so they feel more comfortable and so it's more second nature than it is awkward and first time kind of feeling Right. So, yeah, that's all, that's great. That's great. It's a simple yet effective switch and I think you know, when you talk about relationships, if we're feeling better or different in our body or in more, more, a feeling of control around food and eating that changes how we show up with any within any relationship. Right, completely.

Sabrina: 17:24

So, yeah, it's all in that, that, how our own confidence level and our own feeling of self like value and worth, yeah, yeah, one of the things that kept coming up for me this week and last week, as I've watched you start to do the prelaunch of not a fad any, and get ready for it to come out. And this is something we've known each other for several years now. This is something I didn't know about you. I did not realize that you were one of the pioneers in body acceptance.

Anne: 17:59

The little body neutrality piece. Yeah, I mean that's. Yeah, that was a term that I had first heard in 2015 and it was just in passing in a body image group and I'm like wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. There is way too much depth in that term body neutrality and the meaning of it, and actually I think it was that that really flipped my own switch on how to see my own body, because I didn't have to buy into the positivity movement or the body love you, get a love you by love. I just couldn't. I couldn't go there in this just like, so I just developed a much broader stroke around it because I knew how valuable this term and this way of seeing our bodies could be for myself as well as other people.

Sabrina: 18:54

Yeah, and I think for me that was huge in my own journey of and I started this journey before the body positive movement really started and took like a got a lot of momentum. But even recently there's been a lot of this push for body positive and I have clients coming in and they're like I just can't, I can't love my body, I can't. Okay, okay, that's fine, I get it. There are lots of parts of my body that I will never love. I respect them and I accept them, but I'm really just kind of neutral about them and that has been really pivotal for a lot of people of not not gung ho on the other end of I have to like love everything about my body, but just being it is what it is.

Anne: 19:45

Yeah, I experience everything, every single emotion, every single place I go, everything I do I experience through this body. But it's just more of the vehicle, I think, is the neutrality, the body neutral, the body neutrality. Feel this more like. It just is, you know, and it does this and it does this and it does this, and I don't have to buy into loving it and I also don't have to buy into hating it either. I can kind of find that neutral ground which just changes the perspective that you have of you as a human being. It's not just you're not just a human body, it's a human being.

Sabrina: 20:27

Yeah, and tying this to that, how we do. One thing is how we do most things or everything. Getting to a place of neutrality in a lot of areas is, like my key goal for all of the work that I do. Of our thoughts we can be pretty neutral about our thoughts. We can be pretty neutral about our emotions. We can be really neutral about our bodies. We don't have to be on either extreme.

Anne: 20:53

Right. Yeah, and on the same thing about food right and different types of foods, and you know that can be pretty neutral too, because then it doesn't take a different meaning. You know it doesn't fall into the good, bad category stuff that you and I are both trying to shove away.

Sabrina: 21:14

Yeah, just hanging out in neutral land, it's pretty great.

Anne: 21:18

Yeah, there you go, there's a movie neutral land, we'll get on it. We'll get on it right. Ellie's heading to neutral land.

Sabrina: 21:33

Yeah. Is there anything else about Not a Fat Annie or Allie Rose that you want to share with the listeners today?

Anne: 21:42

I think that I appreciate you being jumping on and saying yes to read this book, and you were the first person that came back with a review. I was so excited and thank you for taking the time to do that, because I know that you're busy too and the work that you do is so important. And this is, I think, if we can start to change our next generation, like through the generations that are here now, that's what can be really helpful. The clients that you work with, the clients that I work with, if they start seeing themselves differently, then they show up differently for the people, the young people in their lives, and that's, you know, we didn't have that type of a role model growing up. It was a different role model and a different.

Anne: 22:31

The society's ideal bodies were ever changing, you know, on this realm as we continue to age. But how do we create now the ages, that we are a different feeling, so that you know, when we have children or we have grandchildren and all that, that they're seeing themselves differently, and I think that's what this book I really wanted this book to tell us To share and then also to kind of highlight this body and body shaming is the biggest target for bullying and I want to say it's just an easy target due to bias that has been transferred down from generation to generation. That's where you know we got to stop that. We got to put an end to that somehow.

Sabrina: 23:26

And that's where it starts is with us as the adults, educating the littles around us of how to navigate bullying, how to be more open and accepting so that they're not doing any of the bullying.

Anne: 23:41

Right, how do we continue to teach and model, like you said, role model? I had a great phrase said to me just the other day habits are caught, not taught, and I love that. So you know that there's a. We catch them from what we see and what we hear and how we perceive things. We don't eat your vegetables, is you know that's a teaching, but we don't always do that. But if everybody around us is eating all our vegetables, well, yeah, that's not bad.

Sabrina: 24:16

Yeah, we just naturally eat our vegetables.

Anne: 24:18

So I think it's a that's. The other piece of this is to highlight that the body shaming and the weight stigma and the bullying in a mild way, I think you know, but that we want to bring that to the reader's attention throughout the book too.

Sabrina: 24:39

Yeah, and I think you did a great job of that, without it being like it's part of the story. It is not Right. The story.

Anne: 24:46

It's just that underlying realization. I think that that that's kind of what our, our society has. It's like a path that they've carved out for us that we don't necessarily want to be on, and so you know, once we're aware, is that where, a where? Word again, right, once we're aware of that, then we can start to navigate away from it.

Sabrina: 25:09

So yeah, gotta know where we're going or where we're headed to recognize.

Anne: 25:13

Oh, this is not where I want to go.

Sabrina: 25:15

And then do something about it.

Anne: 25:18

So true, now I realize, and now I can make a change.

Anne: 25:24

And now you're educating the next generation and the generation after that of how to do things differently, so that we don't repeat those old and that's the hope for this book is to is to share that into a young reader's mind too, that they have, that they have more control over their own thoughts and that they Are able to to take control a little bit more than they think they are sometimes. So, yeah, and Ali Rose, I think it's probably gonna have another adventure or two. I don't know, I haven't decided.

Sabrina: 25:55

Oh, I hope so, I Hope so. She's such a good character, like just, she's just so relatable.

Anne: 26:03

Yeah, she's, she's kind of yeah, she is. She's a mixture of a lot of people for me. So, yeah, it's just it's. This is a very Special book, so thank you for being part of the launch team and the Pre-reading team and all of that.

Sabrina: 26:22

So yeah, thank you. It was such an honor to be asked and to be able to participate in all of it.

Anne: 26:28

It's been a good ride and it the it is on Kindle for 99 cents right now, so you can get not a fat 80 on Kindle for 99 cents and it is out in paperback, so you can get it pretty much anywhere books are sold, so I hope you'll pick it up for a friend or a or a loved one, or a Grandparent or a sister, or a library or a school library or something for the, for people who are listening.

Sabrina: 26:58

So yeah, I personally ordered several copies and at the Office in Iowa we have a free little library and I'm gonna put one copy in there so that people can borrow it and read it at will. I've also got another copy going to our local little Library. Thank, you.

Anne: 27:20

That's awesome, that's awesome yeah.

Sabrina: 27:23

Like we're just gonna spread the love.

Anne: 27:25

I love the idea of putting them in the little library, so that's a great idea, so yeah, so then anybody can just get it and read it.

Sabrina: 27:33

Yeah, and then, yeah, if you're listening to this, I will make sure that there's a link to not a fat Annie, so that you can order paperback or Kindle or both, and Then I'm also gonna put a link to Anne's other book, body joyful, because that's. That's a great read too, and probably a little bit more for the mature.

Anne: 27:51

Yes, that would be. Yeah, a little bit more mature for that one Over 18. Yes, not because there's a double content. Yes, this is true.

Sabrina: 28:02

Just the concept. The ideas are need a little more of that prefrontal cortex development.

Anne: 28:08

Yeah, for sure, for sure, yeah.

Sabrina: 28:10

Well, how else can listeners get ahold of you if they want to know more about a hen?

Anne: 28:16

They can go to well, they can email me always. So in at the body, joyful calm. And the website right now is shaping perspectives, a woman's way to joy. So shaping perspectives, calm.

Sabrina: 28:29

Well, thank you so much for coming on again and I'm sure you will be back again in the future.

Anne: 28:34

Thank you so much for the work you do and for all that you do, and I appreciate Spending some time with you.