The Fat Positive Lounge

[Soft*Silver]

Originally Posted by MsBluem

Going swimsuit shopping Wednesday. Might even try on a bikini or two!

@Miss Tia, I don't know you but I'm super psyched for all the stuff going on for you. Does/will your shop have a place to buy things online?

once we get moved and settled, we are starting an ebay store. Currently we have some purses on, under teahstreasures. I just brought in a box of stilleto heels in sizes 9, 10 and 11 and they will be added over the next few days. We will have a continual flow of merchandise offered on ebay, sorting by size and category of item. Like, one days postings will be all size 2x tops. Next day will be 3x tops. Etc. We have a work area that is conducive for us to do this now!

http://www.ebay.com/sch/teahstreasur...p2047675.l2562

[nycfem]

fun for summer!

[SugarFemme]

Gawd...I wish I had the balls (Ovaries LOL) to wear a bikini

Originally Posted by nycfembbw

fun for summer!

[nycfem]

[LeftWriteFemme]

[LeftWriteFemme]

Here is a link to the Beautiful Body Book Project

I am posting it as a link due to nudity in the video and I don't want to transgress the TOS, but please if you have the time click the link and watch, it's a wonderful video of moms and kids and beauty. Hope you enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nolE35GHCE4

[Soft*Silver]

I know this is going to sound SO contradictory but the sight of a pregnant body is so repulsive to me. Its a gut reaction, and it stems from my two very difficult pregnancies. One ended in a horrible bloody miscarriage where I almost died, and the second was a live birth (thank GOD) that I lived every day for nine months in misery, physically and mentally. Pregnancy was SO revolting to me that I had my tubes tied as soon as my daughter was born.

In saying this, I could not finish watching that video. I had No problem with any of the photos where a woman was not pregnant. But oh boy....the pregnant photos brought me back...

its funny how some things are triggers for one person and joyous celebrations for others.

[nycfem]

"Fabulous And Full-Figured Pin-Up Girl? Yes, Please!"

Take a quick, fun scroll-through of this playful art

http://www.bust.com/fabulous-and-ful...mpaign=popular

[nycfem]

This is a beautiful, body positive romantic video with a full-figured femme and a smaller butch. Loved it!

Mary Lambert - She Keeps Me Warm

http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2013/08...s-me-warm.html

[Hollylane]

Originally Posted by nycfem

This is a beautiful, body positive romantic video with a full-figured femme and a smaller butch. Loved it!

Mary Lambert - She Keeps Me Warm

http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2013/08...s-me-warm.html

This made me cry. It is beautiful. For whatever reason, it reminded me of all those not fat positive thoughts that I still have about my own size(both negative and positive thoughts about my body are a part of my thoughts every day), and made me remember, again today, that I am beautiful, and valuable exactly as I am.

[LeftWriteFemme]

Originally Posted by nycfem

This is a beautiful, body positive romantic video with a full-figured femme and a smaller butch. Loved it!

Mary Lambert - She Keeps Me Warm

http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2013/08...s-me-warm.html

I cried while watching this beautiful video then cried while reading the comments of other people crying while watching. Since I am involved in a relationship that looks very much like the one depicted on the screen it holds a special meaning to me now. I hope Mary Lambert makes many, many more videos!

[LeftWriteFemme]

An Open Apology to All of My Weight Loss Clients


I worked at a popular weight loss company for three years. I loved my job there. I LOVED my clients. I loved making a connection and sharing my knowledge. And I learned a lot about nutrition, about dieting and weight loss and what works and what doesn't. My job was to be a weight loss consultant, and I learned that job very well. I can design a 1,200 calorie meal plan, tell you which activities are most likely to make the number on the scale go down, and how many carbs are in a cup of rice. I can talk the diet game like it's my business... because it was. Volumize with vegetables. Don't go too long in between meals. Start with a bowl of broth-based soup. Are you drinking enough water? Did you exercise enough? Did you exercise too much? Let's look at your food journal.

This is not an anti-weight loss company post (although I could write that too). It's a letter to each and every woman that I unknowingly wronged. My heart is beating a little bit faster as I write this, and so I know this needs to be said. The words have been playing in my head for months. Sometimes it just takes time for me to get up the courage to say the right thing.

So here goes:

Dear Former Weight Loss Clients (you know who you are):

I'm sorry.

I'm sorry because I put you on a 1,200 calorie diet and told you that was healthy. I'm sorry because when you were running 5x a week, I encouraged you to switch from a 1,200 calorie diet to a 1,500 calorie diet, instead of telling you that you should be eating a hell of a lot more than that. I'm sorry because you were breastfeeding and there's no way eating those 1,700 calories a day could have been enough for both you and your baby. I'm sorry because you were gluten intolerant and so desperate to lose weight that you didn't put that on your intake form. But you mentioned it to me later, and I had no idea the damage you were doing to your body. I'm sorry because I think I should have known. I think I should have been educated better before I began to tell all of you what was right or wrong for your body.

I'm sorry because I made you feel like a failure and so you deliberately left a message after the center had closed, telling me you were quitting. I thought you were awesome and gorgeous, and I'm sorry because I never told you that. I'm sorry because you came in telling me you liked to eat organic and weren't sure about all the chemicals in the food, and I made up some BS about how it was a "stepping stone." I'm sorry because many of you had thyroid issues and the LAST thing you should have been doing was eating a gluten-filled, chemically-laden starvation diet. I'm sorry because by the time I stopped working there, I wouldn't touch that food, yet I still sold it to you.

I'm sorry because it's only years later that I realize just how unhealthy a 1,200 calorie diet was. I stayed on a 1,200-1,500 calorie diet for years, so I have the proof in myself. Thyroid issues, mood swings, depression, headaches... oh and gluten intolerance that seemed to "kick in" after about a month of eating the pre-packaged food. Was it a coincidence? Maybe.

I'm sorry because you had body dysmorphic disorder, and it was so painful to hear the things you said about yourself. You looked like a model, and all of my other clients were intimidated by you, asked me why you were there because clearly you didn't need to lose weight. And yet you would sit in my office and cry, appalled that a man might see you naked and be disturbed by the fat that didn't actually exist. I'm sorry because you should have been seeing a therapist, not a weight loss consultant.

I'm sorry because you were young and so beautiful and only there because your mother thought you needed to lose weight. And because there were too many of you like that. Girls who knew you were fine, but whose mothers pushed that belief out of you until you thought like she did. Until you thought there was something wrong with you. And the one time I confronted your mother, you simply got switched to a different consultant. I think I should have made more of a stink, but I didn't. I'm sorry because you were in high school and an athlete, and I pray that you weren't screwed up by that 1,500 calorie diet. Seriously, world? Seriously? A teenage girl walks in with no visible body fat and lots of muscle tone, tells you she's a runner and is happy with her weight... but her mother says she's fat and has to lose weight and so we help her do just that. As an individual, as women, as a company, hell, as a nation, we don't stand up for that girl? What is wrong with us? There ain't nothing right about that. Nothing.

I'm sorry because every time you ate something you "shouldn't" or ate more than you "should," I talked about "getting back on the bandwagon." I cringe now every time someone uses that phrase. When did the way we eat become a bandwagon? When did everyone stop eating and become professional dieters? I'm sorry because I get it now. If you're trying to starve your body by eating fewer calories than it needs, of course it's going to fight back. I used to tell you that then, when you wanted to eat less than 1,200 calories a day. The problem was, I thought 1,200 was enough. I thought that was plenty to support a healthy body. Why did I believe that for so long? I'm sorry because I wasn't trying to trick you or play games to get your money. I believed the lies we were fed as much as you did.

And it wasn't just the company feeding them to me. It was the doctors and registered dietitians on the medical advisory board. It was the media and magazines confirming what I was telling my clients. A palm-sized portion of lean chicken with half a sweet potato and a salad was PLENTY. No matter that you had "cravings" afterward. Cravings are a sign of underlying emotional issues. Yeah, sure they are. I'm a hypnotherapist with a past history of binge eating disorder. I KNOW cravings are a sign of underlying emotional issues. Except when they're not. Except when they're a sign that your body needs more food and you're ignoring it. Then they're a sign that your 1,200 calorie diet is horseshit. Then they're a sign that you've been played.

And that's mostly why I'm sorry. Because I've been played for years, and so have you, and inadvertently, I fed into the lies you've been told your whole life. The lies that say that being healthy means nothing unless you are also thin. The lies that say that you are never enough, that your body is not a beautiful work of art, but rather a piece of clay to be molded by society's norms until it becomes a certain type of sculpture. And even then, it is still a work in progress.

I owe you an apology, my former client and now friend, who I helped to lose too much weight. Who I watched gain the weight back, plus some. Because that's what happens when you put someone on a 1,200 calorie diet. But I didn't know. If you're reading this, then I want you to know that you have always been beautiful. And that all these fad diets are crap meant to screw with your metabolism so that you have to keep buying into them. I think now that I was a really good weight loss consultant. Because I did exactly what the company wanted (but would never dare say). I helped you lose weight and then gain it back, so that you thought we were the solution and you were the failure. You became a repeat client and we kept you in the game. I guess I did my job really well.

And now I wonder, did I do more harm than good? When I left, you all wrote me cards and sent me flowers. I still have those cards, the ones that tell me how much I helped you, how much I cared. But I'm friends with some of you on Facebook now, and I look at your photos and you look happy. And beautiful. And not because you lost weight since I saw you last. But because I see YOU now. You. Not a client sitting in my chair, asking for my assistance in becoming what society wants. But you, a smart and lovely woman, who really doesn't need some random company telling her there's something wrong with her.

So I'm sorry because when you walked in to get your meal plan, I should have told you that you were beautiful. I should have asked you how you FELT. Were you happy? Did you feel physically fit? Were you able to play with your kids? There were so many of you who never needed to lose a pound, and some of you who could have gained some. And maybe sometimes I told you that. But not enough. Not emphatically. Because it was my job to let you believe that making the scale go down was your top priority. And I did my job well.

I am sorry because many of you walked in healthy and walked out with disordered eating, disordered body image, and the feeling that you were a "failure." None of you ever failed. Ever. I failed you. The weight loss company failed you. Our society is failing you.

Just eat food. Eat real food, be active, and live your life. Forget all the diet and weight loss nonsense. It's really just that. Nonsense.

And I can't stop it. But I can stop my part in it. I won't play the weight loss game anymore. I won't do it to my body, and I won't help you do it to yours. That's it. End game.

This post originally appeared on Your Fairy Angel.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/iris-h...b_3762714.html

[LeftWriteFemme]

IMAGINE LIVING IN A WORLD WHERE SIZE DOES NOT MATTER

October 4, 2012 at 11:22am

Imagine for a moment that you lived in a world where body size did not matter. What would a day be like in this new and fab world? Let’s imagine in this new and fab world it is your lunch hour and you decided to have a scrumptious treat, you went to your favorite clothing shop to buy some new clothes. You stepped into a closet like structure and you used a computer screen to select the style of clothing you wanted, and then your body was scanned, a little bell, sounded off, and a hanger with the style clothing you wanted was lowered in front of you. You took your clothing selection off the hanger and it was a perfect fit for your body!!! There were no sizes, nothing that could label or identify you by a number. Each style fit just right because of the amazing technology of the body scan, and for once you did not have to deal with the fact that, even when you had accepted the size of your body in the past, every different brand of clothing actually sized their clothing differently, so there had never been consistency as to the size labels.
Feeling so satisfied with just how easy and fun buying a new outfit was, you went to buy yourself a cup of coffee at Starbucks and although you saw the menu listed calories for each food choice, you took this in as merely informative ,as opposed to some test of wills between you and the devil, whom was tempting you with high calorie goodies. Instead, as you glanced at the menu you asked yourself “Am I hungry or do I just want coffee?” The answer to your question was “I just want coffee and I am not hungry.” However, you realize that although you allow your true physical hunger to guide you as when to eat, it is 1:00pm and you were having so much fun clothing shopping that you forgot to eat anything. You realize that your body does need food to function, and you do not want to starve yourself, why would you? Starving is unheard of in this new and fab world! “You then ask yourself what should I eat to give my body energy?”, You opt for a banana, because you are not hungry , have no real craving, but need to give your body some nourishment. You are comfortable with your choice of having only a banana because when you do get hungry later you know you are going to satisfy a craving at Salvatore’s Kitchen Sink Pizza Palace, where Sal will put anything you want on your pizza except for the kitchen sink, and you are going to have a salad and a slice. As your latte is being prepared you notice a chocolate chip cookie that looks yummy, and you ask the server to pack it in a bag for you, because that just might be desert later, if you are hungry and feel for it.
As your latte is still being made, because even in our new and fab world where body size does not matter it still feels like forever when you are waiting for your Starbucks order, you see someone who looks familiar, it is someone that you think you went to high school with, and then you realize it is, her, you nemesis, the one who always got the guy that you liked, who always scored at least one point or more higher than you on the test, and you think maybe if I look away she will not notice me, noticing her. No such luck, she’s smiling and walking right up to you. You know, she is going to annoy the hell out of you, that is for sure, but in our new fab world where size does not matter, you are not worried you are going to look fat or fatter than the last time you saw her. You take in her general appearance but you are not sizing up her body, because really the size of her body has nothing to do with you. She needs to be comfortable in her own skin and you need to be comfortable in your own skin. Neither of you, talk about weight or size. She is Justas annoying as you remembered but it has to do with the size of her personality not the size of her body. After she leaves, you feel no different about your own body one way or the other, because in our new fab world you would not even consider comparing body sizes. Body size comparisons are considered ludicrous! After all, each of us has different genetics, life experiences, reactions to stress and different levels of stress eating (which is soooo much less in our new and fab world, because half of the emotional eating and starving we used to do had to do with trying to meet societal standards concerning body size, as well as our own unrealistic expectations as to what our body size should be), different cultural beliefs and traditions about food.
Your Starbuck’s latte is finally ready and you sip it as you carry your shopping bags to a table and you sit down to think about your after work plans. You and your guy are going swimming at the local YMCA tonight, because you love the way your body feels as you move through the water. You estimate you may be swimming for forty-five minutes but there are no hard and fast time requirements, because you let your body guide you as to how strong it feels today and how much you are going to push yourself. You laugh out loud, as you think to yourself how ironic it is, that now that you live in a world where body size does not matter , you just love exercise for the sake of moving your body releasing stress, and feeling physically strong, as well as the fact that your guy looks very sexy in his swim trunks.
During this day, you never overeat, because you know that food is always available to you, and you can eat according to your true physical hunger and stop when you are full. As a result of this there is none of the following: no “One Last Chance Eating”, because you are always afraid you are going to miss out on your one last opportunity to eat a food you love.; no “Guilt Eating” where you gorge yourself on more food than you are hungry for because you feel guilty about the yummy chocolate cookie you just ate, because you know that you can have just one or several and you have not blown any diet because there are no new diets!!! So you need not gorge yourself with a box of cookies because you feel guilty about the one or several you had; no “Out-Of –Control Cravings” driving you to binge, because now when you have a craving you satisfy it when reasonably possible, and it subsides, as opposed to when you used toeat “healthy” foods to hold off the craving, and end up gorging on fat free, lite, no sugar foods, until you gave in to your craving for a chocolate chip cookie, and ended up eating a box of them and in the end you realized that you ate ten times as much, as you would have eaten, if you would have just satisfied your craving with one or several chocolate chip cookies.
Doesn’t this world sound beautiful, to live in a zip code where matters of body size are not weighing us down? Dare we even dream of such a Nirvana? Yes, every one of us can choose this world for ourselves, every one of us can choose to make peace with the size of our bodies. We can choose to live our lives as I just described in the new fab world where size does not matter. Unfortunately, at first it is not as easy as described here, because although you, I and some others may be choosing to create a life where size does not matter, not everyone is, but if we so choose, to move towards living a life where size does not matter (which does not mean we are going to sit around eating bon-bons,in fact, it means we are going to make healthier choices for ourselves from a place of self-acceptance and self-love and through having a sane relationship with food) the rewards make the challenge s soooooo worth it!!! Karen Cigna

https://www.facebook.com/notes/size-...51227528789345

[Licious]

This post moved me.

Heck all the comments here affect me. I usually pop in and say so little, but I seem to have plenty to say now.

I studied nutrition on and off for 30 years, this includes, books, seminars and classes taught by "real" professionals.

One thing I learned was how different every body was biochemically and how that meant there was not a "one size fits all" (pun intended) for the natural treatment of health issues.

In fact, one instructor spent an entire class on "biochemical individuality" to knock it into our heads.

So, the same goes obviously, for weight loss and issues of overall body size/dynamics.

Well, obvious to me, but maybe not to others.

I appreciate this letter the weight loss company employee wrote. This person really became aware, and came forward about it. Bless them.

I thank you all who participate here, you have made a big difference in my life.

Take care everyone and love yourself, you deserve it.

Originally Posted by LeftWriteFemme

An Open Apology to All of My Weight Loss Clients


I worked at a popular weight loss company for three years. I loved my job there. I LOVED my clients. I loved making a connection and sharing my knowledge. And I learned a lot about nutrition, about dieting and weight loss and what works and what doesn't. My job was to be a weight loss consultant, and I learned that job very well. I can design a 1,200 calorie meal plan, tell you which activities are most likely to make the number on the scale go down, and how many carbs are in a cup of rice. I can talk the diet game like it's my business... because it was. Volumize with vegetables. Don't go too long in between meals. Start with a bowl of broth-based soup. Are you drinking enough water? Did you exercise enough? Did you exercise too much? Let's look at your food journal.

This is not an anti-weight loss company post (although I could write that too). It's a letter to each and every woman that I unknowingly wronged. My heart is beating a little bit faster as I write this, and so I know this needs to be said. The words have been playing in my head for months. Sometimes it just takes time for me to get up the courage to say the right thing.

So here goes:

Dear Former Weight Loss Clients (you know who you are):

I'm sorry.

Originally Posted by LeftWriteFemme

(post abbreviated, see previous comments for entire post)

[LeftWriteFemme]

It Gets Better, Unless You’re Fat


When you first come out, gay men are eager to let you know that you’re not alone, and that you have a seat at the table. Unless, of course, you’re also fat, in which case, no, you can’t sit with us.



http://www.buzzfeed.com/louispeitzma...less-youre-fat