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20 Body Positive/Fat Positive New Year's ResolutionsHappy New Year’s Eve! Cheers to a happier you with 20 ideas for body positive and fat positive New Year’s resolutions. Anybody of any size can make one of these resolutions. All of these resolutions are body positive with an emphasis on being fat positive. s
The time ranging from the holidays to New Year’s is a time when diet talk and weight loss commitments are at an all-time high. So many people associate New Year’s with weight loss, it feels like “losing weight” is almost considered a default resolution for any new year. As a fat person, people are constantly reminding me that the new year is the perfect time to start losing weight. It seems as though weight loss resolutions have dominated my plans for almost every new year. Quite frankly, I’m sick of it. I feel like I’m capable of so much more than devoting my year to weight loss and nothing else. So are you. During the holidays, fat people are constantly dealing with people bringing up our weight. It’s like people expect us to engage in diet talk with them just because of our larger size. They feel entitled to give us unsolicited advice and assume we can’t be complete versions of ourselves because we’re fat. Fat people often feel pressured to provide explanations or apologies for our weights during the holiday season. Even as we’re surrounded by a delicious abundance of holiday food, many of us face negative criticism for indulging. It seems like fat people like myself experience an uncomfortable kind of hypervisibility in the eyes of society during this time of year. My heart goes out to anyone dealing with body-shaming or fat-shaming relatives during the holidays. I’ve done dangerous things due to making weight loss resolutions for New Year’s. For instance, one year, I took diet pills made of a stimulant substance. I later learned this substance was an analogue to meth. Taking these pills eventually made me pass out in the middle of exercising. It’s no coincidence that I bought these pills with my other fat friend right after Christmas from GNC. The diet pills I was taking are no longer available for sale due to the health risks associated with taking them. I’m not letting anything detrimental happen again this year. Sure, I’m trying to eat healthy and go to the gym, but I’m not tying a diet into my resolution this year. I want to make a resolution that is not only body positive, but fat positive as well. It pisses me off that everybody comes at me and assumes I’m dieting for the new year. It’s like they expect me to do it to fulfill an obligation to be thin. Well, they can kiss my ass. I don’t owe thinness to anyone. I have more fulfilling plans for my new year. Meanwhile, only 8% of Americans achieve their New Year's resolutions. That means 92% of people don't achieve their New Year's resolutions. I think adding dieting into that mix reduces my likelihood of accomplishing my resolution even more. Focusing on a diet for New Year’s feels boring and cliche at this point in my life.The more I focus on diet culture, the more I feel guilty and ashamed of myself. It hurts my relationship with food. I also enjoy exercising most when I’m not fixated on becoming thinner. Diet culture changes my goalpost from becoming healthier to becoming thinner. Thinness doesn’t necessarily equal health. Instead, I’ve decided to dedicate my year to loving and accepting my fat body. I don’t want to just make any old body positive New Year’s resolution. I want to make sure I make a fat positive New Year’s resolution so I make a full commitment to loving myself. Making a body positive resolution for New Year’s isn’t necessarily taking the easy way out. Loving your body can be difficult. If you’re fat like me, it’s easy to fall for fat-shaming and the lie that we shouldn’t love our bodies or embrace them as they are. Even if you’re thin, it’s likely you’ve internalized body shame as well surrounding other aspects of your appearance. Personally, I can say body acceptance has increased my quality of life. Body acceptance is the best gift you can give yourself. Do yourself a favor and commit to loving your body, treating yourself with respect, and dismantling systems of oppression in the lives of people with marginalized bodies, starting with yourself. Here are some ideas for body positive, fat positive New Year’s resolutions to make for 2019: 1. I will compliment my body every day. 2. I will express gratitude for my body every day. 3. I will work on unlearning internalized fatphobia. 4. I will devote time to reading books or articles about fat liberation, fat positivity, and body positivity. 5. I will follow more body positive influencers and plus size influencers on social media. 6. I will take selfies to help me appreciate my body more. 7. I will challenge body-shaming and fat-shaming as often as I can. (This is a great resolution if you have thin privilege.) 6. I will make the conscious effort to free myself from diet culture. 7. I will work on healing my relationship with food. 8. For non-fat people: I will stop saying “I feel fat” if I’ve never been a fat person. 9. I will restrict my time with anyone who fat-shames/body-shames me or remove them from my life altogether. 10. I will spend more time naked to feel more comfortable in my own skin. 11. I will stop moralizing food and exercise. 12. I will limit or eliminate my consumption of media that promotes fatphobia or body-shaming and makes me feel bad about my body. 13. I will make the effort to love a body part I’m not comfortable with. (For instance, I’ve been making the effort to give extra love my double chin.) 14. I will question the assumptions I make about people based on size. 15. I will stop apologizing for my body being the way it is. 16. I will exercise compassion towards myself and my body. 17. I will make my space more accessible for fat people. 18. I will wear whatever clothes I want. 19. I will make my space more accessible for fat people. 20. I will wear whatever clothes I want. Are you making a body positive and fat positive New Year’s resolution? Do you have any body positive or fat positive resolutions of your own? Let me know on Twitter! Enjoy your new year and remember to love yourself! CommentsComments are closed.
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