Coming Home to Your Body: How Deepening Your Roots into Body Trust® Strengthens Eating Disorder Recovery
WHAT IS BODY TRUST®?
In a society that increasingly perpetuates objectification and a hierarchy of bodies, it is not surprising that at least one in ten people in the U.S. will be diagnosed with an eating disorder in their lifetime — that’s nearly 30 million people. Eating disorders are serious but treatable mental and physical illnesses that can affect people of all genders, ages, races, religions, ethnicities, sexual orientations, body shapes, and weights. They arise from a complex interplay of biological, psychological, and social factors. One of the social factors that supports the development of eating disorders is anti-fat bias. In the words of Dr. Deb Burgard, psychologist and leader in the work against weight stigma, "If you want to prevent or treat eating disorders, you must make it safe to be fat."
Of course, body size is only one of many ways our perceived worth is determined in our society. Bodies of color, female bodies, older bodies, disabled bodies and non-gender conforming bodies are all marginalized to varying extents. If we have not yet grappled with our own unconscious bias against diverse bodies, eating disorder behaviors can become coping strategies to access the safety and belonging all humans need. Therefore, living in a culture that values some bodies over others creates a daunting obstacle to hope for full eating disorder recovery.
Even if we understand this intellectually, it is challenging to disconnect from societal rules about what makes a person worthy of love, respect, and belonging. One needs a framework for this process of dismantling and rebuilding. Body Trust®, a framework created and synthesized by Dietitian Dana Sturtevant and Therapist Hilary Kinavey and shared through the Center for Body Trust, provides the necessary structure, support, and guidance for this difficult but liberating journey.
Body Trust is a trauma-informed healing framework that involves reclaiming your body after recognizing the harm done to ourselves and others through the oppression of racism, stigma, diet culture, gender norms, and being treated as “other.”
Body Trust brings into consideration liberatory frameworks for understanding disruptions in our ability to land safely in our present moment body. It instills compassion for disruptions in our ability to experience safety in our body, and helps us explore new ways of relating with ourselves and our bodies.
Body Trust means shifting from external messages about your weight, health and enoughness towards listening to and honoring the wisdom of your body. This approach is a radically different way of thinking about food, weight and health from the dominant weight-centric paradigm. However, a growing community of people of different body sizes, genders, abilities and ages are finding this framework a more realistic way of relating with themselves. Further, a growing number of professionals, including doctors, researchers, therapists, and dietitians, are advocating for this approach to living in a body.
Weight stigma and anti-fat bias have us all “hustling for worthiness,” but we are not all having the same experience. Virgie Tovar, plus-size Latina, author, lecturer, and leading expert on weight-based discrimination and body positivity, explains three dimensions of body injustice: intrapersonal, interpersonal and institutional. Intrapersonal body injustice refers to how you feel about your body. Interpersonal body injustice is how others feel about and treat your body. Institutional body injustice is how well you are allowed to maneuver society and systems, such as traveling, clothing, employment, medical care, buildings, etc., based on your body size. The people in the largest bodies experience the most discrimination, and therefore they are the most vulnerable. Centering the most marginalized and vulnerable people benefits everyone.
How We Reclaim Body Trust
The Body Trust healing process offers a narrative arc to the work that includes three stages of healing: The Rupture, The Reckoning, and The Reclamation.
1. The Rupture
The Rupture involves exploring your body story and recognizing that your coping has been rooted in wisdom. In this stage we explore the questions, “How did we first come to learn that our body was a problem?” and “What has come between you and being at home in your body?” Exploring how we have been socialized into seeing some bodies as more valuable than others is key to this stage. We have been indoctrinated into diet culture before we were old enough to consent. ”Diet culture idolizes thinness and equates it to health and morality, promotes weight loss as a way to attain higher social status, demonizes certain ways of eating while elevating others, and systematically oppresses those that don’t match up with health and appearance ideals,” according to author Christy Harrison. Body Trust Specialist Dr. Sand Chang reminds us, “Let’s not forget that diet culture is anti-fatness, is anti-Blackness, is colonialism, is white supremacy, is the gender binary, is ableism, is patriarchy, is classism.”
2. The Reckoning
The Reckoning consists of coming to terms with the ways your relationship with your body has been disrupted by harmful cultural beliefs and practices. There’s a lot to grieve on this journey to size/body acceptance, including:
The illusion of control
Letting go of the thin ideal
Years wasted on the body project
The big reveal — that moment when you share your weight loss success with others
The harm we perpetuated
3. The Reclamation
The Reclamation supports reclaiming your body, your voice, your story and your self. In this part of the process we externalize the blame and shame and reclaim pleasure, movement, coming home to our bodies and seeing the beauty in all bodies. What would it be like to “locate the problem outside of yourself” — meaning seeing that your body is not wrong, rather it is a society filled with weight stigma, prejudice and oppression. Part of the reclamation includes making your healing bigger than you and advocating for bodies different from your own.
How Body Trust Supports Recovery
The process of deepening your roots into Body Trust supports eating disorder recovery in several transformative ways:
1. Breaking Free from Diet Culture
By rejecting diet culture's harmful messages and finding an aligned community, individuals can focus on healing rather than striving for safety, belonging, power and privilege through manipulating their body size. This shift alleviates the pressure and anxiety surrounding food and body image.
2. Reducing Shame and Stigma
Body Trust helps dismantle the shame and stigma that often accompany body size and eating disorders. By fostering an environment of diversity, acceptance and challenging the diet culture status quo, individuals feel safer to explore and address their struggles.
3. Empowering Autonomy
Body Trust empowers individuals to reclaim consent over their bodies and their choices. This autonomy is essential in rebuilding an attuned relationship with food and self-care practices.
4. Creating Community
Deepening your roots into Body Trust happens within like-minded communities whose members are ready to be disruptors of the dominant weight/health messages. A supportive community where individuals can share experiences and find solidarity brings a sense of belonging that is vital for healing.
5. Deeper Compassion and Empathy for Others Suffering
Through listening to and learning from people with various marginalized identities, you feel less focused on your own suffering and loss of privilege and become more community and liberation-focused. As poet, author, and activist Audre Lorde says, “I am not free while any woman is unfree, even if her shackles are different than mine.” Our shared humanity and a sense of social justice purpose replace eating disorders.
6. Shifting from an Individualistic Healing Approach to Collective Healing
Eating disorder recovery can be difficult if you are only viewing the behaviors through the lens of your individual challenges. Seeing the ways your behaviors are a part of navigating a culture that values some bodies over others and feeling mobilized to support people with more marginalized identities as your own is crucial for long-term recovery.
Body Trust and Hope For Recovery
Body Trust offers a radical framework for eating disorder healing. Hope and a belief in full recovery is improved in spaces where one’s lived experience is centered, body autonomy is honored, and one finds companions on the path of deepening roots into Body Trust. For those seeking recovery, Body Trust provides not just a pathway to healing but a journey towards a more compassionate, liberated, and joyous existence. It's an invitation to trust and respect, and a return to your body, your home.
Much of the language in this post is from the Center of Body Trust trainings. For further information on Body Trust, check out centerforbodytrust.com and get a copy of the book Reclaiming Body Trust by Dana Sturtevant and Hilary Kinavey.
