Tonight, I’m going to be speaking with Ragen Chastain (of Dances With Fat) and Linda Bacon (who literally wrote the book on Health At Every Size®) as part of the 2nd Annual Body Love Revolutionaries Telesummit!

As you may have heard, Ragen has organized a 1 day only money bomb to put up a billboard in a high-trafficked area of Atlanta with a positive message to counteract the negative Strong4Life campaign.

On top of that, the wonderful More Of Me To Love site is matching money bomb contributions up to $5,000!

I’ve already made a donation, but I want to do more. So, I’m donating 30% of the proceeds from Body Love Revolutionaries Telesummit All-Access Passes purchased before 11PM Eastern today.

That means that when you purchase an All-Access Pass today, the proceeds will go:

• 30% to the Support All Kids Money Bomb
• 10% to NOLOSE
• 10% to NAAFA

(and the rest, as always, goes to supporting more free events like this from Body Love Wellness!)

Plus, you get live access to all the calls and access to the recordings through the end of March!

You can check out the Telesummit by clicking here and check out the money bomb by clicking here. You can even purchase your All-Access Pass right here!

Yes, Golda, please sign me up for an All Access Pass to the Body Love Revolutionaries Telesummit. Payment Options Great! $20.00 USD Yay! $30.00 USD Awesome! $40.00 USD Mindblowing! $50.00 USD

Thanks and I hope to “see” you tonight!

xo,

Golda

EDIT:  We raised $73 for the billboard project just from All Access Pass purchases!  Yay!

Buy A Pass, Get A Billboard originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on February 2, 2012.

We’re kicking off the Telesummit tonight with a big fat talk on fat activism!  We’ll be chatting with Marilyn Wann (author of Fat!So?), Amanda Levitt (Founder of Love Your Body Detroit) and Peggy Howell (PR Director for NAAFA).

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be talking health with Dr. Linda Bacon and Ragen Chastain, fatshion with Marie Denee, Rachel Kacenjar, and Yuliya Raquel, sex with Hanne Blank and Virgie Tovar, social media with Marianne Kirby, Margitte Leah Kristjannson and Brian Stuart, fitness with Jeanette DePatie and Anna Guest-Jelley, fat/queer intersections with Bevin Branlandingham, Charlotte Cooper, & Jessica Luxery, and politics with Paul Campos and Amy Erdman Farrell. You can see the full schedule here.

When you register, you’ll get free live access to all of the interviews, and you’ll have the opportunity to get yourquestions answered by our panel.

Click here to learn more and register!

I can’t wait to see you there!

Body Love Revolutionaries Telesummit Starts Tonight! originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on January 31, 2012.

If you haven’t been privy to the awesome images coming from Marilyn Wann and the STANDards campaign, you need to check it out now. It’s okay, go ahead. I’ll wait!

Glad you’re back!

Me & Michelle Matthews (fatsocialworker.blogspot.com) Stand 4 Kids!

As you scrolled through the images, maybe you noticed that the people taking a stand for kids really represented a wide range of people. Some are very fat and some are a little fat and some are pretty thin. Some are small children and some are elderly and many are in between. Some are doing pretty athletic stuff and some are sitting happily.

It seemed that a really diverse group of people were submitting photos for the campaign, so I found it interesting when Marilyn posted this on Facebook last week:

“I notice that so many of us (and I can imagine myself having this feeling if I came across such an invite)…anticipate that we will be excluded for some reason. Confronted with this open invite to share a photo and a credo in these STANDards, people are telling me they must be too thin, not the right gender, not healthy enough. I am not going to exclude anyone for any reason.”

How interesting that people were assuming that they’d be excluded from this campaign because they’re too thin or not healthy enough.  I find this sad because I hear this a lot from people.   I’ve had clients tell me that they know it’s silly, but that they feel too fat for fat pride or too unhealthy for Health At Every Size®.  Like, other people can love their bodies because even though they’re fat, they’re not too fat.  Other people can practice Health At Every Size® because they’re already pretty healthy.  I also find that people toward the thinner end of the spectrum think they’ll be excluded from fat pride because they’re not fat enough.

So I want to deal with these objections in turn.  Check for the objection that applies to you and please take what I write to heart!

THE OBJECTIONS

I Can’t Be Part Of The Fat Pride Movement Because I’m Not Fat (Or Not Fat Enough) — Poppycock!  Well-meaning people of all sizes are welcome in the fat pride movement.  Those immersed in fat pride understand that discrimination against fat people is bad for society as a whole, negatively impacting thin people as well.  We want to live in a world where assumptions are no longer made about people’s bodies based on their relative fatness.  We want to live in a world where thin people don’t hurt their bodies out of a fear of being fat.  And we know that having allies is good for the movement.  Your voice and your presence is wanted and needed. So, welcome!

I Can’t Be Part Of The Fat Pride Movement Because I’m Too Fat – Hogwash!  There is absolutely no weight limit on loving and accepting your body.  Hating your body and trying to change it never got you anywhere before, right?  So why would anyone in the fat pride movement want you to continue that?  There is no separate set of rules that apply to you because you weigh a certain amount.  Your voice and your presence is wanted and needed. So, welcome!

I Can’t Be Part Of The Health At Every Size® Movement Because I’m Not Healthy Enough and/or Too Fat – Hooey!  Health At Every Size® is not Health At Certain Sizes And Only If You’re Healthy Enough.  It’s freakin’ Health At Every Size® and it’s not a misnomer!  HAES® recognizes that intentional weight loss isn’t a good idea and does more harm than good.  So the best thing for anyone’s health is, in a nutshell, eating well, getting appropriate exercise, and accepting their bodies.  Of course, you’re human, and sometimes humans get sick, but that doesn’t mean that  HAES® no longer applies to you.  In fact, accepting HAES® can help you clarify to the health professionals in your life that fixating on your weight will not help you heal.  Healthy or sick, you are an important part of this movement. Your voice and your presence is wanted and needed. So, welcome!

I hope I convinced you that Fat Pride and Health At Every Size® is for you.  And, I really hope you’ll join me for the Body Love Revolutionaries Telesummit which starts tomorrow night!  You don’t want to miss it.  Here’s just a sampling of what you’ll take away:

	Learn what to do when confronted with negativity about your weight.
	Find out how you can live your best life without the highs and lows of weight loss efforts.
	Connect with other people who are committed to being body positive.
	Get fashion tips from people who know and love exactly the body you have.
	Body positive exercise advice for all fitness levels, body types and abilities.
	Get historical and political perspectives on anti-fat efforts.
	Learn how queer activism can inform fat activism.
	Sex-positive and fat-positive advice for the awesome sex life you deserve.
	Hear the body love journeys of your favorite bloggers.
	Learn how to create fat-positive community locally.
	And so much more!

To join us, just register here.

Golda is a certified holistic health counselor and founder of Body Love Wellness, a program designed for plus-sized women who are fed up with dieting and want support to stop obsessing about food and weight.

Fat Pride Is For Everyone, Even You (Yes, You!) originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on January 30, 2012.

Every once in a while, I meet someone in their 20′s who’s been part of the fat positive community since his/her young teens. Often, they found fat pride as a result of a late night Google search that led them to a blog or two. They often tell me they never(!) dieted and focused on approving of their body from a young age.  Sometimes, they even influenced their friends and spread body positivity in school, college, etc.

Fat Kid All Grown Up! Activist Marilyn Wann Parodies The Strong4Life Campaign

I get so excited when I hear these stories.  If fat positivity was reaching kids ten years ago, imagine who it’s reaching now!  We could be supporting a whole new generation of kids to practice Health At Every Size ®, to know that dieting is not the answer, to know that their bodies are perfect just as they are!

I think this is definitely happening (and if you’re a young’un who reads this blog, please feel free to comment and say hi!) but at the same time, I feel like there is even more pressure on fat kids nowadays to change their bodies.  This is nearly unfathomable to me, because as a kid growing up mostly in the 80′s, I felt so much shame and pressure around my fatness, and it’s hard to imagine it being worse.  But according to people who  ignore statistics, childhood obesity is on the rise.  And rather than look at the real issues, like child poverty, food deserts and the fact that our fat shaming society is actually bad for kids and their health, groups like Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta decide to put the onus on fat kids, shaming them for, well, eating, and eating at places that actually donate money to the campaign.  (By the way, fat activists have been doing some amazing work to take down the so-called “Strong4Life” campaign.  If you’re interested in getting involved, check out this site and this Facebook group. For a quick action you can take, sign the petition.)

As I wrote last week, I would really like to live in a society where fat shaming and discrimination are a thing of the past.  I hope to meet more and more young folks (and eventually, older folks) who found body acceptance and HAES® early, felt supported in approving of their bodies, and went on to do great things because body image was never an issue.

One way to support this Body Love Revolution is to support the adults in fat children’s lives. So I’d like to share some tips for the parents/guardians/grandparents/aunts/uncles etc. out there.  If you’re reading this blog, you’re probably already aware of body positivity and want to instill it in the kids in your life.  If you have fat kids, you probably get pressure all the time to do something about their “weight problem.”  I can only imagine the pressure you feel.  And of course, you only have a limited amount of impact on your kids, since they live in this messed up, fat shaming society too.  But here are a few tips just to support you:

1) Demonstrate The Beauty Of Body Diversity — From the beauty industry to the medical industry, we’re bombarded with messages about the kind of bodies that are “good,” “healthy,” and “beautiful.”  These categories are often applied to only a tiny segment of the population, and the rest of us are expected to strive to achieve bodies that are more like this ideal.  As much as possible, try to show your children that a diversity of bodies is really beautiful.  Marilyn Wann’s Fat!So? book is particularly great for this — each chapter features a diversity of arms, bellies, legs etc. to show this beauty in diversity.  Whether you’re 7 or 70, it can feel great to have these reminders.

Dr. Linda Bacon Stands For Kids Too

2) Bring Resources With You When You Deal With Authority Figures — There are probably people in your life and your kid’s life who pressure you to get your kid to diet.  Diets don’t work for kids or adults, but that doesn’t stop doctors, teachers, etc. from pressuring you to put your kid on one.  Having a bit of research in front of you so that you can better advocate for your child can be really helpful.  Check out Linda Bacon’s incredibly helpful letters that you can bring with you to help explain why you’re using HAES® with your kids (and yourself).

3) Make Your Home A Body Positive Space — Think of your home as an oasis from fat shame.  What might need to change?  Maybe there are a few magazines that idealize thin bodies that you don’t want to buy anymore?  Maybe you want to tell your friends that you’re going to change the conversation if they start talking about how “bad” they are for eating something.  Maybe your bathroom scale needs to be replaced with something snazzier.  Getting intentional about creating a body positive home environment can be great for you and your kids.

4) Don’t Make Weight Loss The Answer — Despite the fact that fatness makes kids a target for bullying, protecting fat kids from bullying seems to be a low priority.  Since you hate to see your kids get picked on, you may think that dieting and weight loss are the answer.  But they aren’t the answer.  They just set your child up for more physical and mental health issues, including low self esteem and negative body image.  I’m no expert on bullying, but the more you remind your child that the bully is wrong and that his/her body is perfect the way it is, the better.

5) Get Body Positive Support For Yourself — I think it’s the rare person who escapes childhood and adolescence without body image issues, whether they’re fat or thin.  Fat positive community tends to be welcoming to lots of body types, because people understand that fat pride is about acknowledging that body shaming hurts all of us.  So look for blogs and groups (whether online or local) that feel supportive.  Also consider talking to a HAES therapist or coach (like me!) to support you in feeling great about your body.

Golda is a certified holistic health counselor and founder of Body Love Wellness, a program designed for plus-sized women who are fed up with dieting and want support to stop obsessing about food and weight. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/free to get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining! And, please join her and twenty of the biggest names in HAES(R) and Fat Acceptance at the Body Love Revolutionaries Telesummit (including Marilyn Wann and Linda Bacon, mentioned above)!

Is There Hope For Fat Kids? originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on January 23, 2012.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the podcast of this post here:

Recently, one of my clients told me that one of the reasons why she was fighting for gay marriage rights in her state was that she wanted to be “on the right side of history.” She hopes that someday gay marriage will be so non-controversial that years from now she’ll have grandchildren that won’t be able to conceive of a time when the right to marry was dependent upon the sex of the participants. I really hope that her vision of the future comes true.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (Image courtesy of The Seattle Times)

Similarly, I like to envision a future where discrimination based on weight is not only illegal, but obviously nonsensical. I like to envision a world where all of the negative things that are ascribed to fatness are no longer so ascribed, where people really are judged for the “content of their character,” (to quote Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.), rather than the size of their bodies. My hope is that being on the right side of history means seeing weight oppression as the baseless, useless, horrifically detrimental thing that it is, and that future generations will see that more clearly.

I had always seen The Civil Rights Act and cases like Griswold v. Connecticut as settled. I thought that the hard fought battle for civil rights had resulted in legislation and court decisions that the vast majority of Americans now understood as a very obvious good idea. Even if implementation was messy at least the truths were self-evident. Now, actual, allegedly viable contenders (cough, Ron Paul, cough) for President are pro-repeal.  And as for gay rights, just please go ahead and google Santorum.

Despite all this angling on the Right to be the craziest extremist, I think the majority of people do support civil rights and they understand that discrimination is harmful and unfair.  So now if we can just pull the wool from their eyes and get them to see the harm in weight oppression, perhaps they’ll join us on the right side of history.

Happy Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.

Golda is a certified holistic health counselor and founder of Body Love Wellness, a program designed for plus-sized women who are fed up with dieting and want support to stop obsessing about food and weight. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/free to get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining! And, please join her and twenty of the biggest names in HAES(R) and Fat Acceptance at the Body Love Revolutionaries Telesummit!

Being On The Right Side Of History originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on January 16, 2012.

The Body Love Revolutionaries Telesummit Is Back & Bigger Than Ever!

Last year, over 400 of you signed up to stake your claim as Body Love Revolutionaries.  You joined us on live calls with some of the most bad ass folks in fat acceptance and HAES(R).

This year, we’re back with a group of twenty (!) amazing people who are at the forefront of this revolution for this telesummit.

I’ll be talking Fat Activism with Marilyn Wann,  Amanda Levitt  and Peggy Howell, Fat Health with Linda Bacon and Ragen Chastain, Fatshion with Marie Denee, Rachel Kacenjar, and Yuliya Raquel, Fat Sex with Hanne Blank and Virgie Tovar, Fat Blogging and Social Media with Marianne Kirby, Margitte Kristjansson, and Brian Stuart, Fat Fitness with Jeanette DePatie and Anna Guest-Jelley, Fat/Queer Intersections with Bevin Branlandingham, Charlotte Cooper and Jessica Luxery, and Fat Politics & History with Paul Campos and Amy Farrell.
When you register, you’ll get free live access to all of the interviews, and you’ll have the opportunity to get your questions answered by our panel.

Click here to learn more and register!

I can’t wait to see you there!

Join Me For The 2nd Annual Body Love Revolutionaries Telesummit! originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on January 3, 2012.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the podcast here:

Click here to listen in itunes.

This post really could be an indictment of the way that fat always equals bad in the symbolism of Progressive movements, including Occupy, but it isn’t.  And as much as I wish that fellow Lefties would take up the call of fat acceptance rather than fatphobia, for now it’s a dream deferred.

But I do think that the Occupy movement and the fat acceptance movement have a lot in common.  In essence, the Occupy movement is trying to break down a prevailing myth.  The myth is that with enough smarts and fortitude and hard work, the American dream of prosperity will be realized.  People have been led to believe that it  just takes hard work, dedication, putting your nose to the grindstone, and various other cliches and you too can make it in America, when the reality is endemic income disparity, high unemployment, lost homes, hunger, poverty, and discrimination and all the while huge multinational corporations are in cahoots with much of the government to keep things that way.

Here's my 68% rant!

The reality could not be more different than the myth.  And yet, the Right’s only response is, “Get a job, ya hippies!”  The Right continues to attempt to discredit Occupy’s argument by insisting that the myth is real.  If the Occupy folks would just work harder and do things right and stop being so lazy, they’d all be living the American dream, the Right argues.

Does this sound familiar?  Have you ever been told that if you just worked harder at it and did things right, you’d lose weight and keep it off?  It’s pretty much the argument of every diet pusher when their diet fails.  It’s the argument of every doctor who, despite supposedly having a knowledge of the way the body and metabolism works, insists that diet and exercise will work if you just work hard enough.  It’s the argument that supports continued discrimination against fat people because if fat people really are just lazy and not working hard enough, then it’s their fault, and the diet companies, and pharmaceutical companies, and doctors, and the AMA etc. don’t have to do the work of realizing that the whole system is based on a lie and that it’s dangerous and needs to change.

According to the Lancet, based upon the (utterly bogus) BMI, 68% of Americans are overweight or heavier.  That’s more than two thirds!  Imagine if all of these people had a new awareness.  Imagine if all of these people (and their thin allies) began to see that fat wasn’t bad, that diets don’t work, that discrimination against fat people is wrong, and that people having a diversity of bodies is beautiful.  Imagine the healing that could happen for all of us.

I think it would be exciting for some of us to share our fat stories of being one of the 68%.  I shared mine above, and I’d love for you to share yours here, on the Body Love Wellness facebook page, and anywhere else you desire!

Golda is a certified holistic health counselor and founder of Body Love Wellness, a program designed for plus-sized women who are fed up with dieting and want support to stop obsessing about food and weight. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/free to get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining!

Occupy Fat Street: We Are The 68% originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on November 28, 2011.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the full interview here!

Even if you don’t totally recognize the name Nancy Upton, you have seen her pictures everywhere. For the last two weeks, news outlets and blogs have been abuzz about the woman who entered American Apparel’s Next Big Thing Contest by sending in pictures of herself bathed in ranch dressing, eating in a pool, and covering her lady regions with a cherry pie. For those in the know, it was clear that her intent was to skewer the way American Apparel and other fashion industry giants seem to view plus-sized women. But she never imagined that she’d win the contest in a landslide nor cause an international media stir. So I was particularly thrilled to be able to break into her very busy interviewing schedule to have a chat about fashion, sizeism, body image and more!

(Image of Nancy Upton by Shannon Skloss. Used with permission.)

Nancy first heard about the contest when she read about on Jezebel. When she checked out the contest, she found it really condescending. “I’ve always found [their advertising] to be a little pornographic and obviously really objectifying of women but also portraying women in a submissive, kind of negative, role.” She said that normally she would notice that and just go about her day, but this time, she couldn’t get the idea of the contest out of her mind.  “I just got this image of these people sitting around a conference table, being like, ‘Oh, these fat girls eating food and blah blah blah.’ And I thought, wouldn’t it be funny if I gave them . . . what I imagine they’re thinking about.” She also wanted there to be a nod to the bizarre high fashion imagery that we see on shows like America’s Next Top Model.

So she got together with her friend, photographer Shannon Skloss, and they shot the now well known images of Nancy. But when she submitted the photos, she had no idea of the impact it would have. “I was doing this interview with Jeanne Moos today who is on the Wolf Blitzer show,” she told me. “This woman, who has probably interviewed Hilary Clinton, who’s talked to diplomats… talked about the financial crisis, is interviewing me to put me on CNN to talk about me getting in a tub of ranch dressing. ” On a personal level, putting together this project has given Nancy the opportunity to begin to find her voice as an artist. Nancy had always admired musician/performance artist/ author Amanda Palmer and the way she uses different media to express herself. She told me, “I had a lot of strong opinions and I had a lot of strong ideas but I could never think of how to express them. And I would get ideas to do things and I would think, ‘That’s dumb; nobody wants to see that.’ . . . So to do it, when I’m almost not even realizing I’m doing it, has been the most amazing gift.”

(Image of Nancy Upton by Shannon Skloss. Used with permission.)

I asked Nancy about her own experience with body image, and not surprisingly, her story mirrors many of the ones we often hear. “I used to hate my body,” she told me, “I used to be extremely depressed about my body.” Even at her most athletic, when she was running 7 or 8 minute miles, she would “torture herself about” love handles and cellulite. “If I liked a guy and he didn’t like me, I would think it was because of my weight. If I was auditioning for a role and I didn’t get, I would think it was because of my weight.” Nancy credits therapy and the realization that there were things she could change and things she couldn’t change about her body that she grew to accept it.

(Image of Nancy Upton by Shannon Skloss. Used with permission.)

For Nancy, taking these photos and putting them out there also represented another level of healing for her. All of the photos she submitted (except one) were completely un-photoshopped, because she wanted her body to look as it looks in real life. But it was still hard for her to look at the proofs. “My immediate reaction to them was to be a bit scared . . . if I hadn’t told people I was going to do it, I might have chickened out.” Now she’s so glad that she posted them. “Since I put those up and had the response I had and it started a dialogue — I don’t think I’ve ever felt so comfortable with my body. It really has been kind of a powerful thing.”

Going forward, Nancy’s considering doing more in the area of body image and fashion. “Right now, I have what very few people get in their lives, and that’s a platform. . . . I feel like it would be a missed opportunity if I couldn’t bring more light onto this subject.”

To hear our whole interview and learn about what Nancy thought of American Apparel’s response, click the link above to listen to it or go check out the podcast on Itunes. To keep up with Nancy, check out her Tumblr here.

Golda is a certified holistic health counselor and founder of Body Love Wellness, a program designed for plus-sized women who are fed up with dieting and want support to stop obsessing about food and weight. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/free to get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining!

Profile In Flabulousness: Nancy Upton (She’s The Next Big Thing, For Real) originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on September 19, 2011.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the full interview here!

Here’s the part where I tell you how cool I am because I’ve known Leslie Medlik, star of TLC’s Big Sexy (which airs tomorrow, Tuesday, August 30th at 10PM ET/PT), for years.

Leslie Medlik of Big Sexy (image courtesy of TLC)

She is one of the excellent and flabulous shop girls of my favorite plus sized store, Re/Dress NYC.  I’ve always dug her style — vintage duds, Bettie Page bangs– and her down-to-earth advice on everything from fashion to relationships.  Leslie describes her personal style as a cross between a vintage vixen and a fat hipster. “Sometimes those worlds collide and there’s Leslie,” she told me.

So when I heard she was starring in a fat-positive reality show (what the???) on TLC about five plus sized gals trying to make it big in fashion in NYC, I made sure to get the scoop before she got mobbed by everyone from Curvy to More.

Buzz has been building for Big Sexy over the last few weeks.  It seems that when anyone posts about the new show on Facebook, lots of women write, “this is me!  I need to be on this show!”  So I was curious what the casting process was like for Leslie. ”For me, it was just one of those things that the world dropped in my lap.” A scout had come into Re/Dress to consider it for a location for the show.  She ended up talking to Leslie and asking her to audition.  “It was just really easy and fast.”

Leslie & Nikki At The Beach (image courtesy of TLC)

Unlike most reality TV shows about plus sized women, Big Sexy is supposed to show plus sized people having full, fun, sexy lives.  Since this is pretty groundbreaking, I wondered if Leslie had any trepidations in doing the show.  “I’m someone who’s very cautious about these things and there is always that concern that, while I had talked to the producers about it . . . you never know how things are going to be edited or what’s really going to happen. But at this point, I’m fairly confident that what they’re putting together is going to be a great show.”

Given that this is one of the first really size positive reality shows out there, it could have a big impact on how people generally view fat people and how fat people view themselves.  For Leslie, she’s hoping the show helps more women love their bodies: “the women who are waking up every day hating themselves — maybe this will give them the edge to stop doing that or at least start the process to stop hating themselves.”  She also hopes that people will begin to get the message that size and health are separate things and that attacking people for accepting their bodies is not okay. “That’s the immediate go to, ‘Okay, well you might be confident but you’re unhealthy and you’re gonna die because you’re fat’ and it’s not true.  If we could help debunk that ridiculous myth — that would seal the deal for me.”

The cast of Big Sexy (image courtesy of TLC)

In the first episode (airing tomorrow!), Leslie puts together a fabulous fashion show, which included some gorgeous Monif C. bathing suits.  Three of the other stars of Big Sexy (Nikki Gomez, Tiffany Bank, and Audrey Lea Curry), all plus sized models, are part of the runway show, yet a few of them really struggled with feeling comfortable wearing the bathing suits on the runway.   I asked for Leslie’s take on that.  “I think it’s twofold: I was a little surprised but then, well, not so much because this is how women are constantly dealing with their bodies. And, initially, knowing those two, I was surprised, but then, at the same time, I get it.  I get why they were questioning it, because now not only were people going to be looking at their bodies, judging them coming down the runway, but there are cameras there and there are going to be millions of people [judging them] and all of these things that start to creep in and put doubts in your mind.”  In essence, this struggle over swimsuits really showed how brave a thing it is to be a plus sized woman showing your body with confidence in a world that isn’t accepting of it.

So what’s next for Leslie? She wants to help more women have fun with fashion by offering her services for personal styling, personal shopping and also some wardrobe consulting. “There’s nothing better than helping a woman feel good about herself, regardless of size.  It isn’t just fat women it’s skinny women who have tons of issues with the same thing — not being skinny enough, right? So I want to help women of all sizes.”

Stop by Leslie’s facebook page to stay in touch with her and check out her web site for info on her styling work!

To listen to the full interview, check out Golda’s podcast.

And here’s the commercial!

Golda is a certified holistic health counselor and founder of Body Love Wellness, a program designed for plus-sized women who are fed up with dieting and want support to stop obsessing about food and weight. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/free to get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining!

Profile In Flabulousness: Leslie Medlik From TLC’s Big Sexy originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on August 29, 2011.

I’m sorry, this free offer is no longer available, but you can get your own fully-optimized copy on Amazon (kindle) and Barnes & Noble (Nook, epub) for only $6.97!

This book will support you in:

• Healing from the dieting/bingeing cycle.
• Understanding why diets never seem to work in the long term.
• Simple techniques for freeing yourself from negative body image.
• Easy ways to lower your stress levels when it comes to food.
• How to know when you’re hungry and full and act on that information.

And so much more!

Happy diet-free eating for your beautiful body!

(c) Golda Poretsky 2011

THIS WEEKEND ONLY: Free E-Book Download In Honor Of Be Body Positive Day! originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on August 6, 2011.