I am SO EXCITED to share this with all of you!

For a long time, I’ve only had two options for you.  You could either take advantage of the free offerings on my site, the blog, the podcast and teleclasses, or you could become my client and work with me one on one.

And while I positively love providing both of those options, I’ve been dying to offer a program that would allow my clients to connect with and support one another, all the while getting support from me.  In other words, I’ve wanted to create a group program that would be accessible to more women and would allow for all of us to build a community of like-minded women who are dedicated to empowering one another and breaking the chains of body hatred for good.

I wanted to create a group program that would support you in healing from the pain and isolation of body hatred and food issues.  I wanted to create a community of women who were really committed to supporting themselves and one another in feeling great in their bodies and moving about their lives as the radiant and empowered women that they were born to be.

For over a year, I’ve been working on creating the curriculum for a program that would give its members the tools to really love their bodies, heal from food issues, and more.  And it is finally ready!

So without further ado, I would like to introduce you to The Empress Club.

The symbol of the Empress (in tarot decks and elsewhere) is usually depicted as a beautiful, powerful, plus sized woman.  She is an image representing abundance, power, Mother Earth, divine knowledge, sensuality, and much much more.

Because of this, the Empress is a fitting symbol of a group coaching program designed to support powerful plus-sized women in attaining their desires.

If you are ready to own your beauty, own your body, and own your health, then you are ready for the Empress Club.

Register here, or just keep reading…

Let me tell you a little bit about what you get as an Empress Club Member.  You will:

• Learn powerful tools to IMMEDIATELY change the way you relate to your body
• Get my unique process for healing from long held emotional eating patterns
• Get support from other women who know your struggles and will support you in moving forward
• Own your beauty like you never have before
• How to understand what cravings really mean and give your body the nutrition it needs
• Receive Health At Every Size based counseling — scientifically proven to positively influence health indicators more than diet programs
• Set healthy boundaries based upon your needs and desires
• Build your business or career by networking with other Empresses
• And so much more!

Now, you’re probably wondering how all of this works.  As in, “What exactly do I get as an Empress Club member?”  So here’s a breakdown of all that you get to participate in as an Empress Club member.

First, there are the calls.  You will get 12 food and body image group coaching sessions in a teleclass form.  Each session will be 60-90 minutes long. These classes will be in a workshop style, with a mixture of teaching and Q&A. These are calls where you’ll learn tools to support you in transforming your food and body image issues.  And, you’ll get my personal, in-depth coaching on your specific questions.  And you’ll learn a lot from the questions and successes of your peers!

Then, there’s membership in the exclusive Empress Club community site. You’ll be granted access to your own members-only protected site where you can get your questions answered by me and my team, share knowledge and inspiration with other members, and access the downloadable audios and other program resources. This is the place to share your experiences, get support, post pictures, network, and so much more!

Plus, we have the bonus Live Event, which I call the Empress Club Coronation.  This is a 2-day, private event, where you get your chance to meet the amazing women that you’ve connected with in the Empress Club in person.

Day 1 is a plus size shopping event, where we’ll head to Brooklyn to visit Re/Dress NYC and Lee Lee’s Valise — two wonderful stores dedicated to fabulous plus-size clothes.  There, trained stylists will help you create fantastic looks that look great on you.  Day 2 is our spa day, where you get to pamper yourself at Spa Castle, an amazing, multi-level spa.  We’ll talk body love as we relax and chat in jacuzzis, saunas and whirlpools.  Please note: Attendance at the Empress Club Coronation isn’t required, and no new material will be covered.  However, it is my personal wish that everyone be able to attend.

Plus, because I love my clients and love to over deliver, we’ll have some additional start up and follow up calls so that we can all connect and digest all that we learn.

Plus, now through September 7th September 30th, I’m offering a crazy amazing deal on this program.  So if you’re ready to sign up, or just want to learn more, just click the button below.  You’ll be taken to a link where you’ll get even more info about the program, and get the opportunity to sign up at this really low early bird rate!

I can’t wait for you to join me, Empress!

xoxo,
Golda
Body Love Coach
www.bodylovewellness.com

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

Listen to the podcast of this post here:

To give you a little taste of Stop Dieting Now: 25 Reasons To Stop, 25 Ways To Heal, I’ve excerpted Reason #5: Diet Foods Are Full Of Chemicals & Tip #5: The Real Nutrition Facts for your viewing pleasure!

Reason #5: Diet Foods Are Full Of Chemicals

Many diets support the use of non-nutritional, highly chemicalized foods like fake fats and fake sugars. These chemicalized foods negatively affect body chemistry, cause low-level under-nourishment, and often encourage overeating when the dieter gets the signal that s/he is not getting nourishment.

As an example, back when I was counting points on Weight Watchers, I developed a horrific gastrointestinal problem the likes of which I had never experienced before. I was spending the day in pain, experiencing incredible bloating and ending up in the bathroom for hours. I was frightened of what might be happening to my body, so I made an appointment with a highly recommended internist. The earliest appointment I could get was a week away.

At some point during that week, I had an inkling that I should stop eating the delicious low-fat cheese product I had been eating regularly due to its low Weight Watchers Point status. I stopped eating the cheese (I was only having a few bites of it a day) and within three days my stomach felt normal again. I had similar experiences with diet foods—a popular ice cream bar and a diet brand name pretzel snack both caused rashes that, once I figured out the cause, disappeared within a few days. I’ve seen this pattern over and over again with my clients too.

Our bodies are not really designed to eat food made up mainly of chemicals. When we are able to connect with the wisdom of our bodies, we know what our bodies really crave—whole foods full of nutrients, vitamins and minerals (with the occasional piece of cake, of course!) Diet programs diminish our ability to make appropriate, real food choices.

Tip #5:  The Real Nutrition Facts

Think back to some of your recent diets. Were there any processed, chemicalized foods that you ate because they were “on your diet plan?” If you have any around, take a look at the ingredients list (not the calories/fats/carbs facts) and see if there is any real food in your diet food! Think about whether you would have eaten these foods if you weren’t on a diet. And, if you’re having gastrointestinal, skin or allergy issues that seemed to come from nowhere, try going off any highly processed diet foods for a few days and see if you notice a difference.

Want to get your copy of Stop Dieting Now: 25 Reasons To Stop, 25 Ways to Heal? Then just click here!

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Golda Poretsky, H.H.C. is a certified holistic health counselor who specializes in transforming your relationship with food and your body. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/stay-in-touch/ to sign up for her newsletter and get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining!

© 2010 Golda Poretsky All rights reserved.

I’m pleased to announce that my book, Stop Dieting Now: 25 Reasons To Stop, 25 Ways To Heal is now available at online retailers in the US, Canada, and the UK!

From an early age, our culture tells us that losing weight and dieting is the key to having it all.  Whether it’s better health, a better body, or a better lover, we all learn that dieting will get us what we want faster than anything else.

Though we all want this to be true, if you’re like most dieters, then you know that dieting does not equal happiness.  Not only that, dieting can result in lots of unintended effects, like weight gain, disordered eating, and low self esteem, just to name a few.

But there is a way out.  In this breakthrough book, I show you why diets don’t work and how you can break free from dieting patterns that are holding you back from happiness.

When you read Stop Dieting Now!, you will come away with breakthrough insights and practical actions that you can take immediately to change your relationship with food and your body.  Here are just a few things that you will learn from this book:

• Why you can’t stick to diets (hint: it’s not about willpower).
• Simple techniques for letting go of food-related guilt and shame.
• Why you always seem to gain back the weight you lose from dieting.
• How old diet rules and habits can negatively interfere with your food choices, long after you stop dieting.
• How to avoid passing on dieting behaviors to your kids.
• The dangers behind “weighting” to be thinner before you make changes in your life.
• Real tools that support you in making peace with your body.
• And so much more . . .

Where to buy:

• Goodreads (If you’re a member, please mark it as to-read!)
• Amazon US
• Amazon Canada
• Amazon UK
• Barnes & Noble
• AbeBooks
• IndieBound

Let me know when you get it!

And stay tuned for info on my upcoming book signing at Re/Dress NYC!

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

Recently, this blog has gotten a lot of new readers who may be new to Fat Acceptance & Health At Every Size.

As a consequence, I’ve been fielding lots of comments of the “how can you be promoting fat?!” and “haven’t you heard of type II diabetes?!” variety.  So, rather than trying to respond to these commenters individually (and as a way to provide support to people who want to respond to these comments in their own lives and blogs), I’ve decided to write this post.  I’ve outlined 9 typical statements by commenters, together with an explanation of why each statement is wrong, wrong, wrong.

1) Fat is unhealthy. Fat is not inherently unhealthy.  In fact, being underweight, in many ways, is more dangerous than being overweight, obese, or morbidly obese.  Furthermore, a great deal of evidence suggests that health problems linked to fat are actually a result of dieting, and the incredible strain that dieting puts on the body.  A recent study found that people who lost 15% or more of their body weight had an increased risk of death compared to people of the same size who didn’t lose weight. In addition, fat people live longer than thin people and are more likely to survive cardiac events and not suffer as much blood loss due to treatments such as angioplasty.  Fat has even been shown to protect against a variety of problems, including “infections, cancer, lung disease, heart disease, osteoporosis, anemia, high blood pressure, rheumatoid arthritis and type 2 diabetes.” Fat people also have lower rates of emphysema, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, hip fracture, tuberculosis, anemia, peptic ulcer and chronic bronchitis.

If you’re wondering why you’ve never heard any of this before, that’s because this information doesn’t make anyone money.  It doesn’t support the $60 billion a year diet industry nor the multi-billion dollar weight loss surgery industry nor the multi-bajillion dollar pharmaceutical industry.

2) Fat people all have eating disorders, eat poorly, and don’t exercise. No study has ever supported this conclusion.  And let’s just get clear on something.  You cannot tell anything about a person’s eating habits or fitness level or relative health from their size.  I have clients who are 300-pound clients who eat all organic, whole foods and train for triathalons, and I have 120-pound clients who are generally sedentary and have binge eating disorder.  People of all different sizes have all different habits, and a quick survey of your friends and relatives will show just that.

3) If fat people would eat properly and exercise, they wouldn’t be fat. Contrary to popular opinion, people come in all shapes and sizes.  Just like people are short and tall and in between, people are fat and thin and in between. It’s called diversity.  It’s called genetics. It’s called, in some instances, the result of constant dieting.

4) Weight loss is a healthy goal, deserving of promotion. Not true at all.  First of all, diets don’t work.  They really don’t.  The one or two people that you know that lost weight on a diet and kept it off for more than 5 years are statistical freaks.  Dieting wreaks havoc on the body, affecting everything from your immune system, to your cardiovascular system, to your stamina and mental health, to your body image.  Oh, and don’t get me started on the incredible dangerousness of weight loss surgeries.  If anyone tells you that their plan promises long term weight loss, they are lying to you.  If they promise weight loss and fail to mention whether it will be long term or not, they are deceiving you.

5) Promoting fat acceptance makes people fat. I haven’t seen a study that shows that approving and loving your body causes one to gain weight.  In fact, Health At Every Size practices, which include body acceptance, actually make people healthier.  When you can show me that shaming people about their bodies improves health, then we can talk.  And by the way, the way we shame fat people has led to an exponential rise in discrimination against people in the workplace, healthcare and education.

6) There’s an obesity crisis going on and obesity is on the rise. Actually, it’s not.  Also, see item 1, above.

7) Childhood obesity is a serious problem. Actually, it’s not. Childhood life expectancy continues to rise.  And every attempt to make kids thinner have failed.  And, you might want to follow the money behind Michelle Obama’s obesity initiative to see how corporations are benefiting from the b.s.  The real danger for fat children is the threat of bullying, and the toll that that takes.  Finally, access to healthy, organic food and safe places to play are important for all children, not just fat ones.

8) BMI is an appropriate and scientific way of determining health. If you consider the way BMI works for more than a minute, you realize that it so flawed as to be completely useless.

9) But all of this goes against the conventional wisdom that fat is bad and deadly! Your “conventional wisdom” has been paid for by the diet industry and pharmaceutical companies for decades and decades.  It’s time to get over it and start thinking critically.  I encourage you to read this blog and other fantastic fat acceptance blogs and begin the process of unraveling your internalized and externalized hatred.

Additional Recommended Reading:

• The Diet Myth: Why America’s Obsession With Weight Is Hazardous To Your Health, by Paul Campos
• Losing It: False Hopes & Fat Profits In The Diet Industry, by Laura Fraser
• Fat!So?: Because You Don’t Have To Apologize For Your Size, by Marilyn Wann
• Lessons From The Fat-O-Sphere:  Quit Dieting And Declare A Truce With Your Body, by Kate Harding & Marianne Kirby
• Health At Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight, by Linda Bacon, PhD
• Stop Dieting Now: 25 Reasons To Stop, 25 Ways To Heal, by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
  

P.S.  This post was inspired by Kate Harding‘s excellent post “But Don’t You Realize Fat Is Unhealthy?”

Want more size positive info?  Stay up to date with the Body Love Wellness blog by joining our newsletter.

© 2010 Golda Poretsky.  All rights reserved.

These Ladies May Have A Case Of The Mondays

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

Listen to the podcast of this post here:

Breaktime!

Does this sound like you?  You’re at work or doing school work and you start feeling tired or bored.  You feel like you need a break, so you do one of three things:

1) Get coffee.
2) Get a snack.
3) Get coffee & a snack.

I’ve got nothing against coffee or snacks, particularly if you’re hungry.  But things get a little wonky when you’re eating just to take a break, or overdoing coffee because you’re feeling tired, or both.  You end up consuming more than you really want to, when what you really want is a few moments to chill out.

The Science Of Breaks

Taking a break in your day is not just about conquering boredom.  Just like your energy ebbs and flows and changes throughout the month and throughout the year, your energy naturally changes throughout the day.  Scientists have been studying these ultradian rhythms for fifty years, and have found that, in every 90 minute period, humans have a tendency to need to relax and zone out for about 10-20 minutes.  That doesn’t mean you can’t (and don’t) push through these natural rhythms all the time, but noting when you’re feeling the need to slow down and relax, and doing something about it, can actually increase your productivity and overall well-being.

Breaking Breaktime Rules

Whether you work in an office or at home or anywhere in between, chances are you’ve developed habits in terms of your breaks.  You probably have unwritten rules about what an acceptable break constitutes.  If you’re not sure what I mean, think about taking a walk for a break, or closing your eyes for a few minutes and breathing deeply.  If you feel some guilt about taking this kind of break, then you’ve got break time rules.

The problem with having these rules about what you can and cannot do to take a break is that you can’t get any value from your breaks.  If the only way you allow yourself to take a break is by getting a snack, then you start feeling weird or guilty about snacking when you’re not even hungry, which stresses you out.  Stressing yourself out completely defeats the purpose of your break, since the point of you wanting a break was to de-stress!

Your New Breaktime!

So here’s what you do.  Take a break from crappy breaks by brainstorming some new and creative ways to take a break.  Consider some breaks that would have the effect that you want.  What would be relaxing? Re-energizing? Stimulating?

To get you started, here are 10 new ways to take a workday break.  Keep this list (or your list) open on your computer so that you can refer to it whenever you need it.

If you want to relax:

• Lean back in your chair, close your eyes, and take a few deep breaths.
• Imagine a beautiful place, like a vacation spot that you love, and imagine being there.  Feel the feeling of it with all your senses.
• If you work from home or have your own office that can fit a yoga mat, lie down for 5 minutes.  It may feel really weird, but it’s very relaxing for your body.
• Close or minimize email, chat, twitter, and anything else that constantly updates.  Try doing this for as long as permitted to lower your stress levels and allow yourself to focus.

If you want to re-energize:

• Take a walk, either in your home or office, or for a block or two outside. Outside is best because the air is more oxygenated.
• If you have your own office (or willing or accepting co-workers) nothing beats a mid-day dance break.  Use youtube or pandora (or our dance break music) when you don’t have your favorites handy.  My current dance break favorites are The Rebirth Brass Band and Red Baraat.
• Affirm to yourself that you can take a break when you need to.  Just knowing this can be rejuvenating.

If you want a little of both:

• Do some stretches to increase blood flow to your whole body.
• Feel into your body.  Literally ground yourself in your chair; connect to the feeling of your feet on the floor.  Noticing what your body feels like gets you out of the stress in your head and allows you to reconnect with the totality of who you are.
• Do a journal rant. Write about what you’re feeling, nervous about, angry about.  (You may want to write this by hand, just make sure that you don’t leave it out or keep it on your work computer.)

Let me know what some of your favorite alternative break time activities are in the comment section below!

And for a deeper relaxation, check out some of my downloadable guided meditations here.

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Golda Poretsky, H.H.C. is a certified holistic health counselor who specializes in transforming your relationship with food and your body. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/stay-in-touch/ to sign up for her newsletter and get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining!

© 2010 Golda Poretsky All rights reserved.