Caroline Dooner

How many diets are out there? How many of them are backed by doctors and gurus who claim they know “the most natural way to eat” or “the fastest way to burn fat and never gain it back!” or “the most definite way to never be hungry again, become beautiful, have everyone love you, and have all your dreams come true!”? So many.

We have been told that that's how it works: calories in vs calories out. "Eat less than you expend and you'll lose weight."

Pretending you’re OK when you're not is lying — lying to yourself. And it will keep you not OK.

You can improve your health without losing weight!

I teach people how to eat normally after dieting. And across the board, the people I work with all describe themselves as “type A personalities” or “perfectionists.”

So many of us try to stick to diets, only to find ourselves bingeing, then restricting more, then bingeing again, then restricting more, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo. Our weight is all over the place, our sanity is all over the place, and we feel totally out of control with food.

Dieting is bad for your body, health, relationship with food, relationship with your body, metabolism, and really bad for natural weight stabilization. Of course we are not taught that. We are taught in so many ways that dieting works long-term (it doesn’t) and that losing weight is the simplest and easiest life enhancement we can pursue (it’s not).

I’d rather do anything than talk to cab drivers (or hair dressers, or bus seat mates or… anyone). I hate small talk. I put in my earbuds and I give short polite answers when necessary.

For years I felt ashamed for having a body. Embarrassed to have big boobs. Embarrassed to be anything but tiny and perfect. Embarrassed to be anything bigger than a dainty wisp of air. I felt like taking up physical space in this world was both vulnerable and too powerful.

And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but people are really resistant to movements that aim to inspire people to drop the fight against weight. There are lots of fat-haters.