Navigating the Complexities of Body Image in a GLP-1 Era

Welcome to the Satiated Podcast, where we explore physical and emotional hunger, satiation and healing your relationship with your food and body. I'm your host, Stephanie Mara Fox, your Somatic Nutritional Counselor.

This is the last interview in this body image series and we're gonna go out with a bang! With all the perspectives being offered the past few weeks, I hope you're starting to experience that body image recovery is not as simple as just finding a way to love and appreciate your body. When conversations around body image solely focus on the body's appearance, we miss out on exploring just how hard it is to simply live in a body. Your body is processing a lot every day, and then throw in media, GLP-1 era, and societal pressures into the mix, and no wonder you may find yourself dissociating and disconnecting from your body. Sometimes, it can all just feel like too much.

I feel lucky to have been able to connect with Anna Sweeney to chat about just how hard it is to live in a body and navigate body image worries within the context of the world right now. Anna is a chronically ill and disabled relational nutrition therapist and registered dietitian. She has dedicated her career to counseling, supervising, and consulting in the field of eating disorders. She is a Certified Eating Disorder Specialist and consultant and a certified Intuitive Eating counselor. Anna is the owner of a group nutrition therapy practice dedicated to anti-oppressive, fat-positive eating disorder care. Anna has spoken locally and nationally at numerous conferences and media outlets, is globally recognized as a resource in her field, and regularly communicates on social media as dietitiananna. We chat about the complexities of body image healing, the impact of societal messaging and social media, challenging body image norms, the GLP-1 craze we're in right now, medical stigma, and finding safety in the body.

Before we get into it, as a reminder in 25 days is my Befriending Your Body Image Challenges with Somatic Eating® Practices Workshop, which I only teach once a year. This will occur live on Wednesday, August 27th at 5:00 pm ET. You will learn the somatic wisdom behind your body image concerns, discover a nervous system and trauma lens to body image challenges, and somatic practices to navigate difficult body image days, the scale, comparing yourself to past body expressions, and seeing pictures of yourself. You will walk away with new insights into what your body may be trying to relay by having you worry about your body’s appearance. And you will be able to ask me any questions to get personalized support for your body image challenges. If you can't attend live, the call will be recorded to watch the replay later. To sign up, click HERE and if you have any questions about the workshop, email me at support@stephaniemara.com anytime.

Now, welcome Anna! I am really excited to finally connect with you kind of in person. I get that we're virtual right now, but I'm just gonna say in person, because we've been following each other for so long, and so I'm just really lit up that you're here right now, and to get into all things body image with you today.

Anna Sweeney 03:52

I'm so excited myself. Thank you so much, Stephanie for having me here. It has been a long time coming, and what an important time for this conversation.

Stephanie Mara 04:02

Yeah, yeah. Yes. You might hear my dog in the background, perfect timing.So I'm curious if you can share a little bit around. You know, for those who don't know you, you put out such amazing content on social media. But for those who don't know you, you know a little bit of your journey and how you got into the work that you're doing today.

Anna Sweeney 04:25

Sure. So I, amazingly, have been a dietitian specializing in eating disorders for 18 years. I have dedicated my career to the treatment of eating disorders. I've worked at all levels of care and privilege to work in my own private practice and to have connection with folks on the internet that is meaningful and significant for me, as is the relationship I have with the clients that I support in real life. I started in this field in response to my sister having had an eating disorder and my really not understanding anything about it, I took my first nutrition class, and I was like, you know what? I want to do this, and particularly, I want to do the conversational, relational work that has nothing to do with math and nothing to do with light fixtures and like food science. So I got lucky on a number of different occasions to have a variety of opportunities over the course of my career, and have landed where I am and feel really thankful to be able to do this work that is so meaningful in its relationality and so deeply connecting, and what a privilege to be able to witness people really heal. I will stay forever.

Stephanie Mara 05:56

Oh, I like, feel my heart swelling just hearing that. And like, I feel so similar in that, like, what a privilege and an honor it is to like, hold space in the hardship of struggles with food. And many listeners here know my own journey and how many years I struggled and so it, it is really transformative just to like, sit in a space and see light bulbs go off or face challenges of trying new foods and eating consistently. And I know we're here today to also talk around body image, because it's also such a huge part, like we can't talk about food without talking about body image. And so I'm wondering, from your experience and your work right now, where we are in the body image cycle. You know, I always kind of like to look at the history of body image. Where do you feel like we're at right now, and why it feels like things are kind of peaking recently in it's like extra hard to be in a body right now.

Anna Sweeney 06:58

So I will say, and I feel apologetic to anyone who I treated at the beginning of my career and tried to say, if you have a bad body image day, go get a manicure and, like, take a bubble bath, or, like, write a letter of gratitude for the things that your body can do. Like, I'm sorry that I minimized your experience and suggested that you could reframe your way through a body image difficulty. I don't think inherently, bodies are easy. In fact, having a body is hard, and we don't talk about that like the actual process of being a biological specimen is difficult. And having this biological specimen body with like a really advanced brain that relates to other people and other people's feelings about bodies, and we are getting input about bodies all the time, everywhere. This is not simple. The longest relationship any of us will have is the one that we have of our body and with, like a very deep breath, giving ourselves space to sit with, sit with hard is something that I couldn't do earlier in my career, like I really wanted to reframe, and given my thin white privilege, not really appreciating like, body image is way more complicated than simply liking the way a person looks, right, we have a system that is built to elevate one particular type of body, and that is not most of the bodies. We certainly have seen body positivity was about a decade ago. But in real life, body positivity has always existed, but created by, you know, black, trans fem humans, not really for application for white women in Lululemon, to be quite frank, and now in the era of GLP-1's, which is following the covid era, where we're all looking at ourselves with filters, and people are experiencing their bodies on screens and are seeing bodies that appear to be, quote, real bodies, but we know that there is photo editing that happens all the time. There's just this constant input of body information, and we are certainly going into a summer where everybody's being sold information about like, if you can get this medication, your body can be smaller, you'll be happier, healthier, whatever, without, you know, appreciation of long term impact and all of the other things that we don't know.

Stephanie Mara 09:56

Yeah, all of that is so well said. And first, just in the conversation of, like, you know, practitioners, nutritionists, therapists, like working in the body image realm. I know in my educational experiences, like, there was no classon how to work with people around body image, like I had to go out and find that. And like, you're shaking your head, I imagine, like in the nutritional realm, there also isn't like you said, it's a lot of numbers and math and science, and so it's also like people kind of had to go out into like, the wild wild west of like, how do we navigate these body image concerns, as you discovered and I discovered that too, so I really resonated with what you were talking about of like, these blanket statements of like, okay, let's reframe. Let's try to make this into the positive. Let's see the like, a different perspective here. Never actually honors like you were saying how hard it is to live in a body and especially in a culture where we're constantly being bombarded with various body image messages. So I really appreciate that you're bringing that piece in.

Anna Sweeney 11:04

I'm always very curious, right about, like, the stories we carry about what it means to be in a body. It doesn't start with just us, right? It starts with the people who came before us and the people who came before them. Mass media is really different now than it was in earlier iterations of media, and we are always a part of a social comparison experiment. That is what it means to be human and to exist in space with one another. We want safety, and we want acceptance, and we want to feel well and good, and it is so much easier and so much more comfortable to do the things like say, well, body image healing comes later, right? That like, let's deal with your eating disorder first, and then we'll tend to the body image, or talk to your therapist about your body image, and we end up just shunting conversations where I have appreciated my role as being much more of a witness and a container for story so we can, you know, make our way through tales that have been told to a person over time that help them relate to their body or disconnect from their body, if we can understand more about that, we can actually make meaningful change with regard to the way that we relate to body, which doesn't mean that body image healing is about changing a body. It is about changing the way we relate to being in our bodies, at least for me.

Stephanie Mara 12:51

Yeah, I completely agree with that. And you know, something that I've even noticed is, what if we just start to welcome in, like, okay, you you say you hate your body, or you hate this body part, or you just don't like this body. What's that like for you? You know, rather than trying to fix what is coming up in the moment, like, what is it like to live in a body that you struggle with to like, get to know that experience that it's like, it's okay, let's actually like, maybe ask the judgment and the shame to step aside and get curious about what your experience is like being in a body that is hard to be in. I'm wondering, when you're talking about these stories that you kind of go into, like, what have you found as someone gets closer to maybe the stories that they have about their body, like, what's that exploration like for you?

Anna Sweeney 13:49

For a lot of the work that I do with my clients, it's actually about going back in time and exploring, like, the earliest messages that people receive about bodies, and it might be about their own bodies. There might be a memory of overhearing someone say something about like, when I was five, I heard my family member say something about my body, and I never forgot it. Or when I was a kid, my guardian controlled the way that they ate, and so to be approved of, I did the same thing, or there was vocal judgment about people that lived in bodies size or like bodies that are, quote, different. And it makes so much sense that as young people, we want to belong, we want to be safe, we want to have our bodies not be a focus. Because like young people in the absence of trauma, bodies are these just like fantastic things that can do so oh so much. I didn't appreciate the flexibility of a young person until, like, I became not a young, flexible person anymore. I was like, wow, I could do like, all of these incredible things, and when it comes to difficult body stories and this is obviously different when I am speaking to I mean, there are a multitude of reasons that a person can be disconnected from their body and need to be disconnected from their body. And to me, there is a lot to be said for understanding the how we got here, or how did we get to these judgments, how did we get to these feelings? I'm curious what you just mentioned about, like, naming the shame of, like, a body region. I'm curious. And like, what does it feel like? I actually am very curious. Like, what does it feel like in your body to notice that this is a part of your body that you have judgment around, and where did that judgment come from? And how is it impacting your way of being? And one odd thing, and we are certainly told to do this, but to section ourselves into parts of bodies, right? I hate my stomach, I hate my legs, I hate my blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever it is. And the market is ready for us to do that very thing. So we're going to get shape wear, and we're going to be sold things very early on and get messages very early on about what we are supposed to look like, to be approved of, and it is an active, rebellious process to, you know, acknowledge it and maybe make a decision to say, like, I'm gonna honor this body differently than I have before, and see what it feels like.

Stephanie Mara 17:00

Yeah, I completely agree about diving into these body stories really profound of just what you were even going into of, like, there's so much history there around what has shaped our perception of our body based off of the environments that we grew up with. And like, I even like to kind of point to either the overt, like the messages that we actually received, and the covert, the messages that we heard or witnessed or observed, and that it all shapes our experience of our body to then form this kind of like internalized belief or way of being in the world. Now that doesn't necessarily get challenged or questioned if we aren't also in environments that challenge and question it. So you know, sometimes also when we're in the environments that continue to perpetuate that same message, like you're around your family and friends and you connect with people around similar body image perspectives like, it never gets to kind of be met with curiosity of like, huh? Why do I view my body this way?

Anna Sweeney 18:09

What a powerful question, and what a powerful thing to be able to notice. And I think body image is so interesting is processed in nine different regions of the brain, right? So some of the regions of the brain are in the limbic system, right? Like there's no choice. This is not active thought, it's automatic, safety, survival. Get me through this next moment in time. Some regions of the brain are more advanced. The prefrontal cortex is involved. There's like, thinking parts of the brain that are involved in body image, and like automatic response regions of the brain that are involved in body image. And this is one of the reasons why, you know there are people, who can wake up in the morning and feel great in your body, or fine in your body, and you leave your apartment, you see a reflection of yourself, although you just saw yourself in a mirror, but you see yourself in a reflection on a window somewhere else, and you have a totally different body experience, although your body is the same as it was 10 minutes ago, and or if you are around a coworker who is particularly whatever choose your adjective. If you haven't been nourished, if you are feeling particularly anxious, if you're doing things like trying on bathing suit or going clothing shopping, doing things that perhaps have energy around them, there are moments of vulnerability and as to what you were saying, like, when we are around people, it's so normalized, particularly for women, just to like, body shit talk is so normalized. It's odd to have conversation where we are not meeting one another kind of and I will say, as a disabled person, and earlier in my career, this was part of my life, and certainly earlier in my life, outside of my career, it was part of my life to announce my body, talking about my right leg, saying, oh, my stupid leg, condemning my body out loud in front of people who had body image struggle, not also appreciating simultaneously that I live with like all of the body privilege and I protected myself, or did what I felt was protecting myself by announcing my body before I entered space, and what I did instead was make people very uncomfortable. I didn't do anything kind for myself. In fact, I made myself feel worse by, you know, externalizing this body as problem narrative. And it took a really long time and quite a lot of money and creation of a shit talk jar to like, stop me from saying things out loud, and now I'm way more disabled that I was in earlier chapters when I first said those things. And now I am only grateful for the body that I have, as much as my abilities have been limited. And again, I say all of this acknowledging the many layers of privilege that I live with. But going back to what you just said about being with people, if we normalize this conversation of just like, you know, the water cooler talk is about the diet that I'm going on, or the outfit that I'm not wearing, or the hatred of this body part, it's really, really easy to get stuck in that and to not get curious about why and not challenge it at all.

Stephanie Mara 21:54

Yeah, yeah. Thank you for sharing all of that. You know, what you point to is also how much in a somatic perspective, I'm always curious about how our bodies affect each other on a body to body level, we come into an environment and already are apologizing for our bodies. We're sending the message, even sometimes, to other bodies, of like, it's not safe here to be in our bodies and like we then are trying to connect with other people, body to body, to get maybe coregulation and connection in the sense of belonging. And then it's really hard to do that when, like, the body image piece is at the forefront of the connection that kind of lends itself to more disconnection from each other, rather than just like coming into a space being like, I'm having a really hard time being in my body today. How are you in your body today? Like, like, actually building, like, honesty and authenticity and like, more connection through just normalizing the struggle, like you're talking about that it's okay that we struggle in our bodies, but we so also hide that because there's like, immense shame that, like, we shouldn't struggle living in a body. And, I appreciate that, you know, and I talk about that here as well, about how some of these movements got so misconstrued, like body positivity, which was not really meant in the way that it has been utilized for a long time now. But you know, then we get these messages that it's just like, oh, but you should only speak positive about your body and love your body and appreciate your body and be, you know, gratitude about your body. And then we aren't actually being in the validation or the acknowledgement around hard moments with our body, and sometimes gaslighting ourselves to be like, oh, I shouldn't feel this, and then that doesn't really connect us with other people are also struggling being in their bodies and what it might be like to be in a world where we just, like, authentically, say, yeah, in this moment, I am having a really hard moment, and I love that you pointed out and I talk here more on that. I love the brain piece, you know, I like to go into the nervous system, piece of like, when we are in different nervous system states, we're also gonna perceive our body differently, but it's just, yeah, we are going to experience and see our body differently for so many different reasons, based off of the parts of our brain that are processing our body image or our body schema, the parts of our nervous system that are viewing our bodies, so I appreciate just the many layers and nuance that you're bringing in that body image isn't just this simple piece of like, oh, I don't like my belly, and I either need to change it or start loving it.

Anna Sweeney 24:34

I think body love is a prerequisite for nothing. I really mean that, and I have posted about that and shared my thoughts about that. I've gotten a lot of pushback around it from people who have said, you know, loving my body has helped me to really take care of my body. And if that is part of your experience, then I love that for you. Going back to what I just said about like, the longest relationship we're ever going to have is the one we have with our body. I love a lot of people. That doesn't mean I feel great about a lot of people that I love all of the time. And I think you just said thegaslighting, we can't love our bodies in a way that eliminates system like systems of oppression. We can't love our bodies through hard things and expect, by virtue of just exclaiming, I love this body, that it will be easier to be in a body. And there's nothing wrong right with like, saying kind things to your body, interrupting shit talk as it's happening, because I think there is a lot to be said from a neuroplasticity perspective, for acknowledging when I'm speaking unkindly of my body. Turns out, my body doesn't actually actually change, but it does change the way that I feel in my body. That being said, if we have a singular destination of body love, there's body loathing or body love that skips most humans. If you have a body, there will be chapters of your body, I hope, that feel really wonderful and connecting and good. And there will be parts of the body experience that feel hard and are worthy of being grieved and are worthy of feeling without a reframe, without a need to do something differently, and it's so not sexy and, like, that's not a thing that I can sell and be like, oh, do these four things and feel great in your body. It's just that bodies change, right? Like, as we live on this planet where it's so odd, this is dating me, which is fine, but I'm seeing like actors and actresses that I grew up watching, and men actually get to get older, and I'm watching, like, the evolution of these women's faces and bodies. And it's like you are not 22 but you look kind of like you did when you were 22 and that's an interesting thing to witness. Totally different topic. Sorry.

Stephanie Mara 27:23

No, that's fine. I think it does speak to, again, all the messages that we receive, like we're talking about, how do these body stories get created? And what we see on media does send a message around what is going to lend itself to safety or feeling unsafe. I don't ever want to leave anyone out of the conversation. But just like specifically for women like you're pointing to, we get very specific covert messages in that it is not safe to age that already were treated differently, and that we will be treated even more differently if we show gray hair or wrinkles, or that I've been laughing throughout my life, so I have smile lines. It's like we're not allowed to show the life that we've lived and so I think it is actually on topic that, you know, we continue to, of course, struggle being in our bodies and connecting with our bodies in a different way, because we are also still in a world and in a culture that are sending these messages that it's not safe to be in our body. So I love that you're pointing to, actually, that it's like, yeah, we can say, I love my body and try to heal our relationship with a body part, but we are still in a system that is going to continue to send us very harmful messages.

Anna Sweeney 28:56

I think there's actually a lot of power in being able to recognize how much this has nothing to do with any of us. It is all about commerce. It is all about money and keeping us coming back for more and different. And that is not to say again that I don't wish for people to feel safe in their bodies, and I don't wish for people to feel good and well. And I think that this actually transitions kind of nicely to what we were talking about earlier, like thinking about in my mind, I guess it's the second summer of GLP-1 like madness, but it feels like kind of the first summer of GLP-1.

Stephanie Mara 29:41

It's so intensified.

Anna Sweeney 29:43

Yeah, there's a lot, there's a lot of energy. And I have a lot of humans in my life who feel very overwhelmed by all of the messaging and the omnipresent availability of these medications that I, you know, by virtue of eliciting gastroparesis, temporarily change the way that bodies, you know, body, this is not to say that GLP-1's are new drugs. They've existed for like, nine years for people with diabetes, and they are helpful medications. I know plenty of people on GLP-1's who have stayed in bodies that have not gotten smaller, and that is not what we're talking about with what we're seeing, you know, splayed out all over the world.

Stephanie Mara 30:31

Yeah, I've certainly been noticing a lot of things. I'm curious what you've been noticing shift as the GLP-1 kind of craze this summer has agreed, like really increased very much since last summer, I'm wondering what you have noticed.

Anna Sweeney 30:49

So I'm speaking a lot more about pharmacology than I ever thought that I would, and I am holding a lot of space for a lot of sadness, because I have a number of clients who have done really robust body reclamation work, are very social justice oriented and believe in the reality of body diversity, and do not have the desire to fall prey to big pharma, and also I have so many clients whose doctors have mentioned these things as options like in the recent past. I know that I am not alone in that experience, and I have so many clients and friends and people in my life who are on GLP-1's, or, know people who are on GLP-1's, and in whatever way they are witnessing, I have one client. Some of this is kind of sad, so I will say I have one client who has a parent on a GLP-1, and that parent is a completely different person as a result of having been on these medications. And I have no feedback, and I sit with this person in witnessing the evolution of their parent. I have clients whose doctors make recommendations for things like GLP-1's without diabetes, and my clients, for the most part, are not interested in GLP-1's and also receiving input like that from a physician, from a, you know, a person who they've been in relationship with or cared for by, first, for a period of time now, having these, like magical drugs, it's a very powerful thing, and really just not, not easy. And I think I just saw something about the AMA like so changing the cut off for what is like the A1c cut off for diabetes versus not diabetes, in the interest of promoting GLP-1's, so lowering the A1c threshold.

Stephanie Mara 33:23

I had not heard that one yet. Oh, that like, sits really, like, this is hard in my body right now.

Anna Sweeney 33:30

Yeah, it's very similar to, like, when they change, like, BMI from 27 to 25 because it was, quote, easier to remember for doctors. Like, what the what are you talking about? So now, in with the desire to sell more of these medications, doctors have a different go ahead to say this is now the threshold for what is, quote, pre diabetes and what is actually, I'm so angry. I'm so angered by this. And also, like, not shocked, but so angered by this, because I know it is going to impact so many humans who are at no higher risk than they were, like, two weeks before, you know, MAHA changed these cut offs.

Stephanie Mara 34:23

Yeah, I'm right there with you right now, and I, like, I experienced some intense rage just come through my body hearing that, and like having to sit in that and know that it's like, oh, first, you know anyone who's listening to this, who is on these medications, I never want anyone to feel like shame or judgment around what they feel like they need to do like you're even pointing to at the very beginning, when we started talking like we want everyone to feel safe, and it makes sense that you would feel drawn to a medication that might support you in having a body that fits into a society that is going to then view you a different way and support you infeeling safer to be here. Yeah, and the conversations that you're pointing to is that that's not what we're seeing in the conversation around GLP-1's is how the side effects is how they're affecting people. It's how they're affecting families, is how they are changing the way you feel and function in your body, the way you even potentially express yourself in the world. And that is an important piece that that's, you know, it kind of feels a very similar to what you were just talking about of like, yeah, we can say all these nice things of like, love your body and appreciate your body. It's just like, yeah, you know, just like, go on a GLP-1 for a little bit, like, that'll be fine. And like, yeah, you'll just, you'll lose some weight. And as you're pointing to, and I've seen that too, like, sometimes you don't, because there's, like, other things going on and that it's not that simple of just, like, it's just, you know, this drug that you can take that, you know, everyone's starting to lose weight on that. It's like there's so much more of the story there that's not being addressed or talked about.

Anna Sweeney 36:06

Yep, what I think is, I mean to repeat what you were just saying, like, of course, body autonomy is the most important thing. And I wish that this were a safe planet for all of the bodies. And I super acknowledge that this is not a safe place to exist for people who are of size. It is not, we have a problem. And anti fat bias is deadly. This is not anything other than that, right? So we are contending against fat body like we're contending with fat body hatred, and this drug being made available is hard on bodies that are like, hard on people with fat bodies and hard on people with not fat bodies, small bodies, because there is just this perpetual messaging of get smaller, get smaller, get smaller, get smaller, and if you need to utilize a drug to find felt safety in your body, I have nothing but respect for you, and I have nothing but care for what I imagine is a rather complicated decision, and I think that's one other thing that frustrates me about these meds, is that when they are being prescribed, they're not really being talked about, at least in my experience, doctors are very happy to prescribe them without having big dialogue about and then what happens next? Because the thing is, we don't know, because we are living through like a massive human trial, it is happening live. They've been approved, so they exist, and we don't know what happens 5, 10, 15, 20 years down the line, it's hard to be long sighted in that kind of way. It's really hard to have a body like no notes.

Stephanie Mara 38:18

Yeah, I totally agree. And I'm curious, just in this kind of coming into connection with how difficult it is to live in a body, especially at this time, and not a like you said earlier, like, here are things that you can do for yourself kind of way, but like, what have you actually seen be supportive, to connect, to facilitate safety, to regulate the nervous system, like through this time, that just does feel unsafe to live in a body, right?

Anna Sweeney 38:51

And there's also, like the planet of it all, and like all of the things that are happening on the globe. So this is like we're talking about GLP-1's while everything else is happening. Increasingly, so I am a really big fan of doing things that allow people to access body, even if for very short periods of time. I am a very big fan of humming. I'm a very big fan of noticing a body in relation to gravity, and just like, okay, here I am. I'm connected to Anna. She's somewhere else on the planet, but like, we are both being held down with this same connection, the same weight. And I think, honestly, there are no hacks for this, my hope is that we can build enduring strategies for self care, because when I think about body image healing in the absence of adequate nutrition, in the absence of doing kind of basic like meeting my human needs, it's really hard to think critically about a body experience. It is very easy, going back to the nine different regions of the brain that are involved in body image processing, if you are under fed, if you are not taken care of, if you have ignored the fact that you have to pee for like three hours because you are working whatever is happening, truly, to get to body image in the moment stuff, I want to make sure that everyone has kind of their basic biological needs tended to from there, we can examine what is it that you are feeling in your body, what is taking your focus here? And what would it feel like for us to acknowledge that that is where your brain is sticking to? Can we just name that this is hard in this moment. And you know, doing the ultimate rebellious thing is coming to a place of acknowledging like, even if that part of your body changed, there might be, and probably will be another part of your body that will emerge as a problematic something. What would it feel like to tend to your body as this whole thing, to regard a body as not a set of parts, but an entire being? This stuff takes a lot of practice, because we are breaking really old and long worn patterns. But the greatest thing about our brains is that they are always changing. Neuroplasticity is real, and if the habit is what I was doing announcing a body coming into space, this is back in the day when we have, like, dollars in coins, but I collected like 400 some dollars that I donated to an eating disorder organization in Boston. It was like when I would say things out loud, I put money in this jar. Then I ultimately, when I was thinking negative things about my body in relation to my limp, I would put or my whatever, I would put money in the jar, and I don't spend time again. I'm saying this acknowledging all of my body privilege. I don't spend time there anymore, because I practiced for a really long time working to not engage with that series of thoughts that turned out, like talking shit about myself didn't change anything except make me feel worse and make the people around me feel uncomfortable and it's hard to have a body.

Stephanie Mara 42:49

Yeah. That is so beautifully said, and I agree with so many pieces of that I hear you bringing in a lot of somatic practices, you know, vagal toning exercises and just, you know, being able to, like, meet the moment. You know, I share here about we have to start seeing that if you are having a moment of an increase of a body image concern, can we start seeing that as either your nervous system doesn't feel safe, you're probably a little bit more on the sympathetic nervous system. You're operating from parts of your brain that are scared and in a survival response, and maybe like an inner teenager, an inner child, an internalized belief is coming up in that moment. And so I really hear you first saying, okay, before we kind of dive into all of that, because that's like a lot to meet in a moment, can we first just actually show you that you are safe? I love the gravity piece. It's just like, can I just feel it too, that there's gravity that is supporting my body in, like, standing here right now, and that, like every other body on this earth has the same gravity pushing down on them to make sure that they could stand here on earth, just to find that connection. Rather than what I hear is potentially like those really loud voices that can come up around comparison, or like putting yourself down, or making someone else better, and just finding that connection between, like, we are all here together, navigating the same thing. So I love that and like, yeah, first, it sometimes has to start with, how do I support myself in feeling safe to be here in this second? And then you might have more capacity to, like, meet and move through all the things that are showing up. And I agree with you, it is an ongoing practice to do again and again and again that like the tip jars, you know, I can't even imagine, you know, if some people started like keeping tip jars for themselves every time they thought something negative about their body, like you, how much money could we potentially donate to? Who knows what.

Anna Sweeney 45:05

A lot. And also it can change, right? Like, it's uncomfortable to learn how to drive a car until we learn how to drive a car. And that's like, I can drive a car, I can put on makeup, I can drink water, I can change the radio station, I can reach behind the seat and do something and drive a car at the same time. And it's amazing, because when I first learned how to drive a car, I was terrified, and because I was motivated to drive, I practiced, and I got through that chaotic feeling, and now I'm so super skilled that I can do all of these things while driving a car. I am not telling anyone to multitask and drive, but I am saying, the brain can change. And so if we practice interrupting our negative body chatter, even if the first thing we do is interrupt or or even just become aware of when we are saying things out loud, and just noticing that, and giving yourself a little bit of space to think about a different refrain, or doing what I did. And again, money is not real anymore, so it's probably an app, but like put a buck in an app, every single time you say something bad, and choose a cause, choose something that you want to get for yourself as a like a reward for rewiring patterning that probably starts in for many humans in a kind of a pre verbal space. If we are hearing people around us saying unkind things about our bodies or their bodies we get it that stuff is passed down, and it seems like a kind of silly to think about, like making a shit talk jar, but make a shit talk jar and you will change the way that you speak about your body. And I think even just starting there can make room to change the way that you feel.

Stephanie Mara 47:05

Yeah, you know, I always like to wrap up with a baby step, and I find that is such a fantastic baby step to offer of just building that awareness of how often you are negatively speaking to yourself to catch that. I'm curious, just for anyone who's wondering, what have you found that conversation could look like? Just as an example, because I know that can get confusing for some people, where they're like, okay, so I catch the negative thought about my body, and then I'm beating up on myself, and I put my dollar in my app tip jar. What did that look like for you or those you work with of like, then what?

Anna Sweeney 47:47

Then I get curious about where I am, who I'm around, what's going on. What am I feeling beyond the negative feeling I have about this body or this body part. Is there something I can do to allow myself to feel more comfortable or better in my body? Am I wearing clothing that is too tight? Do I need to take space from that person who always talks about their body and I never feel better about my body when I'm with them? It is an invitation for inquisition. There's a financial part of this that felt meaningful to me, but I think it so it is the noticing, and then it's getting really curious about what's happening and what if anything can I do about it? Because what I find, and and I think this is probably a universally experienced something people find that in there, if they are in similar places, they feel similar ways. If they're with similar people that tend to bring up feelings about bodies, it's likely unchallenged that those feelings, those thoughts, will arrive because they have for however long. And there are choices about like, do I want to not be in this space? Do I not want to be with this person? For a lot of people, the first question, it might not be so cut and dry. What if, instead, it really is just about noticing this is what's happening here. Is there room for setting boundaries? I'm not interested in talking about bodies. I'm not interested in having conversations about your body or my body. Can we change the topic? Etc, etc, etc. This is practice, and it will, you know, ask something of the people around you. I read somewhere a very long time ago that like not upholding your boundaries, only working for the person that's breaking them. And so it takes a lot of practice. A body can be a solid boundary. Body top can be a solid boundary as a start.

Stephanie Mara 49:57

Yeah, thanks for sharing that process a little bit more. I agree with all of those pieces. And I actually, like, recently looked up, like, where does curiosity and compassion shift us in our nervous system? And it does put us more in the parasympathetic nervous system.

Anna Sweeney 50:12

Amen!

Stephanie Mara 50:14

And so, you know, like, just even starting with the curiosity, like you started with, like, it sounds so simple, but it actually is so profound in what it shifts inside of us just to meet what's happening for you with curiosity, of like, Huh, that's really interesting that I'm thinking that thought right now. Or Huh, that's really interesting that I'm starting to, like, beat up on myself more, or feel a certain way, that that just starts a cascade of shifting how you feel and where you're thinking from in your body. So I just appreciate you naming all these things and this entire conversation just like thank you so much for being here and sharing your extensive wisdom in this field. And I'm curious how individuals who are listening can keep in touch with you and the amazing work that you're doing.

Anna Sweeney 51:03

Thanks for being here, and thank you for you, Stephanie, thank you for having me here. I am @dietitiananna on Instagram, and I do actually respond to messages. I have yet to hire someone to help me with social media, and I've been pretty quiet in the last couple of years. I've been, well, it turns out there is Anna, there's me, and then there's dietitian Anna, and we are the same, but we are not the same, and I actually have some exciting things that are going to be coming for people to take a little bit of dietitian Anna home with them. And I'm very excited about that, because I haven't ever done any courseish, anything, so stay tuned, but please do reach out to me on social media. I will respond to you, and it will not be a not Anna responding to you.

Stephanie Mara 51:51

Yeah, I'm the same way. It's me responding. No one else. Yeah, just I absolutely recommend following you. I love everything that you put out there, and your voice is so important to continue and to challenge and bring in a different perspective on body image. So just thank you so much again for being here.

Anna Sweeney 52:10

Thank you, Stephanie. It's such a pleasure.

Stephanie Mara 52:14

Well to everyone listening as always. If you have any questions or insights or aha moments, email me at support@stephaniemara.com anytime, and I hope you all have a safety producing and satiating rest of the day. Bye!

Keep in touch with Anna:

Website: www.wholeliferds.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dietitiananna/