I’m your guide to body neutrality.

Stephanie Lessmeier, LPC

Loving your fat body is the shit.

 

How Can I Not Hate My Body?

 It’s totally possible.

You may not need to take a quiz to know that you have low self-esteem, or that it’s related to having a larger body. You may find yourself hating yourself, putting yourself down constantly, dieting, shifting the conversation back to other people so that you don’t have to talk about your unworthy self, following all of the rules so that you don’t get hurtful critical feedback, putting everyone else’s needs first, or not being able to say no. If you feel like a lot of these apply to you, then you likely also think that your unworthiness is a fact and that it can’t be changed.

 Signs You’ve Been Harmed By Internalized Fatphobia

  • You diet or restrict food to change your body size

  • You feel like your body shouldn’t be as large as it is

  • You believe that you will be more worthy when your body is smaller

  • You wear baggy clothes, or clothes that are too small because it’s painful to shop

  • You avoid dating because you wonder who would even want to date someone with your body

  • You avoid sex that focuses on you because it brings up shame

  • You try to make yourself physically smaller because you don’t want to take up space

  • You try to hide in the back of the group in photos

 This Shit Doesn’t Need to Hold Us Back

Honestly, it’s painful for people with low self-esteem due to fatphobia to work on themselves. I help people learn skills to help manage that pain, then begin examining where we learned those hateful messages, what rules we follow to avoid exacerbating our self-esteem issues, how our actions maintain our sense of unworthiness, and small steps that we can take to accept and love ourselves. Mindsets can shift, and learning to love our fat selves is no different.

 You Are Worth the Work

With a little elbow grease, some skills, and diving deep, you’ll be loving yourself in no time. It’s more than just encouraging you - insert the “she’s only saying that because I pay her” thoughts here - I will actually be taking you through the steps, helping you figure your shit out, and helping you work through it, while giving you tools to make it easier on you. I’ve been through this a time or two and can walk you through the obstacles to the finish line: bright, shiny, authentic self-love.