By Kim Brassor

One Voice Evolving

Trouble with 12-Step

Dieting Was the Disease, Not the Cure

I was born into whiteness, but not into safety. My body was marked early—as “too big,” “too much,” “not right.” By age 10, my mother had decided that my feet and breasts were unacceptable compared to her smaller frame. That’s when the deprivation began: my first diet, my first experience of hunger as discipline.

I grew up in the Twiggy era, when the thin, white body was held up as the only passport to belonging. I learned what so many of us in larger bodies learn: that shame is inherited, and that dieting would be sold as the cure. What I didn’t know then—and what took me decades to name—is that dieting itself was the disease.

Weight stigma—not weight—is the health crisis

The research is unequivocal: the real harm comes from weight stigma, not from fatness itself. Discrimination based on body size activates our stress response system. Cortisol, blood pressure, and inflammation rise—not because of our weight, but because of the hostility we face in schools, workplaces, and even at home. Chronic stress, not body size, is what increases the risk for conditions like diabetes and heart disease.

Stigma fuels disordered eating, not health

The truth is, dieting predicts weight cycling more strongly than body size predicts poor health. Shame drives people into yo-yo dieting, bingeing, and secrecy around food. Every deprivation diet I endured made me sicker, not stronger. Diet culture told me I lacked willpower; in reality, the body was simply trying to survive stigma’s assault.

Stigma makes healthcare unsafe

Perhaps most devastating: weight bias is baked into medicine. People in larger bodies are dismissed, told to “just lose weight” instead of receiving real diagnosis and treatment. Many delay or avoid doctors altogether to escape humiliation. This is how treatable conditions become late-stage illness. This is how stigma—not size—kills.

Reclaiming body trust with Evelyn Tribole

For me, the turning point was finding Evelyn Tribole’s Intuitive Eating. Her work gave me language for what I had always known but never been allowed to trust: that my body was not the enemy.

Tribole’s antidote to dieting is radical in its simplicity: listen, honor, and trust. She teaches that pleasure is not indulgence but wisdom, that hunger is not weakness but guidance. Intuitive Eating showed me that dieting was never the path—it was the problem.

I only ever wanted to feel good in my skin. That desire was not wrong. What was wrong was a culture that convinced me my body was unworthy of dignity until it was smaller.

A call for Weight Stigma Awareness Week

This week, I honor every person who has been denied safety in their own skin. I name dieting for what it is: a system of control that profits off our shame to the tune of $60 billion a year. And I choose body trust instead—because liberation begins when we refuse to make war against ourselves.

The Antidote to Diet Culture

If this resonates with you, I ask you to do three things this week:

1. Share this message so others know weight stigma—not weight—is the crisis.

2. Speak up in your circles when diet talk or body shaming appears. Silence keeps stigma alive.

3. Support and learn from body justice voices like Evelyn Tribole and the broader movement for weight equity in healthcare, education, and policy.

   

   Stay tuned for an upcoming podcast episode of Resilience Reimagined with Evelyn Tribole as my guest.

   In the meantime, dieting was never just about food; it was about trying to find belonging in a world that told me my body was wrong. Over time, I began to see how that drive to shrink myself mirrored something deeper—the way so many of us are cut off from our stories, our roots, and our sense of home.

   That’s why this next conversation feels especially meaningful. In this episode, I sit down with genealogy expert Mica Anders to explore how uncovering our ancestry can reshape the way we understand ourselves and where we come from. Find it on YouTube HERE: