Health at Every Size® Healthcare Provider Listing

I believe that my clients are the experts on their own lives and that their lived experiences and decisions, especially those made to prioritize their safety, are paramount to any perspective I have. Primary of my tasks, then, is listening, creating a relationship that is safe, respectful, and growth-fostering. I draw from Feminist Theory and Relational Cultural Theory to do this well. That said, I also believe we live in a world that capitalizes on the marginalization of vulnerable people, and that in a context convinced of their unworthiness, it can be hard for many of my clients to find a counternarrative. For that reason, I rely on Health at Every Size (HAES). Its insistence on the worth and dignity of all bodies and its expanded definition of health IS the counternarrative. Recent research by Meadows and Higgs (2022) found that people who believed that weight stigma was justified were more likely to experience internalized weight stigma and have lower self-worth as a result. However, people who recognized that weight stigma was wrong were protected from this. So I rely on HAES as a protective, more humane context in which clients can begin to conceive of themselves. I use it alongside Internal Family Systems, which validates internal parts that form to protect clients (e.g., a self-critical part), and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, which allows for the possibility of accepting thoughts without acting on them and instead choosing behavior driven by one’s values.