S3 EP1: Welcome to Season 3 of Fat and Faithful!

Listen: http://fatandfaithful.libsyn.com/s3-ep1-welcome-to-season-3-of-fat-faithful

Episode Transcription by Fayelle Ewuakye. Find her on Twitter at @FayelleEwuakye.  

Read all available transcripts at this link.

(intro music)

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Nicole – Welcome to Fat and Faithful an ongoing conversation about faith politics and culture as they relate to fatness.

Amanda – Welcome to season 3 episode 1 of Fat and Faithful. I am Amanda Martinez Beck and I’m here with my co-host . . .

Nicole – This is J. Nicole Morgan. Hi everybody.

Amanda – And we’re so glad to be back. Nicole, It has been a bit. It has been a minute.

Nicole – It’s been a while. I don’t know… May to, it’s now October so however many months that is like, 7?

Amanda – June, July, August, September. No, just five.

Nicole – Just five. Well OK it felt longer. Super excited.

Amanda – Yeah, this is the longest we’ve gone without recording since we started last summer.

Nicole – We just both had really busy summers which is what we’re gonna talk about today and everything that’s been going on.

Amanda – Yeah, so what’s been up with you? A little bit of big news.

Nicole – Yes, so my book is officially out in the world as of August 1st. So that’s out there. It’s doing great. I had like a launch party which was super fun. And had like a big huge cake version of my book that a friend made me.

Amanda – So nice.

Nicole – That was also delicious. So that was fabulous. It was great to just celebrate it that way. Been getting some good feedback. So I’ve been really excited to launch that and it’s to be officially out there in the world. And what about you? How’d your summer go?

Amanda – Well it was really busy, I got a new job started working full time. And along with editing my book and it’s almost done.

Nicole – Yay!

Amanda – Thank you, I have a few more or, I just need to read it one more time. They sent me the galley proofs yesterday. So just gonna to proofread and then it’ll be printed at the end of October on like physical copies. I’ll get those. But the book releases December 6th. Which, I am very excited about, you talked about your launch party, so I’ve started planning mine.

Nicole – I saw some of your little like launch party decorations. It’s super fun to plan.

Amanda – I’m so excited. It is a strange feeling to be planning something that’s this big a deal. Like.

Nicole – Yeah.

Amanda – Oh it feels that perhaps this is not an appropriate comparison, but it feels like I’m planning a wedding reception.

Nicole – I had similar thoughts and I’ve never been able to do that. So I was very much enjoying having a party. And It’s also, I think you know writing and podcasting are such. . .. I don’t know the right word for it but our audiences are often people that we don’t see in person on a regular basis. And so launch parties are very geographically situated. So being able to celebrate and to share with people that you know but might not be as connected to our work – that was really cool for me. For people who know me and love me and you know just outside of the specific work – and to be able to celebrate that with them was really a neat thing.

Amanda – That’s awesome.

Nicole – And I wish I had teleportation and I can bring everyone who’s listening right now to my party on your party.

Amanda – Agreed. I know I’ve been like “oh I wish Nicole could be at my party.” I really wanted to be at yours. But we live a couple thousand miles apart so…

Nicole – We do and time is a thing.

Amanda – One day we will. You know, listeners, we’ve never met in person.

Nicole – We haven’t.

Amanda – We formed this friendship online so we are very thankful for the interwebs.

Nicole – Yes.

Amanda – One thing was. One thing I’m really excited about is that my launch party is on the book release day December 6.

Nicole – Oh fun. What Day of the week is that?

Amanda – It’s a Thursday. It’s not practical, but um.

Nicole – Hey, do you.

Amanda – Well it’s in the middle of Advent and so it’s the Feast of St. Nicholas which is super fun because one, it’s a feast in the middle of a fasting season.

Nicole – Is Advent a fasting season? How did I not know this

Amanda – It is. Well you’re Protestant. So I won’t hold it against you.

Nicole – OK. I just figured Christmas, feast all the time but it’s not Christmas, it’s Advent.

Amanda – So it’s the four weeks leading up until Christmas and it resets us.It’s, Joy to the World as kind of an advent hymn, “Let every heart prepare Him room”, so we’re preparing for the arrival. “Oh come oh come Emmanuel. ..” That, that, that, longing that hunger for God and then you launch in to a 12 day feast which is from.

Nicole – Twelve days of Christmas.

Amanda – Twelve Days of Christmas, but we’ll probably talk about that more as that approaches. But what Is exciting, is that I did not set my launch date, but the Feast of Saint Nicholas. He is the most celebrated fat saint.

Nicole – So amazing.

Amanda – Isn’t that amazing? And like all bodies are good bodies. So I am, I am having fun. I’m gonna make it a St. Nicholas Day party and my book release. So I’m very excited.

Nicole – That is amazing. That’s so cool. Well besides our books this summer, I know we’re both also on other podcasts Who did you interview with?

Amanda – I was on an episode of The Love Food podcast with Julie Duffy Dillon. She’s a no diet dietitian who focuses on intuitive eating and also PCOS which, her podcast is amazing, she has two podcasts. But you should check her out. Julie Duffy Dillon and we talked about your body telling your story and how that relates to food.

Nicole – Yeah so I was able to speak with I think with, three and I hope I’m not forgetting anyone. So one was Eating with Grace, you can look that up. I really enjoyed talking about that one. Another one was called Can I Say This at Church and so the whole podcast deals with just like various issues that people might find impolite to talk about at church and so we talked with, with him there. And then another one it’s a brand new podcast, it’s called Fierce and Lovely, with an author named Beth Bruno. And talked with her a bit about just all these same topics, body image and what that looks like and what it means to be fierce in loving our bodies but also lovely which is the name of your book.

Amanda – So yeah I like that, I like that word. And I’m going to go ahead and apologize. I have strep throat right now. Listeners hopefully by the time you listen to this I will not have it anymore because that will be a while. But I’m, you’re going to hear me coughing a lot and I’m about to go into coughing.

Nicole – All bodies are good bodies but sometimes they hurt, right?

Amanda – It has definitely been a season of learning to lean into my message that all bodies are good bodies that weak and sick bodies are good even in their, even in their limitations, trying to learn to rest and have relationship right. So if I say that the purpose of my body is relationship and not perfection or health. Yeah, that’s a little harder when, all the sudden you’re like, oh but.

Nicole – I just can’t move!

Amanda – I want a well body. So it’s that, already but not yet, tension.

Nicole – Yeah it’s a lot to learn, grace for the journey.

Amanda – Thanks. Well we’re going to get into discussing an article that went a little viral a few weeks ago. But before we do that we want to give you our resource recommendation of the episode that our group on Facebook, All Bodies Are Good Bodies. It’s facebook.com/groups/allbodiesaregoodbodies. Nicole tell us a little bit about the group.

Nicole – Yeah, so it has grown a lot since we left the podcast last in May. There’s almost 300 members and Amanda and I were just chatting before we got started recording about how fun and encouraging it is to watch people interact with each other. The members of the group just do a really good job of being vulnerable and asking questions that are hard or maybe a little uncomfortable to ask and then encouraging each other towards loving their bodies and accepting their bodies as good and made in the image of God. And so seeing that community is really encouraging to me personally.

Amanda – Yeah. And like any community it’s not all rainbows and bubblegum. We have good conversations and sometimes we get a little prickly with each other just because we’re learning, right? We’re learning how to talk about bodies in a way that honors all bodies as good bodies. And sometimes that is uncomfortable.

Nicole – Yeah and it’s a private Facebook group I believe, so people may be able to see you’re a member but your conversations and your comments are private to those actually in the group.

Amanda – Right.

Nicole – Which is helpful.

Amanda – And we have a great team of moderators. Nicole and I are the main admins but we’ve brought on a team of, I think four or five people who are just really invested in in this conversation. And it’s one of the best things that I’m enjoying right now my life is The All Bodies group. So you should head on over there and check it out.

Nicole – Yes. Thank you for creating that group, Amanda. I think it started as kind of like a book input group and then grew and you just really shaped that. So thank you for that gift, it’s great.

Amanda – Thanks, Nicole!

Nicole – A great place to be on the internet.

Amanda – I know. So one of my big passions is hospitality. And when I say hospitality I’m not talking like just like the hotel industry obviously. Although that’s part of it. I love staying at hotels. But creating a space where people can be themselves and especially for people of size. We’ve been told so often that we have to fit in a certain space whether that be a physical space or emotional space or even an online presence where there’s not, there’s not room to ask these hard questions without people criticizing us for being fat or for asking questions about, is it OK to be fat. Is it ok not to live in diet culture like 100%. We want to be free from that. And so I am so thankful that the group has turned out to be a place where we can see the Holy Spirit making, making room for us to be ourselves through technology. It’s not something I ever thought I would say about technology but I am so glad I was wrong.

Nicole – Yeah it’s it’s a great place to be. I hope you join, who are listening. Go search us out.

Amanda – Yeah. Search us out make sure you answer the questions that pop up when you-.

Nicole – We won’t approve you if you don’t.

Amanda – Right. So it just makes basically we just need to know you’re not a troll.

Nicole – Pretty much.

Amanda – All right. Nicole what’s next on the agenda?

Nicole – OK so we are going to chat about an article today that went a little bit viral this summer on Huffington Post. And it’s an article called Everything You Know About Obesity is Wrong. And it was written by a man named Michael Hobbes. So the article is super long, so we’re not gonna like read through it, as we’ve done with articles before. But we’d like to just kind of chat about it in general. Amanda, do you remember like reading it or your initial thoughts when you first saw it or anything like that?

Amanda – So I got on Facebook the day that it came out which was September 19th. So it’s been a couple of weeks and I had all these notifications!

Nicole – Same!

Amanda – Of “this is an amazing article”, “these are things Amanda has been saying”, et cetera. And number one. So this this this just made me feel very loved because I’m like oh wow people have been listening to what I’m saying. And most of the people who tagged me were not fat people. They were you know what I would call average sized people who I felt like for the first time, were being vocal about the anti fat bias in our society. And I think they’ve always been friends. But to have people step up as allies and be like, “hey”, that was really encouraging. So that, I started reading it with that feeling of, well I hope this article is good I’m encouraged that my friends are talking about this. What about you?

Nicole – Yes a similar experience to logging on to Facebook to a million notifications about it. That day that it was published I was in all day meetings for work, and didn’t look at my phone once I think for like 10 hours. And so I logged on it was just Twitter, Facebook, everyone had been tagging me and I read the article. I don’t think I read it actually till the next day and I read it. It was just, there was kind of these two things. One, exciting that, like it was out there and that this article was so popular and that it was getting views and feedback and affirmation and that people were seeing it and seemed to resonate. But also there is this like nothing in the article was new to me. Like some of the stories, yes. But in terms of the facts and the health studies and things like that that he presented, it’s work that the fat acceptance community has been doing for a very long time. And so there is that mix of “OK this is great, I’m so glad. But this isn’t new. We’ve already been telling you this”, like is this actually going to change anything. In the article, the author of the article, is a thin man I believe a white man. Not sure. And I saw some of his stuff on his Twitter and he’s, he’s acknowledged some of those same things. That part of his thin privilege is what allows him to write it without as much criticism as fat people get when they say the same thing. And so there’s some of that tension there and just kind of accepting that that’s part of the reality of how, how information gets communicated in our world and who gets believed and trusted and elevated and who doesn’t. So yeah and just kinda hold both of those things. It’s a good article and I’m glad it’s out there.

Amanda – One of the things I’m very, I was very touched by, was the photography that accompanies the piece. They were very thoughtful. I’m reading, this is the note about the photographs. It says, “So many images you see in articles about obesity strip fat people of their strength and personality. According to a recent study only 11 percent of large people depicted in news reports were wearing professional clothing. Nearly 60 percent were headless torsos. So we asked our interview subjects to take full creative control of the photos in this piece. This is how they want to present themselves to the world.” That is amazing. And the photos are so lovely. Oh my word.

Nicole – Yeah they are, they’re great and just the self representation and being able to decide, how your body is presented as a gift that we don’t often get.

Amanda – It’s I mean you know the struggle, excuse me, when we look for stock photos and even the people who choose stock photos for our articles or even our book covers. I had to go through a couple of iterations to find one that included, to find representation of fat bodies that are joyful, competent professional with heads.

Nicole – Right? Smiling.

Amanda – Yeah. And I think that tide is shifting. As we we create awareness of the issue so, I’m really thankful for the piece. Yeah.

Nicole – I remember the first time I had an article published on this years ago and the editor was like, “I don’t know what picture to use.” She’s like I can’t I can’t find one, that was like a positive representation of a fat body.

Amanda – Was this your Christianity Today piece?

Nicole – No. This is before that a smaller piece. But yeah it was just it was really difficult and I don’t even remember what we ended up in, like a silhouette. I think that was like some kind of like, I don’t even remember. But it was a fat person or the outline of a fat person who didn’t look sad and so like we’re going with it. Good, found one.

Amanda – Well I remember when I, listeners, if you haven’t listened to the first couple of episodes back in season one I’ll recap. Nicole and I met because I was writing an article about thin privilege and in the church particularly, well my online search yielded the result of, God Loves My Fat Body As It Is that Nicole wrote for Christianity Today. And I remember I can still even without looking back at the article, the photo the featured photo in the article, is a woman standing in a road or a path. A fat woman, and it’s fall I think, she’s wearing fall clothing, and I thought that was you, Nicole.

Nicole – A lot of people did, it looks similar to me but it’s not me.

Amanda – It’s funny when when I reached out to you to ask if I could interview you. And then we Skyped. I was like, oh that’s not Nicole. Your image being different from that picture. But it’s just so interesting because I never thought it could be a stock photo, because it was a fat woman with personality. Like she’s not smiling in the photo. She’s looking seriously. But I just assumed it was you, because I’d never really seen a stock photo like that.

Nicole – I know they did, she did a really good job editing on that one, of finding that photo. I loved it too.

Amanda – Was it Kate Shellnut?

Nicole – Yes. And I don’t actually know she chose the photo. But yes that was the editor of the article.

Amanda – Kate and her team. Way to go Kate Shellnut. Yeah. So what about the article, what do you think made it go viral.

Nicole – You know. I mean, oh goodness analyzing the psychology of everybody. I mean it’s a well written. It’s got all the, it does move you. There’s lots there. I don’t know, what do you think about why this particular one?

Amanda – So I’m, I’m looking at the first couple of paragraphs and it’s about scurvy. Which is not something I would automatically connect with fat bodies right? What do we know about scurvy, it’s prevented by eating citrus and it happened to sailors. So but I love what, what’s the author’s name?

Nicole – Michael Hobbes yeah.

Amanda – That you just found out by kind of trial and error that if you had lemons, limes, and oranges then scurvy would be preventable or treatable. And when when the crew was given, they were doing a study where part of the crew was given citrus and the other part wasn’t. And the results were so clear because the ones who ate fruit improved so quickly they were able to help care for the other group. Right. So but the findings were published and then no one really paid attention for 50 years. And I think, this is a line from this kind of myopia results through repeats throughout history. Is it my-OP-ia? My-O-pia? And so he has this built in to his article of, things we’ve known scientifically that we haven’t put into practice for generations. And how is it affecting the people who are missing out on that but looking at science dieting, doesn’t work, it’s harmful to your health to, to diet. The studies are showing that but people don’t want to hear it because it contradicts the narrative of what we are being fed. No pun intended.

Nicole – When you look at it. So he uses this example of the scurvy. And he does a brief paragraph on seat belts and they both have this resistance to implementing what actually works because of money. And this idea that it was cheaper to try and treat scurvy this other way that didn’t work at all. But it costs less money. So at least we feel like we’re doing something. And then the seat belts, let’s see cars in the 60s used asbestos… It didn’t start banning things that they knew were harmful or forcing things that they knew were helpful for quite a long time. And I’m sure like, cost was a factor there. And that’s the thing we hear often when talking about practice and health is like how much fat people cost the medical industry, as if our bodies are a drain on the system. And so I think there’s some of that same resistance there which I think it’s interesting that he used these ideas. Like somehow, right now for most people, like fat bodies aren’t allowed what their bodies need in terms of resources or investment in our economy as a whole. And so just pondering that is a thing that can get to me, that you know it’s those bodies aren’t worth the certain that there’s a limit to how much my body is allowed to cost myself or the society.

Amanda – That commodification right? Feminism talks a lot about the objectification of women, as it should. We are humans and not objects that exist for someone else’s use, we are created in the image of God. But there’s, my friend Marion Hill put it this way. He says, “weight discrimination is the last acceptable bias that we have.” We think it’s OK to commodify fat bodies. There’s, there’s this story that that there’s a better body to have, a thin healthy body, or a muscular healthy body. So we look for the details. We look for studies that confirm our anti fat bias. So.

Nicole – Yeah I mean I modify that quote to say one of the last, because I think there are other bodies that are still definitely people, are socially acceptable to mock in many ways. But fat bodies are definitely a group of people that, we’re society at whole thinks it’s, who are good, to mock us or to discriminate against us, that it will somehow shame us into being thin.

Amanda – I would say that in the most progressive even though of circumstances, that he’s right. Because I think there’s a lot of awareness of disability discrimination and gender orientation discrimination. But again it’s not a competition. I mean it’s not a competition.

Nicole – No I would agree it’s, it’s fairly common to be in very progressive spaces and for people who are very, very intent on honoring bodies of various identities that they still leave out fat bodies. It’s common. So I would agree in that way.

Amanda – Have you have you been watching The Good Place.

Nicole – I do. I’m watching it, yes.

Amanda – I’ve been reading a lot about it. Mayfield has been writing about it and I love the show. But the thing is, they have represented so much diversity except there are no fat bodies in the show.

Nicole – That reminds me. The other day I think it was yesterday I was scrolling through Facebook and there was an image associated with some event that’s local. And it had a bunch of different arms with raised fists still like a feminist thing and one of the arms was fat and I like, just stopped and stared at it for like a good couple of minutes. I’m like that is so rare. Like all of the arms had different various skin tones and like types of like, jewelry and you can tell they’re trying to represent a wide range of people. And they included fatness. And I’m like that’s so rare.

Amanda – It’s like someone remembering what your favorite candy is but like on a much bigger scale.

Nicole – Like, I exist.

Amanda – Not just what kind of candy I like but that I’m here. Turning back to the article I’m going to read a couple of sentences and then connect it to what’s going on right now. “Forty five percent of adults say they’re preoccupied with their weight. Some or all of the time, an eleven point rise since 1990. Nearly half of 3 to 6 year old girls say they worry about being fat. The emotional costs are incalculable. I have never written a story where so many of my sources cried during interviews where they double and triple check that I would not reveal their names where they shook with anger describing their interaction with doctors and strangers in their own families.” So what is the value of our emotions? Is our emotional health on par with our physical health in in the public discourse. And this is particularly relevant to me thinking about, as we’re recording, the Senate confirmations for Kavanaugh are happening actually today and just thinking about the, the emotion I have seen people express on both sides. Those in favor and those against his confirmation. But I’ve seen so much of it reduced to, that people who are against his confirmation are just being are quote just being emotional as if emotional cost of our public conversations should not matter.

Nicole – Yeah I think there is that underlying assumption. Even if it’s subconscious, that there are some things so important that your emotions and your mental health don’t matter. Your feelings don’t matter. And I say that would be true in the discourse around these Kavanaugh confirmation hearings. And then I think it’s also true when people who are anti fat talk about fat bodies. You often hear that shaming works. That shaming makes people lose weight so therefore it should be employed. And so mental health and like our holistic health of who we are as an entire person, is sacrificed on this idea that somehow we’ll be healthy if we’re skinnier which isn’t even true. Yeah. So yeah I think that’s a key thing.

Amanda – So I was raised to be very thinking oriented even though I am very much a feeler and I saw that come out just even at the beginning of this podcast. So our feelings towards this article are very indicative of our personality types and pardon me, listeners but I’m going to talk about the any enneagram. So if you, if you’re not on board, just, just hit that that little skip button if you want to not hear about the enneagram. But for those of you who don’t know, the enneagram is a personality profiling tool that has nine different personality types and they’re based quantified, not quantified, identified through numbers. And so like a 9 as the peacemaker, the 1 is the perfectionist. The two is the helper or befriend-er. The three is the achieve,r the four is the artist, the five is the analyst researcher, the six is the loyalist, seven is the adventurer, the eight is the challenger OK. I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about it what do you mean, I could just recite those from memory with no problem. No I was not reading any notes, I’m just really into the enneagram. I am a to 2, the helper, the befriend-er, the feeler. Not that other numbers don’t feel, but I’m very much concerned with how others perceive me, and how, how I can help other people. And so reading this article my response is like, I’m being seen. People are, people are coming alongside of me. I have friends on this journey. It makes me feel known and it’s not a perfect article but it’s still really great. Calling out the greatness it. Nicole on the other hand, you’re a 5.

Nicole – I’m now laughing thinking about how I, what I said about it.

Amanda – So what did you say?

Nicole – I was like well it’s great, but we really knew all these facts.

Amanda – Which is such a 5 thing to say!

Nicole – Cool, guy got attention. But, where have you been?

Amanda – Because you’re like, this is data and we’ve been saying this, we’ve been doing the research and reporting the data for years.

Nicole – I’m like, welcome to reality everyone.

Amanda – It’s so funny. Nicole and I have a message, our message on Facebook, back and forth just about life. And after having come across the enneagram and learning that Nicole is a 5 and knowing that I’m a 2, I’m like oh my gosh we’re a great team. Because I have all the feels and she has all the thinks.

Nicole – So look we got something for everyone out there, so, good to go.

Amanda – Let’s, let’s talk about this motif and I don’t know if motif’s the right word. But he says in the, the article “my interest in this issue is slightly more than journalistic. Growing up my mother’s weight was the uncredited co-star of every family drama, the obvious unspoken reason why she never got out of the car when she picked me up from school, why she disappeared from the family photo album for years at a time, why she spent hours making meatloaf and then sat beside us eating a bowl of carrots.” The idea of an uncredited co-star in every family drama, that line. Wow.

Nicole – Yeah. And it just it makes me sad for people who are still hiding from life because they think they’re not allowed to participate. And I totally place the blame for that on our society as a whole rather than the individuals. I wish I could let people know that you’re allowed to live your life in the body you have right now.

Amanda – That’s our slogan, right, to it’s the heart of our motto, slogan not sure the best… Our vision statement for the podcast, Loving God incarnate and our neighbors..

Nicole – Our neighbor’s body as our own.

Amanda – That something like that. We have it on our notes, right?

Nicole – Yes and our mission is to love God incarnate and our neighbor’s body as our own.

Amanda – Yes there we go.

Nicole – We know what we’re doing.

Amanda – The truth is anybody can do a podcast guys.

Nicole – Just get a mic and record yourself.

Amanda – Pretty much but with that we are so consumed by fear about our bodies and a lot of it is not irrational fear. A lot of it is people have been cruel and to be able to come to a place where you say you know what, for the sake of God for God’s sake and for my sake for my neighbor’s sake I’ve got to get the right understanding and see myself the way that God sees me so that I can live out and bring his kingdom on earth as it is in heaven where all bodies are good bodies. The author’s mother said, “the bigger way my weight affected my life was that I waited to do things because I thought fat people couldn’t do them.” She got her master’s degree at thirty eight her PhD at fifty five. “I avoided so many activities where I thought my weight would discredit me.”

Nicole – And I think that a lot of our stories. Like I got into fat acceptance in college so fairly young. But I still often think like if I had known who I was, if I hadn’t been so focused on just like my size in high school like what choices I’ve made that were different than the ones that I did. And I’m very happy with my life, I have a good life but I often wonder, what would have been different if I had been ok with myself and confident about myself from an early age. And I think there would have been differences.

Amanda – Yeah. Even just the emotional exhaustion.

Nicole – Career choices I think there would’ve been a lot of things that I would have explored or pursued that I didn’t or that I chose not to.

Amanda – High school for me was very fraught with weight issues. I was not fat in high school but I thought that I was. I would have passed the chair test. Well I don’t know if pass fail. I would have fit in any chair. Now I do not and I’ve always dreamed of teaching big audiences. Like that’s I just love teaching, and I love performing right. That’s that’s a gift that God has given me. The bigger that I’ve gotten though, imagining myself on a stage as a fat woman has has been one of the struggles. I’m a dreamer. Like, I have to dream it. I have to see it. And then I can go do it. But there just are not a lot of fat women on stages. Yeah. And I…

Nicole – Yep. And the ones that are are often, their body is the center of why they’re on the stage. They don’t get to have their stories.

Amanda – Yeah well it’s can we have a show that, and not even a show. But can we have a person, can we be the person that says I’m here. Well you know I know that you do non-profit work and I am, I’m the new job that I’ve gotten is in the nonprofit field as well. And so meeting people, talking to people, teaching about the different things that we are working for. I’m still, I still even after years of, of loving my body and learning to accept it. I still am afraid of what people are gonna think of me. When I talk about something that’s not bodies right. I can talk about bodies all day long. All bodies are good bodies. This is what you need to do and I’m a witness to the fact that.

Nicole – Yeah but when you’re just being professional and whatever your day job it is, like is anyone going to believe me? Do I look like a slob? Yeah.

Amanda – Right. Does my weight discredit me?

Nicole – We should and entire episode on like professionalism and body size and how that intersects thing.

Amanda – It’s a real thing. Well we’ve been talking for forty two minutes.

Nicole – I know this was supposed to be like our catch up, we won’t chat for long. Welcome to Season 3. But we like to talk so. But we’re going to have an exciting season for y’all. We’ve been talking about notes, we’re going to be interviewing some people. We also hope to expand the season to talking about, talking with people who are loving their neighbors while in other types of marginalized bodies. So expanding that because our mission is to, love God incarnate and our neighbors body as our own and that extends to more than just other fat bodies. So how can we be better at loving all of our neighbors. So we’re gonna learn from some other people in that regard as well. Yeah.

Amanda – Just a reminder. Seek out our Facebook group, facebook.com/groups/allbodiesaregoodbodies and request to join and answer the questions, we’d love to have you there. Contributing to the conversation, asking any questions you have about bodies, and it’s all while we are people of faith, it is open for people of all faith, any faith, no faith. You are welcome.

Nicole – Absolutely. Well thank you so much for joining us today. We’d love for you to continue to engage with us online. You can find us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook at Fat and Faithful and join the discussion group on Facebook at All Bodies are Good Bodies. Please take a minute to rate and review the podcast on iTunes and share this episode of social media using the hashtags, fatandfaithful or allbodiesaregoodbodies. This helps us reach more people with our mission to love God incarnate and our neighbors; bodies as our own.

Amanda – We’re so thankful that you joined us today have a great week.