Before I start posting my thoughts, ideas, and perspectives, I should perhaps share with you how I arrived here and too, for you to know a little more about me.
I could go in-depth with the details of these life events, but for now, I would rather keep it short and save the juicy bits for later.
I’m originally from Newfoundland. I moved to New Brunswick around the age of eight with my mom, her future husband, and my brother.
I would say my first love was food, and my second was art. Therefore, I became a fat girl, who loved to eat and do art.
*Side note: I am reclaiming the word fat and using it as a neutral word or adjective to describe me and disassociating the negativity often associated with the term. Fat is a thing, and we need it on our bodies to live.
However, as a young girl, being or becoming fat was seen by most as problematic. It was my problem and up to me to change it. So, I would say that most of my childhood and youth evolved around my fatness as my main obstacle and until fixed, it would prevent me from living or having a normal girl life.
I felt like I was subtly told that if I couldn’t correct my fatness that it would prevent me from having any sort of future success as a human—ultimately, I was doomed! Therefore, trying to understand how to become unfat at the age of ten reduced the importance and time I allocated to school or academics and exploring personal interests.
The inability to control my weight during my teenage years defined me as someone who was lazy, undisciplined, and unintelligent. Although I didn’t feel that was who I was. I was interested in learning, gaining knowledge, and I believed that I wasn’t predispositioned to what my peers described me as. Immediately after high school I left my small hometown, moved to Ottawa, and studied Graphic Design.
While being alone in a new city and far away from friends and family, I did, however, decide to try and improve my health—by trying again to lose weight. After exploring a myriad of diets, exercise regimes, and restrictive behaviours, I gave up, yet again. I decided that the scale was not my friend. I thought, I won’t give up on health, but I can’t fixate on fatloss as an indicator to how healthy I am. Then, fat slowly began to detach from my body.
And DRUMROLL… I was now consumed by weightloss, health, and fitness. It was my passion, priority, and newfound pride.
After graduating from graphic design, I moved to Toronto area and worked as a junior designer, but I was still obsessed with my weight loss/health journey. A year later, I was laid off from my job. Time off from work resulted in committing more time to the gym. While working out one day I was approached and asked if I was interested in becoming a personal trainer. I was shocked that someone could ever see me in the fitness industry, but I went for it, because I needed a job—and too, it was a boost to the ego.
Shortly after, I gained a full client load while working in a women’s gym. I was suprised how passionate I felt about this job—to meet, hear, and help women who struggled with similar things that I did made me feel like I finally had a purpose. However, Toronto is a culturally diverse city, and the things women spoke to me about left me questioning what I was recommending, doing, or suggesting to my clients. I felt like something was missing.
I took a step back, re-evaluated my life and my job, had a meltdown, and decided to go and study nutrition and dietetics. Truthfully, I did not expect a degree in nutrition to be so heavily focused on food science and management. In other words, I didn’t find what I was searching for during my undergrad. Luckily, towards the end of my degree, in my fourth year, a new professor with a strong demeanor entered my ecological perspectives class. I was enlightened and inspired by this woman and had to learn more from her. After class, I approached her, hoping she could assist or direct me to what I was trying to find, which I now know is a Critical, Feminist Approach toward health, bodies, food, and nutrition—this was it for me. And it still is.
Uncovering the literature that existed on culture, socialization, and beliefs that has kept these strongly held ideas of what health and our bodies should look like, led me to pursue a masters of science in applied human nutrition.
My research along with my own personal experiences, has landed me here. To share my voice to whomever might need to hear it. And too, to encourage the readers voice—we are not alone.
I’m happy to share what I’ve come to learn, or unlearn during my educational and career trajectory.
Here, in this space, I will write what I think and feel—to get a better sense of who I am, but also perhaps to let you know that diet, culture, the way we feel in our bodies, and the way we approach health may be counter-intuitive from what you thought was the correct thing to do.
A lot of the things that I deeply believed to be true about weight, bodies, and health are now UnKept—I’ve let them go. And truthfully, I know I still have some strongly held beliefs to detach from.
However, my intention is not to say what I believe is right or wrong. My intention is to be honest and share my insights and perspectives while welcoming other perspectives and dialog.
Thank you kindly,
Nikita Rose