Are You Avoiding Medical Care for Fear of Being Weighed?
“And it is incredibly aggravating that people think this is just a matter of finding the right doctor when most doctors are incredibly fat phobic.”
Note: At the bottom of this article is a list of doctors who have been reported to not fat shame in the Gainesville FL area.
If being told to lose weight actually helped people lose weight, there would be no fatness and no weight loss industry. If being told, "you will die if you do not lose weight" by a medical doctor (as was told to a clients only 40 pounds above "ideal") helped people get thin, everyone would be thin. Few people would elect to be fat in a culture that so flagrantly hates fatness.
And yet, this fat shaming and blaming conditions on weight is exactly what many medical professionals do. Once, I had a client suffering from an ear ache whose doctor told her to go lose some weight and then come back and he would treat her. An ear ache!
I’ve heard so many stories like this. It breaks my heart.
A quick search on the internet will show you our clients are not alone:
Fat-Shaming by Doctors Happens Way More Often Than You Think: “Doctors are one of the biggest offenders when it comes to making people feel ashamed of the number on the scale.”
Plus-Size Model Elly Mayday Says Doctors Dismissed Her Cancer Symptoms, Blamed Her Weight: “But doctors sent the plus-size model away with pain killers and told her there was nothing to worry about. Doctors also suggested her weight was to blame and told her to exercise more.”
My Doctor Fat-Shamed Me — And I’m Not the Only One: “Doctors often “fail to provide adequate and timely diagnosis and treatment due to all kinds of assumptions, [which] affects patients along the full weight spectrum.”
‘It’s Because You’re Fat’ — And Other Lies My Doctors Told Me: My doctor …“glanced at me and told me my knee pain was due to early-onset arthritis as a result of my being overweight. My blood tests were negative for rheumatoid arthritis — but that didn’t matter, she told me. The only way to stop my pain from getting worse was by losing weight.”
We’ve had clients visit doctors who put their clients on low carb diets to improve their fertility (they are told). When they come to see us, they report struggling with some form of disordered eating, stress and guilt. Those not yet pregnant are terrified that they will not get pregnant unless they follow these low carb regimens, and if they don’t do it right, are afraid they will be blamed for not getting pregnant. They blame themselves for not following the diet well enough when they don’t get pregnant.
One client called a practice to become a new patient. She was on the phone, waiting to find out if she could get an appointment and heard the staff talking to the doctor. The doctor asked the client’s weight and told the staffer, “Tell her to lose some weight and call us then.” The staffer repeated this, and was denied an appointment.
Weight prejudice is rampant in the medical field. Research shows it impacts the care given by doctors, nutritionists, nurses, physical therapists, and more. And, because of this focus on weight, untold numbers of people, of all sizes, are not getting adequate medical care. Some avoid seeing a medical provider until it is too late. In fact, at Nutrition Therapy Associates, spend many hours working to help clients feel strong enough to get the medical care they need.
Taking Charge Of Your Medical Care
Fortunately, there are medical professionals who understand that most medical conditions can be treated successfully without discussion of weight. And some understand that weight is not such a critical factor when it comes to health as in the following articles:
Everything You Know About Obesity Is Wrong: some powerful thoughts about medical care and fatness.
A Physician Forced to Rethink Everything He Thought About Weight and Diabetes: Video. When he was diagnosed with a diabetes, he began to shift his thinking and his approach to medical care.
Why Are American Health Care Costs So High?: Video. Reasons why the US spends so much more on health care than any other country in the world, and along the way reveals some surprising information, and, guess what? It’s not obesity!
Yes, you can get good medical care without focusing on weight. And you deserve that medical care.
So many of our clients feel like failures around weight management. If you do as well, it is critical that you realize you are not the failure, it is they system that has failed you.
Let’s take this out of the realm of weight. How would you feel if your doctor recommended a drug that has a 98% failure rate, and then blamed you when it did not work?
Well, medical providers are doing just that when they recommend you attempt weight loss, which has a published 2-5% success rate!
Finding Medical Professionals Who Will Not Fat Shame You
Fortunately, there are many wonderful medical professionals. If you have been fat shamed, find another provider. But other providers just need some gentle guidance from you. They may not know that weighing will cause you undue stress. You may need to tell them.
You can decline being weighed at the doctors office (unless you are going under anesthesia, or are a child undergoing growth/development, or are working on weight restoration, or are being prescribed medicine for which the dosage is weight dependent (and very few drugs are). The articles below allude to this.
Most of our clients are afraid to decline being weighed. I ALWAYS refuse to be weighed, just to see what will happen. When they point to the scale, I simply tell them a reasonable guestimate of my weight. Some are okay with that, other are quite confused, in which case I might say, “I prefer not to be weighed for this appointment.” I try to be extra nice about it, but I rarely explain myself.
I’ve also had some fun with it. I’ve been known to get on a scale carrying my book, purse and water bottle. I’ve gotten some strange looks. Others haven’t even noticed! (Perhaps showing us how important getting weighed is not.)
My clients sometimes give my card to the doctor, explaining that their nutrition and weight is being closely monitored. They indicate that I will call them with the number if needed. No medical provider ever reached out to me for a weight. (Again showing that perhaps weight is not that critical.)
Following are some great articles to support you:
How to Find a Fat-Positive Doctor Who Won't Just Tell You to Lose Weight: “My weight was somehow always at fault for any illness or ailment, according to the myriad doctors I saw in my adolescence, no matter how unrelated they seemed. Sprained ankle? My fat body was the reason.”
What To Do If Your Doctor Fat Shames You: “Preventing a negative interaction is always better than surviving one.”
Here is a handout called Guidelines for Healthcare Providers. Take some time to review it, so that you can understand what your rights are. Consider forwarding it to health care providers that you are interviewing. If they don’t agree with it, that’s okay, someone else will.
Handout: Health Care Providers in Gainesville FL Who Have Been Reported to Not Fat Shame.
We keep a list of practitioners who have been reported to not fat shame and/or who do not focus on weight (they may mention it, but do not harp on it). Updated 2021.This list is compiled based on comments said to us, our clients’ experiences. We do not check it out further. But, it is a good place to start when you are looking for practitioners as a general guide.
If you have anyone to add to the list, feel free to drop me an email at karin@eatingwisdom.com, or comment below. Please include the doctors name, and what happened, with quotes if you recall. Thank you to all who have sent in the names of wonderful medical providers.
We also keep a private list of medical professionals who have been reported to us as fat shaming. We do not evaluate the claim, but we do quote what our clients told us was said to them. When we have multiple reports, we are confident that is a medical provider that will likely continue to fat shame. If you have any names to add, please send me names and your story—email, or comment below. This list is confidential and will never be distributed, we only use it to help guide our clients.
You Deserve the Best Healthcare
Sometimes it is helpful to interact with others who are dealing with similar issues, to get support, ideas and build confidence. Check out this Facebook page.
Good luck in putting together your weight-neutral, supportive healthcare team. If we can be of assistance, please reach out.
About Eating Wisdom and Drs Karin and Hannah
We are two PhD level Registered and Licensed Nutritionists whose passion is to help others escape diet culture and to learn to use their natural, innate Eating Wisdom to, finally, find peace with food, eating and weight.
Check out our course, Intuitive Eating: How to Escape Diet Culture and Become an Empowered Eater,. plus we have lots of info and handouts (including the original Hunger Fullness Scale) at our website, www.EatingWisdom.com. We also offer 1:1 nutrition therapy. Take advantage of our combined 40+ years of experience and reach out today!
© 2018 Karin Kratina, PhD, RD, LDN.