The BODcast - S3E2

Hello … can it be? Episode 2 of Season 3? Ha, that rhymes - but I promise the rest of the episode won’t.

It’s my birthday tomorrow and I have been having a hard time knowing what I want to talk with you about. Am I having an existential crisis? Am I burned out? Do I simply not have much to say?

No idea. But I figured if I sat down and wrote the show notes something would come out.

I’m still on a high from when I recorded with Sarah at the start of the month and things have been great - but I have been doing some reflecting.

I spoke about goals and intentions on Instagram and I felt that when I listed my goals that I would be broad and universal - yet somehow I still ended up listing actions, outcomes - a to-do list.

So I have been working on my thinking and with the help of one of my most favourite people (my boss, Barb) I looked at all the things I create as The Bodzilla. Do you know what I realised? Making this podcast is one of the most important things on my list of creations. 

That list was long - longer than I expected… and when I added up the time I spent on it and added that to my full-time work hours, added on the time I aspire to spend with my family, I realised I would need to forgo sleep, socialising or sanity to continue.

So - I am starting 37 with intentions.

I intend to do less. Yes, I’m going to keep working - just less often, for less time, under less pressure.

I intend to learn more. I never read the books I buy, I always wish I knew more about the things that matter to me. I will take the recommendations I ask for.

I intend to unwind. I am stressed, and cranky, and while I am good at communicating that so I can set expectations, I don’t like it. It’s not good for me. My body has been giving me signs and I have been ignoring them.

I intend to keep pushing. I put myself out there for opportunities, speak up about inclusion, ask for more and better for myself and for others. I’ve got no plans to stop.

For all the wonderful people who keep listening, I thank you. Good things are coming, for me and for you.

A short and sweet episode - I promise to keep bringing amazing guests on and chatting about big topics.

Until next week, remember; your body, my body - every body is a good body.

The BODcast - S3E1 (incomplete)

This transcript is incomplete - the remaining 25 minutes of transcription will be available ASAP.

April: Well everyone, I am ridiculously excited to introduce Sarah Nicole Landry; you might know her as The Birds Papaya. She is a mum to four children, three of whom we get to make if we watch Instagram stories – Lemmy, Bo and Gemma (not Gemma mom as she’s clarified) plus Maya. For me I'm a long time follower and I could literally not be more thrilled to be chatting with you.

Sarah: I'm so excited; you have been … like you know when you open your DM's and you know you have a bit of a choice - like you get to choose what you open, and I always know when I open yours it's going to be joyful. And that is… I don't think that creators can touch on enough because I think a lot of people think ‘oh you must get a million messages a day’ and I’m sure I do but the ones that are truly encouraging and cheerful - I mean, it means a lot. It means a lot especially in a time like now where there's like a lot of division going on, it means a lot to have just somebody who is cheering you on and being a friend and I've loved following you. I have learned so much from you so this is just such a nice opportunity for me.

A: Well my goodness …I do kind of like other people won’t be able to see but my face is so red! I'm just … Jeez that's a good way to start my day! I’m just so chuffed!

S: I don’t even know what that word means!

A:  Oh, like, thrilled… I'm in Australia we probably actually say we're frothing but I'm not sure that that's necessarily…

S: Frothing at the mouth?!

A: Well I don't know if they mean the mouth… I'm like it's a very weird turn of phrase but in Australia we say words that don't really mean anything

A: Yeah, all right now I'm sorry … *laughter*  Most people remember coming across you, you know as a mom and a blogger; I feel like it could be as long as ten years ago that I would have seen posts from you on Facebook?

S: Facebook for sure I would say Instagram is when I truly started to be a little bit more into what would be somewhat familiar… not as you know, t's like evolved a million times over … but I have been I guess on Instagram for seven or eight years ,so it's been that yeah I've been a blogger and on Facebook for thirteen years, almost fourteen. I came from a season of life where I was a stay at home mom with two little kids so named after them – Maya ‘Papaya’ and Gemma ‘Birdie’ – and Gemma was just a baby so it would have been almost fourteen years now which is wild.

A: I was just trying to think when I was writing my notes for this episode, like when I remember first seeing you; I can't remember the exact place but I just remember seeing it and thinking ‘I have never ever seen anything like that on Facebook before, ever’.

I saw this post shared by a friend who's a mum and I went ‘what the heck, oh my god this is amazing!’ and so you know it I guess for I think for everyone who follows you I'm going to say thank you for starting and really mainstreaming that conversation about bodies.

You really pioneered that - I do feel like there are a lot of people who would never have thought of doing what you did and it was really awesome of you to do that.

S: Well I was kind of pushed into it too; like I don't even feel like I chose it; I was a weight loss account, straight up - I was a weight loss account and people started really enquiring about how much the skin I had which is a very common common conversation to have… like  “where's your loose skin, how do you get rid of loose skin, loose skin, loose skin…” -  and I at one point, I was like this was my loose skin, it happened to show my stretch marks and I and I tagged the bra that I was wearing in the post (because that's what you did) and that was Knix the brand, and the founder, she slid into my DMs!

Knix was like a really tiny brand at the time, just bras and underwear, really. She slid in my DMs and was like “we’d really like you to model for something” and I thought “there's no freaking way” because I had such control over what I showed and how I looked. The whole concept of having to give my body over into somebody else's creative control was truly terrifying, and it wasn't until like I .. I assumed, wrongly, that I would be put in high rise underwear because of my stomach, because of its loose skin, because of the stretch marks – that they would automatically put me in something high rise to cover it.

They put me in low rise and I was upset, but I didn't say anything because I’m a people pleaser, so I was just like “okay, I guess I'll do this” and then they were like “let’x take out your belly button ring, like let's make this as YOU as possible,” and I was just I don't even know how I got through those moments, but by the end of the day I felt really like…  was cool! I sat with so much anxiety of like “what are those pictures to look like?” and when they dropped, I thought I was going to throw up; like I… first of all, I've never seen anybody with a stomach like mine, they were not mainstream like they are now - and I think I always have to remind everyone that we didn't see that! I had never in my life (except on my own mother) seen stretch marks that looks like mine; they were wide, they were long, they were up to my ribs…  they weren't like, just under your armpits and your boobs, like mine were very strong and they went halfway up my body.  

So I remember when that photo came out, and I just wanted to throw up and it was on Facebook.. and it was posted by Knix, not by me and my face was like kinda in, my face was there and I just had to read the comments. And the comments were just like one after the other of “I've never seen somebody that looks like me” and I”'ve never seen stretch marks like mine ever in an ad” and ended up, like it went viral - and I just was like “hold on a second… first of all, I thought I was the only one!” so now I'm finding out through comments that there's other people and it was like something turned a switch in my brain that day… that for eight years I've been mourning and disgusted and terrified about how it would be perceived, that I was curating even at how little I would show and then all of a sudden it was like this it was an empowering part of me - like this was this really unique part of me and I was just like, I just felt  really excited and that I almost had an obligation to not keep hiding that part of myself … and also realizing, remembering how I felt that day, taking those photos  - that at the end of the day, I felt really really good and that now everybody knew my stomach look like so why do I care to put a t-shirt on in the bedroom anymore? Why am I … why am I scared to go to the beach? Everybody here he knows; the secrets been told, like it's gone … and that just chipped away at my shame. I didn't realize there would be a lot more shame we would chip away at like fatphobia and you know cellulite, there was so much more I would chip away at later; but in the beginning, truly, in moments like you're explaining, that was a moment that was a collective moment for so many of us - including me, like truly including me.

Now I see that there were other advertisements that came out, ones I had never seen - but there was other representation far before me.  But mine was the first I'd ever seen, and it was the first for a lot of people and it's still, it's still can be the first …like every once a while ago I go on TikTok and I'm like “oh yeah, y’all have never seen this, like y’ll have never seen a stomach like this!”
So I mean I think that's why I why I did it, right, and yeah like I said it was truly at a time that I was still like “weight loss!” but yeah that change came later.

A: Yeah, and that’s so relatable to me, I'll started off my blogging talking around bodies and weight and things like that, and obviously we know for both of us so much has changed -  and that’s such a great account of what happened because today  - before I started chatting with you, I actually had posted about the fact that it's one year today since the billboard that I did.

S: Yes yes yes! Oh my gosh, that was a year ago.

A: A year ago … what has happened… so much. You had a whole baby.

S: I had a whole baby and my brain just went from like A to B like it was nothing.

A: You’re loke, “OH here I am again!”

think I relate so heavily to what you said about the secret being out; once people have seen that photograph and for anyone who is listening in Australia they may have seen,  I actually did a TV show as well also as part of the billboard shoot there it was TV episode where I was featured.

S: Oh my god, so cool.

A: And so for a lot of people; people I work with, people I know, people I don't know, they all saw that… of course not you don't normally see me running around a bikini - not one that small anyway -  that's not normally me, but now I'm kind of like, well yeah… it's no secret, it was on a six story high billboard in the middle of one of the biggest  cities

S: It’s kind of like immersion therapy, right?  You're just like well yeah, there we are!

A: My tolerance for public nudity has increased exponentially. I mean, I will still wear clothes most of the time.

So these days: you modeled for Knix, you’re not only a writer now … obviously your captions are some of the highest quality even when they're only one line, I get so much joy out of some of the things that you post, my lord. Not to mention the fact that I'm now obsessed with Mario Kart and for so many years I was like “I don't know what the appeal is?” now I can’t stop playing, it it's actually ridiculous.

S: Now get into Animal Crossing and then we'll really get going.

A: OK I’ll take that recommendation; I feel like there’s something more relaxing about Mario Kart than other things.

S: See that's what Animal Crossing is for me, because it's busy work; it's it literally tending to a home, your job, you're doing stuff and my mind goes into the most relaxing state because I can't relax without my mind doing something… so when I'm playing Animal Crossing my brain is busy enough but I'm so relaxed that I’m in like, a meditative state. So me and another friend, we play a lot when we’re high stress, that's usually what we'll do. Shut it down, let's play Animal Crossing. We actually did four hundred hours in 2020, if that just wants to give you like a little glimmer of how much I needed it… but yeah

A: It's nice that you've got something, I think for some people they don't have the things that help them go “okay I'm gonna, you know… it;’s self care! Self care looks different for everyone.

S: Some people meditate, I play Animal Crossing!

A: I just stare at my phone.

So obviously you host ‘The Papaya Podcast’, you’re a four time cover girl -  that’s so cool

S: It’s been so cool.

A: It’s so nice for people who, especially people who stay at home with the kids as well, who can see themselves in someone like you  - and I know that you have been an amazing advocate and ally during everything that's happened over the last few years, and I definitely want us to touch on that.  I just think people who admired you when you were a weight loss account and were able to come on that journey with you, like what you must have done to transform on people's perceptions of themselves because you are showing yourself evolving is really powerful. I remember listening to the episode that you did with the Raffela in 2020 and I was just so moved by that, you were both sharing in such a vulnerable way.

It was really validating, I think, for someone that I really admire to have a conversation – a pretty tough conversation to have.

S: It was!

A: For people who are listening and don't know what I'm referring to, Raffela kind of spearheaded the conversation around thin privilege and body positivity online, and you were so open to having that conversation and amplifying what she had to say,  and with a lot of grace, I think  - so I guess my question is, have things changed much for you since that conversation?

S: Yes, because you know I hadn’t been using the term ‘body positive’ for quite a while before that ever came about -  because I really did learn about the roots but I made a mistake in not being open about that learning. I never shared really about it, I was just like “don't label me that, that's not what I am” and I didn't do enough in the work of being an ally. I didn't do enough in making sure that people were, I mean especially in such fatphobic society, people were very okay with me sharing my stomach or sharing loose skin because, as I love to clarify with people “I can roll up my yoga pants and walk out the front door and be treated like anybody else” -  and that differentiating factor is where a lot of people get really really uncomfortable. Like, “I'm really fine with this movement as long as you don't step to the other side of it, like don't go too far!”

And that's where I was like no, I was really kind of leading in a way that was truly to a wall. It was not pushing past it, and it was not … so when Raffela first put that %HESITATION she basically had a story a story series, where she talked about, you know ‘there's a lot of people who are in very thin privileged bodies, most of them white women -  and they are (you know, straight size meaning you can fit in normal clothing sizes) and they're becoming the face of body positivity’, and I immediately I was like “I'm not body positive, not my thing at all! I'm just out here like, holy crap there's a lot of shame around women's bodies!”

But it didn't matter; it didn't matter what I intended, it mattered what was being perceived. I read some of the comments and I obviously wanted to throw up - I was also like very sick and pregnant, so I always wanted to throw up - and I remember thinking, “I can't believe this woman is just like straight up attacking me, without having a conversation, I wish she had just had a conversation with me,” and so I'm like you know what, I I'm betting that she just wants to have a conversation too… so we decided to have that conversation live on a podcast, and really hold space for each other. Raffela’s one of my dear friends now, she continues to kind of like, push me when I need it, but also like sometimes she’ll be like “I'm sorry for the way we met” and I’m like I’m NOT, because it made me a better person, it made me push not just myself further, but bring other people alongside that type of learning.

If you're okay with me having, you know, stretch marks and cellulite, like can we push that further? Like I understand that for people, especially as somebody who's been healing through their own fatphobia, there is a line of healing ,right? And if I'm one step to that, there has to be a stone after me - like there has to be another step after, I can't be the end of the line.  It has to be ‘you've got to this point, cool, you accept it, that's awesome, I'm so glad that we had this conversation - now let's talk about why it's so different for me than it is for other people. Let's go into the next part’.

And so I really started to own that it wasn't eliminating me from a conversation, but it was like if there is a stepping stone, I'm one stone. So it really just - that's what I take from that.

It did change a little bit of the way I talk ,I think it made me always wanr to knowledge my privilege even while speaking in the spaces. And also, as I gained weight and as I was pregnant I began to see how triggering a lot of the thinner body positive stuff was, and that was difficult because I was like ‘oh crap, I was that person’ and like I definitely was doing some of this stuff … and that's really hard to see that and experience that, how somebody else might have experienced it … and so it's really caused me to like stop, and reflect.

Then also having to navigate, like there's parts of my story that I can't change - there is parts of me that are just truly who I am, and I know that I still have - like especially going through postpartum, I honestly thought I was going to be like “oh this is a cake walk, in this work, I've been doing this for so long I'm gonna be fine” and there is nothing like being praised and adored and admired for your belly and then immediately scrutinized ,immediately scrutinized  - and immediately, like everything that was so cute when you're eating you know, ice cream and stuff when you're pregnant  - the second you're doing it post partum people are like, ‘hold on, are you sure about that? How are you going to get the baby weight off?

It was it was such a switch and I plummeted, like my mental health plummeted and so everything was triggering so I understood that I still need to show up and I still have  to have these conversations, but it has to be ‘this, and’ has to be ‘this, and as well…’, like it couldn't -  I couldn't be the end of the sentence. So I mean I adore that all happened and I think it's still going, and I think there's so much more to go - and it is a lot of like gentle calling out of people, which I'm still uncomfortable with. I have been doing a lot of that more lately, and just like helping people see where it maybe is problematic, or just like it's a simple swap of language sometimes - and and the whole post will change right, and I think for a lot of people at the beginning of those journeys are really stepping into these new spaces, having to learn - as I did  - to acknowledge that privilege is a huge huge part of the whole thing.

A: You've hit the nail on the head again for me when you talk about stepping stones; obviously I'm someone who, you know, fat liberation, body acceptance, self love… I do want every person to be able to shed those body image issues that hold us back from doing fun things because we're afraid about how we look when we're doing things or just simply existing… but I agree that the idea of a stepping stone it is what it is and that's why I personally  - I'm still wanting to engage with and consume the content of people who are thinner than me, who speak about wanting their bodies to be accepted - because my personal experience is that I was friends with someone who had kids and had some issues around her body, very similarly to you, had kids and never seen her body kind of uncovered in public. And that meant that she really wasn't that nice to me, because her own stuff she reflected onto me and I think if that person had had a you, or whoever else that they could look at and feel like ‘actually I don't need to feel this way about myself’ - I always think that  body positivity is self love, but when you externalize it…  so when you accept yourself you aren’t then looking at yourself with scrutiny, which allows you to open up some space to not look at other people with scrutiny?

S: Yes!

A: Because your mind is able to go, ‘well I mean whatever they do with their body and their health and then whatever is not actually my business,’.

But you know, I think learning to be able to stop judging yourself also gives you that ability and that skill to not judge other people, and so I think everybody's got a person that they see on one I feel like they relate to ..and so I'm not gonna be that person for everyone, you're not going to be that person for everyone, right? It's like if we can all see ourselves represented in a positive way, in a way that is your demonstration of accepting ourselves having grace for ourselves, you know -  when we talk about self love, love is nurturing and being content and saying to somebody ‘let me handle that for you’, okay …but say it to yourself! That’s a lesson that I’ve hard learned.

The BODcast: S2E12

The season finale!

Today’s episode is dropping to give you some affirmations to take into 2022. 

I’ve seen plenty of great advice about not letting the diet industry wreak havoc on your body and mind this week - actually, that advice is great for any week. 

If that has felt like it was easier said than done, let me remind you of some important truths. 

Accepting these and reminding yourself of them will help you build up your resilience to negative and harmful messaging - knowing positive truths about yourself will do more for your body image than you’d think!

You deserved to feel good about yourself every year. This year will be different because now you know that to be true. 

You are allowed to set boundaries. It’s important and you will always look back and be glad you stood by them. 

You can communicate your needs and wants. There is nothing shameful about them. 

Your intuition is powerful. If something feels off - it probably is.

You do not need to chase people. You deserve to be loved as you are, in the ways that you want. 

Your body is not a measure of your value in the world. 

Not everyone is where you are. You have the capacity for compassion and understanding to allow others space to continue their learning and unlearning. 

The things you were told as a child may not have been true; you deserve to protect and nourish your inner child as you would any other child. 

Toxic relationships do not need to be maintained no matter who they’re with. You deserve to thrive when you’re connected with others and yourself.  

Staying hydrated is one of the most important things you can do (that one’s just for me).

And finally, the reminder I’ve been giving you all year and will continue to do in 2022:

Your body, my body, every body is a good body.

The BODcast - S2:E11

Good morning and happy Tuesday! It’s BODcast time - episode 11 AKA the penultimate episode of Season 2!

Today it’s a quickie - because that’s what I’m into - about a topic that’s bound to be relevant in the coming week or so. It’s also got a red hot recommendation for you - because why wouldn’t I give you the gift of some very relatable content this festive season?

Everyone knows the phrase ‘agree to disagree’ - well, I can’t stand it when it comes to things that aren’t opinion-based but instead, someone wanting to continue believing and sharing harmful viewpoints.

I recently had a conversation with someone about an image I posted on my personal social media. It was a picture of my feet standing over the entrance to an exhibit by an Aboriginal artist. The art is of the words, “Mate, you’re standing on stolen land”.

I didn’t expect I would still be weeding out people who didn’t share my views about the traditional ownership of the country I live on - I mean, I know we didn’t cure racism with the black tiles on Instagram but surely nobody thinks non-Indigenous people have zero responsibility to face the truth of what colonisation has done?

ANYWAY it seems I was wrong because the angry react and immediate comments about my closed-mindedness, the fact they hadn’t ‘taken’ anything and even a question about my cultural background rolled in. Even though it wasn’t my public page, I moderated the comments and tried to stay super chill when respectfully disagreeing.

This topic and many like it are the ones which will have you in tense moments with people you want to stay friendly (or just civil) with. There are some which I won’t compromise on - and in this instance, I made that clear by simply clarifying my points (not criticising the other person) and telling them that I didn’t agree with them, and that I was happy to stand by my point.

‘Agree to disagree’ can be a chance to agree to continue respectful discussion, when you’re in a conversation that’s uncomfortable but is worth having. During the tense times of end of year celebrations, that might not be the case and so maybe you’re going to need some more pointers about dealing with difficult family members.

Starr McGowan, one of my fellow Acast creators, has just dropped an episode for you with psychologist Angela Murray.

That’s it, that’s the tweet! Instead of talking more, I am going to send you Starr’s way - head to the Relatable podcast and please do enjoy. Fair warning - the episode is marked explicit because of course, gorgeous gorgeous girls like to use colourful language.

From me to you - a reminder for this coming weekend, whether you spend it with people you love or not - your body, my body - every body is a good body.

The BODcast - S2:E10

Ahoy! Episode 10 of the BODcast and this week we are talking about avoiding the ‘new year, new me’ chat.

Now - let’s not get it twisted, I don’t think you should avoid new year's resolutions if you love them! BUT - if you’re resolving to commit to a diet, to losing weight or to changing yourself because of how someone (or society) has made you feel, then let’s talk about why you absolutely don’t need to do that.

I remember when I used to promise myself ‘this year I’m going to’ and fill the blank with some body-shaming rhetoric dressed up as ‘getting healthy’.

Again - changing lifestyle habits to improve your energy, mental health or on the advice of your doctor isn’t something I want you to lean away from.

I just want you to really think about why you’re considering signing up for a year of doing something you haven’t done before or cutting something out of your life that you enjoy (like carbs, for example).

What I want to do is give you a chance to hear what it sounds like when we offer ourselves compassion and acceptance through the season which invites us to choose our worst flaw and concoct a plan to rid ourselves of it.

Imagine you’re at a party, when someone asks the question: “So, what’s your NY resolution going to be?”

You might be tempted to say something self-deprecating (god knows it’s my drug of choice 9/10 times) but instead, you think of me and you say: “Hmm, I think I just really want to resolve to be kinder to myself.”

If that doesn’t draw murmured approval from the crowd, let me tell you, you’re hanging with the wrong one.

Maybe what you’re worried about isn’t being asked how you’re going to hit the reset button on yourself in 2022 but the conversations about naughty food and how you or someone else is going to indulge now but then give that all up on January 1st?

Let’s call this someone Aunty Janice. She’s enjoying her dessert and has maybe already let you know she’s noticed that your body has changed since she saw you in 2019.

She says “We’ll have to make sure we eat it all today, won’t we? No more of these naughty foods after new year, we need to get our figures back!”

It’s probably not acceptable to tell Aunty Janice to fuck off.

If it is, I recommend it, as you’ll likely feel better.

However, in the event that you would NOT benefit from swearing at one of your elderly relatives (respect your elders, love!) then try this:

“I’m OK with my figure right now - I doubt I will be giving up desserts any time soon. But you enjoy yours!”

And then get as far away from Aunty Janice as possible.

Have you had a successful moment where you’ve shut down ‘new year, new me’ chat recently?

I’d love to hear about it so I can share it next week! I think we are in for a long season of conversations about bodies, so let’s make them positive ones - because my body, your body - every body is a good body.

The BODcast - S2: E9

Oh no! The complete stranglehold that diet culture had on my brain! It’s broken!

Not quite.

Welcome back to another episode of The BODcast - Episode 9! 

This week is about diets and how you think we can end diet culture - it’s going to be short and sweet because many good things are! I am going to ask some questions at the end and I would love to hear from you.

I have been exposed to diet food since childhood. Weight Watchers margarine (EW), points, Jenny Craig… all of it.

I also remember being told I would have to have my jaw wired closed or a padlock put on the fridge (one of the reasons you didn’t see me speaking out about the recent magnetic version of the jaw lock. I feel pretty confident based on some of the tweets, posts and articles I read that many of my peers in the fat positive community felt distrubed and distressed by this, just as I did. Sofie Hagen tweeted ‘nothing tastes as good as torture feels’ and even as I laugh, tears well in my eyes reading those words.

Diets are, by definition, “a regimen of eating and drinking sparingly so as to reduce one's weight”. So, after a lifetime of diets and disordered eating in my past (that the thought of never truly go all the way out of my mind) I want to stay away from diet talk as much as possible.

Some people would consider this shaming - those same people generally do not understand fully what it is like to see your body as a before photo OVER AND FUCKING OVER again.

Comfort in your body is something we should all be entitled to. Without taking into consideration the ways that disability, gender dysphoria and chronic illness steal this from many people regardless of their weight or size, this comfort is something that fat people have long been forbidden from feeling.

I know that diet culture is one of the main reasons any time I feel discomfort in or about my body. 

So what I want to know is: 

Do you think it is possible to end diet culture?

When will we smash diet culture and end it for future generations?

What’s the one thing you think YOU can do to help end diet culture?

What’s the worst thing diet culture has ever said to you?

These questions are going to help me do more to dismantle diet BS in 2022 and I want to do it with you by my side. If you want to answer each of those questions in a voice note and email it to me, I could share your ideas with everyone who listens to the BODcast in your own words! Like I said, I will also be putting them up for anyone who wants to respond to a trusty question box and will also share those answers. Like everything good we are ever going to do for the world, we have to be united and do it together.

Thank you in advance for the wonderful responses I hope to get to this episode - speaking of 2022, I’m going to be taking a short break over December and January, because revival is survival baby.

I thought a round dozen episodes for the season would do nicely. All sorts of things come in dozens - eggs, bread rolls, donuts… so stay tuned for three more bites of this sweet BODcast pie and until next week, remember: my body, your body, every body is a good body.

The BODcast - S2: E8

Guess who’s back, back again - haha, who the hell else would it be? It’s episode 8 of the BODcast - today, talking about something I touched on in my first episode. Let’s discuss why body acceptance isn’t fat liberation - and - why I make space for both.

Some people know body acceptance as body neutrality, or may have mistaken body positivity for it, but the truth is that neither of those things quite cover what acceptance is. 

In an article for Goop, Jessamyn Stanley speaks about body acceptance and reading the words feels like seeing my thoughts on paper before I’ve had the chance to think them. In the opening of the article, a perfect summary: We do need to get to a place of caring about our bodies in the way that we care about any other possession. You want to take care of your body and your health the same way you want to take care of your car or your house. It’s just part of the ownership manual. That’s the core idea.

I have spoken about the ways that body positivity is self love, externalised - in saying that, I have also reminded myself and others that love is not always hype, it is not always enjoyment or celebration. Love is nurturing, love is balancing the tough times with the soft places to land. Love is taking better care of something than you would for something that doesn’t mean as much to you (and why, always, is it ourself that is that thing?).

When we become able to embrace and nurture ourselves, being compassionate and offering rest, we also instill the belief within ourselves that others also need that. We find ourselves less and less interested in passing judgement on who’s allowed to have that love. 

Toxic body image beliefs have held us hostage and made us believe that to be entitled to love yourself, you must meet multiple standards: beauty, health, body. All things based on a Euro-centric, colonised ideal that could only exist through eradicating the beauty of others either literally or through oppression.

As I said in my episode about thin privilege, and many times since, the privilege of being able to walk down the street without being judged, without having to fear that someone will make assumptions about you, is one afforded much more often to people living in thin bodies.

But … nobody is immune to body image scrutiny. 

This - this is why I still follow, support and am real life friends with so many people with slim bodies. The reality of how cruel mainstream media can make us when comparing bodies is stark.

I have been the subject of so many nasty remarks about my specific body, from thin people - some who openly found me to be something repellent, to be hated or pitied or both, and some who pretended (maybe even to themselves) to be my friends. 

I could list some of the really hurtful things I remember having said to me - there are lots - but I have so many other things I could be doing with my time so instead I will focus on why I think these people are the reason I want to continue to see thin people reminding each other why they are also OK. Why they also should accept themselves.

Do you think someone who loves their own body and feels confident in its worth and value and how that should be determined would spend time judging what others do with their bodies?

I am not talking about weight loss gurus who purport to love their bodies because they’ve been smashing down kale smoothies and want to ‘help’ - that’s concern trolling and health morality and it belongs in the bin.

I mean - if someone was genuinely OK with themselves, was able to fully recover from any negative body image or eating disorder and detox from beauty ideals and outdated/incorrect medical BS like the BMI, would they be better to be around? Would they become considerably more likely to support their friends no matter their body shape, size, race, ability or gender?

I am inclined to believe they would. I’ve said it before - hurt people hurt people, and happy people are happy when other people are too. 

So when you see thin people reminding each other that bodies can exist without constant self-scrutiny, think of why they need that. Those people will see the same value in others as they see in themselves, because they will know that bodies are homes for our souls and minds, a vessel that is valuable simply because it exists.

If this world was suddenly filled with people for whom it is made saying ‘No! Unmake this! This only works for some of us, and that’s not cool’, then that would be a world where many more of us would be happier and healthier.

There is no need for people who hold privilege to speak OVER those of us who still experience the oppression of being someone who isn’t all the things society has taught us to be or strive to be - and that is why this podcast exists - why I do what I do. I want the people who come to listen to what I have to say to understand that I firmly believe we all have a place and a role in making things better - and how we get there is by using our voice when it is needed.

So if you get a chance to speak up against the system, I encourage you to do it. Because your body, my body - every body is a good body,

The BODcast - S2: E7

Welcome back - it’s Tuesday and that means what? BODcast dayyyyyyy!

Today’s episode is going to touch on something I have had MANY DMs about across the last two years.

I often post things in my stories where the replies will blow up (once, it was about butter, and no I cannot explain why people are so passionate about butter).

If I post something reminding people not to compliment weight loss - or even just to avoid body-related compliments, really - I get LOADS of people asking why it’s a bad thing when ‘they’re just being nice’.

I mean, sure - people who know me well know that I LOVE an outfit or makeup compliment, because I don’t spend THAT much time making myself feel glamorous to not get noticed.

But what I don’t like, don’t want and don’t need (and I am sure you relate, if you’ve ever been a fat person) is to be told I look like I’ve lost weight as a compliment. I probably haven’t, and if I have it was unintentional because there’s nothing I'm trying harder to avoid than thinking about my body weight. I spent years - DECADES - obsessing over it and it never brought me joy.

Talking about bodies just puts the focus back on how our size is valued, measured and evaluated by strangers and society. I’ve spoken MANY times about how I KNOW that my value and my weight aren’t related, and how I want others to be confident in that knowledge for themselves. 

Complimenting weight loss reinforces the idea that smaller is better - and sometimes, the cause can be from illness, stress or an eating disorder. Knowing that a high proportion of diets fail, and that eating disorders kill, encouraging the idea that we should apply this pressure to ourselves isn’t the best choice. For someone early in recovery from an eating disorder, this could set back their progress or even put them right back at the start.

It drives harmful thought processes that can cause us to think that weight increase would be a demonstration of failure, laziness and lack of willpower. This is a bias already held against fat people, and perpetuated by people like Katie Hopkins. As a form of ‘proof’ that fat people are lazy, she deliberately gained weight over a period of 3 months and then lost it. This further serves the anti-fat narrative she peddles and really only proves (without bringing in any of the other foul aspects of the kind of racist, elitist behaviour she’s displayed) that Katie Hopkins is awful and should never ever be platformed by the media.

Demi Lovato wrote on Instagram “Complimenting someone on their weight loss can be as harmful as complimenting someone on their weight gain. Because even if your intention is pure, it might leave that person awake at 2am overthinking that statement.”

They went on to say “Does it feel great? Yeah, sometimes. But only to the loud ass eating disorder voice inside my head that says ‘See, people like a thinner you’ or ‘If you eat less you’ll lose even more weight.’ But it can also sometimes suck because then I start thinking ‘Well, damn. What’d they think of my body before?’”

This rings true for me when in situations where someone whose body is smaller is mine mentions how they feel about their body. The pandemic has brought this conversation back into mainstream conversation as people discussed their ‘COVID kilos’.

Would you ever say to someone “Ohh, wow, you have gained weight”? No? Why?

Complimenting weight loss and demonising weight gain can easily have the same affect on someone, so avoiding both is best.

The more we focus on what people do and how they act (rather than how they look), the more we will make space for dismantling systems which oppress people based on things that aren’t relevant to their value as fellow human beings. 

Because like I always say - my body, your body, every body is a good body.

The BODcast - S2: E6

Good morning and welcome to another episode of the BODcast!

Today’s conversation is a bit of an unusual one for me - I am going to talk about intentional weight loss and weight loss surgery. Here’s a content warning - with the caveat that I have not changed my stance on body acceptance and fat liberation. It’s a discussion, not a confession!

I am friends with a bunch of people who’ve had weight-loss surgery. Some of us met because we were together in online support groups, others because it’s more common than you may think.

I’ve spoken with a few of them about where I am with my body - it feels safest to do so with people who understand and even though I try my best not to make my life about my body and how it looks/what size it is, I am not cured. I am not completely devoid of critical thoughts about my body.

One thing I miss from the past when I was smaller was my fitness. There are a lot of factors - I hate the culture of fitness groups and gyms that do challenges involving calories, food and weight loss; I work full-time and hardly make time to do things like sleep; I have asthma and since the bushfires have been more sensitive to anything that sets it off… and also, I am not motivated by exercise. I like doing it once it’s happening and I love incidental activity like absolutely thrashing it out on a dancefloor for three hours.

So when I say to myself, I want to ‘go back’ to what it was like when I was smaller - that was before I was also a mum, and when I frothed at the idea of having lowered my body weight for my daily (who am I kidding, at least twice daily) moment on the scales.

In the past, and on a regular basis, I get questions from people who’ve researched me and found any of the writing I did when my interest in diet culture was the driver of my content. No offense, past me, but I’m glad that’s not your vibe any more.

I also see the great conversations being had by my friends online - one such example being a question on Clem Ford’s ‘Friday Night Bites’. If you don’t know what I mean, head to Clem’s Instagram and suss it out.

The question basically asked, ‘can we truly be allies and activists in fat liberation when we have engaged in dramatic surgery or other means to lose weight? Are we not lying, to ourselves and the cause?’

I have been open always about the fact that I had a sleeve gastrectomy (AKA gastric sleeve, upper GI surgery) - in fact, the first time I started blogging it was about  weight loss through a diet company I shan’t name.

I shared intermittently across 2011-2017 about my different methods and ‘successes’.

I come from a family of people who both demonised fatness and were, for the most part, of average or above average body weight. In that family, I am the third and not the last to choose this option.

I recall writing about my past as a cleansing exercise - like I was putting being fat behind me as I worked through all sorts of harmful diets, drugs and disorders.

Let me be clear: I do NOT regret having the surgery. As Roxane Gay said:

I felt a swell of pride and then hated myself for that swell, for being so pedestrian as to take pleasure in the sort of validation that goes against so much of what I believe about how bodies should be allowed to be.

Of course I wanted to be thinner, that is why I had the surgery. But me, today, now - I want more than that. I want more for YOU and for the future.

The realities of surgery for me were that I was simultaneously love bombed by people whose own fat phobia made them believe I was finally going to become the thin person I was inside (to match my pretty face!) and judged for how the new way of life the surgery affected my ability to be a ‘normal’ dinner guest.

My hair thinned with my body, and with my patience. I no longer tolerated bad dates, rude men or looks in the gym that made me feel like I didn’t belong there.

I knew that even if I was still fat, I was getting thinner and I was ‘getting healthy’.

The morality attached to health and thinness still pervades my mind - I have gained weight since the surgery (a common occurrence) and so I regularly think about when I was thinner and what I could do to get back there.

Am I fixed? Am I cured? Of course I’m not.

Anti-diet, fat positive role models are only stepping into the mainstream now - and even then, are regularly silenced by patriarchy and insistence that we would all be happier if we were thinner. I don’t judge anyone who wishes to live in a smaller body, a body that conforms.

Why are thin people happier*?

*in this context - I acknowledge that thin privilege doesn’t preclude the difficulties of life  - ahem, intersectionality anyone? The fact I felt the need to mention this indicates that I have been subjected to multiple instances of whatabouting so if you felt that coming on, please rest assured that like anything, nuance is important.

But back to the question; the answer is because they are not constantly told - by the world, by fashion, by media, by their loved ones - that they can’t fit.

Never forget that anti-fatness is rooted in anti-blackness - the pursuit of thinness is a way to distance oneself from stereotypes which are racist and seek to make the Black and brown bodies of the world ‘what not to be’.

I don’t discuss my weight loss surgery any more because I don’t think fatness is a problem we need a solution for.

The problem isn’t us.

I fight every day for the liberation of fat bodies, because my fat body before this surgery deserved it, because every single fat body deserves it.

As a society, we must learn to accept and uplift the bodies we’ve always been afraid to have.

Because my body, your body - every body is a good body.

The BODcast - S2: E5

Well hello - welcome back to S2, episode FIVE of The BODcast!

Today we are talking emotional labour and the mental load.

Aren’t they the same thing, April? Oh sweet baby, no. They’re linked, for sure - and happen a lot of the time for the same people, but they’re not interchangeable.

Let’s start with mental load - anyone who’s ever been in a domestic partnership or had caring responsibilities will know about this.

The mental load is the additional work we do when keeping track of life stuff - for me, as a mum and the more ‘admin-oriented’ person in my family, it means things like asking, “Do we have enough grocery items? When is your phone bill due? Has our child got sunscreen on? Did you remember to stop at the pharmacy like I asked?” or remembering when to say yes or no to an invite because of appointments or activities that are already in the calendar.

These invisible tasks are the ones we do to keep our households running and data has shown that more often, women bear the significant burden in terms of mental load. 

So how’s that different to emotional labour? I mean, it sounds laborious AF, am I right??

Emotional labour was a term first used in the 80s by Arlie Hochschild to describe the way we present during paid work - you might think of this as ‘customer service’ or ‘putting on a happy face’ when at work.

Think of the times you’ve been the person taking a call or speaking to a customer - they’re always right, right? Well, no - but we are usually inducted to a workplace with an understanding of how the business owner expects their workers to treat their customers.

The call centre worker who keeps their voice calm while being berated, the waitress who smiles when she sets down plates or cups even when it might be on a table of people who don’t return the friendly gesture. This is emotional labour. It asks us to put aside our feelings and show the feelings we want to be perceived.

Given you’re here, listening to this podcast, there’s a very good chance you have heard or seen this term being used to describe the work of marginalised folk to explain the intersections and issues they face.

I first heard it used when the Black Lived Matter movement saw hundreds of Black, Indigenous, and people of colour talking about race, or anti-racism - at the behest of white people who didn’t understand the concept of white privilege.

Perhaps you’ve read an educational post from a disabled person discussing ableism or accessibility issues. In my case, you’ve maybe followed the Instagram account of a fat person trying to show how to support fat liberation.

Again, in this context, it asks us to put aside our feelings - in this case, to dissociate from the trauma that led us to have such an intimate understanding of the oppression our bodies face ib a daily basis. The concept of tone policing that I covered in last week’s episode speaks to HOW we discuss these sometimes painful topics - asking someone who is willingly sharing their insight to do so in a way that is more comfortable to hear.

Emotional labour is inherently unappreciated until brought to the attention of people witnessing it - because it is intangible. For this reason, it is usually unpaid - which is something many activist are working to change. The advent of platforms like Patreon allow creators who have expertise and experience to be paid for their insights and for the work that goes into discussing and sharing the difficulties of holding one or more oppressed identities.

Emotional labour in relationships is another way it shows up - maybe you know someone who is really good at calling on you for help but not so much at offering help to you. Maybe you live with someone whose emotions are volatile so you do a lot of mental gymnastics to avoid outbursts or stress. Maybe you’re the go-to friend when there’s a crisis? 

Maybe your DMs get full of people sharing their personal experiences that can be really draining, and you feel compelled to respond to each of them with care and kindness because you do genuinely care about them - it’s still work to support someone, especially if you are not in a space to do so with boundaries.

No matter how emotional labour shows up in your life, it’s important to advocate for yourself and remind people to pay you for your work - or to minimise the amount of unpaid emotional labour you do by having some boundaries that you feel comfortable expressing. 

The consumption of knowledge and insight that social media allows us to have needs to also come with the hope that when people learn from you, they should acknowledge it (and the burden of asking should be removed whenever possible). 

If you know you’re someone who’s learning and growing with the help of online activists, take the opportunity to look for the ways you can pay them and show that you appreciate their work.

After all, if you’d pay $400 for a ticket to a fancy corporate event to see someone speak, why wouldn’t you also pay a portion of that to someone who creates content every day that you get something out of?

Food for thought, babes, and until next time,  remember - your body, my body, every body is a good body.

The BODcast - S2: E4

Well well welcome back - it’s Episode Four, Season 2 of The BODcast! 

Today’s episode is about tone policing - have you heard of it?

If you’re Black, Indigenous, a person of colour - and especially if you’re not a cis man - you’ll have experienced it even if the term doesn’t ring a bell.

You might already know from TV and films black women in media have long been limited to characters who are sassy, sexy or sweet housekeepers.

The ‘angry Black woman’ stereotype has existed since at least the 1920s, and isn’t limited to American culture. It is seen most often in US sitcoms and one of the most notable recent mentions of it comes from a NY Times article where Allesandra Stanley penned the sentence “When Shonda Rhimes writes her autobiography, it should be called “How to Get Away With Being an Angry Black Woman.” 

If you’ve ever been told that you need to ‘lower your voice’, ‘watch your tone’, or to ‘calm down’ - if you know what it feels like to be so frustrated because you know you were making a valid point but the only thing in question is why you’re so angry all the time… then you know what tone policing is.

Tone policing tries to draw attention away from the truth (or maybe the falsity) of a statement by attacking the way in which it was presented rather than the actual statement itself.

This is something we see online and real life and it disproportionately affects marginalised people.

Ijeoma Olou, in her book ‘So You Want To Talk About Race’ says, “Tone policing is when someone (usually the privileged person) in a conversation or situation about oppression shifts the focus of the conversation from the oppression being discussed to the way it is being discussed. Tone policing prioritizes the comfort of the privileged person in the situation over the oppression of the disadvantaged person.”

I have experienced tone policing quite often as a fat person of colour. These intersecting identities are relevant when you consider that in my 20s, I often felt like the sassy sidekick from a 90s sitcom. I was referred to as being ‘big and black’ - which made me entertaining but also someone  you ‘shouldn’t mess with’. 

An ex-partner loved to say “You never mess with an angry black woman who’s got her finger pointed at you.” That same ex-partner compared me being frustrated, angry or crying in a conversation to being abusive or violent - when it turns out, the way I was being gaslit and manipulated was much closer to that. Using tone policing tactics in public and body-shaming in private meant that I believed a lot of the things I was told, internalising racism and in turn believing that the quieter, less ‘sassy’ version of myself was the better one.

The difficulty that comes with working in online activism is the way you are often expected to put your own trauma aside to be able to discuss things. I do feel that what I do is something I have been ‘called’ to do - I do it because I believe in the power of social change - but it can be exhausting to be asked to comment on things or to speak uncomfortable truths. I know that sometimes it isn’t possible for people to do this, and it’s a boundary that online creators often find hard to uphold. 

One of the ways that people deflect and tone police is to call someone who’s asking them to examine their actions ‘a bully’. They start with aggression, demanding that you explain to them why they’ve done the wrong thing because they just don’t get it. They may even gaslight you and say “I didn’t say/do that” in defence of something harmful they’ve done or said.

You MIGHT try to explain, but you don’t owe someone the explanation. It’s likely that you might become emotional while trying to do what’s being asked, and this is a perfectly reasonable way to respond.

Imagine you tell someone they’ve posted something that shows an anti-fat bias. You are feeling triggered or upset - or maybe just sick of it! - and you explain. The person sees you getting upset and says “you don’t need to get so upset about it, you’re being irrational’. 

If you continue to explain, getting frustrated at the way they’re deliberately misunderstanding you, then they might try to say that you’ve hurt THEIR feelings. They’ll bring up (most likely) unrelated issues and trauma of their own, asking “how could you hurt me like this when I am vulnerable?!”

They might accuse you of being unwilling to educate them, and that you’re not being ‘nice’ which makes it hard for them to listen to what you’re saying. 

Some messages I have received that reflect this exact situation include:

• All you needed to do was explain this to me in a nice way

• I did something unintentionally without understanding the impact

• You’re a nasty bully and you’ve really hurt me

• This is an issue I didn’t have enough understanding on. But my willingness to learn just surely tanked.

Yep - they are REAL messages. 

So… when I say the topic of tone policing is one I am sure you might find interesting, this is one of the reasons why. People who put pride flags and ‘ally’ in their Instagram bio might still only be showing up for the people they see are worthy of their allyship. Our ongoing commitment to expanding our understanding of others has to be genuine, and not just for the aesthetics.

Someone admitting that they would give up on trying to learn anything about how anti-fat bias hurts people… even yes, if performed as a one-off comical video for the internet or an entire character in a series of films, whatever … because YOU as a fat person didn’t make them easy to hear it?

Yeah - well you know what you can do with that.

An article from 2018 suggests that the idea of tone policing is flawed, because “in telling someone that you have a right to express yourself as angrily as you want to without them raising an objection, you’re also inherently telling them that they don't have a right to be angry about the way you're addressing them.”

I can see the logic in this viewpoint - however, there is so much value in being able to wrap a phrase around the feeling of being invalidated this way. Like all aspects of communication, nuance and context are key and mistakes will surely be made. 

If you are genuinely trying to give the space to people whose voices have been silenced for far too long, being called in and asked to consider the impact of your actions will be uncomfortable but not impossible.

Thanks again for being here for episode four of The BODcast  - and until next time, remember: your body, my body, every body is a good body.

The BODcast - S2: E3

Welcome back to Episode Three, Season 2 of The BODcast! Today we are talking parasocial relationships! 

The first time I ever heard about this concept was through the legendary Flex Mami. 

She spoke about it and that led me to Googling - which if you’re familiar with Flex, is the 100% correct way to educate yourself about things because it’s FREE and available 24/7!

Have you ever thought ‘I know if I met that person we would be best friends!’ about a celebrity or someone you follow online?

I’m not talking about meeting people through social media, like in a Facebook group - I mean that moment where you tell yourself you’re the sixth member of the Spice Girls after watching SpiceWorld 100 times… no? Just me?

Wikipedia explains that “A parasocial interaction, an exposure that garners interest in a persona, becomes a parasocial relationship after repeated exposure to the media persona causes the media user to develop illusions of intimacy, friendship, and identification.” 

A better way to explain what that might look like in real life (seeing as the term ‘parasocial interaction’ was coined in 1956) might be when you start following someone on Instagram after seeing them on TV.

This can result in a ‘relationship’ where one person is exerting more energy into the interactions, feeling a genuine connection with someone who is not taking the same interest.

The most common time we see parasocial relationships discussed is after the death of a celebrity.

We hear how that person made people feel, through their work, and how ‘knowing them’ was so impactful. Is this sentiment genuine? Yes. The attachment we feel in a parasocial interaction is real, even though we may not genuinely have the connection with the subject of that attachment.

Social media gives us the chance to interact directly with people - taking them from a persona to a person. We see their homes, their family, their daily errands - and they become part of our daily online life.

So, is this unhealthy?

Some say yes. Because of the easy access to online content, especially for younger people, this has normalised becoming attached to or even ‘obsessed with’ someone famous.

Now, if you know how much time I spent consuming information about Mel B (yep, the Spice Girls were and always will be the ultimate parasocial relationship for me), then you know this could become unhealthy. Instead of begging to buy every magazine that showed even the tiniest paparazzi image of your favourite celeb, you’re following them on every social media, interaction with them and hoping that they will notice you.

It’s the real life version of imagining you would be ‘discovered’ as a model while on holidays with your family and suddenly become rich and  famous, or that the storyline of The Princess Diaries would come true for you.

The trouble with this is that you’re genuinely waiting for this person to reply - because unlike a fan letter, your DM or comment can’t get lost in the mail. It could become a negative thing when a celeb doesn’t respond to you after multiple attempts to get their attention.

It could also mean an increase in social avoidance - like the time I stayed home reading Breaking Dawn instead of going to the club on a Saturday night.

However, others argue that this could be a positive social step - allowing people to connect over their shared interest in someone creates a fandom where they instead become friends with each other.

So while parasocial relationships are not abnormal or unhealthy, it’s wise to exercise caution or think critically about your real connection to your favourite follows.

It’s a widely held belief (and one that I share) that people who hold a large platform have a responsibility to ensure that they uphold their personal values - and I say it that way, because I think it’s up to us as the people following celebrities online to realise that we follow them for who they are, not who we want them to be.

Because more than ever, the contentious nature of online content creation/consumption means that the same real people we love to get a little love heart on our DM from are being subjected to abuse, daily demands for action and trolling.

These are negative parasocial relationships - toxic, one-sided, and without a lot of empathy. These are the interactions that say ‘you should speak about this, why don’t you comment on xyz,’ or simply comments about that person’s looks or behaviour that are not cool.

It can also be people who simply start talking at them or asking for information without even a greeting or simple polite conversation. 

I am so lucky that I rarely experience this kind of behaviour from all the rad humans that follow me - and for that I am always grateful!

I hope this little lesson has been useful - if you loved it, let me know! Until next week, remember: your body, my body, every body is a good body.

The BODcast - S2: E2

Welcome back to Episode Two of S2 of The BODcast. Today's episode features a guest: Hannah Diviney - you would be forgiven for thinking Hannah’s last name is pronounced divine-ee because she is simply divine.

Not only is Hannah a writer and disability advocate but she's also a global campaigner for a disabled Disney princess and a nominee for 2022 Young Australian of the Year. At twenty two years of age has already become the editor in chief of ‘Missing Perspectives’, an online publication that shares the views and stories of marginalized people and the founder of Krazy Kosci Klimb which you'll hear a little bit more about during the episode .

 Join me for a super special chat with Hannah; she’s one of the most amazing people I've connected with online. I can't wait for you to hear everything she has to say.

A: Thank you so much Hannah Diviney for being here; I am so excited to have you as my first S2 guest!

H: Thank you so much for having me, I can’t believe we finally like made this work… I feel like for anyone listening, April and I have a lot of conversations in DM sso it's on us you know to actually record this and have a proper conversation that you guys get to hear too!

A: Yes and to be able to see each other because obviously all of our conversations are in messages so yeah we don't do a lot of, a lot of face to face so to speak  - face to screen. Well again, thank you so much I am super pleased to have you on The BODcast and the reason that I wanted you to come on and talk about you and how amazing you are is because I am just in all awe of all of the things that you've achieved… and the fact that this is just the beginning . To me, I just think this is just the start of your star being on the rise … you have already done so much and there is so much yet to come. You’re a writer, a disability advocate - you're the editor in chief at Missing Perspectives; you've been featured by Hello Sunshine which of course we know is a Reese Witherspoon initiative so that's pretty amazing … and you've been nominated for next year's Young Australian of the Year! Is there anything I've missed? OH! Just a worldwide campaign for Disney to bring us a disabled princess  - no big deal just a couple of little achievements!

H: Just a tiny one there!

A: Amazing; so did I miss it I miss anything major? What do you think that covers them all?

H: I think that covers everything that I can talk about for now… more stuff coming!

A: Oh okay the NDAs be flyin’ girl…

H: Something like that, something like that.

A: SO Hannah, I would love to hear first of all, the reason that I know who you are is because all of your - your call to Disney to include a princess with disabilities in their princess series. Obviously we know diversity is a major reason that a lot of us end up connecting online because we see people that we go “wow, that person so interesting …they’re talking about such a topic that I don't know enough about” and so when you actually put out your, your call to them through change dot org - what started that? What was… what was the key to unlocking that moment of going I'm going to ask them for this and I'm not gonna stop asking until they do it?

H: Well actually the quests to kind of ask them the question  began in twenty fifteen; I went and saw the Pixar film inside out with my family and I remember just sitting there thinking “wow that's a really great job of giving mental health - which is probably not what people think of when they think of kid friendly topics typically - they've done a really good job of making it accessible and nuanced so the kids can understand it but so that it has still plenty of ways for adults to enjoy ,”which is what I find the best animation does is it has plenty of layers for all the up for all the adults and parents watching…  and basically after that I wrote them in an open letter that got published online by Mamamia and from there I got a job working for Mamamia but that's another story - we can get to that later!  But in terms of this particular round of, I guess conversation, with change dot org. I started because I was noticing that over the course of the pandemic and a bunch of other kind of social movements that coincided with that; there was a lot of really powerful discussion being had about systemic inequalities and discrimination and all of that kind of stuff. And there was a lot of talk at the time about Sia’s new film ‘Music’  and the potential (and for those of you cannot see April is currently shaking her head)

A: making the frustrated face and just wondering “why why why” yes yes yes

H: So basically people are starting to have that conversation because obviously her portrayal of autism is quite harmful and then that was leading to a broader conversation about representation on screen, and kind of the effect of what they call ‘cripping up’ which is basically where an able bodied actor or actress takes on the disabled role and then get something like an Oscar for their trouble. And basically I saw that window  and was like right I have this window I’m going to dive through it yeah what happens the other side, yeah … and so we launched the petition on December 3rd, 2020 (which is not coincidentally the International Day of People with Disabilities) – a very strategic choice because we figured is disabled issues got the microphone on days like that and they don't necessarily get that space on an average day.

A: Which is something that we need to change obviously and that's part of the work that you do is %HESITATION obviously wanting to make it a mainstream issue so that we can start to step out of quality and say that on undoing and that breaking down of those systemic inequalities that you mentioned before .I just think it's amazing and you had so much great traction – you had so many people support the petition and I am so proud of how you've continued to build on that. It's really special - and I mean you're very young and

H: I’m only 22!

A: Just like Taylor Swift she’s feeling 22…  and who of course… Taylor Swift is very apt to mention as you are a Swifty mega fan – as am I! I’m huge fan of Taylor Swift, especially  in the last probably three to five years …and I just think you have achieved so much. So, on that I think we know that you worked with Mamamia, you've written for them, the petition,  and now Missing Perspectives - can we talk a little bit about Missing Perspectives?

H: We certainly can; Missing Perspectives is I guess in the scheme of things still pretty brand new baby - we only launched in June of this year. We were founded by a friend of mine Phoebe Saintilan who was basically doing some work and came across this report by the Gates Foundation that showed that women were feeling extremely underrepresented in like news, media, policy, decision-making… all of that stuff… and so she decided to do something about it. Originally I was only supposed to be contacted as a writer, because her mom had actually taught me in primary school I kept tabs on me

A: Because teacher are amazing and we love teachers

H: Teachers are amazing and need more money and support for anyone listening who has the power to pay teachers more!

A: That is a very not subtle hints for you to support teachers better whoever's listening yep

H: and then we got talking because she was like “I don't have any editorial experience I don't know what I'm doing” and I was like, “I have a little bit ,” - like I’ve sort of absorbed different stuff from … I've been reading lots of different publications, working, the whole having kind of a decent freelancing career and seeing how different people do things and sort of cherry-picking things I like about what they do ,in making sure to stay away from things that I don’t like necessarily that they do, and yeah we've sort of built from the ground up.

I know you mentioned before the Reese Witherspoon/Hello Sunshine collaboration which is amazing - that happened last week so we've definitely had some growth so I think, in terms of our visibility … but yeah we have writers from over forty countries and an audience of hundreds

A: Amazing and like you know to me I think the Missing Perspectives that will now be able to be covered in those places and sharing your perspectives … the perspectives of the people that you platform through that publication… I just think that's wonderful. So …. nominated for young Australian of the year how much of a surprise was that?

H: You could have knocked me over … I mean to be fair, I have no balance so knocking me over is not that difficult … and that's all right, you can laugh at that because it's true.

A: (laughing) My gosh you have the most impeccable sense of timing  - like you really are one of the funniest people - oh my goodness

H: but in terms of like expecting that, that was not something that I thought would happen …  it was said in jest to me - well I thought it was in jest but it turns out that they were deadly serious…   at the end of this event that I do called the Krazy Kosci Klimb which I co founded which basically sees people with cerebral palsy and their families climb Mt Kosciusko - which for anyone who doesn't know it is a strategy is highest point and as a result of that officially one of the seven summits of the world -  which is definitely not something I think most people would imagine within the scope of the disabled person's capability … so that's kind of the whole point. But basically we just wrapped that in February earlier this year, we do it in February every year, and I had given this speech: and a bunch of people coming up to me congratulating me on the speeches and how good they thought it was and how much I love the event and one of our kind of key sponsors whose very well connected individual came up to me and said “I think that's young Australian of the Year material right there” and I I just laughed him off, because what else are you supposed to do? But it's also that impostor syndrome, pesky thing, like no, that's not that's not for me, that space.

And then it was one of those things where I kind of assumed that it was a comment that was well intentioned but that like no action would come from it - just one of those things that people say in the moment that they definitely mean but just life gets in the way…

A: That there was not a lot of action behind those words, you didn't think that that was something was gonna happen?

H: Just because I I had no idea what the process looked like; I I didn't know anything about it … and then a couple weeks later I got I got a call that was like “No, I was serious about nominating you - how do we go about doing this, let's do it.” So we did and we’re obviously still waiting to see what happens… I think state finalists for each award announced like this month or early November… so we'll see if I made it that far but yeah, it just blows me away because I definitely wasn't expecting that sort of thing. 

The other thing is that I was initially really hesitant to take it because I was like I'm not really in it for like personal glory your gratification or any of that stuff so back up I don't know that I really want all that attention, like that's not really me…  I’m very much, I'm a private person and then I think you know, what Grace Tame has done with her Australian of the Year portfolio this year and try and looking at the ways in which she has made the conversation not about her, but at the broader issue at hand  - when I kind of sat there and thought this could be a really powerful moment for disability issues, for disability representation, but I I would end up just being the messenger, it doesn't have to be about me -  then I was like okay we can we can give this a go

A: I'm so happy that you did and I completely agree; look, I personally quite like attention so I would be fine with being offered an award of any sort (laughs) but I I appreciate -  I think that such an indication of who you are, who you come across to be -  to me -  is someone who's really doing this because you genuinely want to change the world … not because you like a pat on the back, it's not because you want to you know everyone to talk about how great you are (even though you are great) but this for you is a cause that you want to champion you don't necessarily have the face of it you set you just simply want to uplift other people and you want to get these messages that with I can be heard by people who can actually make the change … and therefore  be someone who makes the change.

H: And I think I was explaining this to someone the other day, I said: everything that I do is in service of the idea that I wanted to be better for whoever comes after to me

A: You’re just amazing, I just adore you.

H: I grew up not having really any sort of role models or even an idea of like what disabled adulthood could look like … literally I was just like I have no idea what the future could look like and it was quite a blank page … not necessarily that it's filled with possibilities, but in the literal fact that I don't know what goes here … because I've never seen it before … and I know that I don't want to be a Paralympian, for reasons that … I guess is nothing specific that means that I don’t want to be a Paralympian…  I just always chafed against the idea that that was the only path of success for me, because I grew up the oldest of three girls, two younger sisters who are both obviously able bodied and fiercely sporty and very physically active (which is a whole other thing to grow up with) but basically I would look at them and be like well hold on, you're not assuming that they want to be  Olympians,  you're not asking them what their Olympic sport is going to be… because number one you understand that only the elite of the elite get to the Olympics,  and number two you understand that not everybody wants to get there … so why should I and also what happens if I don't?

I think it was during that SBS special ‘what does Australia really think about disability’ that Kurt Fearnley was talking about the gap between the respect that he gets as a Paralympian, verses the gap the other people with disabilities, the same respect that they get… which brings us to all sorts of narratives about like the whole overcoming your disability idea, which is just toxic and really painful - because I guess it's like saying I'm going to overcome my eye colour… you can't change it. So everything that I achieve is always going to be with my disability firmly in hand I think as much as I didn't want to be when I was a kid, I I hated being disabled, yeah, which means essentially that I hated myself.

And like the level of I guess  damage that can be baked into you when you don’t get the right representation or when  the representation that you see ends up being harmful, is really dangerous and that's the reason why I guess the Disney campaign is so important to me - because I'm like well, if we can start at that age -  and if we can start making it normal from there, then hopefully kids don’t have to grow up feeling that way … and on the flip side it makes able bodied kids who are watching, it means that they're already starting on the path to being allies, because it's not scary.

A: it's become a conversation you know I like, I suppose where we feel more comfortable because we've been so privileged to be given all of this free education in a lot of cases from people like yourself, Carly Findlay,  Kurt Fearnley,  Dylan Alcott; people who are public speakers who talk about disability and how it has affected their lives but also how we as allies who are not part of disability community can really help…  aside from the obvious moments of being able to say hi being ableist is not cold which you know is the bare minimum…  but you know I think that that privilege that we've had to learn from all of you means people like me - you know, I have a child - have conversations that I feel comfortable talking about … OK yes, you know this person in a wheelchair, some people use wheelchairs and some people don’t… I mean, I don't kind of dig too deep into, it it's just about saying yeah some people have wheelchairs, we don't need to make a big deal out of it for that person, that person doesn't need us to you know how the whole story around what they're doing … just understand yep some people do and some people don’t.

We had a great chat yesterday about the noise of the traffic lights, like than the beeping when you go to cross  … my my child said “why is it making a noise? what's that noise?”

I said “Oh it's for the light, you know how when we see the green man, we know we're allowed to cross… well if we couldn't see that, we would still have to know when to cross.” He goes, “yeah well some people don't have any eyes,” and I said “well that's right” and he said yes and then we kept walking; it really didn't have to be a big deal.

H: You’re raising a good ally there.

A: I'm doing my best, 100%

H: and that's one of the things that I always turn to people because like I have always, since I was a kid attracted the stares of other kids, and my mom has always taught me that it's really important for me to engage them as much as I can.  Now that works sometimes, but sometimes, parents are really embarrassed or they go “Oh no, we don't have to talk about that” or they reprimand the kids for staring at me, for coming over, all that kind of stuff.

I'm like I would just prefer that you come and ask me the question like yes I know that it's emotional labour on me and you don't want to bug me, but really if I can just make it that little bit easier, all that little bit less strange so the next time I happens maybe your son or daughter reacts differently I think I think that's good …

A: And I appreciate that acknowledgement of you saying I know it's emotional labour -  because there are going to be people who are not open to that, and that is so okay. Just as if  someone came up and said to me “why are you fat” or “why is your hair green?” because that is the most common question I get when I talk to some child I've never met before it’s “Why is your hair green?” and I just say “why not?”

I think your willingness is something that I really admire about you, but I think also … if you were to say “I don't want to have to have this conversation today, I'm exhausted” because that is the reality ,that sometimes you just feel like I’ve said this four hundred times and it's only Wednesday, that you are allowed to say that too … and I think people need to really try hard to gauge when it's the right moment to say maybe you should ask Hannah why she's in a wheelchair, because the you’d say, well this is why, or say “I use it to get around,” and hopefully they could realize that that's the end of the conversation,  thank you goodbye.

H: Generally with kids I always try to have that openness because I'm like well they don't know, they don't know that I've been asked that question four hundred times, or they don't know that I got really sad because it frustrated me that I couldn't get out of bed by myself this morning or whatever it was … so with them I always try to be open. 

Sometimes you get adults who are a little bit invasive, and that's a bit like “guys please don’t, just let me do this, let me do my thing.”

It doesn't necessarily come out in the form of a question like it'll be like this used to happen quite regularly with when I was traveling to and from Uni, because I still technically am at uni for a couple weeks, then I’ve finished my degree; but I've done two years of it online and two years traveling back and forth to Wollongong, which means taking the train and the bus,  so dealing with public transport  - you're dealing with a huge cross section of the population, and they would ask me where I come from or what I was doing and I would say just come back from Uni, I'm just going to Uni, and for a split second to be able to see the brain have to completely sort of recalibrate their idea of me …

A: yeah because the answer that they were expecting, because they’d made up a story about you in their head?

H: yeah or some people will automatically assume like all you've come from TAFE right? No,  I'm doing a double degree at Uni

A: And look I went to TAFE, and loved it but there was no reason for anyone to make that assumption, there’s no reason. It’s all biases whether there's subconscious or unconscious,  you know they’re all biases and the things that you compete against every day because people are telling themselves stories about strangers

H: yes and I guess like this other biases which would obviously be that TAFE is still seen somewhat as a like lesser form of education, when in reality it's not … we all need people with those skills to help us get through our lives and I think one thing I hope the pandemic teaches people is maybe not take people for granted so much.

A: The value of front line workers and people who do jobs that have not always been considered to have the same prestige is something like a lawyer, or a doctor -  we know doctors haven’t been treated all that well…  I totally agree, I do think that there is probably a bias around what education has value and prestige and I think that's another thing – in the past I have talked about intersectionality … that's one of those things that we think people who learn in an educational institution that's not necessarily surrounded by accolades don’t learn things that are not as important as other people, in a different environment

H: And potentially, some might say in a more open environment - because typically our institutions our surrounded by people who generally look the same.

A: We've seen recently in the news conversations around certain educational institutions,  and the types of people who leave those institutions who go on to not necessarily be the people that we want in our lives. I do think that we need to make space in our own minds to the possibility that nobody is what you're expecting them to be because the only experience that you might have someone is that first impression and so you need to allow that person to make their impression before you decide who they are and what they're about.

H: Definitely.

A: I know you're also someone who works quite closely with the CPA, Cerebral Palsy Alliance… an organisation I hold in high esteem not only for the work that they do but because I have a couple of friends who also benefit from the work that they do … and yeah I is there anything, you know, in terms of the work that you've done with them -  is there anything that you’ve seen as you've done that that's really like warmed your heart? Have you seen any moments in your work with CPA that you got to go this is why I do what I do?

H: I was very lucky to get to hold a Instagram Q&A for them on world CP day which is the 6th of October and that would basically just answering people's questions about CP and just like busting common myths and all that kind of stuff…  but I got some lovely DMs that were sort of along the lines of “we're really glad that our son or daughter with CP, our friend or whatever has someone like you to look up to, we are really happy that like our able-bodied kids will get to see what you do.”

I'm also really fortunate that CPA has given me a monthly column in which I get to essentially be the adult that I never got to see for other kids coming here which is like I said exactly the reason why do everything that I do… getting the opportunity to really exist in those spaces and hear from the people who know what my life looks like that they appreciate what I'm doing .That's kind of the greatest form of compliment that I could ever get really.

A: It’s really wonderful and I think you spoke before about feeling like adulthood was a bit of a blank page for you, and so now you get to fill in that page with a little bit of your experience -  something for them to go oh, I turned the page, there's something to know, what I can do and where I could land as far as chasing dreams and believing that you can do whatever it is that you want to do … in your case what you want to do  is make the world a better place.

H: I definitely think like we need disabled representation in every arena - so many disabled lawyers, we need disabled teachers, disabled doctors - we need disabled people who work at the supermarket … we need representation in every arena and every level so that when disabled kids are kind of coming through they can choose whatever they want.

 I’m lucky and particularly fortunate that my skill is in writing  which means that I get to put my words out to a bigger audience … and I'm sort of developing something of a public profile, but I also want to make sure that like the kids coming up and kind of other disabled people who are really unsure about what the future might hold, know that they don't necessarily have to step in to having a public profile or being a public advocate in order for them to be successful either…  because I think public advocacy is a choice and it's not something that we expect of everybody … sometimes it's just enough that you advocate for yourself and you get through the day and you do what you have to do; and to be honest there was a time where I definitely thought that being a public advocate was not for me because I was struggling so much to keep my head above water that I was not gonna worry about anyone else… it's just like ‘all I can think about is getting through each day’ and then sort of as I got older I realized the literal privilege of like having a voice – and by this I mean the physical act of being able to speak, and articulate myself, and be understood  - is privilege because for anyone who doesn't know, cerebral palsy basically exists on a spectrum, where at one end you have people who are only affected on one side so that might work a little bit lopsided, you might have a claw hand ,they might get fatigue or that kinf of stuff … and then right at the other end you have people who essentially all they can do for themselves independently is breathe and swallow.

 I am very fortunate to sit in the middle of the spectrum; that wasn't necessarily going to be the case, in fact when I was born the doctors told my parents worst case scenario that I would never walk talk or feed myself … so the fact that I do have a voice,  and that I can be understood, is definitely not something I take for granted…  because it quite honestly wasn't supposed to happen so now I feel, well if I've been lucky enough to for whatever reason have that not be the case then I've got a responsibility to use it, you know?

A: I think I'm one of those people and maybe this sounds woo woo but I'm okay with that …  I honestly believe that there is a reason for that, as the people who follow you and listen to what you have to say, we are the lucky ones who get to hear your thoughts and have you articulate this message that you have for us, so beautifully, and in a way that is so easy for us to go ‘okay that makes so much sense, thank you’ - I really do think that you are very special individual and I think your choice to be a public advocate, when you're quite right, it would be perfectly reasonable for you to simply say I choose me -  I choose to take care of myself  - choose to use the voice that I have to speak for myself so that I'm able to be treated the way that I want to be treated…  your choice to do more is something that's really powerful and something that shouldn't be understated; because it's not easy and we both know that it can be hard to spend a lot of time creating content and sharing what can be trauma to help people understand what it is to live your life, to be in your shoes … I really think that that's something that we I can't understate -  how grateful I am that I connected with you.

H: well that makes two of us  - I am extremely grateful that I connected with you because I think the work that you do in making people feel more comfortable in their own skin and more comfortable with their bodies and even like not necessarily having your body be a topic of conversation is really important…I've certainly taken a lot out of it because I struggled a lot with body image and like my relationship to my body,  especially in the context of like what it's supposed to look like or what it's supposed to do, ways that I operate differently to all the girls in the magazines or on the billboards.

A: I want you to be one of those girls Hannah … that's what I want. One thing, you know and I think I said this about the campaign that I did with Curvy Swim ‘Beach Please’ wasn't just about the idea of people who have fat bodies being comfortable … it's about everybody and I think me being the first fat bikini model on a nillboard in Australia is just one thing that we need to do and one thing that mainstream media needs to show us… we've got to keep working to diversify, genuinely diversify, media and the images of bodies and people who we see and who are championed and I think that yes, I see that in your future - I do.

H: I hope I hope you're right there, I hope it gets to that stage because I would love to see it and I think as well. Carly Findlay does a great job talking about this - there's a lot of room in mainstream media where “disfigurement”, all of the forms of disability that affects how you look are used as symbols of evil …  like if we look at say this new James Bond film is going to be the biggest one that  everyone's talking about. If you look at the history of Bond villains, most of them have some “deformity “or facial difference or something along those lines that is meant to be used as a symbol to the audience that they are the bad guy.

A:  Or like the six fingered man in Princess Bride or Anne Hathaway’s digitally altered hands in The Witches … it's not even subtle… between that and I think you know the the other signalling around on you know whether it's queer villains ,and things like that… we have so far to go in terms of how we show audiences, especially children who the bad guy is … 

I think the fact that The Witches came out and there was such a huge outcry and support for the message that this was a far cry from what was the right choice from that studio … that's marvellous, because twenty years ago nobody would have said anything…  people would have spoken about it in their lives and circles…  but a public message condemning to the point where Anne Hathaway had to be like holy shit I've made a terrible mistake, you know I I think that's so… that's so powerful. But again, the bare minimum - because it should never have happened. Somebody in that room should have been able to go “I don't think we should give her these, you know these differences, the physical differences to signal that she's the ultimate evil…  but the fact that that was not present in the room is where you come in because yes you are making a place for people to have powerful voices both online and as part of the media more broadly - and for those opportunities to be in the room -  to happen.

H: I think I gave a similar quote, I guess, in an interview that I did recently with POPSUGAR (not to name drop but that was pretty cool) I said something along the lines of “the people who are in power now have seen no reason to change things because it suits them”, so like if we want things to change, the people at the top and the people who have the power to make the decisions have to change too… because clearly they're not the ones we want making decisions about those kind of things because they haven't seen the gaps where we see them.

A: I think the reason for change has to be you wanting it, and it must come from a want to just have a better world because you can't simply say ‘well if it doesn't affect me then I don't need to work for it’ that's what allyship is, choosing to work for a cause that doesn't actually affect you…  that's what allyship needs to be about…  making yourself uncomfortable whether that be, you know, opportunities being given to people who haven't had those chances - and yeah, that maybe means that you don't get as many opportunities … not everything is finite, some things are and I think the ability to choose a better world and a better experience for young people over yourself? That’s allyship – in part.

H: I think there will be some people who react to that kind of sentiment and go oh this better world is so much more politically correct, the better world is going too far, the better world … why can we just leave it, no one had a problem.. like why is everyone so sensitive all of a sudden? It's like well actually they've been sensitive the whole time…  they just now have the means to express it in a place where you are more likely to hear.

A: Are we sensitive or you insensitive? That's the real question.

H: I definitely think one thing that is there anyone who creates content online knows, people are always going to agree with you … you're going to get people in the DMs who hate what you're doing, who are very much against it - who think you’re being too much, asking too much … and I always try and take that as a sort of compliment because this is my work is actually moved beyond the echo chamber of people who would tell me I was doing a good job regardless of what I was doing…

Obviously my family is not going to like pander to me, but there's a level of like… they're always going to support what I do … so if I'm getting feedback from strangers that they don't like it, that means it's moved to strangers, if that makes sense.

A: They are being exposed to the message and you know, if we hope that a fraction of the strangers instead of hearing and disagreeing with it, hear it and sit with it, get uncomfortable with themselves, without having to come into your DMs then that is a positive change .

I want to thank you so much again for coming on The BODcast, it is it's been my absolute pleasure to talk with you … and I just want to know, is there anything that you would like to share with the people who are hopefully listening to this episode?

H: Well, first of all I think if you listen to the BODcast, you're a pretty awesome human - that shows that you care and that you want to learn,  and hopefully I taught you something and hopefully there's more places for me to teach you things … like come say hi on social media… support my projects…  check out Missing Perspectives, sign the Disney petition… keep your eyes out for some cool stuff coming soon …

A: Because that's just what you do, just keep doing cool things! I am going to put the links to all of the important places like Hannah’s Instagram and to the Missing Perspectives website and the petition in the show notes - you can also come find me on Instagram where you will always find me sharing things from Hannah, so no worries, you will definitely find us.

Once again Hannah Diviney, thank you so much for being my first series to a guest on the BODcast.

The BODcast - S2: E1

Hello! It’s Season 2 of the BODcast, can you believe? So much has happened since I released the last episode, it feels like a lifetime ago.

I thought the best way to relaunch this podcast would be to answer the questions I imagine you have if this is your first listen. Welcome!

And if you were here listening last year, then I am so glad to have you back, THANK YOU!

Let’s start with me! What’s my deal? Who am I? Well, you can call me The Bodzilla or April, because that is my name… and yes, that’s a reference to Bridget Jones’ Diary, I’m so sorry if you’re too young to know what that is! HAHA but seriously - if what you really want to know is ‘who am I to you?’ then I’m your online body acceptance bestie who’s going to be ready to explain, empathise, energise and embolden!

I’ve always been the person who loves to volunteer to speak for the group. I tell jokes when I’m comfortable and even more jokes if I'm uncomfortable. I’m loud and brash and boisterous and so many things we’ve been told not to be when we’re fat. Lots of people call me confident, and I can work with that. Sometimes the confidence is more of a show but hey, whatever gets the vibes going.

As far as who I am to the people I’m closest to, I’m a daughter, mother, wife, friend, colleague and the person who’ll always make themselves look a bit silly to make you laugh.

This might leave you wondering ‘Well, April, why do you call yourself The Bodzilla?’

I mean, it’s a badass name, right? I can’t take the credit, it was thought up by someone else who encouraged me to focus on sharing body positivity online when we connected in 2019. I took the leap to change my profile in February 2020 and have not yet learned how to stop the creeping blush that comes over my face when I hear/see someone speaking about me as ‘The Bodzilla’.

The Bodzilla is a part of who I’ve always been. I just didn’t always have a name for her.

If you’ve been hanging out with me on the socials, you already know what I’ve been getting up to - but if you’ve stumbled across me recently, you might be wondering if you’ve seen or heard of me before.

Earlier this year I was part of CurvySwim’s ‘Beach Please’ campaign which involved me posing in a lilac velvet bikini on Cronulla Beach. I was photographed by the amazing Jez Smith who you might remember as a judge from Australia’s Next Top Model and to say that was a life-changing experience would still be an understatement. Jez has been vocal in his criticism of how misogyny and beauty standards harm women and I am so grateful to have worked with him.

While doing that shoot, I was also filming for the final episode of the SBS “What Does Australia Really Think…?” TV series. Again, what a moment! Hosted by Casey Donovan, whom I’ve been fangirling over since the early 2000s, the show explored Australia’s perception of obesity. It was a little hard to watch at times, but I hope that the impact it has on people is enough to make a real difference.

Aside from that, I might pop up on Triple J, social media campaigns for sex toys, modelling for brands or as a guest on one of your other favourite podcasts. Some might say I am an influencer? I like to think I am influential in the sense that I am someone you’re willing to take advice from. I sometimes think of myself as a writer, a model or public speaker… essentially I’m a Pisces with a smartphone.

I also have a paid job in communications that I go to as well as being lucky enough to make content like this and on the ‘gram. My child is old enough to use the toilet alone but not the toaster so that keeps me busy and I also enjoy socialising, mostly with people who like sparkling wine and scintillating conversation.

You might be wondering ‘Well, why do you need a podcast?’ Let me answer that question with a question: Why does anyone, really? I have thoughts that I love to share, online and in real life, and I wanted to make these bite-size episodes so that it’s a bit like a quick chat with a friend to learn something new or unpack an idea you’re new to. I want to always be doing my part to amplify the issues and views of marginalised people so that genuine diversity and inclusion is something we do habitually in every aspect of our lives, rather than as a corporate initiative or clout chasing.

Speaking of thoughts I’ve had, I wanted to recap the episodes from last season briefly - if you want to go back and listen, great - if not, that’s cool.

Episode 1 covered the basic differences between body positivity (I’m going to say BoPo, because Body Positivity is actually quite hard to say) and self love. I recorded it as my first episode because I think it’s really important to know the difference between normalising normal bodies, accepting ourselves and making space for the owners of bodies which deserve an equal chance to be celebrated.

Episode 2 was on intersectionality - everyone has their own experiences of how their body has been perceived and treated and the ways that society checks the boxes we tick. You’ve probably heard this word used when talking about feminism.

Episode 3 handled a question from a listener about how to talk to her loved ones about their bodies; I shared my thoughts and some insights into how we feel about the word 'fat'. I have a sneaking suspicion that wasn’t the last time I will talk about that topic!

The last episode of Season 1 was the first one with a guest (though not the last!) and that guest was the wonderful Abbie Chatfield. She was in hotel quarantine and when I tell you it was a hilarious chat, that’s an understatement.

It was released in August, and then as the part of the world I live in started to open up again, The BODcast went on a hiatus. So what’s changed since August last year?

Well, me for a start! I think it’s healthy to change and grow, learn and listen. That’s what this podcast is supposed to be about - learning and teaching and sharing so we can all be better. But I’ve also been lucky enough to be able to find time to get back to recording these episodes and joined the Acast Creator Network so I’m RIDICULOUSLY excited for Season 2!

That brings me to the fun bit - what I’ll be talking about this season. I intend to cover some topics that are especially relevant to me, as a fat ciswoman of colour - but also, to share knowledge and open conversations about ways we can be allies to communities we aren’t a part of. I hope to be able to bring more guests on for discussions about their experiences - I want you to submit topics too and share your ideas for guests and topics, or questions.

If you’re wondering whether there’s anything I won’t be talking about - well, I don’t think my voice is needed in every space or on every subject, so I probably won’t discuss pop culture or news. You also won’t hear me committing an episode to opinions about specific people! I will always look for an opportunity to have a guest come on to speak on their lived experiences. I’m all about amplifying the stories of marginalised people. 

So, like I said, thank you so much for listening to this episode, if you’ve gotten this far - I am so excited to drop the next one in less than a week. So until then, take care of yourself and remember - your body, my body… every body is a good body.