Happy (International) No Diet Day!
**Trigger Warning for Diets, Diet Culture, Weight Loss ETC**
Happy International No Diet Day!
Almost everyone in North American knows that May 5th is Cinque de Mayo. A decent-sized niche of the world population knows that May 4th is “International Star Wars Day” (“May the 4th be with you”) But, did you know that May 6th is International No Diet Day? International No Diet Day (INDD) is an annual celebration of body acceptance, including fat acceptance and body shape diversity. This day is also dedicated to promoting a healthy lifestyle with a focus on health at any size (from the world-renowned Dr. Bacon). and in raising awareness of the potential dangers of dieting (as well as diet culture) and the unlikelihood of success:
“Those who complete weight loss programs lose approximately 10 percent of their body weight only to regain two-thirds within a year and almost all of it within five years.” – The Institute of Medicine
INDD has more recently evolved into No Diet Day, still on May 6, and has been recommended as a marketing technique for restaurant owners to serve indulgent treats to their customers. Others have used it as a national social marketing strategy and campaigned for it to attach a local Healthy Eating campaign onto ‘National No-Diet Day’
Regardless, weight loss is not valued, here. Nor are we here to tell you how to eat or where to eat. Loving your body is what’s important.
In celebrating International No Diet Day, participants aim to:
- Question the idea of one “right” body shape.
- Raise awareness of weight discrimination, size bias, and fatphobia.
- Declare a day free from diets and obsessions about body weight.
- Present the facts about the diet industry, emphasizing the inefficacy of commercial diets.
- Honor the Victims of eating disorders and weight-loss surgery.
- Help end weight discrimination, sizism, and fatphobia.
That’s why our Founder, Shannon Svignen-Jones, created our Making Peace with Your Body Program
Making Peace with your Body is about loving yourself, not changing it. And, that’s what fabUplus is about.
We welcome you to celebrate this day, created by Mary Evans Young in 1992. Young is the director of the British group “Diet Breakers”. After personally experiencing anorexia nervosa, she worked to help people appreciate themselves for what they are and to appreciate the body they have. Young, a British feminist, developed her understanding both through her own experiences of being bullied at school for being fat and by speaking with women who attended the management courses she ran.
One of our favorite conversations and lessons she overheard, happened during one of her courses, about whether or not the women in her course were going to eat a biscuit.
“Oh, I’ll just have one”
“I shouldn’t really”
“Oh, all right then”
Young asked the group “What do you think would happen if you spent as much time and energy on your careers as you do on diets?”
She relates this conversation in her book, Diet Breaking: Having It All Without Having to Diet. This happened during one of her courses in 1991. She naturally became irritated with the coffee break conversation
We’re thankful that Mary Evans Young created this day and that you’re spending it with us.