34: Here's What's Wrong With the Body Positivity Movement

Here's What's Wrong With the Body Positivity Movement

The body positivity movement has done a lot of good… but is it actually helping women in midlife, or is it subconsciously keeping us more stuck in criticism than ever?

In this honest and nuanced conversation, we unpack the uncomfortable truth:
 👉 Even body positivity still keeps us focused on appearance.
 👉 It can disconnect us from true body love.
 👉 And it may even prevent us from addressing real health and emotional needs.

If you’ve ever felt like you’re supposed to love your body… but find yourself even more critical of your body as you hit your 40's and 50's, this episode will hit home.

You are going to discover:

• Why body positivity still keeps us obsessed with appearance 
•  How the movement ignores aging and the emotional reality of midlife bodies (and why that matters deeply in midlife) 
•  Why affirmations like “I love my body” often don’t work 
• The difference between not caring what others think and true stewardship of your body 
•  How body positivity can sometimes ignore real health concerns 

The body positivity may reduce shame, which matters, but it doesn’t teach women how to:

•  Truly connect with their bodies 
•  Care for them deeply 
•  Or love them through aging and change

We’ll address the question: can you truly stop caring what others think about your body… without first learning to love it yourself?

Join us in Costa Rica, October 2026 for our Retreat: Soul-Aligned - Design Your Extraordinary Next Chapter! Click here for details.

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 @midlifewomenrising

@jenreimercoaching

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome. This is the Midlife Rising podcast. Have you ever noticed how many midlife women seem to be swinging between two extremes when it comes to their bodies? We sort of move from I don't care anymore to wait, no, I need to color my grace. I need to get rid of these wrinkles, this midsection. And then back to I don't care what people think of me anymore. The body positivity movement says that all shapes and sizes are beautiful. But then as midlife women, we get this not so subtle message that from society that old is not good. Old is ugly. Old is wrinkly. And while the body positivity movement has done some really important things that we're going to talk about, we also think that there are some significant ways that the conversation has gone off track. Today, Jen and I are going to explore the difference between simply accepting our bodies and truly caring for them. And we would love to know what you think of this one because it's bound to ruffle some feathers out there. So tune in and let us know. You're a woman over 40 who spent your life being the one who holds it all together. But now your body's changing and your soul is done pretending everything is fine. Welcome to Midlife Rising. We're your hosts, Sherry and Jen, twin sisters and modern medicine women, here to help you rewire your stress response, balance your hormones, and reclaim your feminine power. Every episode is a rebellion against the rules you never agreed to and a return to yourself. Join us where Midlife isn't a crisis, it's a catalyst. Welcome back to the Midlife Rising Podcast. It's Sherry here, and Jen is finally back after a couple of weeks off of the podcast. So the last couple of episodes I've done solo. So I'm happy to have her back because she is going to keep me on track as we discuss something that's been on my mind for a while now. And that is the body positivity movement. So, Jen, you and I have talked a bit about this, the body positivity movement. And there's a ton that is right with it. But there's also a few bones to pick that with it that I have. Yeah. Um you've been talking about this for a long time, that you have a problem with the body positivity movement as as much as, yeah, it has it's done some good things. But today we want to uncover some of the things that we don't like about it because it's actually hurting women in certain ways, especially as we go through midlife. So there's some paradoxes that we're gonna uncover. Yeah. And I don't know about you, but as my body has changed through the last, I want to say like five years since I went through perimenopause and now in menopause. And I've had a lot of stuff coming up around my body and feeling a lot of stuff around the aging body, and gosh, don't even get me started on the what's going on in Hollywood with aging women and the level of Botox and changes people are making to their faces and their bodies, and it's it makes me really sad. So, Jen, why don't we start with what the body positivity movement has right? Because I I think that this is really I don't know that that anybody's really called this out. I'm sure they have, but let's call it out. Yeah, I mean, it's it's done a lot for um for acceptance of all types of bodies. So I think it's not even just shape of body, like I think it started, it started actually with um black and queer women fighting the discrimination and fate and shame that they faced due to their weight. So it started out as a weight. Um, like I should be positive. I'm we need to love all bodies no matter how heavy or light or fat or thin they are. Yeah, I actually think it started with Dove. They started this whole thing with no, it was way before that. Was it? Yeah, it was in the 60s. I looked it up. I'm the researcher here, remember? Yes, that's great. Okay, and my memory of like a dove was probably, I don't know, was that the like the 90s or the early 2000s? I don't know, that part I can't remember. But so, yes, it started out with like love the shape of your body, which is a good thing because throughout, like for decades, especially the fashion industry has idolized the stick-thin, tall body. Yeah, and and that really like advertising has such a profound impact on women and how they feel about their bodies. And that thin, model-shaped body became the mold and the measuring stick for our self-worth. It was what everybody strove for. And if you you didn't get there, like it was sort of a, well, I'll be happy when I lose weight. I'll be happy when I'm thin. And who like most of us don't ever get there. So are we going to continue, you know, so it challenged, really challenged that link between your body is your worth, or your worth is based on the appearance of your body. Yeah. And now, of course, now we see models of all shapes and sizes. Um, not even, and not just that, it's extended beyond that, right? We have a lot more um diversity in terms of race, in terms of capability, um, everything. Like actually, I was reading an article about Bridgerton. I'm I watch, I shamelessly watch Bridgerton. And um, there is an actress in there that is missing uh her arm.

unknown 6:36

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 6:37

And and she talks about how grateful she is that a show like that would include her in um in the cast as a as a fairly prominent um a role. And we wouldn't have seen that a while back. No. Mike and I actually, my husband and I actually have this conversation a lot because, as you know, he uses a wheelchair. And so I remember when Avatar first came out and the like the first Avatar. Yes. I actually just re-watched about half of that. Yeah, and the main character uses a wheelchair. And we had this big long conversation about what until we got to, well, before we got to the part where he goes into the avatar world. I forgot, I've watched I watched it years and years ago, so I can't remember all the language. But before we we knew that he was going to walk in the other world, we had this conversation about do you think he's actually paralyzed? And the actor. And so what we're seeing now is a lot more actors who actually are disabled or use a wheelchair for real instead of just an actor playing someone who's disabled. And even, I mean, it used to be that. So was even No, so he wasn't really. But there's a lot more of, first of all, there's a lot more roles that are disabled people, like in the show or the movie or the film. And then there are also a lot more disabled actors who are then playing those roles instead of an able-bodied actor playing those roles. Anyway. Yes. So this movement has done a lot. It it has brought us a long way. Yes. But well, and before we even get there, there's a couple of other things that I want to mention about what it has done, because I don't think we've really touched on that. So the thing that I want to highlight about bringing these other types of bodies into the light is that they were invisible before in media, in advertising, in films. And invisibility almost always leads to shame. So there's been a lot, it's it's really uncovered. Whenever you call it out, whenever you bring something to the surface, you reduce the shame. Yes. So it doesn't just, you know, we talked about how this movement has challenged appearance and the connection to self-worth, but it also has released some of the shame around the shape of your body. Yeah. Absolutely. And then the the third thing that I wanted to mention is just that it has separated health from appearance. Like, I I don't think we're the only ones who have, we can't be the only ones who have noticed that. And yet I don't hear anybody talk, I don't hear very many people talking about that. Actually, the Midlife Muse talks about this. But um because she let her hair go gray and she doesn't use Botox and doesn't use all of those things that the this billion multi-billion dollar industry is trying to tell us that we need. That we need so badly. No, and there's there's lots of people who are saying, like, let's age gracefully instead of um, you know, fighting it, but I don't see anybody that's actually made the link to this body positivity movement in this way. No. I haven't either. Yeah. So that's kind of my next point, is it it minimizes what's inside the book. Right. I should just like let's take somebody who's overweight, sure. Then um, and maybe they're actually overweight because they have a legitimate health concern. And it's just saying, nope, I'm happy with my body. Um, but not actually taking the steps to heal a legitimate health concern that is causing that. Yes. Or their body is larger and causing legitimate health concerns. Oh, okay. Yeah, I didn't even. So it's something like it it's both. So, or it could be either one. It could be, you know, y diabetes, for example. There's a perfect one. Heart disease. Right. So now you're not so you're not actually loving your body. Because loving your body isn't just loving the shape, it's actually caring for your body by it's eating healthfully so that you don't get heart disease or diabetes or although sometimes you do get diabetes regardless of what you eat, but um so that you can minimize potential health issues. It's stewardship of your body. That's a good way to put it. I was at a cottage a couple of years, a couple of summers ago, and one of the one of the gals who was there with us is living in a larger body, and she she was she was talking about body positivity and the movement and how her daughter, she put on a bathing suit. We were at a cottage summertime on the lake, and she put on a bathing suit and and kind of like whoop-whooped, and was talking about how her daughters were were really telling her how beautiful her body is. And and then in the next moment, in fact, most of the weekend was filling that same body with chips and alcohol and all the things. Now, we were at a cottage weekend, so you know, of all of I'll I also eat more junk and I'll have a drink and you know, there's no judgment on that. But what I noticed, this is what really got me. This was a pivotal moment for me because it really got me thinking, well, whenever I see this woman, she's not eating healthy, she's not being a good steward of her body, she's not nurturing it, she's not nourishing it with the nutrients it needs, she's not caring for it. And that's not loving your body. So that's where I see there's a big difference between not caring what people think of your body and actually loving your body. There's a huge difference. And it's not just that. It's not just like stewardship and nourishing your body. It's also there's a difference between I don't care what other people think about me my body and I love the shape of it. Yes, I agree. And I have no way of knowing whether that's true because I haven't felt that myself. Like I always cared what other people thought about my body, especially when I was overweight. And I didn't stop caring what they thought until I started loving my own body. Like the two went hand in hand. So I don't know if it's possible. Like if we take your example of that woman, I don't know if it's possible for her to truly not care what everybody thinks about her body. And actually, like, I can imagine she was, you know, saying it. Like, I don't care what everybody thinks, I love my body, but actually she's just saying, I don't care what everybody thinks. And but really deep down, she actually doesn't love her body. And even if that's not her, I bet you there's plenty of women out there that feel that way. Like they're trying to pretend. And that's this is actually my beef with the whole move movement, is it's telling people to sort of, it's kind of like a band-aid solution. Like it's telling people to love their body. Like, so I don't care what people think, I love my body, I'm good with my overweight body or whatever is wrong, whatever like they don't actually like about their body to like just, and it's telling them to just cover it up. It's putting whipped cream on shit. Yeah. And so, and what I found is that never worked for me. Like, I couldn't just pretend I loved it and start loving it. It's kind of like affirmations, never worked for me. Like, you can't just tell yourself I love my body because there's something inside you going, yeah, no, you don't. I don't exactly love my body. And that's always been my thing. It's like, do you though? Or are you just really trying hard? And I I understand why you want to try hard. And I we we were talking about this in our client call the other day. Was that like first, and what I was teaching was that you have to first acknowledge what you don't like about it in order to then start finding the things that you do like about it. It's a bit of a chicken and egg scenario, isn't it, Jen? Like, does the does the love in your body for come first before you can stop caring what others think of your body, or can you do it the opposite way around? And I'm not sure you can. I I'm in the same boat with you. I I'm still struggling to, I mean, that I'm a work in progress. I'm still working on loving my body, but gosh, I've come a long way. And when I began to love my body and started to develop a better relationship with it, and when I began to care for it in a in a deeply nourishing and nurturing way, that was when I started to stop caring what other people think. So I'm in the same camp as you on that. I'd be interested to see if there's research on that. Yeah, or even just to hear from our listeners on what they think about that. I'd love to hear. Yes. Yeah. I we should say that actually. Like, we want to hear from you, our listeners. We want to know what you think about the stuff we're talking about. So send us an email, send us a message on Instagram. Midlife Women Rising is our handle. So, yeah, send us a message and tell us what you think, what you think about this. Could you can you stop caring what other people think of your body without really truly loving your body? Or does that have to come first? Yeah, it's a good question. I I do know that you have to love your body before you'll lose the weight, for example. Yeah. Like when I, when I sh and that's what that's when the subconscious comes into my into um play here. Like when I shifted some of my limiting beliefs about and my subconscious beliefs about my body and about what that meant about me, and I released some of the shame at a very deep level, the weight started falling off. Yeah. And I didn't have to, I was eating healthy, like I wasn't shoving junk into my mouth, but I I didn't need willpower anymore. I and I just started losing weight, and I I couldn't figure out why. I was very excited about it. And now I've been at a weight that I've been really happy with for years. There's definitely subconscious beliefs in there that come into play. You mentioned something else earlier that I wanted to touch on too, Jen. On our call yesterday, one of our clients was talking about being grateful. Oh, yes. And you're talking about the call I had. Yeah, and I I was chatting with her before you did. So I have a good idea of what she was getting at. And for her, her body doesn't work that well. And so she has a lot of anger towards her body. And she also has a lot of anger towards the people who focus on their appearance because she feels like, well, you should just be grateful because you have a body that works. Stop complaining about your appearance. Your body works per like your body works well. Yeah, it's not played up enough, in my opinion. Is what can your body do? What does your body do for you? What is, you know, where have these legs carried me? Right. And I think that's what she was tapping into. And also how angry she is at her body. And I think that's really common for any, like for most of us, we're especially in midlife. I know a lot of women who are really ticked at their bodies. It's not cooperating. They're gaining weight around the middle, yeah. They're, you know, waking up during the night. They're, you know, they have uncomfortable symptoms. Yeah. Uncomfortable or painful or loss of frustration. My body's not cooperating. It starts to feel like a war. Like you're not friends with your body. And so you might be okay with how your body appears. It might be whatever shape it is. And yet you can still harbor a lot of internal anger towards a body part that is not working well. And you might not even notice it. Like I had, so I had um I think it was frozen shoulder. Common menopause symptom. Yes, which I did not know when I first got it. And for a long time, I had really, I didn't even realize it. Like I was working on trying to fix it and get mobility back in my shoulder, but I hadn't really realized how much like I I had separated myself from my shoulder. Do you know what I mean by that? I kind of do now that you mention it. Like it's like my shoulder's that thing that's not working properly. Yes. And it really happened when I was trying to get pregnant. And, you know, my uterus became this statistic among The doctors I was working with, and you know, all my hormone levels. It was all about numbers and stats and how old I am and how quality my eggs are. And I really started to like I felt, I didn't even realize it until I start like took me a while to realize how separate I felt from that whole part of my body. Yeah, it's so interesting. Yeah. So it's it's almost like you need to bring it back into the fold. Yeah, that's one of the actions you can take. Yeah. And so a couple of things that I, or a couple of tips that I gave in the call was to acknowledge those feelings first. Um, you know, that this client kept saying, I know I should be grateful that I can walk and I can, you know, get through life and da-da-da. And I said, you're saying you should be grateful. And that's a judgment on yourself. So allow yourself to feel the anger. You deserve to be angry. You have a condition that's really frustrating, or you you deserve to be angry. Um, so acknowledging all of that first, and then noticing how disconnected, like that when you feel like you're at war with your body, you are disconnected from either a part of it or your body as a whole. That's not love. So the body positivity movement isn't teaching us about body love. No, exactly. I think that's, Jen, I think that is the through line for this whole episode. The body positivity, positivity movement is not teaching us how to truly love in every respect our bodies. Shape, its age, its skin, its wrinkles, its color, its flaws. Yeah. And that's that is what I hate about that movement, in spite of all the good that it's done. So we are starting a movement of our own. That's what this is really all about. And it's all about aging naturally, positively, and powerfully. And it's about all of it's about all of it, not just how we appear when we age, because our appearance changes, but it's about loving your body truly, authentically, unapologetically. Yeah. And as you said, we're both a work in progress. I am still considering coloring my hair again. Um, I am not, because the grays are coming up. Um, I know I'm fighting it. But um, so the invitation to our listeners is to come along with us as we go on this journey together. Absolutely. So the first thing you can do is go back and listen to all our podcast episodes and stay for next week. We drop podcast episodes on Thursday mornings. So check for us then. Follow us because that's how you'll know. If you follow or subscribe, that's how you'll know there's an episode there waiting for you. And what's our episode, Jen, for next week? Oh gosh. It's something that I have only recently learned about myself. So if you're a people pleaser, you're gonna want to tune in next week on Thursday. It is all about a subconscious habit that is keeping you people pleasing. And I am willing to bet that most women do not realize that they're doing this. I certainly didn't until you started talking about it. So it was enlightening for me. So come back and have a listen to that, and we'll see you then.