What is Health at Every Size (HAES)?
Blog Post By Heather Clark
HAES 101
I’ve been in eating disorder recovery for over 20 years. But it wasn’t till 2014 that I discovered Health At Every Size® (HAES®), and it felt like I had finally found the missing piece of the puzzle in healing my relationship with my body. It felt like I was coming home to my body. My passion for the HAES® movement is one of the reasons I love working here at Rock Recovery - every staff member, therapist, and volunteer is aligned with this perspective.
According to the Association for Size Diversity and Health, “The HAES movement is a continuously evolving alternative to the weight-centered approach to treating clients and patients of all sizes… It is also a movement working to promote size acceptance, to end weight discrimination and stigma, and to lessen the cultural obsession with weight loss and thinness” (www.asdah.org/about-asdah).
Key Principles of Health at Every Size
The five core principles of HAES® are:
Weight Inclusivity: Accept and respect the inherent diversity of body shapes and sizes, and reject the idealizing or pathologizing of specific weights.
Health Enhancement: Support health policies that improve and equalize access to information and services, and personal practices that improve human well-being, including attention to individual physical, economic, social, spiritual, emotional and other needs.
Eating for Well-Being: Promote flexible, individualized eating based on hunger, satiety, nutritional needs, and pleasure, rather than any externally regulated eating plan focused on weight control.
Respectful Care: Acknowledge our biases, and work to end weight discrimination, weight stigma, and weight bias. Provide information and services from an understanding that socio-economic status, race, gender, sexual orientation, age, and other identities impact weight stigma, and support environments that address these inequities.
Life-Enhancing Movement: Support physical activities that allow people of all sizes, abilities, and interests to engage in enjoyable movement, to the degree that they choose.
Now, HAES®-aligned providers are not saying that everyone is healthy at every size, because people of all shapes and sizes encounter a wide variety of health struggles. We’re also not saying that health doesn’t matter – on the contrary, we’re insisting that people of all sizes have access to respectful care! Also know that we’re not denying that research shows a correlation between weight and health. We’re just reminding everyone that just because two things are correlated doesn’t mean that one causes the other. We think it’s important to be curious about what it is that links weight and health – could it be weight-based stigma and discrimination that explains the correlation? We have a growing body of research now that suggests that it might.
We think it’s important to be curious about what it is that links weight and health – could it be weight-based stigma and discrimination that explains the correlation? We have a growing body of research now that suggests that it might.
Health At Every Size(R) & Eating Disorder Recovery
So, why does this all matter for disordered eating recovery, and healing our relationships with food and our bodies? For many people, fears around what body fat means can keep us from accessing peace and freedom in our bodies. Whether we fear what body fat indicates about our character, or we fear that it means we will have terrible health outcomes, unlearning the weight-centric paradigm and relearning a HAES® approach instead can allow us to begin to release those deep fears and finally trust our bodies.
HAES® also helps us to re-locate the problem where it belongs. The problems are weight stigma, thin ideals, rigid gender expectations for our appearance, size-based discrimination and mistreatment, and more. The problem is not and never was our bodies! Instead of internalizing our anger and distress and taking aim at our bodies, we can redirect our anger where it actually belongs, which can energize us for self-advocacy and activism.
If you resonate with these ideas, we might be a great fit for you in your treatment and recovery. Click here to learn more about Rock Recovery’s HAES-aligned therapy services or schedule a free consultation to get started. Maybe this is the missing piece for you, too.
Sources:
Association for Size Diversity and Health. (2023). Retrieved from https://asdah.org/health-at-every-size-haes-approach/ on March 3, 2023.
Blake, C.E., et. al. (2013). Adults With Greater Weight Satisfaction Report More Positive Health Behaviors and Have Better Health Status Regardless of Weight. Journal of Obesity.
Bombak, A. (2014). Obesity, Health At Every Size, and Public Health Policy. American Journal of Public Health. 104(2). pp. 60-67. doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2013.301486.
Mensinger, J.L., Cox. S.A., & Henretty, J.L. (2021). Treatment Outcomes and Trajectories of Change in Patients Attributing Their Eating Disorder Onset to Anti-obesity Messaging. Psychosomatic Medicine. 83. pp. 777-786. doi: 10.1097/PSY.0000000000000962.
Puhl, R.M. & Heuer, C.A. (2009). The Stigma of Obesity: A review and update. Obesity Journal. pp 1-24. Doi: 10.1038/oby.2008.636.
Sole-Smith, V. (2020). “Are Schools Teaching Kids to Diet?” The New York Times.
Tylka, T.L., et. al. (2014). The Weight-Inclusive Versus Weight-Normative Approach to Health: Evaluating the evidence for prioritizing well-being over weight loss. Journal of Obesity.