Price: $29.95
Page Count: 195
Publication Date: November 2018
ISBN: 978-1-77258-174-4
Heavy Burdens: Stories of Motherhood and Fatness seeks to address the systemic ways in which the moral panic around “obesity” impacts fat mothers and fat children. Taking a life-course approach, the book begins with analyses of the ways in which fatphobia is enacted on pregnant (or even not-yet-pregnant) women, whose bodies immediately become viewed as objects warranting external control by not only medical professionals, but family members, and even passers-by. The story unfolds as adults recount childhood stories of growing up fat, or growing up in fear of being fat, and how their mothers’ relationships with their own bodies and attempted weight-loss experiences shaped how food, exercise, and body management were approached in their homes in sometimes harmful ways. Finally, the book concludes with stories of women who have since become mothers, examining the ways in which having their own children altered their views on their own bodies and their perceptions of their mothers’ actions, and working to find fat-friendly futures via their own parenting (or grand-parenting) techniques.
This book contains the artwork, stories, and analyses of nearly 20 contributors, all of whom seek to change the ways in which fatness is perceived, experienced, and vilified. It is the editors’ hope that these works will compel readers to reconsider their negative views on fatness and to retain softness toward every mother and child who are simply fighting to exist in the face of fatphobia.
“Heavy Burdens takes up the important discussion of fat and motherhood by blending both scholarly and personal analyses. This collection looks both “up” at mothers (from a child’s view) and “down” from motherhood, complicating ideas about motherhood, responsibility, and individuality through the rocky terrain of weight stigma."
–Dr. May Friedman, Associate Professor, School of Social Work, Ryerson University
Introduction
Baby Weight: Pregnancy and Fatness
‘The elephant in the room’: Naming fat phobia in maternity care………………………………………19
George Parker and Cat Pausé
Bearing………………………………………………………………………………………………….33
Emma Day
Overfeeding the Floating Fetus and Future Citizen: The ‘war on obesity’ and the expansion of fetal rights…………………………………………………………………………………………………….35
April Herndon
Eating for Two: the fear and threat of fatness in pregnancy…………………………………………….45
Megan Davidson and Sarah Lewin
Beauty in the Eye of Eternity……………………………………………………………………………61
Sid Robitaille (Sitka)
Goal Weights, Planned Parenthood, and Aging past my Prime………………………………………...63
Emily R.M. Lind
(Don’t) let them eat cake: Experiences of Fat Kids
I am not Small…………………………………………………………………………………………...79
deborah schnitzer
Love Always…………………………………………………………………………………………………………95
bathbunny
Conversations with our Mothers: exploring maternal blame and the generational effects of body management……………………………………………………………………………………………97
Jen Rinaldi and Samantha Walsh
Untitled……………………………………………………………………………………………...…109
RA
ESAU……………………………………………………………………………………………………111
Natasha Galarraga
Dear Mom……………………………………………………………………………………………...117
Samantha Abel
Happiness Project and Close Bonds: a calorie-counting mother and her fat, feminist killjoy
daughter………………………………………………………………………………………………..137
Crystal Kotow
Coming to Term(s): Fat Motherhood
Sky Woman, Mother……………………………………………………………………….…………..149
Emma Day
From Famine to Feast: Pregnancy and motherhood…………………………………………………..151
Liz Nelson
Sharing………………………………………………………………………………………………..153
Emma Day
Crazy, Squishy Love: How I learned to love my body through the eyes of my son…………………155
Jodi Christie
Feeding…………………………………………………………………………………………….…159
Emma Day
Mother to Daughter: From fat hatred to fat love in 100 years…………………………………………161
Jennifer Lee
Exoskeleton…………………………………………………………………………………………….171
Sherezada Kent
Smiling…………………………………………………………………………………………………181
Emma Day
The Fat of the Matter: Fat Activist Parenting in Fatphobic Times…………………………………….183
Passing it On…………………………………………………………………………………………...187
Kimberly Dark
Author Biographies…………………………………………………………………………………….195
Judy Verseghy is a recent graduate of the MA program in Critical Disability Studies at York University in Toronto, Ontario. Her academic interests include mothering, caregiving, mental health, autism, and fat studies. She is a mother of three humans and three fur babies, and loves all of them deeply (and widely).
Sam Abel is a practicing social worker, a PhD candidate, and an artist. Her social work practice focuses on refugee settlement, mental health, body acceptance, and familial relationships. Sam's academic research explores the experiences of fat people in health care and in the fashion industry. You can see more of her artistic work @saucy.nudles and at bracedcomic.wordpress.com.
