I read this even though I'm not a parent because the way my heart aches for the fat kiddos I see, knowing they are likely going to suffer through horrible bullying from everyone from their parents to their teachers, coaches, doctors, grandparents, I just had to see if Virginia had secret knowledge. Answers. A solution.

Yes and no. Mostly the hard work of creating and fashioning a world we want to live in, which requires the hard work of dismantling the many intersecting systems of oppression that hurt anyone not already born rich, white, cis, and male. The way Sole-Smith gets the reader to this point is through riveting personal interviews that felt like sociological studies and nuanced application of thoroughly researched, evidence-based practices. If, like me, you're an absolute nerd for details, you'll love the references section for every source cited and the resources section for everything from books for young readers to movies to watch for good fat representation.

Parenting is such hard work. My love to everyone doing it, in every body shape and size. ❤️ highly recommend, friends!

if u have a body, read this

There is so much to unpack and I plan to do just that. Damn.

“Your body is valuable but it is not your value”

This book is a very necessary examination of how fat bodies are treated in society today and its impacts on children and parents. It was radical and eye opening. I guarantee it will have you examining the language you use in front of kids. I read this on the heels of experiencing doctors appointment where I showed up to the GYN for a routine pap only to be told no less than 4 times in a 15 minute appointment that I should eat fewer carbs. I left that appointment horrified and knew immediately that I needed to find a new GYN, and this book validated that impulse. I wish my kids grandparents would read it. I wish everyone would read it.

A small critique. I’m the author narrates the audio, and she has whatever kind of accent that makes you add an “r” to words like “idea”. This isn’t a book I’d go out of my way to listen to instead of reading via hard copy.

Soooooo good!

I'm pretty sad to give this book a low rating. While I think many of Sole-Smith's ideas around challenging fatphobia and caring for kids in larger bodies are notable and worthy of credit, her cherry-picked science and questionable statements throughout the book ruined its credibility for me. I appreciated her thoughts on reasonable diet models for kids and her notes that each kid will require different considerations (e.g. kids with eating disorders cannot be given as much food flexibility, kids with ARFID may have to snack more, etc). However, I was unimpressed by statements such as "these studies show correlation, not causation" that are followed up with more studies that show correlation and not causation but are presented as fact (since, presumably, they support the author's POV). I'm open to a debunking of current scientific consensus; however, it must be done logically and systematically, not by throwing anecdotes and wishes at well-substantiated evidence. For example, Sole-Smith states that nothing in parenting styles has changed so dramatically since the 1970s to reflect the 3x increase in kids that meet obesity standards - yet Sole-Smith dismisses ideas about hyper-palatable foods out of hand and does not pursue them further. In my mind, quite a bit has changed in parenting since the 1970s (new diets? but most importantly, new tech, and perhaps a corresponding loss in activity?). In another section, Sole-Smith uses an interview with a doctor to substantiate her claim that children with higher BMIs can demonstrate fewer issues upon lab analysis than kids with lower BMIs. There are so many issues with this - this is an anecdote told by a singular doctor, with no named patients (could be entirely fake)! It isn't even a case study, much less a double-blind peer-reviewed study. Also, this is common sense - if you cherry pick a healthy kid with a higher BMI and an unhealthy kid with a lower BMI, this can always be true. It's statistical analysis that matters in this case. So many other problems like this crop up throughout the book - Sole-Smith talks about how body weight "isn't controllable" but offers no evidence to support this claim and discusses how a study "only document[ing] correlations and not causations" somehow therefore creates the idea that "remov[ing] 'obesity prevention' as a goal for family meals... could mean that more kids would experience meals... [that were] warm, supportive, and full of positive reinforcement." Etc, etc. While I agree that a radical shift surrounding weight and health needs to occur, and that fatphobia should ALWAYS and CONTINUALLY be countered, especially to ensure that fat people receive appropriate medical care, this book felt like it was written to reflect Sole-Smith's desired reality rather than striving to counter fatphobia and disinfo about fat people in the real world.

Full Disclosure: Goodreads Giveaway Winner

What a load of codswallop.

What was good: No one should be shamed because of their weight or body type.

What was bad, I mean really bad: everything else.
I actually went back and checked. This is my 539th book. My average is 3 stars. I have assigned 6% two stars, and less than 1% (two or three books) one star. I would have assigned 0 stars for this if that was a recordable score.

No one should be bullied or shamed about their body. Full. Stop. Periodt. (my students pronounce it with a t in instances like this). However, even intimating that any eating behavior is healthy is a criminal disservice to readers. Weight can be tied to health, if it is causing stress to joints (which it can and does), if it is stressing organs like the heart (which it can and does). Salt can be tied to blood in a small percentage of patients - and those patients should be identified and appropriately counseled. However, to pretend that a diet consisting mostly of refined sugar and fat in highly processed foods is healthy is absurd. To insist that it is not tied to weight/health is delusional.

When someone tries to defend allowing a child to eat as stick of butter as a healthy dinner... it's time to call the guys with the butterfly nets.