Content Warning: mention of child abuse and death by suicide.

Angela Braxton-Johnson (her/she) shares her journey through dieting, 12-step programs, eating disorder out-patient treatment, and finally to Body Trust and liberation in her 50s. Using poetry to put her experiences into words, Angela reads two of her poems, gifting us with their raw beauty and power.

Angela Braxton-Johnson is the owner of Poetically Inspiring Change and Abundant Fatness. She is a poetess, professional life/liberation coach, Certified Body Trust provider, and a self-published author of Black Fury: Fierce Recovery and Abundant Fatness ebooks with visual art, and a stoetry novel called, Who’s Watchin’ Me?: Season One. Her books can be purchased on her website. She is also published in Unchaste Anthologies, 2nd & 3rd volumes and two of her original poems are featured in the of BeNourished.org, Reclaiming Body Trust: A Path to Healing and Liberation by Dana Sturtevant and Hilary Kinavey. She’s been married for 36 years, has 3 children, 6 grands and 2 mini poodles.

Mentioned in this episode: Body Trust and Renee Watson. Please connect with Angela through her website and Instagram.

After recording the interview, Sophia asks each guest 10 unexpected, unrehearsed questions designed to go even deeper. Check it out by subscribing through Apple Podcast Subscriptions or Patreon for as little as $2.

You can connect with Fat Joy on our website, Instagram, and YouTube (full video episodes here!). Want to share the fat love? Please rate this podcast and give it a joyful review.

Our thanks to Chris Jones and AR Media for keeping this podcast looking and sounding joyful.

A counter-culture thinker since childhood, Amanda Laird (she/her) shares the journey she’s taken to follow a different path. From sewing her own period pads as a teen to hosting the popular podcast “Heavy Flow” to building her new business venture, slow & steady studio, Amanda is committed to advancing the feminine economy and exploring the question, ‘what is enough?’

Amanda Laird is the founder and principal strategist of slow & steady. As a former holistic nutritionist, Amanda is an advocate for reproductive health and wellness. She was the host of the Heavy Flow Podcast from 2017 to 2020 and is the author of “Heavy Flow: Breaking the Curse of Menstruation” published by Dundurn Press and nominated for the 2019 Kobo Emerging Writer Prize for Non-Fiction. In her work at slow & steady, Amanda draws on her 15 years as a creative communicator, writer and holistic wellness practitioner, as well as feminist marketing and business frameworks from Kelly Diels, Jennifer Armbrust and CV Harquail.

In the episode, Amanda mentions the book “Toxic Shock,” “Proposals for the Feminine Economy,” and her Spotify playlist.

Please connect with Amanda on her website.

This episode’s poem is by Tony Hoagland and is called “Birdhouse.”

Bonus content with Amanda through Apple Podcast Subscriptions and on Patreon.

Please connect with Fat Joy on our website, Instagram, and YouTube (full video episodes here!).

Want to share the love? Please rate this podcast and give it a review.

Our thanks to AR Media and Emily MacInnis for keeping this podcast looking and sounding joyful

Kelly Diels (she/her) makes it her mission to support culture makers. She’s disrupting the norms of extractive capitalism by shining a light on the harms caused by traditional sales & marketing tactics. She offers an alternative where we can focus on vision, consent, and deepening relationships. And how we can make both money and justice. Recently diagnosed with lipedema, Kelly shares how health is connected to culture-making, too.

Kelly Diels is a feminist educator, writer, and coach. She specializes in feminist marketing for culture-makers. She’s here to raise awareness about how the business-as-usual formulas we learn everywhere actually reproduce oppression. She develops and teaches alternate feminist marketing tools to help us do it differently (and better).

Please connect with Kelly on her website, Instagram, Facebook, and subscribe to her Sunday Love Letter.

This episode’s poem is by Alison Luterman and is called “Some Girls.”

Bonus content with Kelly through Apple Podcast Subscriptions and on Patreon.

Please connect with Fat Joy on our website, Instagram, and YouTube (full video episodes here!). Want to share the love? Please rate this podcast and give it a review.

Our thanks to AR Media and Emily MacInnis for keeping this podcast looking and sounding joyful

With the creation of Fat Torah, Rabbi Dr. Minna Bromberg (she/her) shows people how their religious & spiritual lives can be a liberatory space. Minna broke up with diet culture at 16, but it was when she became a rabbi that she began to write and speak about fat liberation within the Jewish community. She shares how the stories from the Torah and Bible can be read as liberationist, how belonging can be derailed by unconscious bias, and how joy is a spiritual obligation in the Jewish faith.

Rabbi Dr. Minna Bromberg is passionate about bringing her three decades of experience in fat activism to writing and teaching and change-making at the nexus of Judaism and body liberation. Since becoming a rabbi, Minna has led a 250-family Conservative congregation in Reading, PA, released her fifth album of original music, made aliyah, and run the Year-in-Israel program for Hebrew College rabbinical students. When she’s not working on Fat Torah, she’s a voice teacher who specializes in helping people use their voices in leading prayer. She lives in Jerusalem with her husband, Rabbi Alan Abrams, and their two children. Her forthcoming book is “Every Body Beloved: a call for fat liberation in Jewish life.”

Please connect with Minna on Fat Torah.

This episode’s poem is by Ha Jin and is called “A Center.”

Bonus content with Minna through Apple Podcast Subscriptions and on Patreon.

Please connect with Fat Joy on our website, Instagram, and YouTube (full video episodes here!). Want to share the love? Please rate this podcast and give it a review.

Our thanks to AR Media and Emily MacInnis for keeping this podcast looking and sounding joyful

Kids shouldn’t be stopped from playing their favourite sports because they can’t find active wear. Committed to helping kids thrive and not experience the negative impacts of having to leave their teams, their friends, and experience weight-stigmatizing clothing practices at a young age, Pam Luk (she/her) is determined to change the children’s apparel landscape with her company, Ember & Ace. Growing up playing sports, Pam learned the importance of finding active wear that fits. Not finding functional clothing is one of the main reasons kids quit sports, so Pam launched Ember & Ace exclusively for plus size kids with a focus on comfort and performance.

Pam's career has spanned the federal, commercial, and nonprofit sectors where she worked in project management and IT consulting. She holds an International Business & Economics degree from SUNY Brockport. Pam lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband, daughter, and two dogs.Please check out Ember & Ace.

This episode’s poem is “The Bugs of Childhood” by Danusha Lameris.Bonus content with Pam through Apple Podcast Subscriptions and on Patreon.

Please connect with Fat Joy on our website, Instagram, and YouTube (full video episodes here!).

Want to share the love? Please rate this podcast and give it a review.

Our thanks to AR Media and Emily MacInnis for keeping this podcast looking and sounding joyful

How fatness gets represented in popular culture, specifically in reality tv shows, is most often deeply cringe-worthy, violent, and filled with anti-fatness. Dr. Layla Cameron (they/them) brings an alternative way to view shows like “My 600-lbs Life” and “My Big Fat Fabulous Life” that may just help us better envision fat futures.

Dr. Layla Cameron is an academic and filmmaker whose body of work revolves around queer feminist cultural studies and fat politics. Their first documentary film, Fat Hiking Club, explores the politics of outdoor recreational culture in the Pacific Northwest, and Layla is currently developing a second documentary film, Baby Weight, about BMI restrictions in reproductive health care. Layla directs and produces the podcast Fatten, which features fat folks making change in Vancouver, British Columbia. They also run a letterpress printing company called Stay Fat Design Co. In their spare time, Layla enjoys going on road trips in their camper van with their rescue dog, Millie.

Please read more about Layla and their work on their website: www.laylacameron.com.

This episode’s poem is titled “Until the Stars Collapse” by Tonya Ingram.

Bonus content with Layla through Apple Podcast Subscriptions and on Patreon.

Please connect with Fat Joy on our website, Instagram, and YouTube (full video episodes here!). Want to share the love? Please rate this podcast and give it a review.

Our thanks to AR Media and Emily MacInnis for keeping this podcast looking and sounding joyful.

Clarkisha Kent (she/her) is a culture critic and bringer of chaos. Her new book, “Fat Off, Fat On: A Big Bitch Manifesto,” was published this year, and Clarkisha is here to talk about it, along with a foray into the connections between purity culture and fatness and how we can use The Kelli & Kat Test to determine whether a piece of media has provided the audience with thoughtful representation of fat [Black] women and/or non-men.

Clarkisha Kent is a Nigerian American writer, culture critic, former columnist, and author of “Fat Off, Fat On: A Big Bitch Manifesto.” Committed to telling inclusive stories via unique viewpoints from nigh-infancy, she is fascinated with using storytelling and cultural criticism not as a way to “overcome” or “transcend” her unique identities (as a FAT, bisexual, and disabled Black African woman), but as a way to explore them, celebrate them, affirm them, and most importantly, normalize them and make the world safe enough for people who share them to exist.

Please connect with Clarkisha on her website and IG. The Kelli & Kat Test.

Also mentioned are the books “Fearing the Black Body” and “Belly of the Beast.”

This episode’s poem is by Ha Jin and is called “A Center.”

Bonus content with Clarkisha through Apple Podcast Subscriptions and on Patreon.

Please connect with Fat Joy on our website, Instagram, and YouTube (full video episodes here!). Want to share the love? Please rate this podcast and give it a review.

Our thanks to AR Media and Emily MacInnis for keeping this podcast looking and sounding joyful.

Embodiment is one of those words that’s thrown around, but what is it really? Alexandra Shewan (she/they) takes us through what her working definition of embodiment is, how she supports clients with becoming embodied, and the essential roles that being trauma-informed and anti-oppressive should play in therapeutic practices.

Alexandra is a Registered Clinical Counsellor with a virtual/in-person counselling and consulting business, Selkie Counselling, based out of Victoria, BC on unceded lək̓ʷəŋən and W̱SÁNEĆ territories. Her approach to counselling and consulting is intersectionally feminist, collaborative, trauma-informed, and anti-oppressive. Alexandra supports clients in uprooting internalized oppression to feel more embodied and heal their relationship to themselves and others.

The video about trauma and the nervous system that Alexandra mentioned is here, and check out the Centre for Body Trust.

Please connect with Alexandra on her website and Instagram.

This episode’s poem is called “Selkie” and it’s by Rachel Plummer.

Bonus content with Alexandra through Apple Podcast Subscriptions and on Patreon.

Please connect with Fat Joy on our website, Instagram, and YouTube (full video episodes here!). Want to share the love? Please rate this podcast and give it a review.

Our thanks to AR Media and Emily MacInnis for keeping this podcast looking and sounding joyful.

Nia Patterson (they/them) went viral after taking a photo of themselves in a Torrid change room in a bathing suit. Since then, Nia has become an influencer, social media manager, singer, podcaster, and coach. In this conversation, they share their journey and also their top three tips for staying joyful while living in marginalized bodies and with marginalized identities. We also talk about fat secrets and podcast dream guests.

Nia Patterson is a well-respected Black and Queer mental health advocate, writer, artist, and business coach. They are the creator behind @TheFriendINeverWanted and the artist behind @SelfLoveToolChest. They are also the host and producer of the Body Trauma Podcast. Their work mainly centers around Social Justice, Eating Disorder Recovery, Fat Activism, LGBTQIA+, and the Self Love community. Nia is passionate about advocating for people in marginalized bodies and seeks to bring resources to those who do not readily see representation and healthcare for themselves.

Please connect with Nia through their website, IG, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.

This episode’s poem is called “Will Know Nothing” by Arisa White.

Bonus content with Nia through Apple Podcast Subscriptions and on Patreon.

Please connect with Fat Joy on our website, Instagram, and YouTube (full video episodes here!). Want to share the love? Please rate this podcast and give it a review.

Our thanks to AR Media and Emily MacInnis for keeping this podcast looking and sounding joyful.

Tamra Lamese Garland (she/her) & Jeremy C. Garland (he/him) are a mixed-size, mixed-race couple. Throughout their relationship, they’ve had to deal with racism and sizeism in surprising (not surprising) ways, such as being followed and photographed, a surly bartender who got physically threatening, and comments in airports, etc. Through it all, they continue to advocate for each other and for a more inclusive world. This episode will give you all the feels.

Tamra Lamese Garland is a certified life coach, writer, speaker, emcee, serial Entrepreneur, and fat activist. She owns and operates Dozeland Creative and Tamra Lamese Mindset and Mindfulness Coach. She volunteers on the board of the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance (NAAFA) as Social Media Director. Please connect with Tamra on IG and YouTube.

Jeremy C. Garland is a poet, creative director, and a fearless advocate for the power of love. He is co-founder and Creative Director at Dozeland Creative with Tamra. He has authored two books of poetry, “Clyde’s Song” and “My Feral Heart,” performed at the National Poetry Slam, and founded an open mic. Please connect with Jeremy on IG.

This episode’s poem is by Jeremy! You can buy “Clyde’s Song” on Amazon.

Bonus content with Tamra & Jeremy through Apple Podcast Subscriptions and on Patreon.

Please connect with Fat Joy on our website, Instagram, and YouTube (full video episodes here!). Want to share the love? Please rate this podcast and give it a review.

Our thanks to AR Media and Emily MacInnis for keeping this podcast looking and sounding joyful.