LU 016: Dr. Maria Paredes – Reframing and healing your relationship with your body.

Download Episode! Hello, dear body acceptance radicals! In today's episode of the "Life. Unrestricted." podcast, I’m talking to Dr. Maria Paredes from Greensboro, North Carolina. She is a Licensed Professional Counselor and Certified Eating Disorders Specialist who describes herself as a five-star listener, heart healer, courage instiller, lover of ALL bodies, self-compassion coach, voice amplifier, companion to those in pain and a believer in hope. She holds a Bachelor degree in psychology, a Masters degree in school counseling, as well a a doctoral degree in counseling and counselor education. She helps people who are stuck in the diet-binge-cycle as well as those who want to feel more comfortable in their own skin, make peace with food and with their bodies. She offers individual and group counseling, clinical supervision, workshops, and talks at schools, workplaces and different communities. Listen to Maria tell us: – How she grew up without constant diet-talk, weight-obsessing or body-shaming – What made her get into her field of work – How she helps her clients with different therapy methods like Dialectic Behavioral Therapy (DBT), Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Relational-Cultural Therapy (RCT) – Why she doesn’t demonize any behaviors around food and how she finds out what the behavior represents – How she lets people re-relate to behaviors like binge-eating – Why she is against "forcing" people to let go of their coping mechanism and what she does instead – How she helps parents not to pass on the difficult relationship they have to food and body to their children – What she says about her "butt" when she looks in the mirror (hint: it’s gooooood!) – How we can utilized Social Media to our benefit when it comes to un-learn toxic ideas about weight, body, food and shape – Why she fully supports the Health At Every Size (HAES) principles and Intuitive Eating – How she introduces these concepts to her clients – How she helps overcome their internalized shame and fat-phobic beliefs – What helped her become aware of the weight- and fat-stigma in our world – How she helps her clients educate themselves about diet-culture and the capitalistic machinery behind it, and how this helps us stepping out of old beliefs – Why she thinks the path to real body and food liberation are MUCH harder to do than going along with the mainstream dogma and constant dieting – How she started to appreciate her own body – Why we will always be stuck in a weight-obsessed mentality (and spend precious amounts of energy and time trying to "fix" our bodies) unless we address internalized fat-phobia – Why it is so important to surround ourselves with people and images of people of all shapes and sizes to end our inner fat-phobic beliefs – What makes the HAES movement so incredibly beautiful, warm and welcoming... ... And so much more! If you are interested in working with Dr. Maria Paredes or finding out more about what she does, check out her website: http://www.threebirdscounseling.com Also, check out her Facebook site called "Body Politics with Dr. Paredes": https://m.facebook.com/BodyPoliticsWithDrParedes/?__mref=message_bubble   ********* Don't forget!********* Make sure to join my tribe and meet some of the most supportive, loving and kind people of all shapes and sizes, including great coaches and leaders! We’re right over here at: http://www.lifeunrestricted.org/join Podcasting is expensive, more so than I thought. So if you enjoy and love my podcast, please consider supporting it by becoming a "Patreon"! It would greatly help me to keep those episodes coming to you. Thanks! https://www.patreon.com/lifeunrestricted Please: Do subscribe on iTunes (Apple): https://itunes.apple.com/ch/podcast/life.-unrestricted.-podcast/id1130713233?mt=2 or on Stitcher (Android): http://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=93987&refid;=stpr http://www.lifeunrestricted.org/join