Can I Be A Plus-Sized Herbalist?

Katja writes…

Today a student sent me a question and it was so important, i asked her if i could (anonymously) share it, because i know other people are wondering this too.

She wrote:

"I wanted to ask for any advice or your thoughts on how to handle being a plus size herbalist.

I am plus sized. Though I am currently in working on a healthier life style that includes using herbs, I feel like when people see me or see that Im plus sized that they may not want to work with me or any of my products.

I feel like this is my calling I have fallen in love with herbs and how they naturally work with in the body. but I feel like this could possibly hinder me from even opening my own practice one day. I kinda feel alone in this due to most of the herbalist I see on social media are very fit and “healthy”.

Am I wrong to want to be an herbalist even though I am also going through a battle and journey with my weight?"

The bottom line is: we need you. We need plus-sized herbalists. We need everyone, no matter where you are in your journey, whether you’re small or big or short or tall or thin or fat or disabled or abled or sedentary or athletic or anything else.

And the other bottom line is that weight and health are not the same thing. I know that society has all these ideas about what is “good” and “healthy” but that doesn’t mean they’re true. You can be healthy and big! You can be healthy and small! You can be unhealthy and be small or big too!

We’re all just trying to get through our day, and we’re all in the body we’re in. You don’t have to get thin to get healthy, so let’s make our bodies healthy now, regardless of what size or shape they are. And let’s love them too because bodies are pretty amazing actually!

If you have a moment, it would help us a lot if you could subscribe, rate, & review our podcast wherever you listen. This helps others find us more easily. Thank you!!

Our theme music is “Wings” by Nicolai Heidlas.

Support the show

You can find all of our online herbalism courses at online.commonwealthherbs.com!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):


Speaker 2 (00:14):
Hi, I'm Katya and I'm here at Commonwealth
Holistic Herbalism in Boston,Massachusetts, and on the
internet everywhere. Thanks tothe power of the podcast , um,
I am just making a quickemergency pod today. Um,
actually in a little bit re'sgonna make a new episode for
you about some more of theherbs and commerce and some

(00:38):
other great stuff. But therewas something that came up
today that I felt like I justhad to talk about right away
because it's so, so important.
Um, so the disclaimer, youknow, we always, or our
reclaimer, we always do ourreclaimer. Oh, y'all know what
it says, right? I'm not adoctor, I'm an herbalist, and

(01:00):
it's not gonna matter for thisone anyway, because there's no
medical advice in this episode,and we don't give medical
advice anyway 'cause we'reherbalists. And also you're
awesome. Okay? That's the supershort version of our reclaimer.
Um, here's the issue. A studentwrote today and said, well,

(01:26):
here's what they said. Here'swhat they said. I wanted to ask
for any advice or your thoughtson how to handle being a plus
sized herbalist. I am plussized, though I'm currently
working on a healthierlifestyle that includes herbs.
I feel like when people see meor when they see that I'm plus

(01:47):
sized, they may not want towork with me or work with any
of my products. And I feel likeherbalism is my calling and I
have fallen in love with herbsand how they work naturally in
the body. But I feel like thiscould also hinder me from even
opening my own practice oneday. I kind of feel alone in
this due to most of theherbalists I see on social

(02:07):
media are very fit and quote ,healthy. Am I wrong to want to
be an herbalist even though Iam going through a battle and a
journey with my weight? We needyou. We need all of you plus
size plant lovers out there. Weneed every body to learn about

(02:32):
how to help each other with ourhealth, with plants, with
everything. We, we are all,we've got all of us, and we all
are living our lives in thebodies we've got. They may be
skinny, they may be plus size ,they may be abled or disabled.

(02:54):
They may be bodies that wereshorter than we wanted to be,
or taller than we wanted to be,or the wrong color hair. Well,
I guess that one's pretty easyto fix. But you know, like
whatever, not a single one ofus is happy with our bodies.
Nobody is. I wish I were short.
I wish I'm six feet tall. Iwish I was like five feet tall

(03:18):
and like tiny. I, I can't tellyou how much I wish this. Uh,
and everybody's like, oh, butyou must love being tall. No, I
hate being tall. So that's thefirst thing. Every one of us
doesn't love our bodies. That'snot even the first thing. The

(03:38):
first thing is being skinnydoesn't make you healthy.
Appearing to be fit doesn'tmake you healthy. Look at every
like Olympic gymnast out there,they look really fit, right?
They're skinny, they're, youknow, whatever. Most of them
have to have like jointreplacement surgeries before

(04:00):
they're 30. Simone Biles, Ithink maybe hasn't had to do
that yet, but she is, she isthe goat. It's true. She is ,
uh, pretty amazing. But like ifwe look at, or if we look at
ballet dancers, you know,whatever . My sister-in-law was
a professional ballerina, like,you know, Swan Lake and , and

(04:21):
all that stuff at a bigcompany, and she's tiny and she
looks fit. And definitely ifyou just looked at a picture of
her, she would be like, ohyeah, I always wished I looked
like that. She's not healthy.
She is like, every joint in herbody is busted. Like so much of

(04:41):
her body has borne theincredible toll of that work.
But nobody sees that when she'swalking down the street. They
just look at her and say she'shealthy. If you asked her, she
would be like, are you kiddingme? No, but we don't,
we just look at other peopleand we think, oh, that person's

(05:05):
really healthy. We don't know.
They're constipated all thetime. We don't know that
they're whatever, you know ,whatever's going on for them
because of they don't have asign, they don't wear a t-shirt
that says, I'm not actuallythat healthy. You know,
, I know I look great, but I'mnot really that healthy. We
also don't have t-shirts thatsay, you know, like, it doesn't

(05:26):
matter how much I weigh, I, Iactually am wicked healthy. I,
so I, I guess I'm just tryingto say, we have to separate
these ideas between what youlook like and whether or not
you are or ever have been orever could be healthy. We're

(05:49):
all in the bodies, we're in,we're in the bodies, we're in,
it's part of our journeythrough life, right? And so we
do whatever we can to try tomake it more comfortable. For
some people that's tattoos orpiercings. And for some people
it's how they dress or whatcolor they make their hair. Or
for some people it's going tothe gym all the time or like,

(06:11):
whatever it is, we are all justtrying to find a way to get
through every day in this life,in the body we've got, in the
world we live in, in all thosethings. And because of that, we
need herbalist in every kind ofbody. We need every kind of

(06:31):
herbalist. And so yes, thereare so many social media
influencers, influencers outthere who have like that look
it , I don't know, I don'twanna make a blanket statement
in any direction, but if I weregonna make a blanket statement,
I would say Don't trust 'em .

(06:52):
Don't trust 'em . Just bedefinitely don't trust anybody
just 'cause of how they look.
Don't ever do that. Trust 'emif their information is good,
but not because they lookhealthy. 'cause you don't know,
you don't know what's going onfor them. And on social media,
you don't even know if they'retelling the truth, you know? So

(07:15):
Maybe I should have writtendown bullet points because I
feel like this is all rant andno organization whatsoever. But
I also feel so

Speaker 3 (07:28):
Hmm ,

Speaker 2 (07:29):
Ferociously about this topic. We need big
herbalists. We need some smallherbalists too. That's great.
If you are a plus size personout there, if you are a , a big
person, if you are living lifein a larger body, if you're

(07:50):
fat, like whatever, do you notthink that other people who are
living that experience deserveto work with someone like them?
They deserve to work with anherbalist who knows what it's

(08:11):
like to be discriminatedagainst by how they look to be,
to be told, oh you way too muchto be healthy. They, they
deserve to work with somebodywho has those experiences and
can help them navigate life intheir bodies. Because it
doesn't actually matter howmuch you weigh. That's not what

(08:33):
makes you healthy or not,whatever kind of body you have,
there are ways to support thethings that you wanna do in
your life. Oh, it's true. Likeat six feet tall, I was never

(08:53):
gonna be a professional Olympicgymnast. That was never gonna
happen. Okay? There are somethings that you can't do in
your life, but as a hobby, fromtime to time, I used to love to
play on the balance beam. I didsome circus stuff. I did all
kinds, like there are thingsyou can do at the hobby level.
So I, I don't , I'm , I don'twanna say like anyone can do

(09:14):
anything. No. I mean, there,there are some limits on us,
but if you have some specifichealth goals, if you have some
specific mobility goals, itdoesn't really matter what your
weight is, you can work towardsthose things. If, and it

(09:38):
doesn't matter what your weightis about whether you're healthy
or not, skinny people are notnecessarily healthy. Lots of
skinny people are veryunhealthy. Lots of large people
are quite healthy. And so yes,we need every kind of

(10:02):
herbalist, we need largeherbalists just to remind other
people that you can be healthyin any kind of body that you've
got. So yes, please. If you areout there and you are plus

(10:23):
sized and you are thinking likethis person, like how do I
handle being an herbalist inthis body? If people see me, I
think they're not gonna wannawork with me. Oh no, we can fix
that. That's just a matter ofgetting the word out there.
That's just a matter of how wepresent you to the world. Like

(10:44):
that's business skills. We candeal with that, but we need
you, we need you as anherbalist. We need you to help
all the other people who arelike, I think I could be
healthy and I'm not getting thesupport that I need to do that
because I'm being told thatjust lose weight and that's the

(11:06):
total solution. That's not thetotal solution. Be healthy in
the body you've got . And ifyou are feeling like you are in
love with herbs and you lovelearning about them and making
herbal products and learninghow to help people with herbs,

(11:27):
please don't ever feel like,like I know it is so hard to
live in a society that thinksthat only small, skinny women
are valid , valid, and men havetheir own body issues. And then
of course, there's everythingin between too, right? So like

(11:48):
we've all been just saddledwith these ideas of what health
is and what beauty is andwhat's acceptable and valid for
your body. Your body isacceptable and valid. You're in
it, you exist. That means,Like, that means you're valid
. Like if you, if you,if it wasn't valid, it wouldn't

(12:12):
exist. I, I just like, there'sall different kinds of trees
and some of 'em grow , growkind of crooked or whatever
else. It's like, is that notvalid? Because the tree, like
I'm looking out the windowright now and there's like a
really tall street up and downtree, and then there's a tree
that's like way curvy and like,is the curvy tree not right? Is
it somehow broken? It's just asold. It's like, it's just as

(12:34):
big as the straight up and downtree. We can't all be the same.
That would be so boring. Andalso it would be so impractical
if we were all the same. Itwould be a whole lot of
problems that we couldn't solvebecause we would all just be in
this like one bandwidth, right?

(12:55):
We need all of us, we need allof us to solve the problems. We
need all of us to have all theperspectives. And so yes, there
is prejudice out there, butthat's stuff we can take care
of with business skills. That'sstuff we can take care of.

(13:16):
Like, if you're worried abouthaving an herbal business
because you are whatever sizeyou are, do not worry about
that. We can, we can handlethat and don't let it stop you
because we need you. We needall of us. And also, we don't

(13:42):
want to sound like I'm sayingthat concern is not valid. It
is valid. I have that concerntoo. I used to be a lot
skinnier when Ryn and I met, itwas 2007 and I weighed 145
pounds. I'm six feet tall.

(14:03):
That's not really enoughpounds. Now it is 2025 and I
weigh 225 pounds. Well, I'mperimenopausal and I went
through a period of prettyextreme grief that I dealt with

(14:27):
by , um, comfort food,gluten-free dairy, free comfort
food. I mean, I tried tolisten. Do you see? I have to
do that? The pressure you'refeeling is real, is what I'm
trying to say.

Speaker 3 (14:44):
I ,

Speaker 2 (14:48):
I feel it too. I feel it too. When I look at the
videos that I made when I wasyounger, and I look at the
videos that I make now, and Ithink I'm much larger now. And
I also think, what if peopledon't believe me because I got
bigger. But everybody does that. Everybody gets bigger.

(15:16):
Everybody has whatever theyhave. Our bodies, we don't even
always have control over it. Imean, I can't control how tall
I am and believe it or not,there are aspects of weight
that are very difficult tocontrol as well. Some of those
aspects were like keyed intoyour system before you were

(15:39):
even born. And some of thoseaspects were keyed into your
system before you had autonomy,like when you were a child.
It's not always something thatyou have complete control over
in terms of like the exactnumber of pounds that you
weigh. And getting really thinoften requires unhealthy

(16:04):
strategies. So I just, yes, Iit's true. It's scary to put
yourself out there when youfeel like you don't look like
whatever the social ideal is ofwhat we're supposed to look
like so that we're healthy andattractive and whatever else .

(16:29):
I don't wanna be the socialideal. I wanna be real and I
wanna help real people. Nope .
Okay. Yeah, some people are thesocial ideal. I , but most
people aren't. And I think thatwe are more in our integrity to

(16:52):
help others when we've reallygone through it ourselves,
whatever it is . I don't haveto go through exactly what
you're going through. You don'thave to go through exactly what
I'm going through for us to beable to relate to each other.
But we need to have gonethrough some things to be able
to relate to other people whohave gone through some things.

(17:23):
We need real people, realbodies, and we need everyone.
We need the diversity. We needthe full spectrum of
experiences and of life. Weneed you . So I don't know if

(17:47):
this has been a question onyour mind, if you have ever
felt like you wanted to learnthis stuff, but you didn't know
where you could go withoutbeing criticized for your body
here, right here, this is wherewhatever you, whatever you look

(18:10):
like, whatever you feel like,whatever you identify as,
whatever you, your experienceshave been. We want you, we want
you. So yes, you're right.

(18:30):
There are people out there whowill judge, you know, you're
right. 'cause you've alreadyexperienced it. You don't need
me to tell you that. You'reright, you're right. But not
everybody will. And the morethat we come together as people
who value each other, as peoplewho value real people, not fake

(18:57):
influencers, then that's themovement that we're making.
Yeah. Anyway, you're welcomehere. We want you, we want you.

(19:21):
And that's what I have to say.
So I hope this was helpful foryou. Please feel free to email
me if you have been feelingthis way and you just need
somebody to send you a hug, , you know, or if you
have questions about anything,you can email us. It's

(19:43):
[e-mail]. I wannahear from you and maybe just,
you just needed to hearsomebody say that. And if so,
then hope that this washelpful. All right . And later
today, ring's gonna make anepisode that is organized and

(20:05):
orderly and has flow and isvery rational and all that
stuff. So until then, take careof yourselves, take care of
each other, drink some tea, Andlove your body. Bye-bye.