Why Hilary Duff’s “Stronger Not Smaller” Message Is More Important Than Ever

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve likely noticed we are in the era of the incredible shrinking woman and I don’t mean the 1981 Lily Tomlin movie of the same name – shout out to my fellow Gen Xers. No, in a truly toxic turn of events, we have regressed back to the early 2000s diabolical diet culture, to a time when women like Jessica Simpson and Britney Spears were called “fat” with reckless abandon, when Nicole Richie was Paris Hilton’s “chubby” sidekick – until, of course, she wasn’t and she and Lindsay Lohan were dubbed the “Skeletwins” after both losing a concerningly significant amount of weight, and when being skinny was the ultimate goal. Now, more than two decades later, after years of “body positivity” we find ourselves right back in this dystopian diet hellscape and cacophony of calorie counting where thin is, once again, in. 

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The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists reports that strength training has long-term benefits for women in perimenopause, menopause, and beyond including reducing the risk of age-related cognitive decline like Alzheimer’s Disease, lowering risk of certain cancers, and increased mobility just to name a few. 

On the flipside, the dangers and detriments of undereating or disordered eating are just as prolific. The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, or CAMH, Canada’s largest mental health and teaching hospital reports they include bone thinning, brittle bones, low blood pressure, heart damage, brain damage, infertility, gastrointestinal issues and multiorgan failure among others. The Acute Center for Eating Disorders and Severe Malnutrition reports the impacts of food restriction include neurological complications like brain fog and brain atrophy, musculoskeletal complications like osteopenia and osteoporosis, and cardiovascular complications like hypertension or catastrophic arrhythmias.