Podcast Transcript

Renfrew Conference Mini-Series Episode 4: Our Hair, Our Heads, & Our Hearts: Hair Stories & Eating Disorder Recovery, Part 2

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INTRO

Sam: Hey, I’m Sam.

Ashley: Hi, I’m Ashley and you’re listening to All Bodies. All Foods. presented by The Renfrew Center for Eating Disorders. We want to create a space for all bodies to come together authentically and purposefully to discuss various areas that impact us on a cultural and relational level.

Sam: We believe that all bodies and all foods are welcome. We would love for you to join us on this journey. Let’s learn together.

INTRODUCTION TO THE EPISODE

Sam: Body image disturbance and body image dissatisfaction are well documented risk factors and hallmark features of most clinical eating disorders. So, of course, body image work is a crucial component in eating disorder treatment. But maybe there’s one part of our bodies that we’re not talking about enough in eating disorder treatment. Is hair the missing piece in body image work? Can hair be a way to access and explore complex inner experiences both conscious and unconscious? Can a hairstylist play an important role in the healing process? Does our hair tell a story? Well, Margo Maine and Charlie Bishop say that it absolutely does. And it’s time for us to see the connection between our hair, our heads, and our hearts. Our hair stories can reveal historical, cultural, social, spiritual, and political information about all of us. It can be a vehicle for personal transformation, a form of communication, a canvas for self-expression and even a powerful source of motivation and a reflection of progress and recovery. As mental health providers, how do we uncover these hair stories in our sessions and how do they help people heal? To find out these answers we sat down with our presenters Margo Maine and Charlie Bishop. Let’s learn more about their fascinating presentation titled, The Language of Hair: Multicultural Perspectives.

EPISODE

Sam: Hello and welcome back to All Bodies. All Foods. I’m Sam and I’m here with Ashley and our very special guest, Charlie Bishop. Charlie Bishop, MS, LMFT, is an AAMFT clinical fellow, the co-chair for the African American Eating Disorder Professional sub-committee, serves on the iaedp Alabama chapter board and the owner of a Private Practice. She is an international speaker on topics related to black culture, social equality, and body image issues. Welcome to the show, Charlie.

Charlie: Hi, good to be here.

Sam: Yesterday, we interviewed Margo Maine, and you are presenting with Margo today on the The Language of Hair: Multicultural Perspectives. We talked with Margo about a hair story in every client. Can you say more about this hair story and how do you work with clients to start this conversation?

Charlie: So, every person has a story when it comes to their hair. It’s kind of like if you think of it like a canvas or a piece of art, you’re able to display your personality, who you are, what you’re going through, through your hair. And a lot of times, especially when I’m working with clients of color, I can tell when something’s off because if you’re a client who normally keeps your hair up or normally keeps it styled and then you start to see a pattern of okay, you’re not really groomed, something’s different about you and I err on the side of being transparent and being straight to the point. So, I ask, hey, I know you normally keep your hair styled and groomed and for these last couple of sessions, maybe two sessions, I’ve noticed that something’s off. Can you tell me a little bit about that and that kind of opens up to girl, you know, I keep my hair done, you know, it. So how did you know something was wrong and that just opens up dialogue to kind of just express like, you know, maybe I was going through a depressed time or not really feeling my body right now. And so it’s a we’re able to kind of have more dialogue but, you know, just being able to be straightforward, especially if it’s something that you’ve noticed.

Sam: In mental health We’re always taught, you know, if you see something, say something where it’s, oh, I noticed your facial expression changed there or you uncross your legs and shifted. What just happened? We’re not taught to ask or notice hair. It’s a missing piece.

Ashley: But what is so interesting about that is that if you really just talk to anybody, not necessarily even in the mental health field and they’ve changed the style of their hair or maybe got a haircut or dyed it… (inaudible)

Charlie: What happened? What’s wrong?

Sam: Right. It’s not always, oh, you’re not keeping up with your hair, it’s just that your hair has changed can really mean a lot.

Charlie: And you know, you see that, and you know, I’ve had clients who have been very open about like, I appreciate you for asking that because nobody else has really noticed that my hair is different. I can mention a client that I work with, of course, not names, but I mentioned another client who came in and she would regularly change her hair to different colors, different styles, that wasn’t unusual. But what was unusual this day is that it was the color that it was because she would do like auburn and golds and things like that. And then she transformed to green. I’m like okay, this is different, and you know, we had a little conversation about it. You have to notice things like that and it’s not just about like if their face is telling a story, but what’s the hair saying.

Ashley: So, yeah, I was going to say so yesterday, one of the keynotes Christy King spoke about her experience as a young person and a young black person in a school of all white people essentially. And she talked about how she kept her hair a certain way in an effort to fit in as well. And so, I’m curious when you start having those conversations about the hair story, have you seen a shift in your clients to, to maybe that piece of acknowledgment of like, oh like, maybe I’ve kept myself, I’m using air quotes here but like under control or like in like in a certain way but really, that’s not who I am and that’s not my form of expression.

Charlie: Yes. Yes, I can speak to not a particular client, but I’ve had a couple of coworkers who have had this been in this space where I’m going to put my hair in a certain style because of what is expected of me. Interestingly enough and I’m going to talk about this during the presentation, Michelle Obama, actually spoke about her in the White House and how she was intentional about having her hair straight the entire time she was there because she said America wasn’t ready for black hair basically and trying to do different braids and different style. Like today, I have locks, you know, and I can take these locks out tomorrow and do something different. And so, it’s interesting that when we’re in a space where society says that the beauty standard is this Eurocentric appearance, which is the straight hair, or straight cut hair, long straight hair. It kind of puts the pressure on women of color to conform to that space, especially in work.

Sam: Is there more about workplace hair in the workplace in your presentation? I would love to hear more about that.

Charlie: Yes! I kind of dive deep a little bit into hair in the workplace because it’s gotten out of hand in a sense of where it’s discriminatory now. it’s always been discriminatory. But like you can get hired, not hired or fired because of your hair grooming policies. So, like there’s this, you can’t have locks, you can’t have your hair crinkly or curly or things like that. And it’s actually a law that’s being passed out, the Crown Act. Margo probably mentioned it, Margo loves the Crown Act. I love that she supports that. But it’s actually a law now that says that you can’t discriminate, you can’t, you know, do that because of someone’s hair. And I was actually speaking with a colleague before and we kind of went through this space together to where, excuse me, I was speaking with her about her transition and we kind of worked through that together of, I’ve always wore my hair straight Charlie and now I’m in a place of like, forget it. Like I want to be who I am and my hair is naturally crinkly and curly. I’m a black woman. I’m like, okay, go for it, go for it. But I mean, I can say that I’ve been, I’ve done it as well because like even my headshots, I’ve had straight hair and then this last time I did my headshots about a month ago, I said, no, I’m going to do braids and I did braids. It’s unfortunate that people of color have to go through that. There’s actually a case, a guy in Texas, not the guy that y’all talked about yesterday, to come to the workshop and you’ll see (laughter), but he’s actually suing a company because he was hired, he had been working for this company all the way up to COVID. You know, everything happened, COVID, everybody lost their jobs and then they rehired him. He was in Florida. They rehired him back after COVID in California. Perfectly fine. Okay, I’ll get up and move to California and when he got there, they seen that he had locks and told him that he had to cut those locks, or he would be fired and they rescinded his offer and now he’s suing them. The case is still pending, but it’s huge. You’ve put in all of this work with this company in Florida. The same company you get to California and they’re like, no, we don’t accept locks. How crazy is that? You know, it’s so unfortunate, but that’s what happens.

Ashley: It’s just shocking to me and I, and obviously that can be me coming from a place of privilege with that, that this is an act of discrimination, that many people deal with. I mean, your hair is part of you. It’s your expression and, it feels so personal to me and to be attacked for such a personal piece of who I am just by nature. It’s so hard.

Charlie: You know, and then, you know, just being a black woman in general is not even just hair, we discriminated against skin color, right? You know, it’s just, it’s so unfortunate and it’s so unfair that this has been the history of what life has been in America, you know, like even from the voters and when you had to guess how many bubble gum pieces was inside of this jar in order to vote, you know, like it was just, it’s been like that. But my hope is that as we continue to go through life and that we get more allyship and more people on board to say, hey, this isn’t fair in the marginalized groups, then we’ll be able to shift the system but it’s going to take everybody to work together in order to make this change happen. I think we up to like 20 something states, Margo knows for sure with the Crown Act. I’m from Alabama and Alabama is not in one of those states and I’m not surprised, I am from the south.

Ashley: I’m a Tennessee gal, I get it. I’m southern.

Charlie: It’s unfortunate that simply how your hair grows is discriminated against. I mean, disabilities, they go for anybody who has a disability and they’re not able to do certain things because of that. It’s just unfair. It’s this sense of like everybody should be accepted for who they are. Everybody has flaws, everybody has skeletons in their closet, accept them for who they are.

Sam: We talk in eating disorder treatment how important it is to understand your identity. You know, we talk about being authentic and there’s this whole layer where it doesn’t feel safe for people of color to be authentic and we talk about how it can impact body image, you know, and I’m just curious when you work with your clients and maybe they decide to be more expressive and authentic with their hair, what changes for them in their recovery?

Charlie: Confidence, confidence change. Of course, there’s still the part those different pieces about the eating disorder itself, whether no matter what type of eating disorder it is, it’s still that piece about like food but in regards to like when I’m able to start being myself and being authentically me, you see that boost of like self-esteem, self-confidence, self-value, they’re able to start putting their self first and prioritizing their appearance. Especially working with clients who like to hide or kind of like shrink in and not want to be visible, they want to be, they want to be the ones that nobody noticed. And so, when you get to the space of transforming into being authentically mean, being on a apologetically me, oh, it’s like, ok, girl, let’s walk it, let’s talk it, let’s do that.

Ashley: And how do you see those eating disorder symptoms start to dissipate maybe when that ego strength or that confidence heightened.

Charlie: Yeah. I mean, it’s still a challenge at times, you know, because you’re never fully recovered. You’re in this place of continuous work. It takes its time, you know, the more that you are in a place of being more confident about who you are, it’s like does the food piece really matter? You know, like do I have to continue to pick how many times I eat this or how many times I don’t eat that or how many calories I eat here? Does it really matter as much? Because now I’m starting to feel me, I’m starting to feel like who I am, who I was before or who I want to be in the future.

Sam: Oh Yeah, absolutely.

Ashley: Charlie, I think we are running out of time a little bit. So, I just have one more question for you. What would be like one of the, one of the biggest tools or like greatest impacts that you want to leave with the people in the workshop this weekend? What do you want people to walk away with?

Charlie: Oh, that’s a really good question. So many things I want y’all to know.

Ashley: It can be five things. It’s fine.

Charlie: I can say for women of color, black women, in particular, black women, we pay a lot of attention to our hair, whether it’s locks, weaves, a wig, our natural hair, whatever it is, we pay a lot of attention to it. We put a lot of money into it. We put a lot of time into it. And so, it’s one of those things that when you see it, know that that’s us, you know, we’re able to change our hair so many different times, we’re able to express how we feel, what we want to do, where we’ve being, it tells the biggest story of a lifetime. And so really being able to look at a black woman and, and I’m going to say this too, now don’t ask to touch it, you know, just don’t ask to touch it, it’s very offensive to say. Can I touch your hair or oh, your hair’s grown overnight like things like that. But being in the space of just being able to uplift each other, you know, regardless of the color, being able to uplift women in general and empowerment.

Ashley: That’s awesome. Thank you so much Charlie. And we hope the presentation, the workshop goes great. Thank you for being here so much.

Charlie: Thank you.

OUTRO

Ashley: Thank you for listening with us today on All Bodies. All Foods. presented by The Renfrew Center for Eating Disorders.

Sam: We’re looking forward to you joining us next time as we continue these conversations.

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