What Is Body Trust and How Do You Build It?
Body Trust is a term I use often in my work, and when I mention it to clients for the first time, I usually get some version of the same response: "I don't even know what that would feel like."
That makes complete sense. For many people who have spent years in diet culture, who have been told their body is wrong, who have experienced their body as something to be fixed, controlled, or escaped, the idea of actually trusting it feels genuinely foreign. Maybe even a little threatening.
Body Trust is not a feeling you manufacture. It's a practice, and a slow one. Let me explain where it comes from and what building it actually looks like.
Where Body Trust Comes From
Body Trust is a framework developed by Hilary Kinavey and Dana Sturtevant, a therapist and dietitian, founders of Be Nourished. It was laid out in their 2022 book Reclaiming Body Trust. It is a weight-inclusive, social-justice-informed approach to healing the relationship between people and their bodies, grounded in the understanding that body distrust is not a personal failing but a predictable outcome of living in a culture that profits from it.
I trained as a Certified Body Trust Provider because I believe this framework addresses something that most eating disorder treatment misses. It doesn't just focus on behavior around food. It goes deeper, into the lived experience of being in a body in a world that has very specific, very narrow ideas about which bodies are acceptable.
What Body Trust Is Not
Before I explain what Body Trust is, I want to clear up some common misconceptions, because they often get in the way of people engaging with work that could genuinely help them.
Body Trust is not:
Ignoring your health. Body Trust is actually deeply invested in wellbeing. It just understands that wellbeing is not the same as thinness, and that treating your body as the enemy has never made anyone healthier.
Only for people who have made peace with their body already. In fact, it is specifically designed for people who haven't. It meets you exactly where you are, including in the middle of deep body hatred.
A quick fix or a set of techniques. It is relational work that unfolds over time. It asks you to get curious about your body rather than trying to control or change it.
The same as body positivity. Body positivity asks you to feel good about your body. Body Trust asks something more fundamental: that you stop treating your body as something to be distrusted and overridden.
Why We Lose Trust in Our Bodies in the First Place
This is the part of the work I find most important to understand, because it reframes the entire conversation.
Most of us didn't start out distrusting our bodies. Babies are hungry, they cry, they eat, they stop. The trust is intact. What happens over time is that external voices, diet culture, weight stigma, medical fatphobia, family messages, social comparison, begin to override the body's internal signals. We are taught to follow external rules about what and how much to eat rather than internal cues. We are told our body's natural size and shape are wrong. We learn to see our bodies through the lens of how they appear to others rather than how they feel from the inside.
Body distrust is the result of this process. It is not innate. It was learned. And what was learned can, with time and support, be unlearned.
What Building Body Trust Actually Looks Like
Body Trust unfolds differently for every person. There is no formula or timeline. But there are some consistent threads I see in the work with my clients.
Moving from surveillance to curiosity
Most people who struggle with body image spend a significant amount of time monitoring and evaluating their body. Checking, measuring, comparing, criticizing. Body Trust work involves shifting that orientation from surveillance to curiosity. Instead of "what is wrong with my body today," the question becomes "what is my body telling me today?" It is a subtle shift and a profound one.
Learning to hear hunger and fullness again
Years of dieting, restriction, and following external food rules can significantly disrupt the ability to hear the body's hunger and fullness signals. Part of rebuilding Body Trust is the slow, patient work of relearning to hear those signals and, more importantly, learning to respond to them without judgment.
Separating worth from appearance
A core piece of Body Trust work is dismantling the belief that your value as a person is connected to the size or appearance of your body. This belief is so deeply embedded in diet culture that it often feels like objective truth rather than a cultural message. Unpacking it takes time and usually requires the kind of ongoing, supported reflection that therapy provides.
Understanding the social context
One of the things I value most about the Body Trust framework is its explicit acknowledgment that body distrust doesn't happen in a vacuum. Weight stigma is real. Medical fatphobia is real. Diet culture is a multi-billion dollar industry that profits directly from your body distrust. Body Trust work names these systems and helps people understand that the pain they carry is not just personal. It is political.
Practicing compassion for the body you have
This doesn't mean loving your body on the days when that feels impossible. It means practicing the smallest available acts of care. Feeding yourself when you're hungry. Resting when you're tired. Wearing clothes that fit the body you have now, not the body you're waiting to have. These acts of basic care, repeated over time, rebuild the relationship between you and your body.
Is Body Trust Work Right for You?
Body Trust tends to resonate deeply with people who:
Have been in diet culture for a long time and are exhausted by the cycle
Feel disconnected from or at war with their body
Have a history of binge eating, restriction, or chronic dieting
Have experienced weight stigma, medical fatphobia, or discrimination based on body size
Are ready to approach their body with curiosity rather than control
It is also particularly meaningful for people whose body distrust is connected to trauma, identity, or systems of oppression. The framework's social justice orientation makes it a good fit for people who want healing that accounts for the full context of their lives.
Ready to Start Building Trust With Your Body?
As a Certified Body Trust Provider, this framework is central to the work I do with clients at Shore Wellness Counseling. Whether we're working individually or in a group setting, Body Trust is the foundation underneath everything.
My binge eating recovery group Break the Cycle is grounded in Body Trust, Intuitive Eating, and weight-inclusive care. If you're ready to stop fighting your body and start listening to it, I'd love for you to join the waitlist.
Join the waitlist here.
Carianne D'Oriano, Licensed Professional Counselor
If you're looking for more support, reach out to book a free consultation with me!