A Physical Education: How I Escaped Diet Culture and Gained the Power of Lifting

From the most visible woman writing about weightlifting today, a "profoundly engrossing" memoir and manifesto about how lifting helped dissolve her allegiance to diet culture; taught her to be at home in her body; and led her to grow every kind of strength (Elizabeth Greenwood). In A Physical Education, Casey Johnston recounts how she ventured into the brave new world of weightlifting, leaving behind years of restrictive eating and endless cardio. Woven through the trajectory of how she rebuilt her strength and confidence is a staggering expos? of the damaging doctrine spread by diet and fitness culture. Johnston's story dives deep into her own past relationships with calorie restriction, exercise, and codependency. As she progresses on her weightlifting journey, she begins to eat to fuel her growing strength--and her food cravings vanish. Her physical progress fuels a growing understanding of how mainstream messaging she received about women's bodies was about preserving the status