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If you are a regular reader, you know about the 5 Questions With… series where we learn a bit about experts in the field. Previous interviewees include Dr. Lesley Williams, Mikey Mercedes, Aaron Flores, Dr. Gregory Dodell, Lisa Du Breuil, Dr. Asher Larmie, members of Medical Students for Size Inclusivity, Chrissy King, Jessica Jones, Leslie Jordan Garcia, and Dr. Mara Gordon.
Today I am honored to bring you five questions with the incredible Dr. Whitney Trotter!
1. Tell us a bit about yourself and your work
My name is Whitney Trotter and I am a Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner and registered dietician. I am primarily working in outpatient psych right now. I do a lot of medication management in terms of various psychiatric illnesses. I've specialized in eating disorders, trauma-informed and weight inclusive care for over a decade at this point.
Angela Goens and I started the BIPOC Eating Disorders Conference four years ago. So I'm really, really excited and really passionate about that project we've been able to do together.
2. How did you learn about the concept of weight inclusive, body affirming care?
I have to give credit to Veronica Garnet, Kimmie Singh, Chevese Turner, and you. I think as somebody who lives in a larger body but not a fat body, there was just a lot of nuances in terms of what is care, what it should it look like, and my role and responsibility as somebody who, again, is Black but lives in a size privileged body. So I have to give the credit to each of you for really being the foundation and the instrument in my learning and unlearning.
3. How have you and how do you apply those concepts to your work?
We really live in the age of GLP-1 craze and weight loss. And I ironically deal with it more now as a Psych NP than I did as an RD. I think I was able to own and operate my nutrition practice in a way that I didn't have to compete with the weight loss industry. People who were getting referred to me really knew my ethos. They knew that I did weight inclusive care, that I didn't believe in intentional weight loss and restriction. The psychiatry role is so different. I mean, there is such a push for if you have antipsychotic induced weight gain, you must address it. You must get BMI, you must get measurements, you must start metformin. And I have a lot of these conversations daily of what is my role and responsibility when I'm inducing metabolic syndrome or somebody is stable from a mental health standpoint, but is now wanting to go off their medication because they have gained weight. I am really big on connecting people to community and having those conversations and really trying to flesh out, okay, what does mental stability look like for you in a very culturally competent trauma-informed way? And how can we have these conversations about how you feel about your body and the context of your overall mental health and wellbeing.
I have literally had people stable on weight neutral anti-psychotics, and I've had insurance come back and deny and they will you need to do another drug. So, it is a really hard conversation to have and to fight and to write insurance letters and say, Hey, not only is this person stable, they haven't been in the hospital, they haven't had a manic episode, you want me to risk the disruption of their care because the drug is cheaper. So it's a really hard conversation because I believe in doing my due diligence and always talking about risk benefits and side effects. And when you say this has the side effect of weight gain, nine times out of 10 people are not going to want to make that switch. And so it really is having that conversation. And it's hard, it's challenging, but I think we have to, as prescribers, we have to do that. We have to give consent at all levels.
4. What's one thing that you wish people who are still working from a weight focused paradigm could learn or know
I think we don't talk enough about the effect of weight discrimination and stigma. And I think people in the weight centric paradigm don't know how to have those conversations because now what we're seeing is people who want to be trauma-informed and do weight loss and it's very socially acceptable. And I think they're still missing the harm that can come from that. I think people don't understand what weight inclusive care is. They think it's just this hands-off approach and it's like, no, we're saying don't deny somebody their right to exist and thrive independent of what their body size is. Or that if they don't have weight loss goals, it's not that they're not compliant, they can have a different goal and trajectory of their own care. I wish that we would have that conversation more, and I wish that those of us that have been practicing from a weight inclusive perspective would be willing to have those conversations more. Because sometimes we just get tired and fed up, and I had to learn in my new role in psych that a lot of people don't even know what weight inclusive care is. Most of the Nurse Practitioners and Psychiatrists have never heard of it. They don't know what weight stigma is, but they're now finally starting to understand weight inclusive care and the effects of discrimination when it comes to weight.
5. Where do we find you and your work?
So if you are a clinician and you want supervision consultation, my website is
My Instagram is whitneytrotter.rd
The BIPOC Eating Disorders Conference has our own Instagram at BIPOC.eatingdisorders
And our own website
One of the things that we really prioritize our conference on is we are trans-affirming and weight inclusive, and I love that we are unapologetic about that in the ED field, I'm really, really proud of all the things I've done. I'm really proud of our community and grassroots effort for the conference.
[Ragen’s Edit – you can still become a sponsor!]
Bonus question 1: Do you mind telling us a little bit more about the conference?
This year will be the first year that will be in person and virtual, and we are so excited. I think all of us are just craving community connection and so we are starting to really go through the proposal, sponsorships, and getting a fantastic lineup. As we have the past few years, we'll be at the Houston Food Bank. The first night will be networking and a way to give back and anybody is welcome, anybody can attend. What I do love about our conference is each speaker identifies as BIPOC. I've been in the field over a decade and I can remember going to conferences and I was literally the only Black person there. And so I love that we have Indigenous people, we have Latino people, trans fat, Black, API. And so it's been really amazing. Last year we had somebody who is a Black Jewish scholar. We had a Palestinian EDRD, we had San Chang, who's incredible. I'm really proud of the conversations and the presentations that we have.
Bonus Question 2: Anything else you'd like to say?
I hope people sign up for the conference please! It's a community grassroots effort supported by people attending, sponsoring, donating. I hope people will come and attend and if they can't come in person, we have the virtual option as well.
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*Note on language: I use “fat” as a neutral descriptor as used by the fat activist community, I use “ob*se” and “overw*ight” to acknowledge that these are terms that were created to medicalize and pathologize fat bodies, with roots in racism and specifically anti-Blackness. Please read Sabrina Strings’ Fearing the Black Body – the Racial Origins of Fat Phobia and Da’Shaun Harrison’
Really appreciate this interview, and your time, Dr. Trotter!
The weight stigma alongside weight-increasing medication use is so real. As a (currently untreated) chronic pain patient, I have been recommended some medications that are known to cause weight gain. I spent years with an undiagnosed spinal cord injury because my weight was blamed by everyone I asked for help. Once I finally got the imaging and subsequent diagnosis, they wanted to put me on medication that would increase my weight. I have always refused, and have been very open about the fact that I am not willing to increase the stigma and discrimination I get for a chance at slightly less pain for a little while. Providers have never accepted my reasoning, which I think is fascinating (and infuriating), especially when they learned in the same conversation that my diagnosis was delayed by many years because my weight was blamed for my symptoms and no one would order imaging.
The conspiracy theorist in me is very worried about the push to cheaper psychiatric medications that are not weight-neutral, in this new age of GLP1's. Insurance companies are willing to risk patients' health and stability to force med changes to less effective meds that cause weight gain, which increases the stigma and stress patients experience, but wait, don't worry, we've got these GLP1's to help with that, too!
Things are getting very scary for fat folks.
This is the FIRST TIME EVER that I have heard a medical professional SAY OUT LOUD that anti-psychotic weight gain is A THING. I have been told repeatedly that the weight i gained after 25 years of being medicated for a (bipolar disorder) misdiagnosis was all my fault. That psych meds don't do that.