The Role of a Lifetime
Actor Kate Huffman is Helping Others Through Body Positivity Coaching
Writer / Lynda Hedberg Thies
Photography Provided
Kate Huffman recalls vividly from a young age that she wanted to be an actress, and she also vividly remembers an incident in grade school that impacted her self-image. The award-winning actor and writer has held many acting roles on popular shows like “Fresh Off the Boat” and “Castle.” Among the many awards and accolades she has achieved in her career, perhaps the longest-running role Huffman portrayed was projecting the image that everything was OK.
The image-conscious acting industry caused her to keep her decades-long eating disorder and body dysmorphic disorder offstage, until one day she found Clementine eating disorder treatment program for adolescents in Atlanta.
Huffman created a one-woman show around her health issues, bringing her personal and professional worlds together. This created space for healing to occur, and a new career that allowed Huffman to be her authentic self. She tested out the concept in Los Angeles in front of close friends, then friends of friends, and that is when the concept gained traction.
The response inspired her to take her one-woman show on the road across the U.S. and in Europe. The solo show, titled “I’M TOO FAT FOR THIS SHOW,” dealt with her 20 years of eating disorders, obsessive compulsive-disorder and chronic pain. The show received much acclaim.
“This was literally the most terrifying thing I have ever done,” Huffman says. “Once I put that out in the world and I wasn’t rejected, but rather I was accepted and thanked, met with audience member after audience member thanking me with tears streaming down their faces and telling me their story – that is when I realized that my experience was not unique and it inspired me to seek answers to these issues.”
After her last show in Los Angeles in the fall of 2019, she spent time writing a book and preparing to do a book tour in theaters. She was planning to resume her tour in the spring when COVID-19 hit. Huffman found herself sitting around in her apartment, with her gym closed and the refrigerator too close. That is when she saw an opportunity to walk the walk and focus on healing her body dysmorphic disorder.
“I felt this need, because I was going around the country, talking about these eating disorders and body dysmorphic issues, and I was making jokes about the saying, ‘Do as I say, not as I do,’” Huffman says. “The reality was that I was still actively living in that world of obsessive calorie counting, working out and not loving my body at all.”
The first concept was to acknowledge that many images pushed on society in media and on TV regarding body ideals are lies.
“I have always known that, but still felt like I should live by them,” Huffman says.
That is when she realized it was easy to tell others that these messages are lies, but harder to tell herself. She needed to acknowledge that they are lies for her too, and let them go. This thought caused another pivot that would lead her to question all of the old stories.
Huffman wasted no time jumping in for, as she describes, “some deep soul diving and making real progress in that area.” She completed a certification program to become a body positivity coach, with the intention to speak more intelligently on tour and perhaps speak on college campuses. With COVID delaying that plan, she was about to see how it was going to come together.
Huffman became quarantine-weary and old thought patterns of body hatred arose.
“That is when I realized if I was feeling that way, it was probably happening that way for a lot of other people as well,” she says. “In my social media groups, I just asked if anyone would like some body-acceptance classes and the interest was strong, the response was immediate, and I began teaching a lot of classes.”
The classes were so popular that Huffman launched an online community to collaborate, provide support and continue more free trainings. The demand for the workshops gained so much traction that she now offers two courses – a free, short introduction course and a signature course for those ready to dive a little deeper.
The signature course, called the Body Confidence Solution, is a comprehensive, nine-week program packed with tools and information that can be completed at the participant’s own pace. Huffman encourages people to go through it with an accountability partner, completing one lesson per week. The program offers a private community with current and former students, plus two personal coaching sessions with Huffman.
It seems that Huffman may be ahead of the trend of publicly addressing the issue in Hollywood. A People magazine issue published in May of this year included a health article titled “30 Stars Who Battled Eating Disorders – and Came Out Stronger.”
The greatest insight she has gained is just how much mental, physical and spiritual energy is lost to something that is ultimately unimportant, but that can last a long time if not addressed.
Now Huffman is truly living in alignment with her purpose, which allows her to play the role of a lifetime and authentically help others do the same.
For more information on Huffman’s coaching programs and services, check out katehuffman.com.
