Challenging Body Image Norms in Climbing with Sunni Ford from Fat Senders

Sunni Ford is the director of Fat Senders, a climbing group focused on inclusivity for all body types within the climbing community. Sunni shares their journey into climbing, the challenges they've faced because of misconceptions about their capabilities, and the positive impact of creating a supportive environment through Fat Senders. They discuss the importance of navigating assumptions and stereotypes in climbing, the need for more inclusive spaces, and their experiences within the trad climbing community. 

Chapters:

00:00
Introduction to Climbing and Personal Journey

02:48
The Positive Impact of Fatsenders

06:10
Navigating Assumptions and Stereotypes in Climbing

09:08
Creating Inclusive Climbing Spaces

12:05
Experiences in Trad Climbing

15:00
Future Goals and Aspirations for Fatsenders

17:49
Reflections on Competition and Community

21:08
Advice for New Climbers 

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About your host:

Mel Reeve is an experienced writer, casual climber and enthusiast, bringing her knowledge and passion to the podcast. With a background in writing, copywriting and content creation, Mel is dedicated to sharing the diverse stories and perspectives that shape the climbing community.

Transcript

Welcome to the podcast, Sunni. Thank you so much for joining us today. Could you introduce yourself for the audience and tell us a little bit about yourself and your climbing?

Hi, I'm Sunni (they/them). I'm the director of Fat Senders. It's a climbing group based out of Salt Lake City, Utah in the United States. I've been climbing since I was about 13. And yeah, that's me. Awesome. And 13, that's quite a long time. So I've only been climbing like a year myself. And I know obviously for a lot of people it varies massively.

Is it something that you've always loved? How did you kind of come to find it? What was that journey like? It was right across from my dance studio. So I decided to try climbing and I was super freaked out about it, but I also really liked it. I didn't start climbing super consistently until I was about 15 years old and now I'm 26. So I've been climbing a while, but yeah, that's basically how I started. Amazing.

You said dance studio, so did you find there were kind of similarities with dancing climbing? there, you know, things that you enjoyed in both of those sports? Yeah, I really liked the just like time to decompress on the wall and have my mind go blank. It was very similar to dance, but there was as I got older and dance, I started to see like the more toxic side of dancing, which climbing actually has a lot of similarities in that way too. But it was a lot nicer and more welcoming than dancing at the time. 

And you mentioned the kind of toxic side of climbing. That may be a good point to think about the positive work that you do with that sender. So could you tell us a bit about that project and what it means? 

Yeah. So we started in 2023 in June. I was honestly really struggling with my body at the time. My body had changed a lot. partially just getting older. Also, I left like a lot of manual labor jobs and went into an office job in 2022. So everything had just changed for me and the community wasn't always like super accepting. And there's a lot of like unintentional harm done, I think in the community, just talking about, you know, like cutting to climb stronger or.

know, like, yeah, skipping a lot of meals tends to be a pretty frequent topic of conversation, at least here. And I was talking to my partner and I was like, wouldn't it be so cool if I like had a group that I didn't have to think about stuff like that while I was climbing? And yeah, I think we've achieved that. It's obviously not always perfect, but it's been good. Yeah, that sounds like a very powerful space because

I know for myself that climbing and the community that comes with climbing is amazing, but like you say, there are often these kind of underlying toxic perspectives or internal negative self-talk that people do that still impacts the people around them. So what is it like to climb in a space that, as you say, is more focused on being welcoming and positive in those regards? It's awesome. It's super affirming and just

I feel like I can push myself more when people aren't just looking at me and assuming my skill level or telling me that I can't do something. It's a lot easier to try hard and have fun. Yeah. And sorry if you can hear the ice cream van. I live in Scotland. It's just like a background noise for me, but it's always quite surprising for other people. What are those assumptions that are made, if you don't mind me asking? Because I know

(04:43.0)

for myself, the experiences I have with people making assumptions about my climbing, but I'm curious what kind of experiences you have in that regard. Yeah, a lot of it honestly comes in like really backhanded compliments of like, I wasn't expecting you to climb that hard or know that much or, you know, on the more aggressive side, assuming that I'm incompetent or that I need to be like taught how to belay or...

how to set up an anchor or something like that at the crag, which is a lot less frequent, but definitely a thing that's happened. Yeah. And how do you deal with that when it does happen? Obviously that's great to hear it's happening less, but how would you cope when that does happen? To be honest, I've gotten better at handling situations like that. I used to kind of just brush it off and be like, whatever, and just kind of move spaces. And now I'm more in the space of like, why would you...

assume that I didn't know, why would you ask me that? Do you think that that was a compliment? More like kind of asking people like, what do you mean by that? And I think that's something that has changed as I get like a little bit more confident in myself and my abilities climbing. Yeah. And what impact do you think it has? Because so for a bit of context, I'm really lucky I climb with a really great women's group pretty much every week.

And I feel like it really changes the space for me to be in what is kind of typically quite a male dominated environment and to be like with a group of women taking up space. So I'm curious in a similar vein, what it's like to be like with the group, whether that's at the crag or at an indoor gym, wherever you guys are climbing. What does that kind of impact? How does that kind of impact the space that you're in and how you feel about it?

(06:41.804)

You know...

(06:45.91)

I think kind of like echoing just a lot of like what I've said before, it just changes the tone of everything to be pretty positive. I also feel like when you're in a group of people, people don't tend to question your authority as much. And people just kind of leave us alone, which is really nice. It's not, I don't know, I don't feel like as like threatened or like unwelcome when we're there in a group.

and taking up space. So yeah, I guess that's it. Yeah, I that makes a lot of sense. I think that's a great point there about the fact that it's like maybe not even a totally active thing. It's just like you're being left alone to do what you want to do. And you don't have to worry about having like a negative experience because you have that kind of like group safety. And they think, yeah, there's lots of different people who I can imagine will relate to that experience, particularly in climbing spaces. I'm curious because

I think a lot about this and like, I don't know if we will discover the answer to this right now, but maybe just something to think about and talk about. I find it really hard when I'm in climbing spaces and I feel like visibly different because I'm like taller or bigger than other people climbing, whatever it might be. What do you think climbing gyms, people in climbing spaces can do to make people feel more comfortable in those environments?

(08:12.942)

That's such a hard one. totally. If you don't have an answer, that's fine. Like I'm not asking you to fix it. I'm just, guess, curious what you think. What makes it, what makes that better for you if you have any experience of that happening? Yeah, I think having like an open line of communication with like the gym or like local organizations, I think that that's a really good first step. Obviously you can't police everything that everyone says or how everyone acts, you know.

But just having the backing of those spaces that can be controlled, I think is really important. And also just pushing a cultural shift of climbing to not just be this super aggro, intense sport. And it can be something that people enjoy recreationally, and that can be just fine. I think...

A lot of climbing brands tend to only push the side of climbing that's like the most intense. And I think that that could definitely be a way to bring down that like kind of almost like, I don't want to say like pretentiousness, but that like kind of unwelcoming environment that happens sometimes. think that's such a great point because you're right. There's like a very specific image of what our climber looks like, which is obviously like the whole point of the name of this podcast. But you know,

deconstructing that is a big part of how we make the space more inclusive. And I think particularly for those people who are maybe just used to seeing themselves in branded images of climbing yeah, it is so important to make sure that that's actually representing a much more diverse group, not just because it's the right thing to do, which it is, but also it does change the experience that you have in those spaces. Yeah, I think that's such a great point. And what kind of feedback do you get from the people that come along to the Fatsenders group?

What stories do you hear from people about the experiences that they're having?

(10:12.494)

I've heard quite a bit. I've heard like it's been life changing to have a group of people that aren't like focused on weight loss and focused on consistently like pushing grades and stuff like that. like similar to what I said before, just having a space to just be yourself and climb as hard as you want to, or as not hard as you want to, but.

yeah, I think a lot of that same sentiment of just feeling like you don't have to change in order to be a climber. love that. I feel like that's such a great summary of what it should be about. Like climbing isn't about becoming something else for the sake of climbing. It's like you're going climbing. I think that's a great way to summarize it. Yeah. I love that.

Awesome. And what do you like to do? What's your favorite kind of climbing? Do you have favorite places that you like to go? I do a little bit of everything. I love trad climbing. I think it's very scary still. I sport climb primarily in like big cottonwood and in Salt Lake. And I also end up bouldering a lot just because it's the most accessible.

You don't need a partner. yeah, I was to someone for a different episode of this podcast where we both described ourselves as like reluctant boulders because we love it, but it's maybe not our first choice, but it's the easiest one to do. often, that's the first choice. That's awesome to hear that you love trad climbing I personally have never been trad climbing, but I really want to go. Like it just seems super cool. But what is it about trad climbing specifically that you enjoy and get that kind of

excitement and joy from. I think it's a bit more methodical. It's also scary and my brain is quiet. So scary. I'm like, I'm a pretty mellow trad climber, but I'm still always scared. I'll probably always be scared of climbing. I mean, I feel like if we weren't scared, would we get what we want from it in the same way? You know, like if it wasn't scary, would it give me anything? I don't know if it would.

(12:34.102)

I don't know if it would for me either. Yeah. Yeah. And with trad Climbing, again, not a trad Climber, but I'm curious, do you feel, is there like, I don't know, a different kind of community within the trad Climbing community where you are? Like, does it feel different? Does it feel more inclusive? I guess I'm just saying that because the trad Climbers that I know are all like really mellow, really cool, but that might be personal bias. It depends. So...

Growing up kind of like the only way that I could learn how to trad climb until I started working in the gym. didn't start working in a gym until I was 18, but it was like the old like hard-o dance that were maybe a little bit creepy. And I had like a really good mentor. She was great, but she didn't really trad climb much. So that was like the only way that I could get into it then.

I think now it feels really different. It feels like something... Most of my friends at Trad Climb are there to like have fun and just go on an adventure. And it does feel more inclusive, but I don't want to like speak for the entire community as a whole, because there is still, you know, the fringes of it that are kind of intense. Yeah, I think that's an interesting point. And you've raised there about how it's changed. And as someone who's like,

relatively new to the climbing community. I've definitely heard people talking about that shift. And yeah, it's really interesting to see from what you've said there about how that has happened for you as well. And I guess there is something specifically about trad climbing where you do need that mentorship. Obviously you can take lessons, I guess, the same as you would in any other kind of type of climbing. But I imagine to do it regularly, you do need to have a kind of mentorship relationship with someone. Definitely. Yeah.

Awesome. And what are you kind of looking to do with the fat senders Project in future? Just kind of more of the same events that you do now? Do you have any kind of specific plans? Yeah, I'm hoping to take my single-pitcher-scripter exam like within the next year. I'm hoping to do more like low-cost skillshares, free skillshares, and just a little bit less group meetups just because...

(15:00.078)

A lot of us end up climbing together all the time anyway. But yeah, it's interesting. Things have changed a little bit this year. We've had like pretty low turnout. And I think some of that is like, I don't know, maybe partially due to a little bit of a culture shift. I feel like at least here, things are kind of starting to go back to how they were like the earlier 2000s. Just like.

everybody being on Ozempic and everybody losing weight and everybody wanting to be small and that's kind of resurfacing again. And I wonder if that correlates, but it looks like it does. Yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense, I think, because I feel like we've obviously gone through like culturally in very board strokes, like this big kind of body positivity and body acceptance movement. then now things do seem to be shifting back around to it being much more acceptable to like aspire.

a specific body type and I see a lot less, I guess, open criticism of that approach and particularly within climbing. Obviously that's a mindset that is often promoted anyway, so that would make sense. can totally see that. And I do feel like with climbing, you know, I...

When we first started fat senders, it was really interesting because a lot of the people that we had come up to the table, you know, were very small by maybe regular standards were very, very small. And they were like, I just feel bigger than all of my climbing friends. And I'm like, that's, you know, it's not quite our goal because we do want to help people that are like actually existing in bigger bodies. Even though everyone is allowed our meetups.

it's not quite our goal, but it is something that I've felt in the climbing community as well. Cause I've been a whole range of sizes and I've always felt too big to climb, even when I was what you would consider like fairly thin. So I do feel like it's kind of always been like that with climbing. It's like so, so intense. Yeah, definitely. And I feel like there is so much positive talk from people like doing the work like yourself and like.

(17:20.533)

even like athletes like I know, yeah, Janja Garnbrett's done some really amazing work around like speaking about eating disorders and that kind of thing, which is really important. But like, yeah, there still just does seem to be this like fundamental wrongness in the world of climbing where like you can be the best climber that you can be, but if your body looks a certain way, people are going to make a judgment. And it is just, it's just so sad to me because it's such a wonderful thing. Yeah. I didn't really have a point beyond that, but yeah, just it sucks.

No, it is sad. competed. I actually just had surgery two weeks ago, but I competed a week before that. And it was really interesting. I've been so in my bubble that I'm like, is like positive and nice and everyone that's like friends with me, whether they're fat or thin is like very accepting and kind. And I went and I competed and the people were great. They were nice, but

It was interesting just like hearing the way that people talk about themselves, even when they're climbing at like a very elite level. then, yeah, it was interesting. It is sad. Yeah. And how was the competition not to like shift away from that? that's a great point you made there, but yeah, that sounds so exciting. it was great. So they had a pretty low level, like number of non-binary athletes in the open category. and I.

probably climbed like two grades under the open category, but I really wanted it to run. And so I talked to the GM. I was like, hey, I'm not going to win this thing, but I will compete. So I was exhausted. That's like harder than I've climbed or even tried to climb in so long, but it was great. was super positive and you know, there were definitely low points.

It did take me back to some of my previous climbing mentality of like, why am I not this strong anymore? But it was also great. So that sounds like such a powerful experience to be doing something, obviously for the joy of climbing, but also to make sure that you're making space for people. And that like, I can't imagine. feel like in a way, and during competition, you like, as you say, feel like you're not going to win, that's like in a way harder than

(19:42.424)

going in with the intention to win, I could imagine. Yeah. And I knew like the top four people in that category like very much deserve to compete for money. And I was like, all right, if I have to embarrass myself in front of people, then that's fine. I'm sure lots of people watching that were very excited and I feel like sometimes doing things that feel embarrassing are the most powerful too.

Sometimes, I mean, not always sometimes you're just like, that's so silly, but that sounds like a very important moment, even if it felt like uncomfortable. Amazing. And I mean, you don't have to talk about this if you don't want to, but I hope you're, surgery went okay and you're doing all right. Yeah, I'm like really ready to be back climbing. Yeah. This will be, I think, probably the longest time that I haven't climbed like at all.

Not two weeks. I can't climb for like six weeks, up to three months. So we'll see. That'll suck. Yeah. What are you doing instead to keep yourself happy? I'll be mostly biking and skiing, which is, will be great. I'm ski instructing this year. So. cool. I've never skied, but it looks awesome. It's very fun. Yeah. A lot easier than climbing. really? Okay. Maybe I should get to skiing.

Yeah, you're just going to go downhill. You don't have to lift yourself up. It's great. Okay. Yeah, I definitely need to give that a try. And I guess maybe this is not a great question to ask in the short term, but what kind of goals do you have for your climbing? Maybe thinking more longer time, obviously, given that you're having this break.

I...

(21:33.644)

I would like to be comfortable climbing a little bit harder than I have been, you know, last like year and a half. I think just for like, you know, comfortability and especially guiding, it's just a little bit easier sometimes to be climbing a little bit harder than the grades that you're guiding at. And I already obviously climbed like a little bit harder, but it'd be nice to be far outside that zone. So yeah, just stepping it up.

a a notch. Awesome. And can you tell us a bit more about your guiding? What kinds of things you do? So I can't guide by myself yet because I haven't taken my exam, but I have taken my course. So I've gotten to do some like intro to anchor building as the second guide. I did a self-rescue clinic, which was great. Most things that I do, like I'm not

My goal is not to be a commercial guide by any means. I pretty much only do like affinity group guiding stuff. I actually work for Flash Foxy. So. nice. I follow them on Instagram and they were seem like they're doing the coolest stuff like just super awesome. It's been a while, but when they need me, I'm there. Awesome. And you mentioned this earlier actually, and I kind of missed the opportunity to pick up on it. So maybe you just bring it up now. But you talked about kind of

wanting to not so much do the group work with fat senders but to be doing those kind of like workshops and I guess like kind of teaching and stuff. Could you maybe share a bit about why that's important to you? Yeah, I think partially just because like the demand that we've seen for those things is so much higher than just the group meetups. I think people want to learn and they want to feel safe in a space that might be geared towards beginners.

I also think that people have a lot of imposter syndrome and will always feel more comfortable in those spaces, even if they're not beginners. So yeah. then doing a little bit more like online education as well, which we really need to start doing just cause it's accessible, even if people aren't comfortable being in such a big social setting. but yeah, that's kind of why we're starting to go.

(24:01.228)

more that way. you have like specific things that you're looking to create for the kind of online side of things? I think we're going to do an updated harness review. We've been working on a harness with Black Diamond. kind of bringing to light a lot more of the stuff that we do behind the scenes and making sure that people know that like there is gear available. And like we talked about before, that has declined a little bit.

just with the trend cycle, unfortunately. But yeah, just making sure that people know what's there and what's actually good and well-fitted. Awesome. And do you have any kind of thoughts or advice for anyone listening who maybe isn't able to physically attend any of your sessions, but is feeling inspired to engage more with climbing, whether that's just, I don't know, going to the bouldering gym for the first time or...

maybe something bigger like getting into a different style of climbing or something like that.

(25:08.706)

I think my first piece of advice would be to just keep an eye on what is available wherever you might be. If there is any groups similar or if you're interested in starting a group that's similar, that's always a possibility too. And just remembering that there are a lot of other people like you climbing or maybe even a few and it's still worth it to climb even if you don't.

you know, maybe like look or feel like you belong in the climbing community. And also just to have fun and not take the grades too seriously. Yeah, that is great advice. think it's I feel like it's very easy to kind of subtly get sucked in when you're going regularly to this idea of what you should be doing, how you should look. And it is so important, like you say, to remember, like it's about having fun. It's about doing something you enjoy and get benefit from rather than, you know, having to aspire to anyone else's idea of what a climber should be.

So yeah, that's definitely great advice. Awesome. If people want to find more of your work and FATsenders, where should they look you up? Yeah, we're Fat_senders on Instagram and TikTok and FATsenders.org is our website. Awesome. Well, thank you so much for such a great conversation. It was really wonderful to hear more about the work that you do. And yeah, thanks for coming on. Awesome. Thank you, Mel. No problem. Right.

Turn off the recording.