Fifteen years ago, Sara Bird introduced the concept of FATorexia — a bold exploration of how women living with obesity often experience a profound disconnect between how they see themselves and how they are perceived by the world.
At a time when conversations around obesity were dominated by weight-loss narratives and stigma, FATorexia shifted the focus toward identity, perception, and lived experience. It asked a powerful question:
What do you see when you look in the mirror — and who decided that was the truth?
The original book challenged assumptions about body image, visibility, and self-recognition long before lived-experience research became widely acknowledged in health and behavioural science.
Today, that work has evolved.
FATorexia: What Do You See When You Look in the Mirror?
Now available as an ebook. This is where the journey began — an early exploration of lived experience that continues to inform Sara’s work today.
Sara’s current doctoral research builds on the foundations first explored in FATorexia, integrating obesity science and longevity research to understand how women over 50 can sustain health span, confidence, and vitality in later life. Where FATorexia explored identity and perception,
Beyond FATorexia expands the conversation — connecting lived experience with evidence-based frameworks that support strength, resilience, and sustainable change.
This evolution reflects a journey that has been more than fifteen years in the making:
From recognising invisibility → to reclaiming identity → to redefining what it means to age well.
Women over 50 often carry decades of messaging about weight, worth, and visibility. Yet their lived experiences — especially where obesity and ageing intersect — remain underrepresented in both research and workplace strategy. Beyond FATorexia brings those experiences forward, not as problems to fix, but as insights that shape a new approach to health span, confidence, and longevity.It underpins everything Sara delivers today through Flight by Sara Bird — from corporate advisory to the F-Life intervention.
FATorexia: What Do You See When You Look in the Mirror?
Now available as an ebook. This is where the journey began — an early exploration of lived experience that continues to inform Sara’s work today.
Beyond FATorexia is not a departure from Sara’s earlier work — it is the natural evolution of it.It reflects a deepening understanding of how obesity, identity, and longevity intersect in women’s lives, and why sustainable change begins not with judgement, but with recognition.
Whether you are an organisation navigating the future of an ageing workforce or a woman ready to reconnect with your strength, Flight by Sara Bird offers a research-led path forward.
Email sara@flightbysarabird.co.uk or complete the form below