Ashley Lange, LPCC

Approach to care

• What does it look like for you to provide care to patients in larger bodies? How is, or isn’t, your approach different from how you care for patients in smaller bodies? If you work with children, how is or isn’t your approach different when working with children?

  I am strongly invested in fat liberation as a philosophical and political framework. I understand fat bodies as marginalized in our society, and bring that into my work. When working with adults or children I am willing and committed to addressing this directly in how it impacts their lives and health.

• What is your perspective on how weight is or is not related to health?

  Weight can be a factor in understanding many different things about a person, but "overall healthy," "healthy," or "taking care of themselves" simply isn't one of them. Weight can indicate specific traumas or micro and macro aggressions they may have been subjected to due to their size. It might indicate ways that diet and fat phobic culture has impacted their self-worth. It can also point to treatment by other health professionals that is downright harmful. It can also offer very slight indicators about things like blood pressure or activity level, but absolutely never out of context, and never as anything more than a hundred data points of important information for a health professional to consider. For instance, I want people with fat bodies to be informed when medications may or may not work for them because all the studies were on straight sized bodies. I would also want them to know about ways to modify physical therapy treatments, or access the most effective care in other ways (bigger blood pressure cuffs, for instance!)

• Finish this sentence: “Fat people are…” 

  human beings. They are also unjustly marginalized in systemic and individual interpersonal ways.

• How do you, your clinic, and the healthcare system you work in use BMI (i.e BMI cutoffs for accessing certain services, BMI on charts and printouts, etc)? Is this flexible?

  N/A

• If a patient declines to be weighed, how do you and/or your staff proceed?

  N/A

• If a patient declines to discuss weight loss, nutrition, and/or exercise, how do you proceed?

  More than happy to accept and work any and all limits regarding these topics.

• Do you offer weight loss as a service, and if so, how much of your practice is this? What do you do if a patient requests your assistance with losing weight?

  No.

• What does the physical accessibility of your office space look like? What kinds of accommodations are present for people in larger bodies? Are there things you wish were in place that are currently not? 

  I offer telehealth only, so I can accomodate anyone with access to reliable internet and a private space to meet.

• What do you do to allow fat people to feel comfortable and welcome in your office? 

  I provide telehealth only. My only office restriction, per se, is someone cannot be actively driving a vehicle while we meet.

• If you’d like to use this space to talk about any identities (gender, race, size, sexuality, etc.) you hold and how this relates to your care, please do so. 

  I identify myself as fat, as well as bisexual. I am a white, cisgender woman who was born in the USA and had access to higher education resources.

Profile last updated August 2026