In our culture, we are bombarded by daily images of perfect models on magazine covers and
overly-thin actresses on TV and overwhelmed by stressful living. External success is valued over
authentic happiness, and industries get fat financially as a result. It's no wonder we are seeing the
biggest rise in the most insidious causes of death today.
On the one hand, we have an obesity epidemic. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about one-third of U.S. adults (33.8 percent) are obese. Approximately 17 percent (or 12.5 million) of children and adolescents aged 2 to 19 are obese. An estimated 300,000 deaths per year may be attributable to obesity.
On the other hand, we have an eating disorder crisis. An estimated 24 million people of all ages
suffer from anorexia, bulimia or binge eating disorders in the U.S. In fact, a young woman with
anorexia is 12 times more likely to die than other women her age without anorexia. (The Renfrew Center Foundation for Eating Disorders, 2003).
More common, but lesser-known, is a phenomenon called "disordered eating." Disordered eating
affects 3 in 4 American women ages 25 to 45, according to a 2008 survey sponsored by SELF magazine in partnership with the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Disordered eaters may engage in excessive dieting, eating when not hungry, eating in secret, skipping meals and primarily eating fattening, over-processed, "comfort" or convenience foods. This can result in low energy, trouble concentrating, anxiety, depression and/or being moderately overweight or underweight. Although disordered eating is considered less serious than eating disorders or obesity, it can lead to both.
Eating disorders, obesity and disordered eating arise from a variety of physical, emotional, and
social issues, all of which need to be addressed for effective treatment. The use or avoidance
of food as a coping mechanism ultimately leads to illness and emotional distress, affecting the
majority of the U.S. population.
We overeat because we are unhappy with ourselves or want to feel a sense of comfort or control
in our lives. We avoid eating or eat and then purge because we feel we cannot measure up to
the ideal body image. We choose unhealthy convenience foods to avoid the planning or time
commitment needed for authentic care of the body.
It all boils down to a state of being that we are trying to achieve through food. We are a culture of
people who do not love ourselves enough to live well nor accept ourselves enough to eat for our
individual body types, shapes or chemistry -- and industries profit from these insecurities.
The food industry feeds us processed, packaged, pesticide-laced food to make life "easier."
The advertising industry constantly reminds us how unacceptable we are so that we'll purchase products. The entertainment industry feeds us fantasies to escape our unhappy lives and false notions that fame and fortune lead to happiness.
In addition to exploring the medical reasons for these troubling eating patterns, the solution rests
upon the development of emotional mastery -- the ability to manage painful or uncomfortable
emotions separately from food, combined with an awareness of industries that use our emotions
against us. Developing a high level of self-acceptance is also critical to this process.
This does not mean that the problems of obesity, eating disorders and disordered eating should
be ignored. Self-acceptance means adopting a non-critical attitude toward yourself and making
choices based out on love for yourself and a desire to treat your body respectfully. It means
accepting your particular body shape, understanding your specific body requirements and giving
your body the type and amount of food and exercise it needs.
Mimi Francis, behavioral health therapist at Green Mountain residential weight loss center, asks, "How well has not liking yourself worked so far? The truth is, it hasn't. In fact, if you dislike your body, it's that much easier to abuse it."
People who truly love and accept themselves will not settle for overeating or starving themselves.
They will do what is necessary to be healthy.
In order to heal the obesity, eating disorders and disordered eating crises in America, we need to
shift our attitudes and our choices:
The human body wants to thrive. In its natural state, it seeks to find homeostasis within itself.
When we can teach people how to truly love themselves, how to master their emotions and value
what is truly good for them, then people will naturally do what is needed to create optimum health
within the context of what is possible for them.
Follow Susan Liddy, M.A., PCC, CPCC on Twitter: www.twitter.com/SusanLiddy
Jowita Bydlowska: Kate Middleton and I Would Probably Rather Be Sad Than Fat
Disordered eating - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Q&A with Susan Schulherr: What Disordered Eating Really Means ...
Beth Novick
Disordered Eating Coach
www.lastingchangenow.com
Thanks so much for sharing Beth!
:) Susan
Please see my reply to the post just below...
I know that what you are dealing with is extremely challenging especially if you feel you have to go it alone. What I want you to consider right now... and get super honest about, are the results of your eating. What results are you getting from binging and purging? You likely get some relief or escape from some pain that you are in or fear that you have: we'll call these "positive results". And, you likely get what we'll call "negative results", such as guilt, shame, feeling out of control, hunger, sore throat and other negative physical conditions.
For your "negative results", I want you to REALLY associate them with your eating habits. Think of them as if you would if you were to lick a cigarette butt filled ashtray at a nightclub. REALLY associate how disgusting it feels to engage in your eating habit.
For your "positive results", I want you to discover how you can get those same results in another way. I KNOW that you are capable of creating these positive feelings in better ways.
Finally, eating disorders are not something to mess around with. YOU WILL DIE if you continue this way. Do what ever possible TODAY to find the support that you need. Use Hanna as inspiration that this is possible.
You can beat this and you are too important on this planet not too.
Hanna - good work. *high five*
Susan
First I've heard of the book.
Food is meant to nourish us.
Not kill us.
I WAS KID BEING SKINNY THEN TEENAGER /YOUNG ADULT. NEED VITAMIN HELLP MANAGE EAT WELL LIKE THAT...I OLDER HAD DIABETICE MY WEIGH NOT BAD LIKE 100 POUND...LONG AGO LOST POUND LIKE 75 TO 85 PUND..THAT WHY.. PEOPLE NEED VITAMIN NEED FOR EATING WELL:D
Must be hard for you to be a witness too.
((( hug )))
-Susan
At age 18, it is still very early in her life to turn this ALL around.
Our whole culture has disordered eating. That's why over 70% are overweight, heading towards 100%.
After 25 years of obesity and failure, I finally discovered the behavioral solution as a behavioral specialist and addictions counselor, lost 140 lbs., and have maintained my ideal weight since. I've been training others since, and I invite you to look into my work and my book.
William Anderson, LMHC
Author of 'The Anderson Method - Secrets of Permanent Weight Loss'
www.TheAndersonMethod.com
Blog: http://theandersonmethodblog.wordpress.com/
Run the study for 6 months and see if the Method results in more pounds lost than the other method or the placebo. Anderson's testimonial is anecdotal. The plural of anecdote is not data. Show us the data please.
When I first started helping others in 1985, I followed my first 50 patients for a year after the training. 100% lost the weight they had set out for as an initial goal, and at the end of the year, 70% had maintained their success. Since the comparable average success rates with diets is less than 35% and 5% respectively, I felt no further need to defend my results. If I were only half as successful as I am, I'd still be seven times as successful as the average. As far as the 30% who were not as successful as I'd have hoped for, their 100% success is still a good possibility, with the persistence that is so much a part of our humanity. They will never forget the science and psychology they learn in my program. As far as your suggestion of a research project, I invite you to arrange it. I'll even supply the curriculum and textbooks free of charge. I have 15 therapists throughout the country providing the training, adding more gradually as I recruit and train them.
I am not trying to look like a model because I know that no matter how skinny I get, I will not magically transform into a 5'11" slim yet impossibly busty Victoria's Secret model. I am not aiming for Kate Moss circa Heroin chic. I am someone who deeply despises themselves and I self harm through restriction, by denying myself the bare minimum to survive. Some obese woman in middle America using her EBT card to buy soda and Cheetos at Walmart for her equally unhealthy child has nothing to do with this.
Oh, and for every person who says "Men want REAL women with REAL curves. Not bags of bones", way to miss the point. Sex and sexual relationships are pretty much the LAST thing on the mind of someone deeply entrenched in a life threatening eating disorder.
Just want to give you a hug and let you know that I am proud of you for all of your efforts.
Your awareness to what it is that drives you to avoid eating is excellent.
Now, how can you take that awareness and "shoot holes in it"?
For example, is it really true that you should be despised?
Is it really true that you are deserving of punishment?
Please find someone who can support you to answer these questions from your empowered true self because even though you say that deep down you despise yourself, my guess is that deeper down you really just want to be loved.
-Susan
It's only been in the last 15-20 years that women and girls have become so addicted to and influenced by pictures in magazines. When I was a teen in the 60s, we had Twiggy and others. No one was starving themselves to look like them. We merely commented, Gee, she's awfully thin," and turned the page. So what. I'm naturally thin and it didn't use to mean a thing. Most young people used to to be slender to medium before all these eating disorders started. Those are definitely a modern cultural neurosis.
People need to wean themselves away from media images and stop confusing them with reality. Being thin is a job requirement for fashion models and professional dancers - for logistical reasons. There are naturally thin people who can fill these spots - no one needs to starve themselves. Some people do need to get a life.
I spent a month in treatment. And while I'm not "totally' cured to this day, I'm at a light, but healthy weight for my height.
And as long as the media perpetuates "Thin is in", other young women will continue along this path, to strive to look like the models in the magazines. Yes, some people are "naturally thin", but there is a lot of airbrushing that goes into many images.
Telling people to "wean themselves away from the media", when Tabloid magazines, Tabloid "shows", and sites on the internet are readily available for viewing. Hmm.
For most of my life I was underweight and accused of having an eating disordered.
I was teased relentlessly for how I looked.
I would eat and eat and eat just to keep the weight on.
Now at age 43 I am having trouble maintaining a healthy weight (in the opposite direction.)
Be good to yourself and never let anyone tell you that you are anything other than magnificent.
Thanks so much for your comment.
-Susan