A Relationship That Needs Some Work And Extra TLC

-Melissa Punch

Blogger and writer Celina Ottaway (her blog-life is a wonderful and conscious journey!) wrote a nice piece for November’s issue of body+soul regarding an important component that is essential to all of our lives, eating disordered or not: FOOD – and how mindful eating (I’m partial to the term “conscious eating”) can help reconnect and form a healthier relationship to that which sustains us.

I don’t have an eating disorder. But like many women I know, somewhere along the way, eating — what, when, how much, in front of whom, how fast — got complicated. The sensation of hunger went from a physical signal with a simple response (“eat”) to a mixed emotion that has no clear solution. Should I, shouldn’t I? I’m being bad, I’m being good. I deserve this. I will hate myself in the morning. And on and on

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How did our appetites — for nourishment and pleasure — become suspect? Is it possible to listen to our bodies the way we did when we were children? The answers lie somewhere in the tangle of emotional, cultural, and neurological reactions that shapes our desire to eat. “Hunger is complicated,” says Jean Kristeller, Ph.D., professor of psychology at Indiana State University and president of The Center for Mindful Eating. Besides the actual physical sensation, “it has to do with a complexity of psychological cravings that may have very little to do with your physical need for food.”

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 I love Celina’s parting thoughts:

Whether we move toward our deepest hungers or simply recognize them, we begin inhabiting ourselves more fully. And this moves us closer to feeling ourselves from the inside out, like we did once upon a time.

Subcutaneous… you are my Friend

 

Most of us realize that we need “fat” not only in our diet, but within our bodies– I say most since when you have an eating disorder, know someone with an ED, or care for someone suffering with this illness, specifically anorexia nervosa, which is hallmarked by the intense fear of gaining weight, this is a very difficult truth to swallow as well as visually accept within ones’ physical body.  

There are also some studies that suggest for some this “fear” can be a precusor to eating disorders  among the array of environmental, behavioral influences as well as genetic and/or biochemical predeterminers that scientists are still compiling and discovering that can leave some individuals much more susceptible than others to either severe eating disordered behavior, EDNOS, or a severe diagnosed eating disorder that requires serious and comprehensive treatment. 

What’s also intriguing is the work by researchers continuing to unfold in evolutionary biology, genetic imprinting, and epigenetic inheritance which I’m certain there are correlations within these findings and eating disorders that have yet to be fully available and utilized, but may be able to provide us with a much more inclusive picture behind the illness and how to improve prevention and treatment.

There was a recent study highlighting the benefits (mostly catching everyone’s eye with the glorification of our ever evolving rump, or as writer Debra Dikerson slammed in Salon.com last year about mainstreaming “Gi-normous butts”) of subcutaneous fat, which produces hormones known as adipokines found to boost metabolism (of course, I’m assuming this study will also fuel the weight-loss industry and war-on-obesity too) found in the booty area as well as belly and showing to be protective against type2 diabetes, but also reaffirming the adage that “diets don’t work” and briefly explains why this is part of the reason it’s difficult to keep that weight off once lost; and that our fat cells are set during adolescence and don’t decrease, but do actually expand in size.   

And while I don’t embrace the the good/bad dichotomous thinking and categorization of really anything when it comes to our daily living and Life– you tend to find things more in shades of gray or muted with other colors vs just a pigment of one– the study is looking at two types of fat: subcutaneous and visceral , and where they are found within the body.  Subcutaneous tends to be in the booty and stomach area, and has more benefits vs visceral, which tends to be the gunk blocking arteries, causing damage to organs– sorry to say you’re bad visceral, or maybe scientists just haven’t fully found out what you’re doing and why you are getting such a bad wrap. 

Another study that continues in similar dialogue and highlights the complications of metabolic syndrome and that this can be triggered by overeating, which is correlated with weight gain, especially if done consecutively over a sustained period of time, and makes me wonder about endocannabinoids and their role cause/effect in obesity  and how this, if at all correlates.  The study also points to our fat cells being set during adolescence,  but Dr Stephen O’Rahilly of Cambridge remains unconvinced, and isn’t prescribing to this determination just yet.

Maybe another more basic message to keep at forefront is that it’s not nice to fool with Mother Nature– she rises up with a vengeance.  Our bodies have evolved over time and there is inherit wisdom to what we carry around with us everyday.

-Love Thyself

Bon Anniversaire INDD!

 

I love how the birth of International No Diet Day began “from a picnic in Mary’s living room” in the early ’90’s and fertilized it’s magnitude world-wide.  Ms Evans-Young is herself a recovered anorexic and wrote the book Diet Breaking: Having it all Without Having to Diet and it couldn’t be a better time than now to let the message sink in– deep and with reflection.

Largesse gives the background on the term: size esteem  which was initially coined by Richard Stimson, husband to a contributing director/writer at the site, Karen Stimson who explains it perfectly:

– Feeling acceptance of, respect for, and pride in one’s body, whatever its size or shape –

But I like this analogy even more highlighted by Cheri Erdman EdD who wrote the book Live Large! and thought about it as a simple yet poignant equation:  Size Acceptance + Self Esteem = SIZE ESTEEM

Either way you think about it, the insanity of dieting, wanting to force our bodies to be a size/shape it was not genetically determined to be– and thankfully so for the beautiful variety of shapes, sizes, colors, we all add to the collage of life, is quite dubious. 

It’s even further magnified when you or a loved one suffer from an eating disorder and are trying to regain your health and follow through with recovery and maintaining wellness in a seemingly endless fat-phobic, diet-crazed, fashion-consumed environment.  Our daughter at times can take on this incessant self-doubt and accusational inquiries about why she has to eat what she has to when others, her classmates, etc. eat less than she does and are constantly discussing “fat” laden topics— it’s enough to make anyone go a little bonkers.  Advertisers, marketing, the health ins field, even health care (hey, let’s face it– those mega-million dollar hospitals that now look more like shopping malls want  to treat the ill business) and the all time winner: the diet industry.

Stuffed and Starved is a title from researcher Raj Patel more about food prices, the global-glut, etc. but I had to think about this a little bit more this morning how it really ties into so many other layers of Life– and will be worth dissecting and playing off the similar as well as dissimilar dualities we can only pretend don’t exist, or just think is someone else’s “problem” to fix, get over, medicate– like the cliched remark I’ve heard countless times since our daughter was diagnosed with anorexia- “why doesn’t she just eat?!”, then the instant turn against parents when our children don’t eat = it’s your fault, you did something “wrong”, etc.

Yes, INDD is a day we find relative and meaningful in our family.  And with the weather reaching low 70’s, sun shining– I think a picnic is just what we’ll do to celebrate this day!

-shanti