Happy Independence Day!!

July 4th is one of my favorite holidays- I LOVE summer, fireworks, watermelon, and sunny days at the beach. I fully realize, however, that today is March 13 and we are not rapidly approaching July 4th at this point. Why do I even bring up July 4th?? Well, it is the day when we typically celebrate 'independence.' But I started thinking recently that while we celebrate independence collectively as a nation, it is not as common that we individually celebrate our personal independence from struggles or things that have held us back in the past-- or perhaps even from things that we are currently struggling with still that are holding us back. I'm not necessarily talking about making a big public declaration, or throwing a big party to celebrate your independence (if that is what you want to do though, go for it! haha). But personally acknowledging and having a fixed time set aside that exists to remind you and reflect on such a decision can provide great meaning and purpose. I have heard, as I'm sure many of you have, of people marking their days of sobriety- and that is surely a form of commemorating a momentous decision to turn from alcohol or another substance. While (like I said) I am not necessarily suggesting we release fireworks to mark our independence from something, I think that acknowledging the surrender that takes place with such a decision is important and worth remembering and reflecting on.

My intention in writing this post about independence, as weird as it might sound, is to encourage you to consider having an independence day for yourself. What exactly do I mean by this? Well, I think that we all go through things in our lives. I write a lot about body image and eating disorders, but there are certainly other struggles that exist out there as well that you may face!! Whether it is an eating disorder or body image issue, an unhealthy relationship that you find yourself struggling to get out of, an unhealthy habit that seems to control you, dependence on alcohol or an illicit substance, or something else, I think it is SO important to commemorate your decision to turn from whatever it is that is holding you back and is keeping you from being FREE so that you are able to use it as a means of pushing ahead. Of course, we don't all have a specific date or a specific time to commemorate moments like these and that is okay- because turning from an unhealthy behavior or a way of thinking can be a gradual process. The point is that having a specific date isn't necessary. What seems important (to me) is the heart behind this, which is that we are acknowledging a surrender of our will and are choosing to move forward from a certain point on. Surrender does not mean that we don't slip and sometimes fall back into old ways of thinking or acting- but surrender keeps us moving forward as we look ahead to a goal or a way of life that we strive to maintain.

Do you find that you stare at yourself in every reflection, mirror, store window, etc that you walk past, obsessively checking yourself out to make sure you look ok?? Do you feel like you need someone else (a friend, a boyfriend, a husband, a parent, your child, etc) to validate your worth?? Do you feel like you need to be a certain size or weight to be happy?? Do you feel that you need a certain food/drink/drug to feel alive or satisfied?? Are you constantly doubting yourself or being critical of yourself?? Any way of thinking or acting that keeps you from being free is a way of thinking or acting that is not only not helpful for you but serves to keep you in bondage. To start by simply acknowledging and becoming aware of such captivity is the first step. Making a decision to 'be free' is not as easy as it sounds, and requires diligence, faith and hard work!! For some of us, we need more support to experience freedom- whether that is with the help of a friend, a pastor, or a counselor, to walk through that process with.

I would encourage you to consider if anything (person, place, thing) is holding you back in your life and what may be keeping you from becoming the person you were created to be. There is no better way to live than in freedom!! Walter Conkrite said that "there is no such thing as a little freedom. Either you are all free, or you are not free." Sounds pretty obvious, right? Well, if that is the case... and if there is anything that is keeping you from being 'all free' than I would challenge you to take an action step forward- no matter how big or small.

**As an aside, I want to be clear that if you have an eating disorder, simply stating freedom from your ED does not usually make it go away-- and this is not what I am suggesting will happen if you declare a fight against your ED. An eating disorder is a mental illness, and as such, cannot just be wished away. However, your will in fighting your ED is soo important. Maybe your declaration of independence from your ED begins with pursuing professional help, or seeking the level of care that is appropriate and advised for you by a health professional. Or perhaps it means being committed to the recovery process. Whatever this action step may look like, I want to make sure that I am clear on this point! :)

It's Time to Talk About It!

National Eating Disorders Awareness Week (NEDAw) is in full swing. In my last post, I shared about the mission and goals of NEDAw, so if you missed it, take a look! This year's theme is "It's Time to Talk About It" and the hope is for everyone to do just one thing! If we all do one thing, no matter how small, think about the attention we can bring to highlight a major psychiatric illness in our society that is often very misunderstood! One suggestion for doing one thing (compliments of NEDA- National Eating Disorders Association) is to use your social networking sites (think facebook, twitter, etc...) to post some kind of link or information about eating disorders that may serve to initiate conversations or educate people about eating disorders. Margarita Tartakovsky wrote a blog post on some myths and facts about eating disorders that might be of interest (you might learn something yourself too- this is a great list)! Below is the list that she made with the help of some eating disorder professionals (access it in full here). I would encourage you to read it, but also to pass them on to someone this week in order to raise awareness about the facts behind eating disorders!

Eating Disorder Myths

In honor of NEDA’s theme, let’s talk about eating disorder myths and facts. There are many misconceptions surrounding eating disorders. I’ve asked several clinicians to share a few myths and facts.

Myth: Media is the primary cause for the development of most eating disorders. (Julie Holland, MHS, CEDS, Eating Recovery Center)

Fact: Although recent surveys have confirmed that adolescent girls get much of their health information from the media, media messages themselves are not a primary cause of eating disorders. Messages that promote an unrealistic thin ideal can set unrealistic standards regarding body size and shape. The fact is, media messages have the ability to positively or negatively affect one’s body image and/or self-image based on the message and how it is presented. It is important that we teach individuals critical thinking when looking at media images.

Myth: Eating disorders are triggered by a desire to be thin.(Emmett R. Bishop, Jr., MD, CEDS, Eating Recovery Center)

Fact: Eating disorder behaviors do not develop merely because an individual has a longing to be thin. For instance, an individual who does not know that he or she has wheat or lactose intolerance may develop a fear of food due to the discomfort or pain it causes. Someone in chemotherapy or with a gastrointestinal disorder may stop eating to avoid nausea.

Myth: Eating disorders are a choice. (Julie Holland)

Fact: Although individuals may choose to start a diet or engage in certain behaviors, eating disorders themselves are not a choice. People do not choose to have anorexia or bulimia. These disorders develop over a period of time and require various levels of treatment to address complex symptoms including medical, psychiatric and other underlying issues.

Myth: You can tell if someone has an eating disorder just by looking at them. (Marla Scanzello, MS, RD, Eating Recovery Center)

Fact: Many people with eating disorders are of normal weight, or even overweight. Weight is not a tell-all sign of an eating disorder. Furthermore, eating disorder patients can become quite skilled at hiding their disordered eating behaviors.

Myth: People with eating disorders will eat normally / recover when they choose to do so. (Dr. Ravin)

Fact: This myth implies that EDs are willful behavior and that a patient can simply make a choice to recover. Thus, it blames people with EDs for having an illness that is not their fault. Most people with EDs are not able to eat normally on their own; they require significant outside support (nutritionist, parental support in refeeding, residential tx, etc.) in order to normalize their eating habits.

Myth: Developing a positive body image is not that important in the overall recovery from an eating disorder and should be worked on towards the end of the recovery process. (Carolyn Jones)

Fact: A continued negative body image is one of the main contributing factors to a relapse in the eating recovery process. Improving a person’s body image is one of the hardest and most time-consuming things to change in the healing process and should be undertaken early during treatment.

Myth: Eating disorders are not deadly. (Kenneth L. Weiner, MD, CEDS, Eating Recovery Center)

Fact: In all actuality, it is quite the opposite. Eating disorders are the deadliest mental illness. A woman with anorexia nervosa is 5.6 times more likely to die than another woman of her same age. The most frequent causes of death from eating disorders are suicide (32 percent), complications associated with anorexia (19 percent), and cancer (11 percent). The average age of death for an individual with anorexia is only 34 years.

Myth: You can never fully recover from an eating disorder. (Julie Holland & Sarah Ravin)

Fact: According to Holland, “Recovery takes commitment, dedication, hard work and time. However, full recovery is absolutely possible through finding the appropriate treatment professionals and program.”

According to Dr. Ravin, “The people who believe this are probably those who did not receive treatment, received inadequate or low-quality treatment, lacked the necessary social support, or were never pushed to reach and maintain an ideal body weight and stay there long enough for brain healing to occur.The underlying biological predisposition will always be there, but people can and do recover fully from EDs. I’ve seen it happen many times.”

Of course you are not limited to posting this information on your social networking sites! There is a lot of great information on NEDA's website (follow this link to access their information/resources page) as well as on many other sites. Maybe you can re-post a blog, an article, or the name of a book that you have read and enjoyed about body image, eating disorders, etc... Anything that you can do to help raise awareness is meaningful. We often hear so much in the news about schizophrenia and Alzheimer's (which are both worthy of our attention), but would you be surprised to learn that eating disorders impact five times as many people as schizophrenia? And eating disorders affect double the number of people with Alzheimer's? (These statistics were taken from John Grohol, PsyD, of PsychCentral). This information does not serve to take anything away from either of these illnesses, but rather the purpose is to illustrate the prevalence of eating disorders as psychiatric illness. If you have learned anything new from this blog post (or even if you haven't!), I would encourage you in honor of this week to share something new with your families, friends and loved ones because it's time to talk about it.

National Eating Disorders Awareness Week (NEDAw)

About a month ago, I mentioned National Eating Disorders Awareness Week, along with one or two ways that you might begin to consider or think about getting involved (click here to read!). Well, now that the time is upon us, and it officially begins tomorrow (Sunday, February 21), I will be posting different suggestions and tips all week related to you being able to do just one thing to participate. The theme of this year's National Eating Disorders Awareness Week is "It's Time to Talk About It." Below is a Q and A that I have copied from NEDA's website to give you more information about the mission, etc. behind the week!

So, what is National Eating Disorders Awareness Week?

NEDAwareness Week is a collective effort of primarily volunteers, eating disorder professionals, health care providers, educators, social workers, and individuals committed to raising awareness of the dangers surrounding eating disorders and the need for early intervention and treatment.

***What is The Mission of NEDAwareness Week?

Our aim of NEDAwareness Week is to ultimately prevent eating disorders and body image issues while reducing the stigma surrounding eating disorders and improving access to treatment. Eating disorders are serious, life-threatening illnesses — not choices — and it’s important to recognize the pressures, attitudes and behaviors that shape the disorder.

How does NEDAwareness Week Work?

This year, NEDA is calling for everyone to do just one thing to help raise awareness and provide accurate information about eating disorders. NEDAwareness Week participants can choose from a huge range of ways to contribute: Distribute info pamphlets and put up posters, write one letter for Media Watchdogs, register as a Volunteer Speaker or host a Volunteer Speaker, coordinate a NEDA Walk, or arrange interactive and educational activities such as panel discussions, fashion shows, body fairs, movie screenings, art exhibits and more. As an official NEDAwareness Week participant you can be involved in any way that works with your schedule, resources, community, and interests. These events and activities attract public media attention - on local, national and international levels.

To lead NEDAwareness Week off, I would encourage all of you to think about one way that you might be able to get involved this week. Whether it is focusing on curbing fat talk, researching information about eating disorders and sharing that information with others, encouraging your friends, family and loved ones to love their bodies (and loving your own!), or anything else you would like to do, think of one thing that feels authentic for you and do it! As I said, I will be providing suggestions and examples this week, and encourage you to try as many or few of them as you want.

Tomorrow, a nutritionist colleague and friend, Ellen Morrison, MS, RD, LDN will be on the radio at various times and stations to discuss NEDAw and ways that you can participate. She will specifically be sharing about ways to affirm and encourage yourselves and each other to love yourself and your body. To find out more about Ellen and her work, follow this link. She will be on at 7am (a little early, ha ha- so if you miss it, I will hopefully be able to post the podcast at some point as soon as it is made available). Here is a schedule of when she will be on: 7am on 2/21 (Sunday, tomorrow) on G105, The River (100.7) and KISS (93.9). Her segment will also air at 6pm on The Rush (106.1).

Operation Beautiful

A lot of girls play dress-up when they're little. It's fun to dress up and pretend to be glamourous. I know when I was little, getting the chance to play around with make-up, high heels and princess dresses was definitely a special thing. However, I don't really remember looking up to anyone in the media and idolizing them. I know that I watched TV, and I wasn't a completely sheltered kid. But I don't remember having the kinds of 'role models' today that many young girls do (like Hannah Montana, etc). For example, I was at Target the other day, checking out, and there were two five year old looking girls with one of their mothers. They were looking at all of the magazines on display and kept screaming, "Ooohh Taylor Swift, I love her, she is so pretty. She is so lucky that she is dating [so-and-so]." All I kept thinking was- how do they know this stuff? Haha. I mean, I watch TV and read up on celebrity gossip from time to time but it just seemed weird to me that they knew so much about Taylor Swift. It just dawned on me how different things are for children who are growing up now, and how much more intense, accessible and available media is for people of all ages.

I guess the concerning thing to me is that when girls this young are exposed to an ideal standard of beauty as dictated by Hollywood, they are shaped from this young age to view beauty as what they see on the covers of magazines. The issue is not that young girls should not think Taylor Swift is beautiful, or that magazines are horrible. I actually love Taylor Swift and think she is a good role model for young girls- she appears to be gracious, hard working, and humble- all things that make one beautiful. The issue to me is that if young girls (as well as women of all ages) are not seeing people of all shapes, sizes and colors, etc, in the media that are regarded as beautiful, then it is likely they will view beauty very narrowly. And, beauty is not just about looks! How many times have you met someone that is physically attractive or beautiful, and then they spoke or acted in such a way that made them unattractive to you? As much as it is a cliche, beauty (in Hollywood) is only skin deep! In a world where already 'beautiful' people are getting plastic surgery to enhance their image, the messages that are sent to women about beauty are not necessarily healthy or positive.

Someone recently shared with me about a really amazing movement going on that is called Operation Beautiful, which aims to help people embrace their beauty. The mission of Operation Beautiful is to end fat talk, which involves talking about weight, lamenting over the width of our thighs (or any other body parts), and comparing ourselves to others! The tag-line on their website is "Ending Fat Talk One Anonymous Post-It At A Time." They encourage people to leave positive, encouraging, anonymous notes in random places- public restroom mirrors in schools, restaurants, etc- to be seen by random people. (An example from their site: When the world says 'give in', stay strong! You are a fighter. You are beautiful. Have a great day!) They encourage people to leave the website address on the note so people can go to the site and find out more about Operation Beautiful. The site is awesome in that people share personal stories about how they have been impacted by an anonymous note, as well as the impact that leaving notes around for people has on them. This is such a great pro-active way to encourage people and to end fat talk. The person who told me about Operation Beautiful leaves anonymous post-it notes in the diet/health section at Barnes and Noble. What a great idea!! The reason I love this so much is that so often it is difficult to know how to do little things that positively impact people in a significant way- and this is an example of something that is super easy to do but that makes a big difference.

For more information on Operation Beautiful, follow this link. And view this video below for more information and to be inspired by what they are doing!

Mixed Messages and Making Moves..

This morning, I read a really thought provoking blog entry on True/Slant (which is a blogazine--kind of like a magazine, but a blog... umm, i might have made up that word!!). The author, Katie Drummond, was discussing Katherine McPhee's recent bikini cover on Shape magazine. McPhee, who gained fame after appearing on American Idol, has publicly discussed her past struggles with bulimia, and her experience of being admitted to treatment for three months prior to going on the show in order to focus on getting healthy. Ms. Drummond takes aim at Shape Magazine for putting a recovered eating disorder patient clad in a bikini (and airbrushed!) on its cover, as well as at McPhee for posing in a bikini and perpetuating unrealistic images of beauty after struggling herself with feeling pressure as a result of viewing similar unrealistic images in the media. Ms. Drummond's article is entitled A Lesson in Health Hypocrisy and she explores the hypocrisy that exists in this scenario. Her blog entry is a little angsty, but I appreciate the passion with which she writes because I think that by posing in a bikini for a magazine which happens to advertise 'drop a pound by Friday' on its cover, McPhee- and Shape- are sending some pretty mixed messages.

I wonder if McPhee, or Shape, or the media in general realize the impact that they are having on women by sending such mixed messages. I am not pointing the finger at McPhee (well, maybe I am a little), but she says in the article that doing six different 'moves' changed her body. This sets an alarm off to me. It's not that exercising is wrong, or trying to be healthy or fit is wrong, but it concerns me that her happiness and acceptance of her body are a result of the changes she has made to her body. It just sends the wrong message to women about where our happiness comes from. Again, the point is not to bash McPhee. I just think it is important to raise awareness and discuss some of these things that we become numb to, because whether we know it or not, these images impact us! While there is not one single cause of eating disorders, and while seeing unrealistic images of women's bodies do not cause eating disorders, these images can be a precipitating factor, when combined with a genetic predisposition and certain environmental factors.

A month from now, NEDA (the National Eating Disorder Association) is sponsoring National Eating Disorders Awareness Week--- February 21-27. I will be posting more information as this week draws nearer, but I wanted to mention it in light of what I read this morning on True/Slant. Rather than just venting about the media and that magazine cover, or discussing how things could or should be different, it is helpful to think forwardly and focus on what we can do to make some changes! One simple thing that I have mentioned before is using GoodSearch! This is a search engine, just like google, that donates money to nonprofits of your choice before you perform each search. You can donate to eating disorder nonprofits, as well as a bunch of other great organizations. Follow this link to find out more. The second thing that I wanted to mention is something that I read on NEDA's website the other day. Marilyn Wann, author of Fat? So!, developed an art activity for people to participate in that deals with transforming the numbers on scales to adjectives! Confused? The Boulder Youth Body Alliance (BYBA), a nonprofit that seeks to encourage teens to change the world, rather than their bodies, has encouraged teens to participate in this activity by turning scales into art. I love this idea and think it must be really empowering for women of all ages to take part in something like this! Follow this link to view pictures/examples of scales as art, and to read more about what BYBA is doing!