Before and After Photos: To Post or Not To Post?
I stumbled upon a before and after picture this morning while mindlessly browsing Facebook. I couldn’t look away. The girl (who I know from treatment) was severely underweight in the photo. I was simultaneously horrified and captivated. For a moment, I was transported back into the eating disorder mindset. I remembered the “good” feeling of seeing the number on the scale drop. I remembered how “accomplished” I felt watching myself shrink. Eventually, I was able to talk myself down from it. I reminded myself that although losing weight did make me feel “good” and “accomplished,” the good...
Read MoreWhy Your Diet Won’t Work (via Mirror-Mirror)
We’ve all heard about the fads: the Atkins diet, the South Beach diet, cleanses, juicing, de-toxing, veganism (other than an ethically-motivated choice), gluten-free diets (that is, those that aren’t due to celiac’s or gluten sensitivities), raw food diets, liquid diets… The list goes on. Fad diets are marketed so cleverly and pictured so alluringly on Pinterest that it becomes quite easy to get caught up with the crowd. But the fact is that dieting doesn’t work, plain and simple. Recently, I had the opportunity to write an article for the eating disorder...
Read MoreBody Image is the Last to Go…?
It has been a somewhat difficult week, which means that it has also been difficult to write. I find that my inspiration and motivation to write (not to mention my ability to concentrate) are very much bound up with my mood. Moreover, in my borderline-desperation to fully recover, I catch myself hesitating to write anything but positive, encouraging entries on this blog. But, as I need to remind myself fairly often, recovery is not a straight line. It has its ups and downs, its forward movement and backward tumbles. I would not be accurately portraying what it is like here in the middle...
Read MoreVictoria’s Secret Reveals the “Perfect Body”
Just when we thought we were making progress on valuing women’s realistic shapes and sizes, Victoria’s Secret jumps in to tighten the measuring tape again. The lingerie baron recently launched a marketing campaign for their “Body” line of lingerie that features the slogan “The Perfect ‘Body’.” The lacy creations are modeled by ten of the Victoria’s Secret “Angels” — thigh gabs, visible ribs, protruding collar bones, and all. Questionably-nourished models are nothing new for Victoria’s Secret; emblazoning the word PERFECT...
Read MorePatient Advocacy: Winning the Battle Against Blue Cross Blue Shield
As much as I don’t want to spend another minute on this topic, I think it’s necessary to talk about this last week and what has happened with Blue Cross Blue Shield. Let’s put the happy ending of the story first: I won my battle with Blue Cross Blue Shield and was able to return to treatment as of last night. I have learned two things from the experience of successfully going up against my insurance company on my own: It is possible to reverse an insurance company’s decision. They bank on most people giving up after the first few “no’s,” so you just have to make sure to push them far enough....
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