Dear Readers,
I was sent these two great articles by a sufferer in California.
Dear Maha,
I found these two articles very useful. They are helping me in my recovery. I hope you’ll share them with your readers.
Please do read them they can really help you in your journey to recovery and happiness.
Happy Reading!
Facing the Inner Critic
By: Sheira Kahn
Hijacked by Shame: The World Inside
Family, friends, professionals, even eating-disorder sufferers themselves find eating disorders perplexing. Why would an otherwise intelligent and competent woman refuse to do the most basic thing to keep herself alive — to eat, or refrain from overeating if that were threatening her health? While the behaviors do not seem logical, they do make sense in the context of the eating-disorder sufferer’s inner world.
The inner world of someone with an eating disorder is constantly being hijacked by self-hatred and shame. Although we’ve all experienced shame, few people who have not had an eating disorder can imagine the intensity of the shame for someone who has. Recall your most excruciating, humiliating memory. Were you panicked? Did you want to escape? Were you so desperate in that moment that dying seemed like a good option? You have barely begun to experience what someone in the throes of an eating disorder deals with continuously. Triggers are everywhere, from the number on the scale, to a brief glance in the mirror, to the perception that she said the wrong thing to someone.
People with eating disorders are often intelligent and passionate. The part of the psyche that creates the shame fuses this intelligence and passion to create a conviction of failure so strong that the ED sufferer experiences it at a cellular level. Because it feels authentic, questioning the conviction would be inaccurate, disobedient — even blasphemous. In this way, the shame hijacks her body, her mind and her emotions.
For example, take the assertion, “You’re fat.” Imagine that a well-nourished, but not overweight person is continually hearing that statement echo in her mind. She compares herself to models such as Gisele Bündchen, Kate Moss, and Niki Taylor — all of whom met the physical criteria for Anorexia at the time of this writing. Strictly speaking, if that is the standard to which she is comparing herself, indeed she is “fat.” Her intelligence then tells her that the assertion “You’re fat” is accurate. This leads to despair, which she experiences as real because her passionate nature allows her to feel things deeply and directly.
The shame leads to a further conclusion: “Because you are fat, you are unlovable.” This produces such a desperate feeling of isolation and failure that the person would do anything — ANYTHING — to improve the situation. The easiest thing to control is her body, so the dagger of shame turns inward. The depth of the conviction that she is unlovable, corroborated by emotions that feel true at a cellular level, combine to make her want to die rather than eat or gain weight. (Conversely, the person may be dying TO eat as an escape from the desperate feelings inside.) What she is trying to control is not just her body, but also her intolerable sense of isolation and failure. Unfortunately, the eating disorder only magnifies what it seeks to assuage, since it amplifies her sense of weakness and despicability.
This article is excerpted from The Erasing ED Treatment Manual by Sheira Kahn and Nicole Laby, available on Amazon.
How To Silence Your Inner Critic
By: Dr. Nina
Are you eating as a way of escaping a loud inner critic?
Do you tell yourself things like, “You’re not good enough” or “You don’t deserve to be happy” or “You’re such a loser” or worse?
Food can momentarily take you away from that internal critic, the part that attacks your spirit and stop you from living your best life.
(Hint: a quick way of identifying your inner critic is to catch when you talk to yourself in second person “You’re a loser” rather than, “I’m a loser”)
Here’s how to silence that mean voice:
Imagine a mental courtroom. You’re well-acquainted with your internal prosecutor/ critic. Now, cultivate an internal defense attorney.
When the prosecutor says you’re not good enough, OBJECT. Then, take the floor and demand evidence for these accusations. Remember, a judge will tell you:
Feelings are not facts.
Feelings are not admissible as evidence. If you “feel” like there’s something wrong with you, challenge that notion. If you “feel” like you should be in a different place in your life, challenge that, too. Give your defense attorney an equal opportunity to be heard.
When the internal prosecutor accuses you of not being good enough, don’t accept it as the truth.
Demand that the prosecutor define “good enough” (by the way, that is subjective and NOT a number on the scale).
What criteria form the basis of this accusation? Is it your weight? What else?
Present alternative evidence to the court
Think about how you actually live your life. If you’re reading this, there is likely a part of you that is proactive, hopeful and willing to consider new perspectives. If you have tried and failed many diets, you’re not a failure – you’re really tenacious.
When you weigh the evidence and judge for yourself, chances are you’ll come to a different conclusion than if you only look at yourself from the eyes of a prosecutor.
Stop punishing yourself for crimes you haven’t committed.
Liberate yourself from that inner prosecutor and feel better about yourself, so you won’t use food for comfort or distraction.
About Dr Nina
Dr. Nina Savelle-Rocklin, Psy.D. is a psychoanalyst specializing in weight, food and body image issues based in Los Angeles.
Dr. Nina’s personal experience with disordered eating gives her a unique understanding of what it is like to struggle, and she knows that hope is possible. She brings a fresh perspective to the treatment of disordered eating, helping people understand “why” they turn to food instead of focusing on the behavior itself.
Recognized as a thought leader in eating psychology, Dr. Nina’s work has been widely published across a variety of media, most notably The Los Angeles Times, Huffington Post, Prevention and Real Simple. She is also a regular contributor to Eating Disorder Hope, Eating Disorders Online, Walden Behavioral Health, the British Obesity Society, the National Eating Disorders Association, as well as many others.
She writes an award-winning blog, Make Peace With Food, hosts a popular podcast, Win The Diet War with Dr. Nina (voted ‘New and Noteworthy’ within its first week of release on iTunes) and can be seen on her video series, The Dr. Nina Show. She is also writing a book for Rowman & Littlefield on the psychoanalytic treatment of eating disorders, due for release in 2016.
Dr. Nina Savelle-Rocklin, Psy.D., Certified Psychoanalyst, Licensed Psychotherapist (CA LMFT43526)
