What is compulsive eating?

First you have to think about what normal eating is. Basically eating according to your needs. Those needs can be to manage your mood and try to keep you from sinking into a pit of some kind of mental disorder. 

It's part of your emotional defense mechanisms.

That is where compulsive eating deviates from the norm, it is an extension of that. The pattern increases deepens and a temporary measure can become ingrained. The key to dealing with it is to deal with the underlying stressors and tensions that are distorting your eating habits.  Much treatment deals with trying to directly repress the desire to eat, which is trying to solve a symptom as if it's a cause.

Eating is necessary for life, therefore using addiction as a model is inapt. Any definition of compulsive eating should come from the way it actually functions, not from something else which is hardly comparable, drugs are not food. This is important for cure and restoration and should be paramount.

Addiction is mainly a physiological dependence on drugs, that has psychological components. The only thing close to a food addiction is alcoholism, because as well as being a drug or a toxin, alcohol is a food.

As neither are necessary for existence, they can theoretically be stopped completely. Whether they should have to be is a source of debate. It would clearly be better if the excess craving for alcohol could be reversed or removed. If that approach had been taken, that could have informed all reversal of unwanted and excess cravings of all kinds.

That's probably why the urge is to get eating disorders on board with that. To continue that evasion. If a drug addict's system can adapt sufficiently and restore the normal balance of innate opiate production. Then their lucky and may be able to remain drug free. Abstaining from drugs cannot guarantee that, anymore than suppressing excess hunger can guarantee to return it to normal.

Compulsive eating occurs when hunger and appetite signals increase substantially (link to hunger study) out of proportion to your body's current energy and nutrient needs of the body. Hunger rises through signalling from the whole body, to your brain. It has several main causes, overwhelming mental /or emotional trauma-notably bereavement or separation from parent are just some.

Weight acceptance

I see a tiny and therefore lets face it rather preliminary at best study validates what it calls a more weight acceptance approach-well it's better than the tedious misnomer of "obesity acceptance." As they say, softly, softly catchee monkey. Because we've been wound up into such as tizzy over fatness and weight, we're in the wrong mode altogether to deal with the health of fat people productively.

It seems amazing that not harming fat people as a precursor to oh, anything, or just apropos of nothing, needs validation of any kind. It's dieting that's the unnatural and dysfunctional pathology. And remember also that harming fat people as a preamble to dieting is a sleight-of-hand. You lift the self hatred/hatred as you perform diet behaviours, manipulating your sense of well being in order to link that to your dieting.

The trouble with seeking evidence for the obvious-hurting people is bad for them-is it tends toward underlining the erroneous normalization of the accepted dysfunction, by default. Make no mistake is abnormal to disassociate from your own body, insult, degrade and dehumanize it and claim that is the interests of health.

We are repeatedly informed that discomfort triggers compensatory hunger, so it's hardly surprising that the group which eschewed discomforting of people, felt more in balance when it came to eating. That's a given, which is why there's always been a big question mark over the insistence of discomforting fat people-to lose weight.

So, level of "social support" can affect the demands being made on a person's hunger?

Even if it did make it healthier, that wouldn't justify that approach. If anything can be achieved negatively, it can be achieved positively. If people are seen as valuable enough, which clearly they are not. The real deal with HAES for me is that it starts from there regardless of others who require 'evidence'.

Like others, the evidence of our lives is clear enough for many of us. 

Panic business

Big Liberty has written about the case building of moral panics. It contains fascinating links, one to another post she wrote directly on the subject of moral panics;

A moral panic is an intense feeling expressed in a population about an issue that appears to threaten the social order.

Appears to is right;

Those who start the panic when they fear a threat to prevailing social or cultural values are known by researchers as "moral entrepreneurs", while people who supposedly threaten the social order have been described as "folk devils."

Moral entrepreneurs is so right, that's the whole of the 'obesity' industry, science and et al. That describes precisely the direction of their role which has little nothing to do with improving health. It's more about perpetuating their own bailiwick, which works according to their own personal dictates.

There's a similarity with politicians, who work to an ideology which they proselytize and alter reality to match.

I'm not entirely convinced that a lot of obesity researchers have a feel for scientific advance that we're used to from other medical science which seeks to resolution, rather than enforcement. There's little sense of advancement through pure knowledge. It's more as a means to an end, influencing others and facilitating a sense of self importance.

It also relates that moral panics are based on that which is rarely voiced and so is at heart is a taboo.

This is what most fascinates me about the obesity crisis, what is the unspoken heart of it?

I've got a few ideas on what those are, but it definitely causes me to wrack my brains. I've always had doubts, I just didn't follow them up so much they kind of hung there as I sustaining my FoBT. Since getting off that bad trip, the subterranean aspects seem to press themselves more into one's consciousness.

Oh happy days.

Kate Moss's skinny taste

It seems Kate Moss is in trouble; again. In an interview up on the women's wear daily site, in answer to the question "Do you have a motto?" she was quoted saying;

There are loads. There’s “Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.” That’s one of them. You try and remember, but it never works.

It shouldn't be surprising that this has caused a hoo-ha, but somehow it is, slightly. Part of me thinks that people might have been too bored to bother. Not because anorexia isn't serious, but because in my head, I cannot understand how health campaigners still have the cheek to pass off the growth of anorexia onto the rag trade.

Just like Twiggy (Lawson) was responsible for the establishment of the thin ideal, because she insisted on being photographed whilst being a gorgeous gamine, as opposed to her being a woman who's time had come. Kate Moss is the modern version, their similarities, both come from humble, backgrounds, exhibiting an admirable confidence in themselves and a comfortableness in their own skin that is almost deceptively transcendent and inspiring.

Yes, even though she wishes to remain thin, possibly over and above professional necessity, I'd still say that she has an admirable, and inspiring belief in herself.

Both were/are idolised by the thin worshiping classes and act as a vehicle for disapproval of that ideation and therefore self castigation, rather like fat people, but more in the form of envy rather than fearful contempt. I think it's one of the reasons why I've never had a bad word to say about either of them, I know how it feels to be a target for the unspoken desires of others who cannot face them head on.

I suppose this kind of ruckus occurs because they are a lightening rod for the re-iteration of the right thing. You should not be too thin and you should not be 'overweight', you should be healthy. That is inbetween, acceptable.

If you are judge not, then they're waiting to attack you and reassert the acceptable order.

Nevermind that the behaviours recommended especially to the 'overweight' are anorexia, and that is exactly what we are asked to aspire to, it would be seen in us as a victory against our gluttony and sloth. Some of the 'advice' given is straight out of thinspiration, take every opportunity to exercise. That doesn't mean take up tennis on Monday and gym on Thursday, it means, in every spare moment, perform the regulation physical jerks.

Don't even think of enjoyment, because nothing tastes as good as thin as the prospect of getting society off your back.

Major League obesity doctor=SFA

Dr. Arya Sharma is apparently a big cheese obesity doctor in Canada. What does that mean? Politeness forbids me from answering that succinctly.

Although, I must add, I'm not hating on Canada, I have a soft spot for any countries unjustly overshadowed by their noisier neighbours, on general principle. It's just that obesity professionals, are mostly bums, who've achieved nothing. They do not have any sense of vocation I can discern nor the voracious curiosity I assumed de rigueur for any scientist or researcher in the main.

Nor do I see any signs they give much of a damn about fat people, over and above appearance sake. I certainly hope they are the only group who've enthusiastically helped to destroy the reputation of their clientele, rather than seeking to increase the public's understanding of them. Its interesting that this is not felt to serve the interests of the obesity field. I wonder why.

But ever capable of being open minded and optimistic, I stand to be corrected in this case. It seems to me that Sharma is someone who knows better, but can't follow through, the former makes him heroic to some.

I understand it is because we must not judge obesity hustlers as they are, but as if they are behaving properly in order to model good behaviour in them. It is our duty to encourage them to do what they should already be doing of their own volition.

If we show what nice people we are, this will make people behave better towards us, as our bad behaviour has clearly caused people to behave badly toward us.

That isn't true, but it makes sense.

Now's in time

I've been thinking a bit lately about a recurring mental theme of mine. What is all this obesity stuff about? Amongst all the shouting and angst, are we just communicating things to each other that we aren't able to say out loud, in a direct manner?

From the start of this whole FA adventure, I've not been able to get on board with feeling that fat people are oppressed, not in the way I understand it. It doesn't matter worth a damn to me, as I don't believe you need to be, to complain about being treated unfairly.

It doesn't delegitimize fat people's stories or desire for fair treatment in any way. I just feel that claims of oppression are premature for many reasons. It's just not systemic, in the ways that racism or sexism are.

It's perfectly reasonable to not wish to wait that for that. Things have already gotten bad enough with no end in sight.

Oh, Ms Angelou!

Perusing obesity timebomb , I espied an interview with Maya Angelou, and the gorgeous, (inside and out) Gary Younge.

As to be expected, she does her thing;

In an unfamiliar culture, it is wise to offer no innovations, no suggestions, or lessons.

Yes indeed, and how hard is that, at times?

"I'm always disappointed when people don't live up to their potential," she says to me. "I know that a number of people look down on themselves and consequently on everybody who looks like them." She suggests that this mindset is at the root of black kids thinking that to do well at school is to "act white". "But that, too, can change,"

Yes, I've discovered that so often, I think I'm going to stick with it, this time.

And;

Sure enough, halfway through the interview she tells me I'm fat and suggests I pay more attention to the size of my portions. "You are going to have to lose that weight. You're too young and too handsome. Don't do it to yourself."

What?! Wait a minute.

Criticizing the magnificent GY's physique?

I have to take issue with that Ms. A, with the greatest of respect. Potentials can and will be fulfilled regardless of your weight as those of us willing to see ourselves as a whole person. Our fat is non detachable, and we are not a collection of bad habits.

Not doing so is one of the 'holes' we all need to avoid.

Amongst many other projects, she's working on a cookbook called. "Great Food All Day Long".

Ok Ms A. I won't tell the food police they'll have you up for 'encouraging obesity'.

My body

My body is an intricate animal, at once delicate and powerful. It is visceral, compelling and real.

It is me. My body is myself.

I am not a cigarette. My body is not a cigarette.

I am not alcohol. My body is not alcohol.

I am not a collection of habits. My body is not a collection of habits.

My body is my existence.

Bad moments

Over at the notorious B-L-O-G watrd Lissa asks about being in the moment and the difficulties of getting there.

In a world of self creation/actualisation, with our plans for world domination, or just the domination of self, we can fall into the trap of always being and thinking ahead of ourselves.

The information age is one of sensationalism, and we struggle with the mundane and seek escape in fantasy. Nothing wholly wrong with this, it is part of coping with day to day life and a vital part of our ability to envisage better.

What also causes disconnection from the self in this moment or any other is the background to each and every moment, your constant beliefs, especially those about yourself.

There is a lot of talk of mindfulness and returning to it, that can be tricky to get that balance and get back into the habit. But when you get there, you will be surrounded by the self you have created, and if that is unbearable, mindfulness, will also be hard to bear.

Indeed, a toxic view of yourself may well be the driving force for evading being in the moment. How can you want to be in the moment when that moment is always horrible, because you are always horrible?

When we take it upon ourselves to view ourselves in carelessly degrading and demeaning ways, because for instance we think this is honesty and facing up to the truth, our mental and emotional defences don't just ignore that, they cannot, they must act to minimise the effects of our vandalism of ourselves.

Those defences act in ways similar to our physical defences, they attempt to void the poison, or they attempt to separate us from it. You can perceive the latter when you begin to notice that people who foul their own nest, become semi detached from it.

They often don't recognise this themselves, so caught up are they in feeling their righteous sense of honour about facing the truth of themselves, they don't notice that whilst branding themselves, they identify so much with what they consider a righteous status, that they often don't see themselves in the light they've branded themselves.

They see themselves as goodness in waiting.

This doesn't fully save them from the damage and exhaustion of their view of themselves, it merely minimises the damage. This can unfortunately prolong it by making it less clearly perceived. Though the damage limitation helps to keep worse at bay.

They are not totally unaware of the pain they feel, they tend to blame it on the what it is they've labelled themselves, not on the consequences of labelling themselves with a negative status they cannot escape.

Being in the moment requires you to live with all that you believe yourself to be underlying the moment. If it is bad, that is what you will be communing with. You will find yourself bored, easily distracted, or feeling various feelings of anxiety and panic emerge, unhindered by your usual distracted or semi-detached states. The one good thing about attempting mindfulness, is that it will give you a chance to become aware of this.

Only if you realise it though, because the moment and being in it, will only benefit you, if your moment can be lived in.

Eating predestined conclusions makes you fatuous

This report on a study soon to appear in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism, claims eating quickly is responsible for overeating. Hey, isn't everything, why not that?

Overlooking the promiscuous misuse of that term to the point where it has become ill defined, we'll stick with, eating more than, less.
The habit of eating at your desk which has become more prevalent in recent times is helping to fuel the obesity epidemic.

How so?

Encouraging people to eat quickly whilst doing other things.

The study split people into groups and gave them the same amount of ice cream, 300ml. Different people ate at different speeds.

Those who took 30 minutes to finish their portion, reported feeling fuller than those who were quicker and their blood sample had higher levels of hormones that tell the brain the stomach is full.

Specifically;

Scientists believe eating quickly stops the release of a hormone that tells the brain when the stomach is full.

Believe is right, because this would mean that people eat fast to resist fullness. Fullness gives a large range of pleasureful feelings, a sense of satisfaction, which brings an emotional uplift, you know when you sit back after having had your fill, feeling like all is right with the world?

Now why would you recklessly cast this aside, to eat faster and according to this report, lessen the chances of this happening and increase the likely amount you will ingest?

Why pleasure of course. Hang on a minute: D'OH!

Let's go over that.

Eating more than you need is more likely to lead to indigestion, heartburn, sluggishness, physical discomfort etc.

And yet scientists are prepared to 'believe' this is likely.

It is much touted that fat people eat faster, on average than those less so. I don't know, all I do know is that honestly the fastest eaters I've ever witnessed happen to have been amongst the thinnest people I've ever met.

If this is more than mere anecdote, it might be in part because fat people are more likely to make a conscious effort to slow down their eating.

I once had one of the few successes I've ever had doing this. I apropos of nothing decided to do this one time.

Unsurprisingly, everything was fine at first, then even though I suffered no discomfort whatsoever, it's as if something shifted in the background-internally that is- and for the life of me, It wasn't the same.

I could get no pleasure whatsoever from eating, so I actually stopped, usually out of boredom, but strangely unsatisfied, I felt what I'd eaten, but not in the way you are supposed to feel it.

It was a feeling way out there in the distance somewhere, unconnected with anything like fullness or satisfaction, but running parrallel to it, I knew I'd eaten though.

I carried on, but that's really what did for me in the end, the inability to get any pleasure at all, eating just became, not so much a bore, as a blah. Gray meaningless somehow. This is the kicker, it didn't lessen my appetite. It didn't give up and slink off, as usual, it just became more insistent, until it all became too self defeating and I stopped.

I would not claim universality for my experience, but I'm pretty sure aspects of it are widespread, if not, certainly, the upshot is.

Which is that the same as other attempts to slip calorie reduction and the threat of starvation past the body's defences, it might in a few yield dramatic results which will be trumpeted wildly as if we've never heard it before.

And the overwhelming majority will find it short lived as the body merely adjusts. Yeah, it doesn't always cotton on/act, immediately but come on, if someone was stealing amounts from your bank account, at some point it's going to register, right?

You wish we were thin haters!

Checking out Natalie at axisoffat, I couldn't believe the nerve ofthis woman.

I do not wish to label or put down any specific weight groups, but this article does illustrate is how certain people who are relatively slim or merely plump, make sure that their chosen dissatisfaction with their own bodies (and lives) means no one else is entitled to make peace with their own.

They seem to think they own weight and who gets to be OK with themselves. They deeply resent thinner people, and cast them in the role of people who by their very existence, prove a painful reminder of their own discontent.

Yet they keep them on a pedestal, on the other hand, they despise fat people, who they think they've been given as a motivational tool, and wish to prevent them having any sense of self respect.

In her article Virginia Haussegger describes model Linda Evangelista as a freak, because Evangelista told her in an interview that she makes no effort to participate in the superstitions that are supposed to control people's weight. Good on her, she sounds like my kind of woman and I never thought I'd say that.

Thing is, anyone who's naturally thin, is the same, it's nothing to do with being a professional coat hanger. In fact, we are all 'naturally' the size we are, however we got their it was 'natural' to us as it is to Evangelista, whether we've struggled against it, or not.

She describes her as a beautiful goddess, merely because she's photogenic and doesn't diet.

Whooweee.

Well she did not tell Haussegger to call her that, that is her own view. It's part of her mission to be a weight watcher, again, her decision. Like so many who have belief systems that degrade them, she cannot suck it up, she has to share;

The appearance of fat is ugly when it reeks of sloth and a lack of discipline. Being skinny is ugly when it reeks of malnutrition and starvation.

With her mentality, she sees herself as somehow the 'wisdom of the middle' and the standard by which everyone should judge themselves. This is the ego fighting back after taking a pounding from being compared to 'goddesses'.

But that's not what most women are objecting to when they criticise skinny models in magazines.

Absolutely. Like herself, they are struggling to get out of the bind they've put themselves in with their tendentious inferiority complexes.

She then quotes Karl Largerfeld, himself a former long term fattie saying that women who complain about the size of catwalk models are fat mothers eating bags of chips; who's he kidding?

Maybe that's how it was for him when he was fat, I wouldn't be surprised, he is surrounded by thinness. That's enough to addle anyone's brain when it comes to their weight.

From this she goes on to the clincher;

Fat women hate skinny women. Maybe they console their misery with more chips.

Oh how some would love it if we were sitting there in raging at anyone thinner than ourselves- wait a minute, that's Haussegger! It's self loathing that does that, not being fat, also a very good reason to start appreciating yourself for what you are, not angling after being someone else.

Only silly people wish to partake in thin shaming. Many fat people recognise we are brothers and sisters under the skin, and vice versa. We recognise that certain people wish to demonise or be jealous of us due to their own insecurities and as you see, can't take it.

If you decide to stop hating yourself and go crazy and actively seek to like, nay love yourself, you don't feel the need to hate others, why should you? Their very existence cannot provoke insult if it's not there. You can admire beauty and not feel in any way lessened by it.

I don't and have never given a damn about the size of models, I know what they are for and have found the blaming of them to be a lot of displacement from the true culprits. As if models have any more effect on girls and women than authority figures who tell them fatness is a health risk and immoral or family members they look up to who shout out at fat people 'why don't you just stop eating?', then act really shocked when weight anxiety prompts their children to take that literally.

I have very little time for the fashion industry in general, and abuse of it's own workers should be dealt with the same way any employers who bully and are reckless with the health of their staff, but are they to blame for anorexia?

Puhr-leese.