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Disordered Eating

Disordered eating can be viewed along a continuum of behaviors and attitudes about food and the body. Dieting behavior has become so common, even among children, that a disordered pattern of eating often escapes clinical detection and therefore remains untreated and unchanged.  

Our culture perpetuates unrealistic standards of beauty and acceptibility which can lead to unhealthy eating patterns and compensatory behaviors, often with the goal of maintaining an unrealistic body shape or size. Healthcare providers can inadvertently contribute to a disordered relationship with food by recommending diets and other weight loss regimens that can do more harm than good.

Patterns of restricting food intake can paradoxically lead to overeating as the body tries to obtain the nutrients and energy it needs. When diets fail, there is generally a sense of personal failure and a resolve to try harder, rather than an awareness that diets don't work well for the majority of people in the long term. Tuning into hunger and fullness cues is a much more effective way to heal one's relationship with food. 

Eating beyond the point of satiety can also be a means of managing or avoiding emotions and can signal deeper underlying issues that must be resolved before true healing can begin. The key is to find healthy ways to manage and express our emotions, and to become more aware of when, why, and how we eat. 

There is a bounty of scientific evidence that weight cycling, also known as yo-yo dieting, has serious health risks, and that BMI and weight are often poor indicators of health.  Therefore, rejecting the pressures of diet culture in favor of true health-promoting activities is a more sustainable path to long term wellbeing.

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