Myla Dalbesio on Her New Calvin Klein Campaign and the Rise of the 'In-Between' Model

By Leah Chernikoff 

Photo: Calvin Klein

Myla Dalbesio explodes with laughter on the other end of the phone. “It’s crazy!” she exclaims. “I can’t even.”

The 27-year-old model is talking about booking her latest gig, modeling Calvin Klein underwear in the brand’s latest "Perfectly Fit" campaign, which was shot by Lachlan Bailey. “It was such a surreal moment. I cried,” she admitted. 

Booking an underwear campaign for such an iconic brand would be a coup for any model. But it’s especially notable for Dalbesio, who, at a size 10, is what the fashion industry would—still, surprisingly—call “plus size.” (“In fact, not so long ago plus size models were around size 10-12, but that number has recently shrunk to an 8,” said Cosmopolitan earlier this year, while PLUS Model concurs that models “between size 6 and size 14” are typically considered plus size.)

“It’s kind of confusing because I’m a bigger girl,” Dalbesio says. “I’m not the biggest girl on the market but I’m definitely bigger than all the girls [Calvin Klein] has ever worked with, so that is really intimidating.” (We have reached out to Calvin Klein to confirm.) She wasn’t sure, she said of the shoot, what was expected from her “in terms of her size or shape.” Refreshingly, what was expected of her was the same thing that was expected of the other models featured in the campaign (Lara Stone, Jourdan Dunn, Ji Hye Park): to take a beautiful picture. “No one even batted an eye,” she says. “It was very cool.” 

Myla in an editorial shoot (Photo: Courtesy JAG Models)

So what does it mean for a brand like Calvin Klein—known for launching the careers of such svelte models as Brooke Shields and Kate Moss—to cast a model who deviates from the size 0 standard and not make a fuss about it? 

To Dalbesio, who spent years abusing Adderall, crash dieting, and flirting with bulimia in an attempt to whittle herself to “straight size,” it represents progress. “It’s not like [Calvin Klein] released this campaign and were like ‘Whoa, look, there’s this plus size girl in our campaign.’ They released me in this campaign with everyone else; there’s no distinction. It’s not a separate section for plus size girls,” she says.

There was a time in the industry, not too long ago, when it seemed that the high fashion world was using plus size models as a headline-grabbing gimmick (see: the groundbreaking Italian Vogue cover featuring Tara Lynn, Candice Huffine, and Robyn Lawley in June 2011; Crystal Renn in a 2010 Chanel campaign.)

Related: Pirelli Calendar Gets Its First Plus-Size Model

“I feel like for a minute, it was starting to feel like this ‘plus size’ thing really was a trend, and that it was over,” Dalbesio says. “There was that beautiful Italian Vogue story, and the girls that were in that ended up doing really well [in their modeling careers]. But when that happened, we felt really excited; we thought it was going to open so many doors for all of us, you know? And it felt like it hadn’t. It was dying out.”

Now, Dalbesio is a bit more hopeful about size in the modeling industry. “I’m in the middle,” she says. “I’m not skinny enough to be with the skinny girls and I’m not large enough to be with the large girls and I haven’t been able to find my place. This [campaign] was such a great feeling.” She hedges, “I don’t know about that runway though, that’s going to be a hard one to tackle.”

***

Most Common Mental Illnesses On College Campuses

By Walbert Castillo

Open up your eyes and ears. Mental illnesses are real and they are prevalent within our society, especially for college students.

On a national level, 42.5 million (18.2 percent) American adults suffer from some form of mental illness each year, according to News Week. Out of the 18.2 percent of American adults suffering, USA Today stated 27 percent of college kids experience some type of mental health problem, which includes Depression, Anxiety, Eating Disorders, Substance Abuse, Insomnia and Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD).

Many of these mental disorders are an impediment for academic success, which could eventually lead to a lower GPA and/or dropping out of school. One thing students should keep in mind is that their university offers health services, which are geared to lift their ailment.

However, 50 percent of students who have a mental illness do not access these mental health services offered at their university and 45 percent drop out of college in not doing so. Sometimes, these mental illnesses occur because students find difficulty in adjusting to these new environments, are stressed from schoolwork, are homesick and/or lonely.

What can I do if I have a mental illness and I am having a difficult time in school?

• Check out your school’s mental health services
• Talk to your professors and tell them what you are going through; they can possibly accommodate you by lowering your course load
• Join support groups: sometimes talking about your problems with others can relieve you of your pain
• Talk to your family and friends who will support you. 

• According to Everyday Health, there are approximately 1,100 suicides on college campuses nationwide each year. The majority of these deaths are caused by untreated depression. Depression has increased approximately 10 percent over the course of the past 10 years. Depression is an intense feeling of sadness that overtakes a person.

  Depression usually lasts for an extended period of time from many days to weeks and may hinder your ability to function normally. Depression is the second leading cause of death for college students across the nation.

  The National Alliance on Mental Illness conducted a survey and discovered women are two times more likely than men to experience a form of depression.

  

  Image via: http://www.sparqvault.com

  Anxiety

  Social anxiety disorder, phobias and panic disorders fall under the category of anxiety disorder. These disorders can highly hinder a person’s habitual routines and make them stressed and/or scared about future events. Stress amps up the anxiety to a level where people will not be able to function properly. Anxiety disorders are common on a college campus.

  National Alliance on Mental Illness stated that 50 percent of college students who have felt anxiety said that it was difficult to succeed academically. In addition, 75 percent of people who have anxiety disorder are those 22 and younger.

  When you have a friend suffering from anxiety disorder, listen to their thoughts and encourage them to seek professional help. Best Colleges states several symptoms of anxiety disorder: feelings of apprehension, fearfulness, irregular heartbeat and muscle pain.

  Eating Disorders

  Eating disorders include anorexia, bulimia and binge eating disorders. If you are starting to develop abnormal eating patterns, or any mental illness, seek professional help.

  People who have eating disorders will find themselves obsessed with their body weight and the intake of food.

  “People with anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa tend to be perfectionists who suffer from low-self esteem and are extremely critical of themselves and their body,” American Psychiatric Association stated.

  In a study done by Best Colleges, 62 percentof college women have abnormal eating patterns.

  

  Image via: http://img.emedtvdt.com

  Substance Abuse Addiction  

  Partying in college has become the social norm for any type of student. Along with these parties comes alcohol and drug use that may end up being taken in large amounts.

  The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism stated that:

  • About 80 percent of college students drink
  • 1,825 students, ages 18 to 24, die each year from alcohol-related injuries
  • About 25 percent of college students report academic consequences of their drinking
  • More than 150,000 students develop an alcohol-related health problem.
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    Image via: http://cdn.healthworks.m

    If I have a mental illness going into college, how can I prepare myself?

    It’s always best to talk with your parents about your mental illness. This way you can figure out the right approach to take for college. Do you need to seek medical services first before you can go to college? Parents are the best supporters you will have so be open with them. Once you seek help from these medical services, your therapist can assist with your long-term scheduling.

    The best universities to select are the ones that provide students the best types of medicinal programs in response to mental illnesses. Other students might be facing similar struggles when dealing with their mental illness, so find a school that can provide the best treatment for you. These services can easily be found through your school’s website.

    According to US News, “some schools, like Cornell University, reach out to students during the summer to request their medical history and tell them about campus services.”

    After your first year of college, figure out a schedule for your upcoming college years. It’s best to time manage wisely and prepare early for the next transition of your life.

Navigating Weight Loss After an Eating Disorder

When people with histories of disordered eating want to slim down, their approach sometimes needs to be more sensitive. 

Stepping on a scale can feel like stepping into dangerous territory for people recovering from an eating disorder.

By Anna Medaris Miller Caroline Adams Miller, 53, hasn’t stepped on a scale in 30 years. Technically, she has – during her visits to the OB-GYN for her three pregnancies – but she never looked at the number. 

“I would go in and I would say, ‘You’re not going to weigh me unless I stand on the scale backwards, plug my ears and you do not tell me what my weight is,’” says Miller, a positive psychology coach in Bethesda, Maryland, and author of “My Name is Caroline,” the first major autobiography by a bulimia survivor. Her latest book, “Positively Caroline: How I Beat Bulimia For Good and Found Real Happiness,” describes her long-term recovery. 

Weight gain from pregnancy, medications or just life happens to most of us. But when it happens to people who have had eating disorders, weight loss often has to be approached with more care. 

“You have to accommodate your vulnerabilities in life and when you have this one, restricting food and so on and so forth poses certain risks,” says Marsha Marcus, a professor of psychiatry and psychology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. “It doesn’t mean you can’t do it, and certainly for some people, maybe they should, but there’s no one answer.” 

Redefining Success

According to the National Eating Disorders Association, eating disorders affect about 20 million women and 10 million men in the United States. Many more have likely experienced disordered eating patterns. That means plenty of people who have struggled with the conditions are among us at the gym, the grocery store – and the doctor’s office, where their histories may go undisclosed. 

“They might go to see their primary care physician and [he or she] says, 'Hey, you really need to lose some weight,’ but the physician may not even have a clue that the patient has a history of an eating disorder,” says Cynthia Bulik, director of the University of North Carolina’s Center of Excellence for Eating Disorders. 

That’s important because, while people with eating disorders can and do recover, certain things like the number on a scale can remain vulnerabilities, experts say. Cutting calories and amping up exercise – touted as the hallmark of healthy weight loss – in and of themselves can be risky for people who’ve had eating disorders, since being in a state of “negative energy balance,” or expending more energy than you're consuming, might trigger those unhealthy patterns again, Bulik says. 

“For most of us, that's a really uncomfortable physical experience: When we’re hungry, we get irritable, we get headaches and it’s not a good feeling,” she says. “For people with anorexia nervosa, it’s probably their favorite physical state – it feels good to them. They feel worse when they’re full.” Bulik says this trait is likely due to a biological mechanism that made them more vulnerable to an eating disorder in the first place. 

For Miller, such potential vulnerabilities are part of the reason why she doesn’t step on the scale, doesn’t drink alcohol and swims competitively for the love of the sport, not its body-shaping effects. “I had to go back and redefine what I want my body to do, not what I want it to look like,” she says. 

Do Ask, Do Tell

One of the most important ways for people with histories of eating disorders to stay healthy while losing weight is to discuss their backgrounds with their doctors and even their personal trainers or fitness instructors, experts say. 

Bulik, for one, would like to see “eating disorders” as a checkable box under medical history at doctor’s appointments, right alongside history of heart disease or glaucoma. That way, clinicians might rethink how they’re prescribing weight loss or choose to focus on aspects of a patient’s health other than weight. 

“Whatever approach is taken with these folks has to be an anti-dieting approach,” Bulik says. For example, the goal might be to lower cholesterol or to increase physical activity. Striving to hit a certain number on the scale, on the other hand, is “the danger zone” for people who have or have had eating disorders, Bulik says. 

The conversation about eating disorder history should also happen at the gym, says Jodi Rubin​, a social worker and eating disorder specialist in New York who founded “Destructively Fit,” a program that trains fitness professionals to recognize eating disorder symptoms in their clients and then address those issues appropriately and sensitively. 

“What I’ve found is that nobody talks about eating disorders – they talk about food, they sort of dance around it, so what I encourage people to do is ask, ‘Have you ever had an eating disorder or do you now, and how is exercise connected to that?’” Rubin says. 

If a client does reveal a history of disordered eating, his or her personal trainer might consider focusing on measurements such as how much weight the client can lift or how quickly he or she gets winded after climbing the stairs, since stepping on the scale at each session could be “devastating," Rubin says. 

People with histories of eating disorders might also benefit from exercising away from the mirror and learning how the proper techniques feel, rather than how they look. Exercises like yoga that open up the body and facilitate connection with it, too, can be good choices for people with histories of eating disorders, Rubin says. Of course, all these approaches can be motivating for people who have never had an eating disorder, too. 

At the end of the day, experts say, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to how people who have had eating disorders approach weight loss later in life. In fact, Miller says, if they received appropriate treatment from a mental health professional and recovered by learning to address the condition’s underlying factors, their approach to weight loss later on might not be all that different from the rest of ours. 

“How do people not relapse after having a baby? How do people lose weight and not trigger an eating disorder?” Miller asks. “If you’ve gone through recovery in a strong way, those don’t become challenges.” 

Living with binge eating disorder

If you have binge eating disorder, please know that you’re alone. Binge eating disorder (BED) is actually the most common eating disorder. It affects about 3.5 percent of women and 2 percent of men.

You’re also not weak, wrong or crazy. BED “is not a reflection of who you are as a person,” said Karin Lawson, PsyD, a psychologist and clinical director of Embrace, the binge eating recovery program at Oliver-Pyatt Centers.

Binge eating may serve many functions, according to Amy Pershing, LMSW, ACSW, the executive director of Pershing Turner Centers, an eating disorder recovery outpatient clinic in Ann Arbor, Mich., and Annapolis, Md.

It might soothe stress and help you escape, especially when you’ve experienced trauma or significant shame, she said. “You have survived, perhaps in part because your relationship with food was a powerful coping strategy. There are better strategies now; you can learn them, and you can heal.”

Some people can get better by using self-help strategies, but BED most often requires treatment. People with BED typically suffer for many years, have co-occurring physical and mental health issues and severe body image issues, which perpetuate weight cycling and exacerbate the disorder, said Chevese Turner, founder and president of the Binge Eating Disorder Association and co-founder and managing director of Pershing Turner Centers.

But the good news is that BED is highly treatable, and you can recover, said Judith Matz, LCSW, co-author of Beyond a Shadow of a Diet: The Comprehensive Guide to Treating Binge Eating Disorder, Compulsive Eating and Emotional Overeating.

Below, you’ll learn more about what BED is (and isn’t) along with treatments that work (and don’t work) and helpful coping strategies.

What is Binge Eating Disorder?

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5) defines BED in this way:

Recurrent episodes of binge eating. An episode of binge eating is characterized by both of the following:

• eating, in a discrete period of time (for example, within any 2-hour period), an amount of food that is definitely larger than most people would eat in a similar period of time under similar circumstances
• a sense of lack of control over eating during the episode (for example, a feeling that one cannot stop eating or control what or how much one is eating)

The binge-eating episodes are associated with three (or more) of the following:

• eating much more rapidly than normal
• eating until feeling uncomfortably full
• eating large amounts of food when not feeling physically hungry
• eating alone because of feeling embarrassed by how much one is eating
• feeling disgusted with oneself, depressed, or very guilty afterwards

Marked distress regarding binge eating is present.

The binge eating occurs, on average, at least once a week for three months.

The binge eating is not associated with the recurrent use of inappropriate compensatory behavior (for example, purging) and does not occur exclusively during the course Anorexia Nervosa, Bulimia Nervosa, or Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder.

Pershing stressed the importance of paying attention to the client’s experience with food, not just to the criteria. “[I]t is critical to remember that the most important issues are a lack of control over the eating behavior and distress/shameover the behavior.”

She noted that some clients may “graze” throughout the day, and eat significantly more than needed, but in a longer period of time than the DSM defines.

Lawson also defines BED more broadly. In addition to the lack of control and feelings of shame, she’s seen that most clients have a “preoccupation with food and/or body image [and] eating compulsively while feeling numb or checked-out.”

BED has a complex etiology. Family dysfunction, genetics, attachment ruptures, mood disorders, trauma (“rates are significantly higher with BED, especially complex trauma”) and environment (such as experiences with weight stigma) may all play a role, Pershing said.

It’s also serious. According to Turner, “Within the BED community, it is not unusual to hear of individuals who have experienced serious organ failure, suicidal ideation or completion, disability due to crippling co-morbid psychiatric conditions, and metabolic issues related to weight cycling and nutritional deprivation.”

Myths About BED

There are many myths about BED and its treatment. Here’s a selection:

• Myth: If people had more willpower, they’d stop bingeing. BED has nothing to do with willpower. Again, it’s a serious disorder. This egregious myth only “contributes to the eating disorder voice that maintains and exacerbates the condition,” Turner said. “For people with BED, eating feels out of control … is disconnected from physical hunger, and is often connected to other issues such as anxiety or depression,” said Matz, LCSW, who treats BED in Skokie, Ill.
• Myth: People with BED are “overweight.” Actually, they “come in all sizes,” Matz said. About 30 percent of people with the disorder are considered “normal” weight and one percent are underweight, according to body mass index, Turner said. (“There are people at higher weights who do not struggle with BED or other overeating problems,” Matz said.)
• Myth: “BED is treated by a ‘sensible eating plan’ (i.e., a diet),” Pershing said. Diets are actually contraindicated for BED and may trigger it, she said. “[T]hey can lead to weight cycling (losing and then regaining weight), which is actually hard on the body and can lead to health issues,” Lawson said. Treatment requires that people with BED work through the psychological, physical and situational factors that trigger binge episodes, Pershing said. “Another diet will not change anything; all it will do it lighten your wallet and leave you with a 95 percent likelihood of regaining the weight in 3 years.”
• Myth: BED doesn’t require the same level of intervention as anorexia or bulimia. Typically, it requires the same treatment as any other eating disorder, Pershing said. This may include: “individual therapy, nutrition professional, groups, expressive therapies [and] medication management.”

What Doesn’t Work in Treating BED

“People with BED may turn to weight management programs,” Matz said. In fact, about 30 percent of people who seek these interventions have BED. But food restrictions actually promote binge eating, she said.

Unfortunately, many professionals think weight loss is essential for recovery for individuals at higher weights. “This is a dangerous concept because the very behaviors that are prescribed for weight loss in those with BED are ‘diagnosed’ in eating disorders that do not involve higher weights,” Turner said.

“For example, individuals with BED are encouraged to count calories, limit food groups (sugar and fat particularly), and restrict food intake with no regard for hunger or satiety.”

The weight-loss approach only fuels feelings of failure and shame, perpetuating the cycle of “self-loathing, defeat, and further eating disorder behaviors,” said Turner, who described below what this feels like:

Having BED means living in a constant state of anxiety and yearning for something that is seemingly forever elusive. Imagine having a stomachache that never goes away. You get up daily and hope that today will be the day that your stomach feels normal again.

You are determined that you are going to find the cause, but each time you go to the doctor, she tells you that it is your fault you have this pain and that you just need to follow the very specific but easy directions she will provide to you. You go home and are determined to implement the doctor’s recommendations perfectly.

After some time, you realize that you are following the doctor’s orders to a “T,” but nothing has changed. Your stomach continues to hurt and you find you are more distressed than ever because you know that everyone around you is assuming that you are not following the recommendations. You are confident that you are the only one who is suffering like this and there is a major defect in your character that is propelling the stomach problems and your ability to control them.

You decide that you are going to isolate and keep everyone away because you do not deserve friends or love. You and your stomach pain are together forever — it’s all you have.

What Does Work for Treating BED

There are different treatment modalities, including cognitive-behavioral therapy, dialectical behavior therapy, internal family systems and trauma therapy, which have shown benefit for BED, Pershing said. The key is that the “client feels validated, taken seriously and respected.”

It’s important for treatment to target the emotional and behavioral aspects of BED, Matz said.

Clients learn the underlying emotional reasons they turn to food along with coping strategies to use when they’re emotionally distressed. They also learn to relinquish dieting and restrictive behaviors around food, which only perpetuate binge eating, she said.

It’s also important to have a multidisciplinary team, which ideally includes “a therapist, nutritionist, non-shaming physician, and a psychiatrist (particularly if there are co-morbid struggles, such as depression, anxiety, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder or substance abuse),” Lawson said.

She recommended seeing a registered dietitian who is well-versed in intuitive eating, which focuses on reconnecting to your body and your natural sense of hunger and fullness. This is in stark contrast, she said, to society’s belief that people with BED “can’t trust themselves, need to diet and rely on external numbers and messages.”

When you learn to trust your body, this trust spills over into other parts of your life. You become more confident in using your voice with others, setting boundaries and pursuing meaningful goals, Lawson said. “It all takes practice and none of it is easy, but food is the metaphor, not the problem, per se.”

People with BED commonly have physical issues, such as polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), hypothyroidism, low vitamin D, sleep apnea and inflammation, Lawson said. This is why having a physician on your team is helpful.

If you or someone you love struggles with binge eating disorder please call Ramey Nutrition at 206-909-8022, or visit us at www.RameyNutrition.com. You're not alone!

Eating Healthy: The mistake that triggered my eating disorder and the lesson I learned

About two months ago I took on a challenge to change my life for the better - or at least that was the goal.  I had no idea how this change would actually affect how I live and eat.  Choosing to eliminate chemicals and certain processed foods from my diet has been more of a process than I ever expected.

I never realized the extent that preservatives, bleached and chemically treated flour and other chemicals have weaved their way into the diets of Americans.  It feels like I have spent more hours reading labels than actually eating these days.  Needless to say my education on the American food industry has exponentially grown in this time.

I will be honest with you all.  I have made mistakes and I am learning from them.  Going cold turkey, eliminating everything that was bad all at once was probably the worst mistake I could have made.

At the very beginning, I went through my cupboards and threw out or gave away food I knew I shouldn’t have.  I was so tired of the fatigue and pain that I did something drastic and in the end I paid what could have been a very high price for my hast.

That one act sent me into a tail spin of depression and the ugly monster of anorexia reared it’s head once again.  It’s been ten years, nearly to the day, since I started the downward spiral that took me from a weight of 165 pounds to a bony five foot seven frame of 108 pounds in only a few months.

Each time this hits me now, it hits harder and faster than any time before.  This time I dropped ten pounds in nearly a week.  It's not something I like talking about, but I also know that talking about it is one of the key weapons in keeping it at bay.

The road to recovery back then took me a few years.  I had to truly battle back not only to a healthy weight but also a healthy mind set.  Anorexia and bulimia had taken control and the rational, medical professional portion of my brain could not overcome the eating disorder.  I went through countless bottles of ipecac and avoided food like the plague.  The way my brain worked back then was that on a good day my intake was about 200 calories, the equivalent to a bag of Skittles.  On a bad day, my intake was about 500 calories.

To this day I have had several lapses but none to the extent it reoccurred this time.  Fortunately, I was able to break out of it and am now working towards a continual healthy mind set around the foods I should be eating.

What I learned was that I should have done more research prior to starting with the new eating habits.  I should have read even more labels, searched the web, and talked to others to have an arsenal of information prior to clearing out my cupboards.  I should have looked for the foods that I could tell my brain that I could have, instead of telling my brain what I couldn't have.  I thought that eating healthy meant eating all fresh food that, to be honest, I didn't have the money for.

I love being in the kitchen and love the process of cooking up a delicious meal for my family.  I love the process of looking at a single ingrediant and planning a meal around it.  But that doesn't hold true when I am by myself.  Living alone most of the time, I'm a bit lazy in the kitchen. I’m not one that likes to spend a whole lot of time prepping dinner for just myself.  And with the Fibromyalgia fatigue that comes at the end of a long day at work, I often don’t have the energy to spend a whole lot of time to prepare food for dinner.

So in an effort to save money and time, I started looking for products and ideas that would save time but still put me on the path of eating healthy.  I spent even more time reading labels and reading up on the chemicals that are found so often in the products we consume.

All this time spent gave me the idea to start sharing what I learned in the hope that others don’t go through the same issues I did when just starting off.  Whether you have been diagnosed with Fibromyalgia like myself, or have food allergies, or other chronic conditions where food is a contributing factor, I hope the information can be useful for someone out there.

Is Gluten-Free the New Eating Disorder?

Jennifer Lawrence is grabbing headlines again, but this time it’s not hackers and voyeurs on the wrong side of the outspoken star: it’s followers of the gluten-free fad – people she says are part of a “new cool eating disorder”.

J-Law took a stab at the diet in a recent interview with Vanity Fair. The 24-year-old actress is dating Chris Martin – the ex-husband of Hollywood’s most vocal vegan, Gwynneth Paltrow, whose hit gluten-free cookbook It’s All Good, was published last year. Paltrow has led the charge in making a celebrity lifestyle of healthy eating, but while Paltrow has been lauded by some for being an exponent of health in a country plagued by an obesity epidemic, others might say that her penchant for gluten-free, dairy-free, meat-free and organic eating borders on an unhealthy obsession.

Orthorexia nervosa is an eating disorder that is characterized by an obsessive preoccupation with avoiding foods that one perceives to be ‘unhealthy’: an unhealthy fixation on healthy eating. And, although the disorder starts out as a benign attempt to eat more healthily, orthorexia sufferers soon loose perspective and the ability to moderate their insistence on ‘foood purity’. As is the case with other eating disorders, orthorexia sufferers’ self-esteem becomes entwined with their ability to maintain a rigid diet. But, inevitably, the individual’s food choices become so restrictive that their health deteriorates and can lead to malnutrition. And, as is the case with orthorexia, rigid eating can also lead to social exclusion, as their preoccupation with health crowds out other aspects of their life.

So where do we draw the line? And when does a healthy inclination to snack organic morph into an obsessive inability to face normal grub like potatoes? While Paltrow seems happy enough with her healthy habits, and the answer may not lie in Lawrence’s love for pasta and pizza, the latter’s words may serve as a warning to blind followers of food fads.

Women’s greatest threat isn’t misogyny, it’s counting calories

The modern feminist movement is losing because of our obsession with weight.

By Vanessa Garcia September 5

Vanessa Garcia is a writer, playwright, and journalist. She is a doctoral candidate at the University of California Irvine.

I was lying in bed in my New York City apartment when the world went black. My breathing had gotten sluggish, and my heart felt like it was slowing down. I didn’t feel pressure in my chest, and I didn’t feel pain, just an overwhelming sense of tiredness and fatigue. A complete depletion of energy and the absolute inability to move. And then: black.
I hadn’t eaten anything but gum and coffee for three days. Even before that, I’d been eating very little for weeks, months, even years. I was 24 years old and a full-fledged anorexic-bulimic.
It was 2003, and I was trying to launch my career as a writer. I had dreamed of publishing my first novel by then. Instead, between the ages of 15 and 29, I suffered from numerous bouts of anorexia and bulimia. I wasted my most promising years and what little energy I had obsessing over my weight.
My problem reached the extreme, but these kinds of unhealthy relationships with food are hardly uncommon for women. At every turn we see them: a woman counting calories, a woman dieting despite her normal weight, a woman cutting carbs or pretending she’s allergic to gluten so she doesn’t have to eat that slice of pizza at the office party. I have friends who spend three hours at the gym and run marathons on a diet of bananas. This isn’t an exaggeration. According to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders, 25 percent of college-aged women binge and purge as a form of weight-control.
College-educated women are leaning closer to the toilet bowl than to Sheryl Sandberg’s boardroom table. In the past several years, women have been speaking louder about gender discrepancies in the workplace, unfair pay and the paradoxes that arise out of trying to “have it all.” On the surface, 21st-century feminism seems to be booming. But even as writer Hanna Rosin proclaimed “The End of Men” in 2010, women were really the ones disappearing. Quite literally. According to a 2009 article in the American Journal of Psychiatry, eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of any mental disorder.
Women are starving themselves. They’re spending more time thinking about their calorie intake than how to change the world. It’s not just the severe disorders that we have to be wary of. In a 2008 survey by SELF magazine and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 75 percent of women reported disordered eating patterns, 37 percent regularly skipped meals to lose weight, and 26 percent cut out entire food groups. The report concluded that “eating habits that women think are normal — such as banishing carbohydrates, skipping meals and in some cases extreme dieting — may actually be symptoms of disordered eating.”
The drivers of this illness are all around us. Models weigh as much as 30 percent less than their recommended weight and plus-size models are often as small as a size 6. The press tells us that Victoria Beckham lost her “baby weight” with the Five Hands Diet, which means she ate five fistfuls of food a day. And there are actresses such as Elizabeth Hurley, who notoriously told Allure magazine that she’s always “thought Marilyn Monroe looked fabulous, but I’d kill myself if I was that fat.” Monroe was about 5 feet 5 inches tall and fluctuated between 118 and 140 pounds.

Even now, when songs like “All About That Bass” by Meghan Trainor hit the pop charts, I have to wonder if they are the solution or the problem. The song, touted as a healthy-sized woman’s anthem, is actually pretty demeaning considering that the only reason Trainor gives for being happy with her curves is that guys like them: “Yeah, my mama she told me don’t worry about your size/She says boys like a little more booty to hold at night.”
Women have to take their bodies back. We can’t close gender gaps when we spend endless hours counting calories instead of cracking glass ceilings. We can’t gain self-assurance when body dysmorphia is so abundant. It takes a whole lot of strength, fuel and energy to push all of inequity’s baggage off of us.
I know exactly the kind of life that weight obsession leads to. I was shaken out of my blackout by an enormous push on my back, a big jolt and something — perhaps my inner voice – whispering, “You have too much left to do.” I realized that I was alone and that I could very likely die that way. I could waste away, along with my brain, my thoughts and everything I could possibly become. I put on my coat, went outside and bought a wrap. I tried to ingest it. It was painful, both physically and emotionally, but I wanted to live. This was the beginning of my recovery. Back then, I was 5 feet 5 inches tall and 100 pounds with a winter coat, sweaters, long underwear and boots on. (I only weighed myself fully dressed in winter, so if I weighed too much, I could blame it on the extra clothes.) It took five years from that moment — two of those in weekly therapy — for me to truly gain normalcy in my eating patterns. Today, I weigh around 135 pounds.
All I can think now is: What a waste of life. I think about the missed opportunities and the unmet goals I sacrificed because of the time and energy I wasted on cutting my weight. If I could talk to my 25-year-old self, I’d tell her, “Your time is precious. Get help. Do it now. You have too many important things to do.”

Family-based Therapy May Effectively Treat Adolescent Anorexia Nervosa

MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Stewart Agras, M.D.
Professor of Psychiatry Emeritus
Stanford University School of Medicine

MedicalResearch: What was the study about?

Dr. Agras: Family-based treatment (FBT) has been shown to be more effective than individual psychotherapy for the treatment of adolescent anorexia nervosa. This treatment focuses on helping the family to re-feed their child. The question posed in this study was whether Family-based treatment would have any advantages over Systemic family therapy (SyFT) focusing on family interactions that may affect the maintenance of the disorder. The participants were 164 adolescents with anorexia nervosa and their families – one of the largest studies of its type.

MedicalResearch: What is the background of study?

Dr. Agras: Anorexia nervosa has one of the highest death rates, from suicide or starvation, of any psychiatric disorder particularly in longstanding cases and is associated with major psychosocial disability. There are no evidence-based treatments for these cases hence it is important to treat anorexia early in its course in adolescence to reduce the number of persistent cases.

MedicalResearch: What were the main findings?

Dr. Agras: Both family therapies were equally effective in weight restoration and reducingeating disorder symptoms at the end of treatment and at follow-up.

However, Family-based treatment led to faster initial weight gain and significantly fewer days in hospital. This reduced the cost of treatment by half (about $9000 vs $18,000). It is likely that the early weight gain resulting from the focus on re-feeding with Family-based treatment reduced the risk of hospitalization. However, SyFT was found in a moderator analysis to be more effective than Family-based treatment for patients with obsessive-compulsive symptoms.

MedicalResearch: Were you surprised by any aspect of the results?

Dr. Agras: Yes. We expected Family-based treatment to be more effective than SyFT at end of treatment because of its specific focus on helping the family to re-feed their child.

MedicalResearch: What should clinicians and patients take away from this report?

Dr. Agras:

• First, this study confirmed the effectiveness of Family-based treatment in treating adolescents with anorexia nervosaand demonstrated major cost-savings from its use compared to SyFT.
• Second, for patients with more severe obsessive-compulsive symptoms SyFT may be the better choice. Parents should know that there is effective outpatient treatment for most adolescents with anorexia nervosa, that Family-based treatment is the preferred treatment, but that SyFT may be more useful for some adolescents.
• Finally, this study confirmed that patients with a shorter duration of anorexia nervosa improved more than those with a longer duration, underlining the need for early identification of this disorder in adolescence together with early treatment.

 

Citation:

Comparison of 2 Family Therapies for Adolescent Anorexia Nervosa: A Randomized Parallel Trial.

Agras W, Lock J, Brandt H, et al. Comparison of 2 Family Therapies for Adolescent Anorexia Nervosa: A Randomized Parallel Trial. JAMA Psychiatry. Published online September 24, 2014. doi:10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2014.10

If you or someone you love struggles with an eating disorder, please call us at (206) 909-8022 or visit us at www.RameyNutrition.com

Concerns rise for child anorexia crisis

A new study has revealed that some children as young as eight years old are going to extreme lengths to change their bodies because they are unhappy with their weight.

With up to two million Australians having developed serious eating disorders at a time in their lives, psychologists now want to act on what has become a body image crisis.

Tatiana Johns, now 23 years old, has suffered from anorexia for almost half her young life.

Struggling with undiagnosed depression, she found a website promoting ‘thinspiration’ giving tips from emaciated models.

“This was the start of my disorder. I was obsessed with losing weight and exercising and things like that,” Tatiana said.

“It just kind of went under the radar.”

From 14, Tatiana's weight plummeted to that of a girl almost half her age.

Kids as young at eight years old are going to extreme lengths to change their bodies, with images on social media being blamed for the crisis. Photo: 7News

Desperately hiding it from her parents, she tracked her mission to lose even more.

Eight-year-old Dana's anorexia, featured in a British documentary, highlights increasing numbers of primary school girls suffering from anorexia.

“At that moment I wanted to die. I gave up eating altogether,” Dana said.

The Australian Institute of Family Studies’ new survey of 4000 kids found the majority has tried to control their weight by age 10.

Now, a new preventative program in Sydney schools aims to alert parents.

“I think parents would be really surprised at the impact that social media can have on their child's body image,” Clinical Psychologist Ariana Elias said.

Tatiana, 23, reads diary entries from when her eating disorder began from 14 years old. Photo: 7News

“It's really helpful if parents can understand what they can do to help mediate and then protect their kids.”

A large share of the blame is being directed at social networking sites, leaving children exposed to body image propaganda.

If you or someone you love struggles with an eating disorder, please call us at (206) 909-8022 or visit us at www.RameyNutrition.com