This video my mom sent me was too lovely not to share.

Writer Naomi Wolf was the keynote speaker at NEDA this year, and I honestly wasn't sure I was going to hear her speak.  Not because I'm anti-feminist (I'm not) but because I've read her book "The Beauty Myth" and I didn't find it that relevant to my own experience of an eating disorder.  I'm glad I went as a) it wasn't as bad as I feared and b) I found that many people had a similar response to what Wolf had to say.

I've heard Wolf speak before, and she is a phenomenal, engaging speaker.  She's super-articulate, very intelligent, and she knows her stuff.  I very much respect her and what she has to say.

However...

Although I think our cultural ideas and beauty obsessions and diet mentality are absolutely toxic, I don't think that if you eliminated them, you would eliminate eating disorders.  Most women feel bad when they're looking at Photoshopped models.  Most women diet at some point.  Most women don't have eating disorders.

(Not to mention, what about men?  What about people who live in cultures when thin isn't overvalued?  What about people with non fat-phobic anorexia?)

It's not uncommon for an eating disorder to start with an effort to "tone up" or "lose a few."    Yet once the disease process starts--once it kicks in--appearance is the last stinking thing most people with EDs are really thinking about.  People told me that my ED was making me look atrocious.  I was aware, on some level, that they were right.  By that point, the ED had a life of its own.  I was terrified of eating.  Even if it didn't have calories and exercising didn't burn any of them off, I would have still felt compelled to starve and exercise.  I couldn't stop.  That's why it's an illness.

I'm aware that the only evidence based prevention programs for eating disorders have focused on improving body image, and I'm not saying they don't work.  The research literature shows they do work.  But in a survey of 6000 eating disorder sufferers, no one said that their eating disorder had anything to do with vanity or cultural ideas (I heard this in a presentation by Susan Ringwood, the CEO of the UK charity B-EAT).  They did say that cultural ideals made it harder to recover, something I definitely endorse.

Eating disorders existed before thin was in, and they will probably exist after Size Zero seems as antiquated and misguided as chastity belts and foot binding.  The cultural language of fat and thin and dieting are what we have to put our experience into words.  They are how we frame what is happening to us.  People in the Middle Ages framed anorexia has an effort to be more spiritual.  Now, we look at it as an effort to be thinner or look like some supermodel.  But the way we make sense of an illness is different than the illness itself.

It just fundamentally bothers me that fighting eating disorders is seem as (in large part) fighting the fashion and cosmetics industry.  They use our obsession with being thin and such to sell products, it's true.  They make lots of women feel insecure about their looks, and then go on whackjob diets.  The body dysmorphia that accompanies an eating disorder isn't just a really bad version of wondering if these pants make your thighs look fat.  Being beheaded isn't just like a really bad paper cut, either.  An eating disorder isn't a really extreme diet.  It might look like that, but it's fundamentally different.

Wolf mentioned nothing about underlying vulnerabilities like anxiety and depression to eating disorders.  She did say that restricting in and of itself is crazy making, which is good.  Although she said that "parents don't cause eating disorders," she also said that her own mother's bitching about her thighs primed her for anorexia.  None of her other siblings developed an eating disorder, yet I'm sure they all heard the kvetching and comparing.  Why Naomi?  Why only her?  It's fundamentally not okay if your mother is diet-obsessed and tells you you're too fat.  Not okay.  And that sort of environment is certainly conducive to the development of an ED, but it's impossible to say that had this person grown up in a different environment, they never would have developed an eating disorder.

It was...frustrating at times to hear no mention of science and biology.  My friend Sarah Ravin asked Wolf afterwards why there was no mention, and Wolf said "I don't really do that science stuff."  I understand that science might not be everyone's little pet, but seriously?

The emphasis on beauty images only reinforces the idea that EDs are an expression of vanity, or just a bunch of beauty-obsessed kids who need to stop reading magazines.  And they're not.  Our focus on this does everyone a disservice.

I have to confess: I have a soft spot in my heart for the Discovery Channel show MythBusters. It's a great show to teach the otherwise uninterested about how to conduct a solid experiment, and there's lots of pyrotechnics--what's not to love? Besides that, the ever-nerdy biologist in me loves to poke holes in commonly held theories and ideas, whether historical, sociological, or scientific.

Which is why I loved this article from (of all places) Discovery News: New TV Show Perpetuates Anorexia Myths. The new TV show, hosted by Jessica Simpson, is called "The Price of Beauty" and will air on VH1. Simpson says this about the show:

“I have always believed that beauty comes from within and confidence will always make a woman beautiful, but I know how much pressure some women put on themselves to look perfect. I am really looking forward to discovering how beauty is perceived in different cultures and participating in some of the crazy things people do to feel beautiful. I know we will all learn a lot on this journey and I am so excited that VH1 is coming along on what I’m sure will be a wild ride.”

Which is all well and good- I have no problem with a show looking at different cultural ideals of beauty, and how it varies from place to place. I think it could be both entertaining and eye-opening.

So what does this have to do with anorexia?

In one of the first episodes, Simpson interviews anorexia sufferer Isabelle Caro, whose appearance in an anti-anorexia billboard caused quite an uproar several years ago. And since Discovery News writer Benjamin Radford did such a good smack-down of the issues, I'll let him speak:

What Isabelle Caro, Jessica Simpson, and the VH1 show don’t realize is that anorexia has little or nothing to do with fashion modeling. Eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia are biological diseases, not voluntary behaviors. The idea that a model, photo of a model, or Web site can "encourage" anorexia is not supported by science or research. Images of thin people cannot "encourage" anorexia, any more than photographs of bipolar patients "encourage" bipolar disorder, or photos of diabetics "encourage" diabetes.

Though many people are convinced that anorexia is a threat to most young women because of the media images they see, that’s not what the scientific evidence says. Anorexia is a very rare and complex psychological disorder with many indications of a strong genetic component; as anorexia expert Cynthia Bulik noted in her 2007 study “The Genetics of Anorexia,” published in the Annual Review of Nutrition, “Family studies have consistently demonstrated that anorexia nervosa runs in families.” Most research studies have failed to find a cause-and-effect link between media images of thin people and eating disorders.

...Nearly every woman in America regularly sees thin women in everyday life and the media, yet according to the National Institute of Mental Health, only about one percent of them develop the disease. If there a strong link existed between media exposure and anorexia, we would expect to see an incidence many orders of magnitude higher than is found.

Anorexia is a tragic disease; some young women (and men) do diet to excess and have body image issues. But the scientific research shows that they are the exception, not the rule. The first step in solving a problem is correctly understanding it, and TV shows like “The Price of Beauty” may actually end up doing more harm than good.

Since research suggests that the causes of anorexia have more to do with genetics than thin fashion models, efforts to educate young girls about the artificiality of airbrushed media images won’t do anything to treat or cure anorexia. Girls and young women deserve facts and truth instead of myths and misinformation.

(emphasis mine)

Can I hear a "Hallelujah, amen!"?

If anorexia is seen as a cultural illness by a bunch of diet-crazed beauty freaks, no wonder the allocation for research dollars is minimal, that insurance companies can put up such resistance to covering eating disorder treatment*, that I have been told by so many people to snap out of it and get over it. Yes, I have been exposed to the thin body ideals. Yes, I have probably internalized some of that. No, that has nothing to do with my anorexia.

I wasn't trying to be thin to look like some sort of magazine model; I was terrified of eating and gaining weight. I was aware that anorexia made me look pretty atrocious--I couldn't sense that I had lost weight as my illness progressed, but I could see the gray-yellow skin, the blue nails and lips, the brittle, thinning hair. The culture of thin provides a vocabulary for many sufferers, and it helped me explain to myself and others why I didn't want to eat or tried to avoid eating. I did believe my own bullshit, to some degree. One of the key aspects of anorexia is the inability to understand just how sick you are. So, yeah, telling yourself and your parents and your friends and anyone who cares to listen that your starvation is just an attempt to lose a few pounds and/or just another diet is an easily available defense. It makes sense to you and it helps get those around you to stop breathing down your bony neck.

Anorexia existed before the advent of supermodels, and I have a feeling it will exist after. In the meantime, I'm sending a huge thank you to Benjamin Radford for speaking out on this issue. You can post your own comments at the bottom of the article, so send him some ED Bites lovin'.

*There are other reasons insurance companies can do this, too, not the least of which is the lobbying power fueled by astronomical profits and the fact that it's cheaper to let sufferers die than pay for treatment. But I digress...

A long time ago, in a world far, far away, plump women were considered pretty. Sexy. Attractive.

Aside from the fact that I hate the word 'plump,' this may have been a good thing. Except for Kate Moss and Nicole Ritchie perhaps.

I came across an interesting article yesterday in the New York Times about girls being "overfed" in the mostly Islamic country of Mauritania in North Africa.

Why?

Men find them sexier that way.

Hmmmmm........

In days gone by, fat was a symbol of fertility. It meant that you had enough energy reserves to sustain a pregnancy. That you could survive a famine. I'm guessing (hoping) that this was a woman's natural fat and curves, but even so. While I'd wager that carrying too much weight on your body is far less harmful than carrying too little, it's still not good. Especially psychologically.

The article describes the ordeals of girls being overfed, such as being forced to drink 5 gallons of camel's milk, and having to eat their own vomit if they couldn't keep it down. It's the total, utter, and complete opposite of dieting young girls here in America. That it's normal. That health will be risked in order to achieve what society calls the ideal body. That the ideal body is so far off from reality that you have to alter yourself physically to achieve it.

Basically, it means that just about everyone, everywhere idealizes a female figure that is not compatible with the way most women look.

I heard it explained in one book on evolutionary psychology that beauty has to be somewhat rare because ordinary really isn't beautiful. And beautiful is a good way to find a mate with ideal genes.

Bollocks. Yeah, beauty is on the inside, but people also find different things beautiful in the opposite (or same) sex. Nor is this a ticket to eternal happiness, as much as current weight loss companies would have us believe.

Of course, the article started with a little vignette about Mauritanian women taking walks, all fat and huffing and puffing. Why?

One woman said, "Because I am fat."

Another woman said, "For my health and to be skinny."

And this is where cultures collide. Big time.

Is this tradition of overfeeding girls dying out because of health risks? Or because men are finding different things beautiful in women?

I'm no expert, but I have a hunch that it's the latter. Or maybe it's driven by the women, thinking that they will have a better chance of finding a mate if they look thinner.

Basically, the moral of the story is this: why can't we be beautiful just the way we are? (cue Christina Aguilara music) Why do we have to starve or binge in order for someone to find us attractive?

I think it also goes deeper than just what men want. It's the little snarky competition between women as to who will get the best guy. I feel much more insecure about my looks when I'm in a group of women than when I'm in a group of men. How am I being judged? Do I measure up? It's all of this primal competition. For years, this sexual selection has allowed our species to survive.

Isn't it time for a better way?