Q & A Friday – I’m Afraid to Eat Fat

How Eating Fat Helps Cure Binge EatingQuestion: Hi Leora!

I got the 100 days of real food cookbooks, and notice that they say to eat full fat cheese and yogurts and things like that, I know that you say we should eat full fat yogurts and things as well. I know they are better for my body, and I can eat less of then to get full faster, but it’s honestly hard for me to not buy nonfat.  It makes me worried about gaining weight. I know it’s silly, but would love any advice you can give!

Thank you! Elizabeth

Answer: Hi Elizabeth, 

Yes, you are right. There is an underlying message out there that all fat is bad- body fat, fats in food, all of it. There is a belief that eating fat makes you fat– which is not only untrue, it’s also the opposite. When you eat more healthy fat, your body weight actually regulates and comes to its healthy place.  At this point, although many of us know from a nutritional and intellectual standpoint that full-fat products are much better for your body- it’s still difficult to integrate that knowledge to day-to-day eating. Fat certainly keeps you fuller longer and is more satisfying but it also decreases your risk of binge eating, and conversely,  avoiding fat increases your chances of bingeing. So much of healing from binge eating disorder is also about increasing your nutritional profile. This is why: 

–Essential fatty acids found in food supply the nutrients that promote growth of our cell functions but our body cannot make on its own. Thus if we avoid fat, we will either get very ill or our body will involuntarily turn to binge eating to meet these needs. 

–Your brain is made up of fat- the myelin sheath (which insulates your nerve cells) is made up of fat. Because of this, it’s important to continue to supply your brain with fat. This helps to increase concentration and uplift your mood.  Depression and anxiety can often lead to binge eating as it temporarily decreases these mood issues (and then makes them a lot worse). By keeping your brain feeling strong and stable, you have more of a chance of avoiding binges. 

–Fat transports essential fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, E and K) to your cells.  Your body needs these nutrients to keep its functions going. If it doesn’t have fat to deliver them, you will likely binge (whether you want to or not) because your body is looking to heal itself. 

–Fat helps to regulate your hormones which will keep issues like PMS at bay. When you find that your mood swings are fluctuating less, it decreases your chances of binge eating. 

Because of how essential fat is, your body will seek out ways to get it if you avoid it. Now, your main question is “how can I get myself to eat fat?”  You have to flip the message in your brain that “fat is bad.”

Flip Your Thoughts about Fat: When you see full-fat yogurt or olive oil or milk or cheese, I want you to try to think to yourself, “there is something rich and nurturing for my body, I am dousing my body in nutrients when I feed it healthy fats.   You are changing your thoughts about what fat is. Instead of equating fat with an unhealthy body, start to think about how healthy and strong fat makes your body. 

Take it slow:  This doesn’t have to be a fast all or nothing process. You can start slow. For instance you can tell yourself that you will have one bowl of full fat yogurt in the morning once and see how it goes. Then you can make a list of breakfast foods that are full fat and try one each morning. For instance:

  • Toast with peanut butter
  • Eggs with Avocado
  • Full fat yogurt with berries 
  • Macadamia nuts with fruit 
  • Bacon/Avocado rolls
  • Butternut squash with butter or olive oil mashed in (yes squash for breakfast! very yummy)

And then just let yourself sit with it mindfully and see how it makes your body feel. Usually when I do this experiment with clients, I give them a one week challenge of eating a breakfast with fat and protein each morning. Although they are often scared, they tend to feel so nurtured that they notice their urge to binge decreases considerably and they feel grateful for their new appreciation of nourishing fats. 

Start slow. Try it for one breakfast and see how it goes and then let me know! Thank you for the question. 

When Your Critic Won’t Stop Attacking You


You’re so fat! Look at the size of your thighs, your butt is huge… what is wrong with you? Why do you have to be so…so…  so what? 

There’s that voice that sits inside your head and tells you that there is something wrong with you. The inner critic. The part of you that tells you that in order to be liked by people, you have to be thinner, smarter, faster, stronger, and if you’re not, you’re worthless.  Do you know how many people deal with that voice? Many. Probably at least half (or more) of the people you talk to daily. 

The problem with the inner critic is that she won’t be silenced by obeying her, it just makes her stronger.  When the you inside of you punishes you for being you… you’re in trouble ALL THE TIME. 

So what to do when you live with a punisher inside your head? 

Dismantle the critic. 

Step One: Analyze the statement with writing. Write down the day, time, and the event that was happening right before your inner critic began yelling at you. 

Step Two: When you hear the critic saying something to you, try to think about what her purpose is. What reason does she have to tell you she’s telling you? What is underneath the statement? 

Example: It’s Thursday afternoon at 1pm, you are on your lunch break and are scrolling through Facebook and you see that one of your best friends from college just got engaged. You get a pit in your stomach and you start hearing yourself saying “you need to lose weight, you have to go on a diet, there’s something wrong with you…” you instantly throw your burrito in the garbage can and berate yourself for not getting a salad instead. What happened there? Maybe you saw that your friend was getting engaged and it reminded you that you’re not currently in a relationship and that you want to me. Maybe you felt scared that you’d never be in a relationship. Maybe your fear of being alone for the rest of your life made you decide to take it out on your body, that the only way you could remedy dying alone was by beating yourself up. Beating yourself up isn’t going to solve the fears that you have. Telling yourself that there is something wrong with you and that you need to diet isn’t going to make you not scared. It’s just going to add an abuser into the life of an already scared person. What do you really need? 

Step Three: Replace your abuser with a kinder, gentler voice. Now that you know why you were so upset and abusing yourself, find the loving Mom inside of you, the one who holds you and wipes your tears and tells you that you matter, tells you that you are perfect, whole and complete just the way you are. Because you do matter and you are perfect, whole and complete just the way you are. 

Step Four: Disengage from the abusive voice. Just because you hear it, doesn’t mean you have to listen to it. Think of it as an irritating noise in the background that you tune out, like construction outside your office, or a siren zooming by. You can hear it, but you don’t have to chase it. You can choose to ignore it.

Step Five:  If the voice persists, tell yourself, “this is unhelpful and unneeded.” You might even picture a giant stop sign in your mind. Just tell the voice to stop. Tell the voice that there’s no room for it. This is part of cognitive behavioral therapy.  In behavioral therapy, we have urges or desires but we learn not to act on them or to stop them before they take over. In cognitive behavioral therapy, we take the cognitions (or the thoughts) and we choose not to follow them and not to allow them to control us. The principle is that controlling the  behavior of the thought will help to calm the difficult feelings  that follow the thought. When you disengage with painful thoughts, painful feelings decrease. And when the painful feelings decrease, you begin to live your life in authenticity, in the way that you know is valuable for both yourself and the people around you.

You deserve to be treated with respect by yourself and by the people around you. But you can’t control the people around you, so let’s start with you.  (Your next step is to disengage with toxic people.  As long you are choosing not to treat yourself poorly, no one else should be able to make you feel like crap either.)


10 New Years Resolutions that Will Actually Change your Life. And not one of them involves losing weight.


Did you know that each year 62%  of Americans make New Years Resolutions and of those 62% only 8% are able to stick to them? That means that almost 197 million people make resolutions and 140 million of those people give up on those. This makes setting resolutions a pretty big set-up for failure and unhappiness.  

Do you know what the number one most common New Years resolution?

I’m sure you can guess that one easily — lose weight!

Unfortunately though, despite your best intentions for improving your life, New Years resolutions tend to make people miserable as people usually fail at them by the second week in January. 

Let’s not do that same game again. Let’s forget about any resolution that has you thinking in terms of all-or-nothing.  Instead,  I want to you to try to think about increasing happiness and joy and kindness to yourself. Here are ten ways to do that:

1. Resolve to stop supporting a media that devalues women.

How to do it: Stop buying fitness magazines and supporting “health and fitness” sites that tout the same tired articles on how to: lose 10 pounds this month!  Torch 500 calories in one workout!!  Finally! get rid of cellulite for good- the new secret workout that plastic surgeons don’t want you to know about.  There are only so many diets and  workouts available, yet these magazines and websites seem to be able to repackage the same information over and over again for years and decades on end. 

How it will change your life:  You will save money on magazines,  you will save the earth by not contributing to waste and you will create more time and space for yourself to think about other things and to enjoy your life. You will get rid of the clutter in your house. You will stop beating yourself up for not following varying and contradictory advice that those magazine give.  You will find relief of feeling as though you should be something else, you will stop dealing with the stress of seeing digitally enhanced images that portray an unrealistic version of what a woman is supposed to look like.  You’ll  be able to relax and just breathe and just be you…

2. Resolve to stop comparing yourself to other people. 

How to do it: When you find yourself going to the place of,  “my life would be so much better if I made as much money as…”  or “everyone has someone to spend Valentines Day with except for me…”  stop yourself immediately. Think of a big stop sign in your mind and say to yourself, “no. I’m not going there.” Remember that everyone has their own path, their own Dharma. When you look to someone else’s path you stop moving along your own. You become paralyzed and you’re unable to allow your life unfold the way beautifully and the way it’s supposed to.

How it will change your life: You will actually be able to focus on going forward in your life given what you have. You will be able to appreciate and enjoy the things and the people who are in your life rather than feeling disconnected to what you do have. You will find that when you look at and enjoy what you do have rather than what you don’t have you will generally be happier. You will also be able to enhance and make more of the good things in your life because you will be moving forward in joy and able to appreciate those around you rather than stuck in envy.

3. Resolve to stop spending buying money on miracle potions. 

How to do it: Stop looking for the next miracle skin cream or beauty potion that will make you perfect. Stick to one simple skin care regimen that you enjoy and that you can afford. Keep your diet healthy (lots of fresh fruits and vegetables) and get fresh air and exercise.

How it will change your life: It will take away the stress and anxiety about buying something every time you see a commercial or read an article about how different your skin will look and be when you get this one product. It will reduce waste in your life and it will keep you from spending excessive cash on something disposable.

4. Resolve to let go of gossip and criticizing other people

How to do it:  So, this means that even if you happen to be present for a conversation where someone starts talking about someone else, you make the decision not to engage in that conversation and you don’t allow someone to chide you into idle gossip. You choose not to criticize people around you either to their faces or behind their backs. You don’t talk about how someone looks, about their life choices, about their parenting skills, you just let people live their lives and you live yours with kindness and integrity. If people start to talk about others around you, you can just say, “I have this New Years resolution to let go of judgment and criticism of others, so I don’t want to go there.”

How it will change your life:   Letting go of negativity and criticism will feel better in your body. You will feel lighter and more at peace. You will also find that people around you trust you more. They will know that their secrets are safe with you and that they are able to talk to you without fear of judgement or criticism. It will take a big weight off of you and give you more mind space to concentrate on yourself and your own needs. The people around you might just decide to jump on your bandwagon making your circle more pleasant to be around.

5. Resolve to stop engaging in Fat Chat

How to do it: Stop talking about how fat you are. Stop talking about how much weight you need to lose. Stop talking about diets. Stop talking about who has gained or lost weight. Stop commenting on other people’s weight either to their face or behind their back, even if it’s “Wow you lost so much weight…”  Make a choice to not engage with any talk about other people’s bodies or your own.  

How it Will Change your life: You are choosing not to participate in a society that judges women for the way their bodies look and for how much they weigh.  You create a positive example for those around you and you have done something to change the way people judge people by looking at how much they weigh. When you engage in fat chat, you are contributing to the continuing exploitation of women’s bodies, making it okay for the media to perpetuate the myth of the perfect female form.  Change starts with you.

6. Resolve to do the things you love more often

How to do it: Make doing things that you love a priority. Carve out time for them every day. If you love to write, give yourself 1/2 hour a day to write. If you love to knit, or sew, or ride your motorcycle, or take photographs, or garden or play with your cat, or go swimming, or draw, paint or sculpt, or sing, make sure that it is something that you do several times a week. It’s so common that people prioritize cleaning the house and paying the bills and never feel like you never have time to do the things that you love. You have the power to make your life enjoyable. When you go into super-functional mode and stop paying attention to the things that give you pleasure, you feel as though you’re just moving through life crossing things off your “to do” list. Some things should be done not to get them done, but for pure pleasure. Don’t reward yourself by vowing to draw after the dishes are done, make drawing a priority. Put it on your list for sometime during the day, not in the evening after all your chores are done. Do it on your lunch break. Make time for you.

How It Will Change Your Life: It will help you to appreciate and enjoy your life, it will make you an active participant in your life so that you can enjoy the day-by-day, not be bored waiting for the next thing to happen.

7.Resolve to work on letting go of what other people think of you

How to do it:  Remember that nobody’s opinion is any more important or any better than your own. So try to have a high opinion of yourself. Hold yourself with integrity– become the person who you admire. When you are holding yourself with integrity (that means being compassionate, kind, not lying or stealing or hurting anyone, holding the highest intention for good), you will know that nobody else’s opinion of you matters because you are a good person.  Remember that most people don’t have the time or the energy to spend time thinking about you– they are spending most of their time thinking about themselves. If they are wasting their time thinking about you, well then congratulations,  you’ve got lots of power!

How it Will Change Your Life:  You will have the freedom to live your life the way you want without the weight of the fear of criticism of others. You will feel lighter and enjoy life more.

8. Resolve to spend more time with people or animals who have less than you

How to do It: Do volunteer work at the SPCA or your local homeless shelter or soup kitchen. Find something that you’d be interested in doing at [http://www.volunteermatch.org/]

How it Will Change Your Life:  Studies have actually found that people who volunteer have lower mortality rates and less chronic pain and heart disease. This is because of the sense of community and sharing volunteer work creates. It also reduces isolation (key in healing from eating issues) and increases self esteem and life satisfaction. 

9. Resolve to take at least one month to go on a “spending fast.”

How to do it: Take 30 days to go on a spending fast where you buy nothing except for true essentials, such as food and hygienic products; no fancy bottled water, no takeout, no fancy meals, no bottles of wine, no fancy soaps, no new clothes, no new jewelry, nothing– just what you really really need.

How it Will Change Your Life: You will find some relief in not having to worry about what dress to buy but knowing that you have a dress at home. You won’t worry about walking into Target for a bottle of shampoo and coming out having spent $150 on razors and lotion, and you won’t have to deal with a late night pizza binge. You will find relief in not having to think too much about what to buy. A spending fast, even for a month is a huge relief.

10. Learn to Recognize Your Emotional State

How to do it: Use mindfulness to check in with yourself throughout the day. Set a timer on your phone to go off once every few hours. When it goes off, stop and ask yourself, “what am I feeling?” If you don’t know, check this list of feelings . Then practice just sitting with that feeling without doing anything to change it.

How it Will Change Your Life: As you learn to be aware of what you are feeling throughout the day, you won’t surprisingly find yourself engaged in activities that you have previously done to avoid feeling, for instance, you won’t find yourself eating when you are anxious because you will know that you have the capacity to sit with uncomfortable feelings.

What do you think, can you make a few of these changes? You don’t have to be perfect or do them all the time, but I’m betting that if you chose even just one of these, it would make significant positive changes in your life. Try it! Let me know how it goes. 

Get Through December without Bingeing Day 22


Todays Tip

In yesterday’s post, I asked people to send me specific questions that they want addressed in the December series. I got some great questions so I’ll be doing my best to answer over the next few days.

Dear Leora, I am at work, and there is food EVERYWHERE. It’s the holidays, and people have brought in cheesecake, toffee, chocolates, brownies, cookies and cupcakes. I have put on weight because I cannot resist this food, and I feel ugly and terrible about myself. Do you have any advice for *not* eating this stuff?

This is a big one at the holidays. People bring in baked goods and treats all the time. The office is full of sugary treats that make people happy- unless they have a dysfunctional relationship with food. Then it makes work a living hell.

The way I work with clients around this specific issue is to help them create a healthy boundary around the holiday treats.

For example. Someone might tell themselves that their healthy number for holiday treats is two each day. So what they can then do is plan what time they are going to go into the kitchen to get the treat. Perhaps it’s after lunch at 1pm. At 1pm, they walk into the kitchen or staff room and they take a look around and figure out what it is that they really, really want. They take that on their planned break, sit down and allow themselves to enjoy it. To taste it, to chew it to swallow it. Perhaps they enjoy that treat with a cup of tea and some music for a five minute break. Let yourself be satisfied and enjoy. Then, at 4pm, they can do it once more. Then you know that the next day you will have two treats again, so you don’t have to worry about getting everything in all at once. You have to figure out what your number is (maybe it’s one treat a day, maybe it’s three), but it’s important to plan ahead so that you don’t become black and white about it.

If you for instance say that you aren’t going to have any and then you go into the kitchen and accidentally grab something– it might set you into a sneak eating, bingey tailspin.

If you absolutely feel unable to make reasonable boundaries around the holiday treats this year, then you might instead decide to avoid the places where said food lives. For instance– “Bob has candy canes on his desk, can’t go talk to Bob today…” or “No kitchen today, gotta leave the office and get my coffee from Starbucks…”

I do suggest that if you are able to though, if food is honestly everywhere, it would be a relief for you to allow yourself to eat a little bit of it in a controlled and moderate way rather than telling yourself no and then feeling out of control with it.

It’s often in the restriction and the resistance where we find the most stress. Giving an allowance will reduce that stress.

Another practical tactic is to keep a big bowl of apples on your desk. Here is why, for most people apples are not a binge food. [But If apples are your binge food then read no more. Though in my two decades of treating Binge Eating Disorder I’ve never seen apples be anyone’s binge food, so I’d be surprised. If apples are your binge food, you have to reply and let me know]. But I digress… the bowl of apples on your desk will be easy for you to grab, so if there is binge food all around you and it’s unavoidable, having a non-binge food at your disposal and easily reachable will help you to fend off a binge.

Inspirational Quote

Excess on occasion is exhilarating. It prevents moderation from acquiring the deadening effect of a habit.-William Somerset Maugham

I love this humorous quote by Somerset Maugham because it reminds us that sometimes “messing up” is just human. And that it’s the way that we react to the excess that will hurt us more than the excess. For instance, I ate a brownie- I’m so stressed out about it that I’m going to binge on more brownies- rather than- oh, I ate a brownie– it was great- Now I’m going to relax in a nice tube tonight and watch The Gilmore Girls.


<<—-Go To Day 22   Go To Day 23–>>

Get Through December Without Bingeing Day 21


I am getting through December. Are you? I’ve had a migraine that started on Sunday and lasted through Tuesday morning. I am finally better but I was a true wreck. Not the most patient Mom on the planet or the most helpful wife. Far from it. I spent most of the time sprawled out in bed or on the couch. I attempted a viewing of The Sound of Music with my 5 year old son, but the pure grumpiness and pain that coursed through my veins into a pulsating mess in my right eye made me unable to feel anything but anger at the young and innocent Rolf as I knew what was to come. So by 16 going on 17 I was done.

I’m sure that many of you are going home to families that might be dysfunctional this week. Really, most families are dysfunctional (or perhaps I have a skewed sample set as a Psychotherapist) – and I want to help you to navigate your recovery and stay strong while you’re there. Please don’t hesitate to reply to this email with any questions. I’ll anonymously post the answer in tip form in upcoming get through December newsletters.

Todays Tip

For the past few weeks in the 5 Week Program, we’ve been talking a lot about guilt and obligation. Many have been telling me that their families are stressful for them because they are constantly doing for everyone in the family and they don’t know how to say no. They feel guilty for saying no and have no good reason to say no. I have what I call the codependency litmus test here. If you say no will you feel guilty and if you say yes will you feel resentful? If the answer is yes and yes, take the choice to go with the guilt. The guilt is yours, that’s something you can work with. Those of us with the disordered eating schema tend to spend a lot of time trying to please people and to be the best us that we possibly can be. We sacrifice our own needs for the sake of others. Then, eventually, in your family, you become the person who everyone expects to make sacrifices. When you don’t, when you choose to take care of yourself, people get angry. This is common. That’s because we don’t like change. We hide from it. And when we change, we force other people to change too. Change causes an effect of change all around. For instance, your sister asks you to take her shopping because she wants to have wine in the afternoon and doesn’t want to drive. You don’t feel like taking her to the market. You’re tired, you’ve been working all week, you finally have a rest. If you tell her no, she will get angry. She will get angry because then she has to do something that she doesn’t want to do. She is forced to make a healthier choice because you are choosing not to sacrifice your needs for her needs. You are choosing to care for yourself. Change is hard, but necessary. We were all given our own lives and the ability to do things for ourselves. If you don’t give someone else they opportunity to care for themselves when they can, (unless they are children or elderly or disabled) you are cheating both yourself and them. Take care of yourself and everyone else is forced to do the same. That’s change that can be good!

Inspirational Quote

Relationships are where we take our recovery on the road. – Melody Beattie

I love this quote. It reminds us that we didn’t get sick in a void and we can’t recover in a void. We have to reclaim ourselves in the system that we became who we are in. That means work and change and doing something scary. But it’s the kind of necessary work that makes life-long change.

<—Go To Day 20       Go to Day 22—>>>

Get Through December without Bingeing -Day 13

feeling-out-of-control-with-food-3Todays Tip

Today I spoke with a 5 week program member over the phone. She was feeling a lot of anxiety over all the “lose weight,” or “maintain weight” over the holidays. She told me that she’s been seeing postings all over the Internet. She asked, “I know that I need to lose weight for my health, how can I do that mindfully?”

So therein lies the issue. Anyone who has issues with disordered eating has tried not once, but probably hundreds if not thousands of times to lose weight.

Don’t try to lose weight. Trying to lose weight for someone with a tendency toward disordered eating is like trying to drink moderately for someone with alcoholism. Diets and weight loss striving are what contribute to your disordered eating.

What I would like you to strive for instead is satisfaction. No. Not moderation. SATISFACTION.

When you eat and feel dissatisfied with what you ate, you will be driven to binge.

First, think about what satisfaction means to you. Does it mean finishing your meal feeling as though you were nourished? Having your body feel full but not uncomfortable? Knowing that you ate what your body wanted? What does it mean to you? Consider what satisfaction means to you. Write it down and strive for it!

I PROMISE YOU that when you stop dieting, when you stop focusing on weight loss, when you eat when your body needs food and when you are not bingeing — your body will come to its natural weight. Will you be skinny? If skinny is not your natural weight you likely won’t be. Will you be fat? If fat is not your natural weight, you likely won’t be. If you think about those times when you first started dieting because you thought you were fat and what that turned into — imagine what it would have been like if someone told you that you were perfect, to trust your body, that your body would run most efficiently when you fed it what it needed when it needed it instead of telling you that you were… whatever made you think you needed to be different.

This is hard because people keep promising you that if you do a certain way of eating that you’ll be so thin and fit… but they don’t know you and how your mind and body react to diets.

Again… I PROMISE YOU that when you are not dieting and not bingeing your weight will stabilize and it will likely be comfortable and pleasing to you because it is the weight that your body wants to be at. It won’t be quick like a diet. But it will be less painful than years of dieting and bingeing and you will spend years of your life feeling satisfied and at peace rather than stressed out and dieting and gaining weight.

And to answer the question that I get all the time, why can other people be Paleo/grain-free/Atkins, etc for years on end and lose weight but you can’t? It’s because you react differently to diets. When you diet you develop an eating disorder. Some people can’t drink alcohol because when they do they become an alcoholic, others can drink and take it or leave it. Think of diets as your vice and your trigger and your booze. Diets aren’t safe for people with tendencies toward disordered eating. Anyone who tells you that they know how to help you lose weight is lying to you.

Todays Inspiration

“What is addiction, really? It is a sign, a signal, a symptom of distress. It is a language that tells us about a plight that must be understood.” – Alice Miller

When your addiction is to dieting and the pursuit of weight loss, it’s a symptom of wanting to fit in, to be loved, to feel like everyone else. But when you work on your own self care and kindness toward yourself and your body, you naturally just begin feeling better instead of trying to mold yourself into something that you believe is more socially acceptable.

<<—– Go to Day 12

Get Through December Without Bingeing- Day 12


Todays Tip

You that whole thing that happens when you entertain and you feel like you have to be perfect? That your house has to be perfect, that your food has to be perfect and that your hair, your clothes and your kids have to be perfect? And then something inevitably goes wrong, your tomato aspic comes out looking like an Alpo ad rather than a Martha Steward centerpiece… And you feel sad and you beat yourself up and the whole party is ruined…. 

But it’s not. But that’s part of what the ED tells us. That we have to be everything or we’re nothing. 

One of the motivating forces behind eating disorders is the drive to be perfect. People hope for a perfect body, perfect eating habits, flawless skin,  trying to act perfect by always saying the right thing, they try to keep a perfectly clean home and car, and  on and on and on– whatever the individual definition of perfection is . This season is particularly triggering because there is this air of mythical innocence and perfection to Christmas to be like Donna Reed in “It’s a Wonderful Life” (I have a client who will be laughing if she reads this because she thinks I make too many It’s a Wonderful Life” references.) The problem is of course, that nobody is perfect so in the strive for perfection, failure is inevitable.  And this season is inherently messy.  Often, because of that, trying to make things perfect becomes a frustrating let down, as well as a horrible blow to self esteem. “I messed up, therefore I’m a failure, I suck, I’m a horrible person…” and descent into depression or further into eating disorder behavior, or other compulsive behaviors follow.  Some people have such high expectations of themselves that they feel paralyzed. They can barely function because their belief of what they have to be is unattainable so they figure “why bother?”and live in a stuck place where they are unable to go forward with their lives because they hate themselves so much for what they are not. Other people are not so dichotomous and strive toward perfection, but punish themselves when they fail. Like people who have very rigid eating regimens and so if they eat something off their plan they binge, and figure they’ll start all over again the next day. Or they might punish themselves by purging or doing excruciating exercise.

Letting go of the myth of perfection is not easy. So many folks have their heads wrapped around that goal that they believe their lives will be meaningless without it.

  • Remember that perfection is a myth. No one is meant to be perfect, that’s not the way life is. We evolve, learn and grow. Nobody can sit down having never played the piano before and play a perfect concerto. You must start from scratch, learn, practice, and make mistakes.
  • If you never made any mistakes, you would never learn anything. Mistakes are the way we learn. If you can learn from your mistakes rather than making the same mistake over and over again without learning anything, you are evolving.
  • Perfection is not a human or even animal trait. There is no such thing as perfection. That’s not why we exist on this planet. Of course  I don’t know why we exist, but I’m betting that being perfect is not at the top of the list. Especially considering that it’s so subjective.
  • Life is not exciting when our goal is to be perfect because we are unable to take in the intricacies of life. We become so stressed out when we “mess up” that we aren’t able to appreciate what is happening in the moment.
  • Having personal goals and striving toward them is crucial for happiness and joy. However, if the end goal is so rigid, the journey there won’t be enjoyable. The end goal might not even be attained, but what you can learn as you travel through can be more enlightening than what you even set out to achieve.
  • If you find yourself paralyzed, try to take one small step forward. Rather than thinking that you can’t do this overwhelming task perfectly, make small goals that will enable you to move forward.  For example, If you think that you have 200 pounds to lose, that’s very daunting and probably very difficult to begin. However, if your goal is something less daunting, like “try a new vegetable once a week” or “try and get some movement in every day” or “eat at least one fresh fruit and one fresh vegetable each day,” or “make an appointment with a registered dietician” you will find that it’s not too daunting. And if you go a day without getting movement or without eating a fresh fruit, you can always make up for it the next day, rather than thinking, “this is too hard, I can’t do it, I’ll just have to give up.”  It’s possible that you might not reach your original end goal, but when your end goal is really health, that is something you can achieve by letting go of perfection and by integrating loving, healthy habits- this is where you will find improved health.  If you have a very messy house that seems overwhelming to clean, just do one drawer or one surface at a time. It might take you many weeks or months to complete the task, but cleaning one drawer or one section of your closet, or one corner of a room is a lot more doable than cleaning a whole house.
  • Rather than striving for perfection, think about what you can do each day that helps you to be the person that you like. Think about the things that you do that make you like yourself and try to do more of it.  You don’t want to do an overhaul and completely change the person you are, that’s a recipe for self defeatism and self deprecation, not to mention a complete self esteem killer.

Being who you are is what makes you perfect. No one can be a more perfect version of you than you.

Inspirational Quote for the Day

“Perfectionism is self-abuse of the highest order.” – Anne Wilson Schaef I love this quote because it’s so cute, the pursuit of perfection is nothing more than a way to abuse ourselves. The pursuit of health and self-love however are much more worthwhile pursuits. 

<<—Go To Day 11     Go To Day 13—>>

Get Through December Without Bingeing Day 11


Sunday morning. Is it possible that you drank a little too much last night? Too much holiday indulgence and now you’re feeling a little hangover?

Todays Tip

Avoiding the dreaded hangover next day binge. A few years ago, there was a report that linked binge drinking to binge eating for the next 24 hours. If you have overindulged on alcohol, there is a pretty big chance that you will want to wake up and care for your body by eating a lot of greasy food and that it will then trigger a binge for you.

There are a few things to do that can help you to feel better without bingeing.

1. Drink lots of water to rehydrate yourself. You can also do coconut water which is a natural rehydration booster. If that’s not your thing, go for the gatorade or the Pedialyte.

2.Eat eggs (add tomatoes, avocados and spinach!) Eggs have cysteine, which is an amino acid that increases glutathione and reduces the acetaldehyde toxicity which causes a hangover. Tomatoes, avocados and spinach all contain high levels of glutathione which detoxify the liver and help you to feel better.

3.Black tea – As soon as you are feeling rehydrated, sipping on black tea might help your body feel more awake and alive and sooth your belly.

Bonus Tip: Get out in nature or at least into some fresh air and take a walk. It will invigorate you and help you to feel better!!!

Inspirational Quote


So, for Eating Disorder recovery let’s change that a little. If you hear a voice that says “you’re too fat to be happy…” go out and do the things you love, let yourself enjoy your life and that voice will be silenced.


<—- Go to Day 10 

Get Through December Without Bingeing Day Nine


Really, I don’t mean to complain but it is COLD here in California. So cold that I have to wear my warmest hoodie. Lol– when I had just moved here, I remember the first Winter hearing on the radio that it was a COLD day in the Bay so to remember to get your warmest hoodie. I grew up in New York City and had been living in Boston so when I heard “cold day” and “warmest hoodie” I burst out laughing.

Anyway, I hope that you are enjoying the Get Through December without bingeing series. 

Todays Tip

Mindfulness. We tend to think of mindfulness as spending 20 minutes a day sitting in half lotus with our eyes closed trying to either stop our thoughts or notice them without attachment. Meditation is great! But it’s not mindfulness. It’s like the homework that you do to help your mindfulness practice and to access your inner peace. But what mindfulness practice really encompasses is a whole-hearted approach to your daily life, not 20 minutes a day of meditation. It’s about noticing your thoughts, feelings and the way you react to them.

Louis Ormont came up with the psychological theory of the observing ego. The observing ego is the part of you that watches your behaviors, thoughts, actions, and reactions without judgment or attachment, just curiosity. This is where Eastern Philosophy and American Psychology overlap. Calling on your observing ego is a way to institute mindfulness when you are feeling overwhelmed.

Here’s how to do it. Imagine just pulling yourself out of yourself for a moment and watching yourself like a movie. You are standing outside of yourself and just observing. Example: You are at a party and you notice that you have the urge to run to the buffet to eat. You then pull yourself out of yourself and just watch like an impartial viewer. I am feeling really anxious here– there are a lot of people and I don’t know what to say. I am afraid that people are judging me. I am afraid of what that they think about the way I look. I am afraid to talk for fear of sounding unintelligent. I want to eat so that I don’t feel this way. That’s very interesting to see my feelings and watch how I want to react to it.

So what you are doing in a sense is disconnecting yourself from the intensity of the feelings and the urges and watching yourself with kindness, curiosity and impartiality. This is a mindfulness practice that can help you to not get so bogged down in feelings and help you to just be despite what impulses your brain might be sending to you. Try it out next time you find yourself in a situation that is anxiety provoking.

Inspirational Quote of the Day

Elegance lies not in the clothes we wear, but in the way we wear them.
It isn’t in the way we wield a sword, but in the dialogue we hold that could avoid a war.

Elegance is achieved when, having discarded all superfluous things, we discover simplicity and concentration; the simpler the pose, the better; the more sober, the more beautiful.

And what is simplicity? It is the coming together of the true values of life.
Snow is pretty because it has only one colour.
The sea is pretty because it appears to be a flat plane.
The desert is beautiful because it seems to consist only of sand and rocks.

The simplest things in life are the most extraordinary. Let them reveal themselves.

-Paulo Coelho

This is the second half of Paulo Coelho’s poem Elegance. This is so relevant to recovery. We try so hard to make things perfect and we get caught up in the complexity. As they say in AA— “KISS” (Keep it simple, sweetie!) The less you try to force things to happen, the easier your life becomes. Be you and be kind to you and nourishing to yourself in both mind and body. xoxo

<—–Go To Day 9             Go To Day 10–>>   

Get Through December Without Bingeing Day Eight

get-through-decemberwithout-binge-eatingI’m happy you’re still reading my daily series on how to get through December without bingeing. What a week! So happy it’s Thursday already.

We are getting knee deep into holiday parties so remember to keep coming here for tips and inspiration.

Todays Tip

Did you know that often, in the Winter, people binge eat because they are cold? FACT.

Eating raises your metabolism and warms you up. So other things to do when you have the urge to binge because you’re cold? Drink a cup of tea, take a hot bath or shower, do 30 jumping jacks, cuddle under a blanket, stretch your body, turn the heat up, put on extra sweaters… This is a physical reason for bingeing and one leftover from evolution. We no longer need to bulk up for Winter because we have coats and heat and houses to keep us warm. We don’t have to cuddle up under animal pelts in caves. Don’t blame yourself! It’s biology’s fault.

Inspirational Quote

“You must do the things you think you cannot do.” – Eleanor Roosevelt

This is an important one– because we are only limited by our own beliefs. When you challenge those beliefs, the world becomes completely open to you.

Click here to Ready Day 9