Eating Disorder & Body Image: Share Your Poetry/Writings

Writing is a very powerful tool for many with Eating Disorders and an excellent way for others to relate and be inspired. Do you have a poem(s) and/or writing(s) about your struggles, experiences, or recovery with your Eating Disorder that you'd like to share with others? Weighing The Facts would like to feature your writing here so that others can relate, find support, and encouragement towards recovery.

Participation may be anonymous or credited, whichever you feel comfortable with. Poems/writings must be your own work. If you're interested in participating please contact me at Mrsmenopausal@yahoo.com.

Thank you.

MrsM


*Check out the sidebar menu for submissions and read the wonderful poetry and writings others have already shared on Weighing The Facts.




picture source:http://www.flickr.com/photos/thorinside/675520667/

Eating Disorders In The News: November 2010

Unplanned Pregnancies More Common In Women With Anorexia Nervosa

Times of India 

Women with anorexia nervosa are much more likely to have both unplanned pregnancies and induced abortions than women who don't have the serious eating disorder, according to a new study.

The study has been conducted by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Norwegian researchers.

Lead author Cynthia M. Bulik said that these results may be driven by a mistaken belief among women with anorexia that they can't get pregnant because they are either not having menstrual periods at all or are having irregular periods.

"Anorexia is not a good contraceptive. Just because you're not menstruating, or because you're menstruating irregularly, doesn't mean you're not at risk for becoming pregnant," said Bulik.

"Physicians and other health care providers need to be aware of this as well. Doctors who treat women and adolescent girls, in particular, "need to make sure that they have the conversation about sexuality and contraception as clearly with patients with anorexia as they do with all other girls and women," she added.
Read in full: More Common In Women With Anorexia Nervosa

Eating Ourselves Sick 

HeraldSun.com 

DANGEROUS eating habits are becoming so normal they affect nearly one in two women, new research reveals. A Victoria University study has found almost half of the participants had experienced at least one episode of vomiting, laxative or diuretic abuse or uncontrolled binge eating to control their weight in the previous six months.

It also found more than 90 per cent of the 209 women were dissatisfied with their bodies, causing extreme dieting among older women as well as younger ones.
Researcher Lyndsey Nolan, a psychology lecturer at Victoria University, said the findings were alarming.

"Women have begun to resort to destructive means to achieve weight loss," Dr Nolan says.
Read in full: Eating Ourselves Sick 


Kirstie’s Beating Teenage Anorexia
Walesonline

KIRSTIE McLEAN knows only too well the hell caused by anorexia.
The 17-year-old’s weight plummeted to just over five stone last year, and she has been battling the condition ever since.

This year she fought back from the illness to be a finalist in the Miss Cardiff beauty pageant. Kirstie, a student from Rumney, Cardiff, said more needed to be done to spot the condition earlier.
“When I went to the doctor’s I wasn’t half as bad as I got,” she said.

“They should be taught how to recognise it and visit their patients regularly to stop it before it gets out of control.”

Kirstie said airbrushed models and film stars in magazines portrayed an unrealistic image of health and beauty.

“They are causing people to put themselves in danger by trying to do the impossible,” she said.
Read in full: Kirstie's Beating Teenage Anorexia

Children As Young As 8 Treated For Eating Disorders 

Walesonline 

Doctors must be better trained to spot life-threatening eating disorders in young children.
That is the demand from health professionals today as doctors admit to a “lack of awareness” in dealing with eating disorders in young children, who they sometimes simply diagnose as fussy eaters.

The call comes as figures reveal children as young as eight are being admitted to Welsh hospitals
suffering from eating disorders.

The alarming data uncovered by Wales On Sunday shows youngsters are developing life-threatening conditions like anorexia having barely reached primary school.

Our research reveals the shocking age of the youngest patient in the country, but also shows children aged nine, 10, and 11 have been hospitalised.

But experts warn the figures reveal “the tip of the iceberg” and the problem is increasing.
Read in full: Children As Young As 8

300 Calories a DAY: Portia de Rossi Cries to Oprah as She Reveals Shocking Details of Her Anorexia
Dailymail

Portia de Rossi has sat down for a tearful interview with Oprah in which she discusses the depths of her anorexia and how she was almost 'proud' of dropping to under six stone, weighing in at just 82 lbs.
De Rossi, who has changed her name to Portia Degeneres since marrying partner Ellen Degeneres, choked up while promoting her memoir 'Unbearable Lightness: A Story of Loss and Gain.'

'It wasn't that I was proud of it,' she tells Oprah in the interview airing in the U.S. on Monday. 'But it was certainly a recognition for my self control.'
Read in full: Portia de Rossi

How Ricci Beat Anorexia
Toronto Sun

The threat of a hospital stay prompted actress Christina Ricci to fight her anorexia issues as a teen.
The star was just 16 when doctors and her parents urged her to consider a drastic cure for her eating disorder - but Ricci wasn't happy about the idea of being strapped to a bed for weeks.
She tells Black Book magazine, "They were going to hospitalize me, and I was worried about people force-feeding me through a tube. I didn't want that, so I fought the disease."
Ricci won her battle and now insists she'll never go back to starving herself to stay thin: "I still think about it, but I could never do it again. I remember the overwhelming feeling of hopelessness when I was in the middle of it. My brain had basically become my biggest tormentor. I'd become afraid of myself."
Read in full: Ricci

'I Heart Anorexia' T-Shirts -- Is Artist Alexsandro Palombo's Work Chic or Cruel?

NY Daily News

Is it weighty commentary or making light of a serious issue?

"I heart Anorexia" artist Alexsandro Palombo is drawing some heavy criticism online for his drawings of celebrities, depicted as skeletons.

Palombo's drawings of famously thin celebrity Victoria Beckham, with her head perched upon a pile of leopard-print bones, as well as designer Rachel Zoe, also drawn as a skeleton, perched on a toilet have some critics crying foul. 

"Want to become a perfect Skeleton fashion victim but you don't know how?," he wrote on his blog Humor Chic.  "Every day just eat a nice apple for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Make sure it's always a glamorous red one, it gives the idea of substance. Don't drink water, an apple contains enough liquid. Replace it with champagne and lots of coke."

Palombo is clearly poking fun at the whole idea of idealized perfection, but not everyone is laughing.
Read in full: I Heart Anorexia

sources sited above