anxiety Archives • Food Freedom Therapy™

#ScrewYourBeautyStandards

We are not born disliking our bodies. We are innocent in our self-acceptance until we learn there is a “right” way to look. After that, we evaluate ourselves against whatever ideal we are taught because it is our nature to compare. If we are fortunate, we will grow up in a family that values inner qualities over appearance. Sometimes that can protect us from internalizing the broader culture’s narrow beauty ideal. But it’s difficult to stay immune to all the messages from everywhere else… the teasing from kids at school… the magazine covers with Photoshopped images… the TV commercials pushing their weight-loss products…

And some are not fortunate enough to grow up in families where beauty is recognized in a diversity of shapes, sizes and colors. For too many, the pain starts at home and family opens the first wounds, which are only deepened by peers and the media.

Seemingly from all corners, the message is clear: We aren’t good enough. Not T-H-I-N enough.

Because thin = good and we so reason, therefore, fat must = bad, right? Some will even directly say that it is.

I used to buy into all of it, like so many do. I hated my body long before I developed an eating disorder, and it laid the foundation for me to go down that path. I was so desperate to lose weight, to be accepted, to feel okay for once. I was so mad at myself for not being thin like my friends and the pretty girls I saw in the media.

Thankfully, now I’m recovered—from both my eating disorder and my body hatred. But I’m still angry. I’m angry that we live in a culture that works so dang hard to make us feel bad about ourselves. You can’t go a day without seeing advertisements for products related to weight loss, makeup, hair dye, eye creams, tummy-control pants, and on and on and on. If you don’t feel pretty, thin, or young enough, then they promise to change that if you’re willing to spend enough time and money.

And I mean lots of money. Beauty is a $532 billion industry and is expected to just keep growing. The problem is that every commercial you see isn’t simply trying to sell you something; first, it tries to convince you that you need what they’re selling. It plays on, sometimes even creates, insecurities. The subtle goal is for you to feel bad about yourself so that you’ll then want to buy something that will (supposedly) make you feel more confident.

While common sense likely tells us that we’re influenced by the media, it never hurts to have some research to back that up—which of course, it does. Indeed, research shows that media influence can lead children and adolescents to internalize ideals imposed by society, which also increases the probability that they will suffer from issues like body dysmorphia and eating disorders. Studies suggest this can start as young as six years old, if not even earlier. We’re talking Kindergarteners, maybe younger!

That makes me angry for every little girl that is harmed by these messages poured into her about her value and what she is supposed to be. I hope that like I have, you’ll learn to turn that anger and disgust that you direct at yourself for not being what you “should” be, and you’ll start getting angry at the diet and beauty cultures instead. Not because makeup is evil or dyeing your hair is inherently bad, but because being sold the idea that you can’t feel good about yourself without those things is wrong. Being told we have to be a certain BMI to be attractive and worthwhile is beyond shallow—it’s destructive and sick, and I will never stop fighting for a better world for my son and daughter.

If you’d like to talk about how to get break free from these destructive cultural messages and finally accept yourself as you are, please contact me about a teletherapy appointment or follow me on Instagram or Facebook.

Much love,

Sources

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.572.7007&rep=rep1&type=pdf

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6540021/

I’m Cherie Miller, MS, LPC, founder of Food Freedom Therapy™. I offer counseling for chronic dieting as well eating disorder therapy for Anorexia, Bulimia, Binge Eating Disorder, Orthorexia, ARFID, and other eating disorder issues. Contact me here or follow me on Instagram or Facebook.

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Why Can’t I Stop Bingeing?!

How many times have you called yourself a failure after eating something you felt you shouldn’t have? After all, dieting is just a matter of willpower, right? So after every “failure” when we’ve eaten the wrong food or eaten too much food, we beat ourselves up for blowing it (again!) and are left feeling convinced we are weak… maybe even addicted to food. That would at least explain why we feel so powerless to stop the bingeing and overeating, even when we so desperately want to stop. “I am not going to do that again,” you probably promise yourself, and double-down on your commitment to follow the rules this time.

The truth is, your bingeing is not because you don’t have enough willpower. And it’s not because you’re addicted to food. It’s because dieting is a flawed methodology, with inherent side effects that cause its own failure. Notice I said that dieting is the failure—not you. Research shows that 80 to 95% of people who diet don’t lose weight long-term. That means it’s rare for people to sustain weight loss on diets, and those who do are statistical outliers. Still, dieting for intentional weight loss is prescribed all the time for all kinds of reasons! If dieting was a medication, it would never get FDA approval with such terrible success rates. Especially when you consider the mental and physical consequences of dieting, which I won’t go into detail today (check out this post for that). For now, I just want to look at the diet-binge cycle on a pretty basic level so you can see the domino effect that is set into motion the minute you start a diet.

Dieting: Restricting certain food or limiting amounts of food.
Dieting “High”: Initial feelings of control, accomplishment, and relief of anxiety related to weight and eating.
Deprivation/Obsession: Preoccupation with food, hunger, feelings of deprivation, and cravings.
Anxiety: Fear of losing control, anxiety around food.
Binge/Overeating: Bingeing on restricted or “bad” foods, “breaking the rules”.
Shame and Guilt: Feeling like a failure, beating yourself up.
Anxiety: Worry about gaining weight due to bingeing.
Dieting again to relieve anxiety… and starting the cycle all over again!

As you can see from this cycle, bingeing is an expected response to deprivation for most people (even some people with anorexia nervosa experience “binges”). There are biological reasons for this, in addition to the emotional ones, which we will discuss in the next post. So if you want to stop bingeing, you have to stop dieting and restricting. I know this isn’t the answer most people want, because it’s hard to accept that dieting doesn’t work. For one, we’ve been brainwashed to think it does and to blame ourselves for not being able to lose weight long-term. And also, because giving up dieting feels like giving up on the dream of losing weight and finally keeping it off.

Giving up on intentional weight loss is incredibly difficult given the weight stigma and biases that surround us, but it is possible. You can start rejecting diet culture by learning about Health At Every Size (HAES®), which provides a rarely-heard scientific perspective on issues related to weight. It would also be helpful to work with a good eating disorder therapist or dietitian who can guide you through the process of learning intuitive eating and healing your relationship with food and your body. If you’d like to talk with me about that, please contact me!

Check out the follow up post to this one, The Effects of Dieting on Your Body and Mind.

Much love,

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A Potential Flaw in Positive Thinking Psychology

Photo Credit: ileanaandrei.ro

There’s a lot of talk these days about positive thinking and how important it is to change your thinking to improve your health and happiness. And while I won’t argue that our mindset affects our feelings and behavior (because I believe it absolutely does), I am concerned that we can put too much emphasis on thinking. That’s a big statement for a Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) therapist to make! But here’s the balance that I would like to bring to the discussion: Though highly influential, thoughts are not an all-powerful force in our lives.

There are potential drawbacks to believing that everything we think affects our behavior. So even while we acknowledge the significance of our thoughts and strive to have healthier, more constructive thinking patterns, let’s also recognize some limitations of our thoughts. For example, thoughts…

do not always reflect what we really believe, feel or want.
do not always mean we will act on whatever that thought is.
do not always reflect reality.

Let’s take a closer look at why each of these points is relevant.

#1. Thoughts do not always reflect what we really believe, feel or want. We all have had bizarre, maybe even dark thoughts that pop into our heads at times—that is a normal part of being human. It does not mean you are “crazy” or a bad person. Some people struggle with these types of thoughts more than others, particularly people with issues like anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, or postpartum depression. On the extreme end, I’ve had clients who had intrusive thoughts about things like stabbing their spouses or molesting their child (even though they had no reason or desire to do such things), and they worried it meant there was something evil inside of them. Being bothered by your thoughts is a sign that they don’t reflect your wants or values. In cases like these that go beyond the “normal” occasional bizarre thoughts we all have, there are often biological causes for these thoughts. There is sometimes trauma in that person’s past that can be influencing these thoughts.

#2. Thoughts do not always mean we will act on whatever that thought is. Thoughts do not automatically manifest into behavior. None of my clients who had bizarre, or even violent, intrusive thoughts ever acted on them because that is not who they were.

Now, sometimes our thoughts do line up with our feelings and that makes it more likely we will act on them, but it doesn’t mean we have to. This is key for my clients in eating disorder recovery, who might have obsessive thoughts about not eating or about thinking they are fat (and also feeling fat). Though it can be incredibly difficult, they can choose not to act on those thoughts. In her book, Life without Ed, Jenni Shaefer describes it as “disobeying” the eating disorder. We can have thoughts and feelings about harming ourselves and decide to call a friend instead. A tape can play in our head about how that big presentation at work will be a flop, but then it turns out we nail it.

#3. Thoughts do not always reflect reality. Thoughts, like feelings, are not facts. Research confirms that much of what we worry about doesn’t even happen.¹ And just because we think something doesn’t make it true. We can think we’re ugly and actually be attractive. We can think we’re an idiot and be very intelligent. We can think we are boring and socially awkward while in reality, people find us engaging and pleasant to be around. The stories we tell ourselves are just that: stories. And sometimes stories are only partially true or sometimes they are completely false.

It is really, really good news that while we work on changing detrimental thoughts, we are not completely at their mercy until they change or go away. We can still choose to ignore or to act opposite of our thoughts when they aren’t healthy. Remember friends, we are not just thoughts… we also have a will and a conscience and many other elements that make up who we are and drive what we do.

Much love,

¹References: “85 Percent of What We Worry About Never Happens” By Don Joseph Goewey (www.huffingtonpost.com/don-joseph-goewey-/85-of-what-we-worry-about_b_8028368.html)

Cherie Miller, MS, LPC opened Dare 2 Hope Counseling to help clients all over the country get free from their food, weight, and self-confidence struggles. Her specialty is eating disorders, including anorexia, bulimia, binge-eating, orthorexia and other unhealthy eating patterns. Contact her here.

When You Can’t Fix Your Family

Photo Credit: Getty Images

Sometimes the people in our life who should love us the most and treat us with the most care, actually treat us with the most indifference. Or worse… inflict the most harm on us. It’s awful and it’s not fair, because we don’t get to pick our family. The good news is that as we get older, we get to decide how close we will be, emotionally and physically, to those family members. (See my previous post about How You Can (Finally!) Disengage from a Toxic Parent.)

A lady I used to do therapy with has a very dysfunctional family she struggled to detach from, even though their toxic behavior and comments provoked disabling anxiety for her, as well as profound feelings of shame and isolation. At 61-years-old, this woman was still trying to earn their approval and acceptance, and blaming herself for their maltreatment, thinking on a subconscious level that if she could just do things ‘right’, they’d finally love her.

Once, she described a vivid dream that she had when she was just four years old: “I was on a battlefield in the middle of a war and there was shooting and bombs were going off. I was lost and terrified at all the chaos and violence, when my parents and brothers and sisters drove up in a Jeep. I thought I was being rescued, but they looked at me, and then just drove off, leaving me there. I remember I woke up bawling, I was so scared and hurt that they left me.”

I asked if her if that little four-year-old girl deserved to be rescued, if she deserved more love and protection from her family than she got—not just in the dream but in real life.

“Yes!” my client almost shouted, angry tears welling up in her eyes as she grieved for that little girl.

“You are that little girl still. You’re just older. But there wasn’t a point, a specific age, when you stopped deserving those things.”

Friends, it’s so tempting for us, especially when we’re children trying to make sense of a confusing world, to believe that our family’s chaos or the abuse or neglect we suffer at their hands is our fault. Because if it’s our fault, then we can fix it, right? If it’s not our fault, and it is actually theirs… well, then that means we have no control over their behavior and that is scary—again, especially when we’re vulnerable children dependent on those very people.

Now you are grown up. And you still can’t fix them. And you can’t change them by ‘fixing’ yourself. But you can put in boundaries to minimize the degree to which they continue to rob you of joy, peace, and self-esteem. You get to decide now what you will and will not accept. And I hope you’ll stop accepting anything that is wounding your heart and soul. Believe it yet or not, you do deserve better.

Much love,

The First Step to Being Happy

Photo Credit: Psychology Today

Some of us just never really seem to find or hang on to happiness for long. And yet there are some people who are happy even when life is really hard. During our lifetime, we will, without question, experience heartbreak or undeserved tragedies. No one is immune; suffering is an unavoidable part of the human condition. So how do some some people manage to stay relatively happy or more quickly recapture their happiness after devestation?

Those types of people take responsibility for their own happiness, and that starts with choosing to be happy. It is always a choice to be made—and not just once, but daily, maybe minute by minute—even as we are bombarded with reasons not to be happy.

It can be tempting to abdicate our happiness responsibility by blaming our circumstances or others, and sometimes, it would even be perfectly understandable given what’s going on in our lives. But that leaves us helpless. Helplessness is scary because it means we will be stuck and miserable until something or someone else changes. When we realize we can take control of our happiness and are brave enough to own that process, joy becomes possible again, whether or not other things change. Taking responsibility means we are powerful instead of powerless. It’s not easy at all, but it is life-changing.

Ask yourself what keeps you from choosing to be happy. Does taking personal responsiblity for your feelings seem too hard? Does it feel like letting people who have hurt you off the hook? Make a list of all the ways that believing you have no control over your happiness prevents you from having the life you want. Now, make a list of the ways your life would be different if you could cultivate more happiness for yourself instead of waiting for it to happen to you.

After creating each list, consider making a commitment to start choosing happiness and learning how to live that out. Go ahead, it’s okay to chase joy! If you’re a reader like me, a fun book on the topic is The Happiness Dare by Jennifer Dukes Lee.

P.S. Depression can be a biological condition, not just an emotional one, needing medical treatment such as medication so please don’t think I’m saying depression can be cured by thinking happy thoughts! Sadness and depression are not only unavoidable at times, I don’t even think we should try to always avoid them. Though painful (I know from personal experience), they can serve a purpose by adding meaning and depth to our lives. They can grow us and teach us important lessons, like how to reach out for connection or to slow down and take care of ourselves. The point is just DON’T STAY STUCK there longer than you need to!

Be well,

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Letting Go Is So Cliché

We’ve all heard the phrase “let it go’ so often, it’s easy to gloss over. I almost yawned typing it.

And yet, living it out is so much more than a feel-good catchphrase. It’s profound and painful… and utterly life-changing.

There are two parts to this Letting Go Lesson, and today I’ll focus on the first. It’s about how so much of our unhappiness is because we are entirely mixed up about what we can and can’t control. We are desperate to control things (and people) that we can’t, and often don’t want to take control of what we should.

I want to control everything. Everything. From the other drivers on the road, to how fast the line at Walmart moves, to how my husband behaves. Does that sound familiar to anyone else? I cling to the idea that all these things and people should be a certain way. And perhaps sometimes I’m right. I mean, yeah, I think we can all agree that many people should be more considerate.

Reality check: They aren’t.

I always kept coming back to the fact that I don’t want to accept reality because it should be different, and it feels like accepting = okaying it. It doesn’t. It means that I finally realize keeping a death grip on my shoulds comes at a cost. Wanting to control things we can’t will inevitably lead to feeling angry, depressed, indignant, impatient, helpless.

Being mad doesn’t actually change any of the things we’re mad about, it just spoils our happy.

This pattern is not just pointless, it’s harmful. An old saying compares holding onto anger like holding a hot coal and expecting the other person to get burned. Can you see that whether our anger at that person (or situation) is justified is irrelevant? Because everything will go on as normal while you stand there getting burned. Now, I’m not advocating against anger in general, because sometimes, that’s an appropriate response, such as when our boundaries are crossed. What I am saying is that when anger takes up too much space in our hearts, it will inevitably crowd out the happiness.

While we can’t control everything and everyone else, we can control ourselves. It’s just that’s the very thing we often don’t want to control. We’d rather say we’re the victim of crappy events and can’t help being unhappy about it. But even when we have no say in someone else’s behavior or how something turns out, we do have a say in a how we react. We can choose to be perpetually angry or we can choose to let go and respond in a way that adds to our wellbeing. We can decide to drop the coal…not because we’re necessarily wrong in thinking that things should be a certain way, but simply because we don’t want any more third-degree burns. In the psychology profession, we call this practice Radical Acceptance (a term from dialectical behavior therapy [DBT]).

So let’s learn to let go. I know, easier said than done, right? Stay tuned…next post I’ll talk about how we can do actually do it.

Be well,

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How to Successfully Navigate a Career Setback

We all know that life doesn’t always go the way we want, and sometimes we have to change courses unexpectedly. Maybe the career change didn’t work out so well or the new boss is horrible or the higher-ups are moving your department to Alaska. Whatever it is, change is hard. But how hard depends a whole lot more on the way we handle it than the situation itself. Here are some tips to help make the best out of difficult change.

#1. Throw a pity party.
That’s right…feel sorry for yourself. Pretending you don’t feel sad or bitter won’t make those feelings go away. They’ll just stay unresolved and will weigh you down like soggy clothes. The key is that you can’t give yourself permission to hang on to those feelings either. So set a time limit. “I will feel sorry for myself for _____ days and then I will move on.” Acknowledge those feelings as acceptable given what you experienced, process them properly, and then put them away because those feelings don’t ultimately serve you—they are not stepping stones to success.

#2. Gather some cheerleaders.
Big change—especially change involving risk—demands a good support system. We all need people who will encourage us when things get tough, who will believe in us when we don’t believe in ourselves, and will tell us not to quit. People who will say things like what a dear friend texted me when I had some setbacks in the middle of a significant life change:

Now is the time to set a vision for yourself and do everything in your power to get there. You’re already well on your way, which means the hardest parts are behind you, but don’t give up because you’re gonna land on your feet.

Don’t kid yourself…you can’t do it alone.

#3. Find a mentor.
I repeat…you can’t do it alone. Not only is it important to have people in your corner cheering you on, it’s also important to have someone coaching you. Even professional athletes still have coaches, so don’t think you’re above it. Learn from someone else’s mistakes instead of making your own. Duplicate their successes. Find someone who is (1) knowledgeable about your new endeavors and (2) knowledgeable about you. Because you need practical advice, but you also need personal insight. But don’t waste your time—and certainly don’t waste theirs—if you are not going to listen to them. Of course, you don’t have to accept or follow everything they say, but you do need to be willing to discern it all with humility and openness.

#4. Be optimistic, but set realistic expectations.
On some level, you have to believe that you can succeed or you won’t. Yes, most of us will have some doubt (which is why a good support system is important), but we don’t commit whole-heartedly—if we even make an attempt all!—to endeavors we believe are doomed to fail. Now, I’ve worn my “Proud Pessimist” badge most of life, but if I’m honest, I have to admit that it’s never exactly been a springboard to happiness or healing. Whether it comes naturally or not, work on fostering some optimism to help buoy you when things get tough.

And expect that things will get tough. Don’t be the other extreme either—a Positive Polly who’s unprepared for the setbacks and challenges sure to come. We set ourselves up for unnecessary frustration and disappointment if we think that things should always go smoothly.

#5. Develop a plan.
You need to map out where you’re going and how you’re going to get there. A word of caution, though—you may feel overwhelmed as you start unfolding things. There’s no doubt a lot to do and success feels a long way off. Take a deep breath and remind yourself that you don’t have to do it all at once. Prioritize things based on what really has to happen first and then start with small steps. This will keep things manageable and build confidence as you gather momentum.

“Sweet are the uses of adversity which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, wears yet a precious jewel in his head.” ~ William Shakespeare

#6. Get tough.
As I’ve mentioned a few times, there will be more challenges ahead, so decide now that the inner critic is to be ignored when he or she starts up. Commit that you won’t give up easily and that you are stronger than that—maybe even make a contract with yourself. Post a no-whining policy on your computer. Do whatever you have to, but start building resiliency in yourself now.

Be well,

Cherie Miller, MS is owner of Dare 2 Hope Coaching and a virtual Health and Wellness Life Coach who helps clients all over the country improve their lives. Her specialty is helping people get free from their food, weight, and self-confidence struggles. Contact her here.

4 Tips for Dealing with Overwhelming Anxiety

If you struggle with anxiety, you’re certainly not alone. Anxiety disorders are the most common mental health issue in our country, affecting an estimated 40 million adults in the U.S. (source: National Institute of Mental Health). Given that the NIMH also says that average onset is age 11, you might have struggled with anxiety for a long time. Maybe you have even started to believe that being a “worry wart” is just the way you are. While there’s some truth to that, there are lots of strategies for managing anxiety so that it doesn’t take a toll on your emotional and physical well-being (because yes, anxiety has a significant impact on your body!). Whether it’s generalized anxiety, panic attacks, OCD, or some other form of anxiety, here are 4 tips to help manage those emotions.

#1. Do some breathing exercises. Our bodies and minds (i.e., emotions) are highly interrelated and we can use that to our advantage. I’m not getting all new-agey on you; there is real science behind why deep breathing works. A quick explanation is that anxiety puts your body in fight-or-flight mode (remember that fun little phrase from high school biology?), and flooding your brain with oxygen basically tells it that everything is fine so that your sympathetic nervous system can calm back down.

#2. Stop the stinkin’ thinkin’. Though not always, our emotions are often triggered by our thoughts. Do you convince yourself that something is a catastrophe when it really isn’t? Do you worry about all the possible outcomes of a situation—usually all the negative ways something could turn out? Do you assume people are judging you unfavorably? Do you tell yourself you just won’t be able to handle if ____ (fill in the blank)? All of these are examples of what we call cognitive distortions because they are irrational thoughts that inevitably lead to anxiety and depression. Practicing more positive, realistic thinking can lead to healthier, more positive emotions.

#3. Get distracted. Ruminating—thinking obsessively about something—is rarely productive. It’s not the same as problem-solving and just ends up wasting a lot of time and energy. One of the best ways to break out of that circling-the-drain trap is to simply do something else, preferably something you enjoy! Get outside to soak up nature for a bit or call a friend. Do something kind for someone else. Engage in your favorite hobby. Wrap up in a soft blanket and sip your favorite drink. Whatever is going to soothe your spirit and refocus your mind in that moment, try that.

#4. If all else fails, try just accepting it. Accepting the anxiety sounds counter-intuitive doesn’t it? But in certain circumstances, accepting rather than fighting something is a better route because the process of fighting can sometimes give that thing more power and control over you. It’s like being in quicksand… the more you struggle against it, the faster and deeper you sink. Anxiety is usually about self-protection, so acknowledge that and thank your anxiety for what it’s trying to do to help. Try saying something like this to yourself: “I actually have the skills I need to handle whatever might happen so I don’t need to focus on the anxiety so much anymore. It’s still there and that’s fine, but I’m moving on to thinking about and doing other things.” And then do!

There are other tips I can give about dealing with anxiety and I could even expand on some of these, but this is probably enough for today. If you have questions, though, please don’t hesitate to contact me!

Be well,