Ep. 1 of OUTWEIGH: A Series Exposing the 'Grey Area' of Disordered Eating

In this first episode of the series, Amy explains the birth story of OUTWEIGH. Lisa and Amy get raw about how language matters, giving details from their own personal lives how intended compliments towards their bodies ended up reinforcing unhealthy behaviors. Lisa opens up with her personal disordered eating story with orthorexia-sharing how it began and hid perfectly beneath seemingly innocuous "healthy habits" as well as fundamental changes she made to overcome it. She also shares her heartfelt letter to her younger self.

We’re joined by our first expert, eating disorder therapist Jennifer Rollin (@jennifer_rollin) who explains what disordered eating is and how you can best care for yourself or a loved one you witness struggling. We'll also have two special guests, Andrea and Claire bravely share their personal stories and powerful letters to their younger selves. Amy closes out with helpful tips to surviving COVID quarantine talk without drowning in diet culture noise. 

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Maybe that's Lisa, and we're just two girls that want
to have a conversation with you. Dear sixteen year old Andrea,
Hey gorgeous, Dear younger Lauren. Each episode is stories from people.
I would deprive myself by myself obsessively because I was
eating healthy. I couldn't understand that I had a problem
with food. Losing my period scared me the most. My
story starts when I was around seven. That's when I

(00:24):
started to hate my body. Body image is like our
inner picture of our outer self. Healthy behaviors have a
much bigger role at all health than the actual number
on the scales. Internal dialogue can be so powerful and
often it's super negative and critical in a way that
we wouldn't talk to other people that we care about.
When you start to share your story, that gives other

(00:44):
people the courage to share theirs. I know you would
be proud now of how far you have come in
your relationship to food, exercise, and to yourself. I felt freedom,
I've gained relationships. I've found my true sense of self worth.
There's one thing I need you to take away. You're
going to be okay. Life without disordered eating outweighs everything

(01:08):
you're listening to Episode one about Way. In this series,
we will be discussing eating disorders. People who have struggled
with eating disorders or disordered eating will be sharing their
story in detail. So please be advised that this content
may not be for everybody right now, especially if you're
currently in the throes of recovery. Our goal is to
make sure that you get the best help necessary for

(01:29):
you or a loved one. This podcast should not replace
therapy or treatment. To get help, support or more resources,
head to National Eating Disorders Dot org. Okay, so kind
of giddy as we hit record and start this journey
episode one of this series that Lisa and I are
calling out Way, And just to give y'all a little

(01:50):
backstory of how this came about. I was at the
hospital with my dad in December of two thousand nineteen,
so just a few months ago, and I immediately had
flashbacks of being in the hospital with my mom. My
mom passed away from cancer in two thousand and fourteen,
and my sister and I were her primary caregivers for

(02:11):
two years. So a lot that happened and there was
very stressful. I didn't know how to process a lot
of it. But I had a history with disordered eating
and eating disorder, but it never came back during her battle.
But the day after my mom died, I was throwing
up my food and I did not know why or what.

(02:33):
And we'll get into that more when I share my story,
but just to kind of get to the point of
me calling Lisa, I'm at the hospital with my dad.
It's really bad and thankfully he's doing better. We've recovered,
but the situation was not good and it instantly took
me to a place of trauma. And all my brain
could think of was, oh my gosh, last time I

(02:54):
was in a traumatic experience, that's what I resorted to.
So am I in a better place now? How am
I going to handle this? Am I strong enough? And
I was just battling back and forth, But really the
overwhelming feeling was I felt freedom, and I felt like
I'm not going to whatever I was clinging to before,

(03:15):
where it was food for like I would overeat or
then I would throw up. And even with my mom,
I mean, I'm getting into stuff that honestly, in my mind,
it doesn't make sense. And when I explain it to Lisa,
she'll help maybe help me with some of my thoughts
as we go through it. But long story short, I
left the hospital feeling free, and it was because some
of the tools that Lisa had given me and just

(03:36):
other things I've been working on where I thought, oh
my gosh, I want other people to feel this freedom
and how can we do this? Like I feel so free.
So I pick up the phone in the parking garage
at the hospital and I call Lisa and I'm like,
I feel free right now. I want other people to
feel freedom. I want to do I don't know what

(03:57):
this looks like. Maybe we get together in person people
and we have a big gathering and we all talk
about it, and then the conversation went back and forth
and we're like, okay, wait, maybe it's a podcast, and
so here we are. And how brave and amazing is
Amy to tell her story to open this up for
all of us. I'm like already crying again for like
the second time today. It's gonna be an emotional floor episodes,

(04:20):
I think, and I think why I'm getting excited is
not because I'm in a place. Yes, you're hearing from people.
You're gonna hear throughout the series of people that are
on the other side, and I guess I like to
believe that I'm on the other side, but I don't
want you all to think that I have it all
figured out and I'm there because I've learned. Even though
I thought I was on the other side, I'm still

(04:41):
journeying through it, and I have relied on Lisa a
lot of even called her while preparing for this series.
I've been going through some other stuff where I was
trying to stop certain behaviors that I realized were not
healthy for me, but I didn't think that they were
bad or wrong, but really for me, if I'm truly

(05:02):
trying to give myself that freedom and recover, I had
to let go of things that were shackles in a sense,
but I didn't know they were. And that's what the
gray area is about. Oftentimes, those of us in the
gray area where I was where Amy, I canna say,
is but maybe have some some tendencies. You don't know
you're in it because we haven't opened our eyes to

(05:22):
tendencies that are not healthy, even if the behavior looks
healthy on paper. And going back to Amy's original idea,
which was to be in person with a large group
and host some sort of event. I'm putting it out
there that I hope that we read enough people that
this becomes that one day, and we can hold space
for more people to just show up as they are,

(05:45):
without fear, without limits, and get it, if not a
full feeling, a taste of that freedom of just living aligned. Yeah,
and really this podcast is for everyone. I think we're
two females and my podcast is predominantly female, and I
feel like this is a space where females tend to

(06:06):
open up. But if you're a male listening to this, amazing,
however you identify, you are welcome. You know that oftentimes
gender details can get in the way of people finding help,
and we all go through this. It is actually universal.
The disordered eating or eating disorders don't discriminate. So whatever

(06:26):
however old you are, however old you are, whatever size
you are, whatever race you are. But there's for me,
some of it was I'm rewiring my brain. And on
the four Things podcast, we've been talking about doing that
with gratitude, and you really can. When you focus on
something and you do it repetitively, you can reset things

(06:48):
We've mentioned. We've got personal stories from real people and
they're about three to five minutes long, people just getting vulnerable,
sharing their story. And then everyone also that shared has
a letter to themselves, so that they would write to
themselves when they were in that dark place. And so
I'm most excited for people to hear that because you

(07:09):
really are hearing from girls of all types, not just girls.
We hope to expand this beyond. We're hearing from all humans. Yes,
all humans. The stories that we have in this seriesies
what's called season one. Yeah, this series are girls. So

(07:30):
Lisa's going to share hers. I'm just gonna set the
stage of what you can expect to hear a little
bit of. But then we'll get into our interviews with
experts and therapists, and then topics that Lisa and I
just think are important to talk about. And I never
knew things I was saying to people or I was
receiving from people were harmful to me, And now that

(07:51):
I am aware of it, painfully aware, almost catch myself like,
oh my gosh, don't say that, or oh my gosh,
don't take too much of what you just received from somebody,
because that is not where you get your worth at all, whatsoever.
And back to the rewiring of the brain. We'll get
into this, like a specific book that I read called
Brain over Binge. I think ultimately, for me, I started

(08:14):
dieting too young and put my brain into this weird
pattern of thinking. I was in starvation mode, and that
led to me binging, which led to me thinking over
eight which led to me purging. And then I would
go to different therapists and they would tell me, oh, well,
it's it's because your dad left and you're filling a
void with food and I would be like, okay, but

(08:36):
now what. But I didn't realize the pattern I was
setting myself up on, and that was what I don't
want to age myself but thirty years ago or something.
So we'll get into our personal stories for sure, and
Lisa's going to share hers in a second. I think
you bring up such a good point here that as
we hear from different experts and we hear different stories,
we are not here to tell you what the best

(08:58):
plan of healing is. We are here to share that
what you are experiencing is not something to be shameful of,
and that and tell you that you are not alone.
So I love that Amy has found freedom in somebody
seeing her and not just another therapist saying it's because
your dad left. It's because your dad left, because for Amy,

(09:18):
that doesn't resonate. But when Catherine Hansen, the author of
The Brain over Binge, said, that's not what it's about.
This is about dieting too young that struck a chord
with Amy. And when you, I believe, correct me if
I'm wrong, when you felt validated, when you felt seen,
when it hit like felt like you hit the jackpot,
and yes, that's when it began. Only then could you

(09:39):
begin to heal. So whatever your jackpot, yes, that's what
I feel, that's what it is for me. We hope
to inspire some light to say that, like there's a
million there's no one reason that an eating disorder happened.
It's not just the desire to be thin. For many people,
it is the desire to be thin. But we believe
that there are different reasons that it happened, and there

(10:01):
are different healing paths to get out of it. But
what we are all experiencing is what we want to
really expose so that we can begin to release that shame,
to find the next step into you being your greatest you.
And I think that right now we should get into
how language matters with body image, because I think back

(10:21):
to I mentioned after my mom passed away and my
tendencies came back, and I was restricting but then eating,
but then throwing up, and I got down to the
lowest weight probably i've been in forever, and got attention
from that. But that fed even though that's not what

(10:42):
it was about. It became about that because then, you know,
I remember one comment specifically, and I know the girl
meant no harm, but I remember everything clear as day.
I remember exactly what I was wearing, where I was,
what we were doing, and she passed me and looked
at me and she said, role, whatever you were doing,
I need this plan A S A P. And I

(11:04):
just kind of smiled and was like, oh, yeah, you know,
and then carried on. But in my mind, I was like,
if she only knew that, right now, she's complimenting whatever
she thinks it's happening with my body and looks really
good right now that I threw up my lunch yesterday
and then didn't eat dinner and took a zanex so

(11:27):
I could sleep and like not think about eating, right
So then that gave me some sort of weird validation
that that's how I'm supposed to be. Reinforcement reinforced it,
so then the pattern kept going and I kept, you know,
until it couldn't anymore, because we need food to live,

(11:48):
and we need it. It's calories are energy, like food
is not something that we need to be restricting from
our lives. And I was. And we'll get into more
of my story. I know keeps saying that, but I'm
just touching on certain things of why language matters, because
for me, she has no idea that that comment, whether
it's acting, whether it's quote unquote positive right like you

(12:11):
received a intended compliment, whether it's negative to make somebody,
you know, hope to motivate somebody into making change, regardless
of it being supposed to be positive or supposed to
be negative, it always impacts us negatively. So we need
to recognize that commenting on people's bodies, whether it's about

(12:32):
being pregnant, Oh you don't look pregnant, or oh my god,
I can't believe you bounced back so fast, or anything alike.
That Because as I've as I talked about this stuff
on social media, I hear stories from every age, every
walk of life, and for me, I remember, you know
your moment with that woman was I was always very thin,
and all of a sudden I walked into my grand
never thought about food, walked into my grandfather's house, and

(12:53):
he said, Wow, your cheeks look fuller. And he actually
meant that as a compliment because older people they think
that full or is a positive thing, which is an
interesting shift over the last couple of decades. But immediately
after years of being complimented about you know, what's your secret? Oh,
you've a fast metabolism, I was like, am I gaining weight?
You know? Is the mayor not showing me what I'm

(13:15):
supposed to see? And if that, who am I? So?
How can we be better conversationalists? How can we say
things to other people that lift them up and don't
cause them to spiral mentally which causes them to take
any sort of action because you never know the root
of somebody's weight loss or weight gain or whatever it
may look like what I was going through, she had

(13:35):
no idea the struggles I was having, and it it
just fed into it. Or if someone is sick or
has something going on, I mean, just for that's not
even what this podcast is about. But honestly, you never know.
Just for example, if you comment on someone's weight loss
but they haven't been vocal about a disease that they're
battling and they don't want to talk about it, and
now suddenly you've commented on their body and they're like, oh, wow,

(13:59):
well I must look sick. Yeah, I must look sick,
or okay, well, at least one thing good that's coming
out of this disease is that I'm losing weight. But
there should not be validation and what we look like.
And I think we can still compliment our friends and
our coworkers and our people that we care about, but
what what adjectives can we use that are better? And

(14:21):
I was talking to my hair firston the other day
and we were kind of going through what we were
talking about, and she used the word radiant, and I thought, gosh,
that's such a good one. And she was like, that's
what I'm gonna start doing. She said, I'm just gonna
start saying you look radiant. And it's not a blind compliment,
you know, not just like oh whatever, it's like, we're
all beautiful. And I think inside we're thinking, somebody looks radiant.
But the words that come out of our mouths faster

(14:43):
than we realize our Oh you look radiant? Did you
lose weight? Like it's so attached to everything, but the
feeling that we see when we see another human that
we identify as being beautiful, regardless of what they look like,
is radiant. I mean, my favorite compliment to receive is
you of great energy. Like that means that I'm showing
up as me because I'm putting good stuff into the

(15:04):
world and they are feeling it. And we are having
a communication a conversation without even having a conversation. Yea,
so we're not making it. And I told you this
when I was on the amtrack the other day. The
women in front of me, I didn't even hear their conversation,
but a stranger, a full on stranger, passes by and says, oh,
I overheard you speaking about weight loss. I have to

(15:24):
tell you, I just did blah blah blah blah blah
diet and I lost blah blah blah pounds. And then
like carries on and the other two women are just like,
I don't know what they extracted from it, but I
know that could have led to a path of eating
disorder or disordered eating for those two women having that conversation,
and this woman carried such pride like it was the

(15:45):
most important thing, this message that she could deliver. And
I just remember thinking, like, we as humans were meant
to do more. We're meant to help each other more
that just inject ourselves into conversation to brag about our
weight loss. And I think that's another thing you'll learn
throughout the series as it organically comes up, is we're

(16:06):
not going to probably call out diets by name per se,
but that were not fans of how would you want
to say at least so like of. I have personally
had to let go of the diet world and things
I wasn't even putting in the diet category. I realized, oh, shoot,
that is kind of a diet, So I need to

(16:26):
let that go for my healing, for my growth. How
seriously do I want to take this? And I'll just
use this as an example. I never even knew what
counting of macro was until recently, but I thought that
was actually helping me understand because I had had such
disordered thoughts about food and a lot of times we're

(16:46):
just consume juice all day and think I was doing
my body good. That's not the case. But I really
didn't know. Okay, we like what what is how much
protein should like if I have? Or how many carbs
should I have? So I really got serious about it,
and it's tracking my protein, carbs all my intake. I
didn't think that that was bad. I was still allowing

(17:06):
myself freedom to eat whatever. But I guess not really
because I was tracking it. And then through Lisa's encouragement,
I had to let that go. And I had such
anxiety around that that I let it go. And I
remember texting you on Saturday morning and I was already
freaking out about the day because somehow this new thing

(17:27):
again never tracked that stuff before my life. I mean
way back in the day. I know I had done
you know, counted points or whatever, but this was different
to me. And yet now all of a sudden, I'm
clinging to it as if it's like the only thing
that I can live by, And just the thought of
having to let it go, I didn't know if I
could face the day. And I had to text you

(17:50):
and talk to you about it, and you encouraged me
and gave me some good tools and we'll go over
some of that too later, but I started even seeing
myself differently where I think that Following Monday, I was
at work and we took a show picture, like we
had an artist in and we all got on the
stage and took a picture. And then I saw the
picture and I was like, uh, And I sent it
to you and I was like, what is happening? Ever

(18:11):
since I stopped counting, I am gaining weight and what
is happening? And you just you were very sweet about it,
but basically told me, Amy, you look the same, no offense, same,
no offense, but you look exactly the same. But in
my mind, my body image, my body image was so
distorted that I mentally shifted. My brain was telling me

(18:36):
because I had not counted the last two days that
I had gained weight. And I think that all of
it comes down to we're never taught or given time
to develop self trust, and so we are always looking
for that outer thing to latch onto, these external rules,
right like you did. They had the weight watchers, which
was the point. Then it was the macros, which was

(18:57):
counting macros, and these are all external things and it's
so hard to leave that behind and start to understand
that your body, the thing you've been fighting your entire life,
actually provides cues to let you know what you need,
when you need it, and how much you need it.
And going back to the macro things, I just want
to encourage the way that I I do things, which

(19:19):
is different than other dietitians or different counselors, is that
I think you can have an awareness about calories, protein, fat,
all that stuff. It's good to get an education, but
using that education as a way to manipulate what and
how much you eat is very different than using that
as a way to flourish and feel good. Yeah, that
is one thing I wanted to touch on later is

(19:40):
outer wisdom and knowing that, and we will dial in
because I think that that's important. But another thing I
want to touch on, since we're talking about different kinds
of plans, is there was a time in my life
where I had to eat quote unquote clean all the
time and I had to have it was I was
very on a very strict list of foods that I
could couldn't have And what I didn't realize at the

(20:03):
time because there wasn't a name for it. You touch
on this too. I feel like Lisa and I stories
are going to organically come out through each episode, but
Lisa's about to share her actual contained story, just like
a lot of the guests that are to be coming
on and sharing. Lisa and I are going to do that. Um,
but it's orthorexia, and I think that that's an important

(20:25):
topic to touch on because you may not even know
exactly what that is and if you fall in that category.
So we do have someone coming on and we'll get
into that with an expert and eating disorder therapist, Jennifer
Rawlins will be on. So before we get to that, though, Lisa,
I would love for you to share your story. Okay,
I can actually remember one of the final times that

(20:47):
eating food and thoughts about my body wasn't so complicated.
Growing up, people always complimented me for how much I
could eat. I had an appetite, I liked food, and
I was so lucky that I could eat quote what
I wanted and not worry about my body size changing unquote.
Some of my earliest memories involve adults commenting about my

(21:08):
thin frame and how blessed I was to have good
genes and a fast metabolism. I didn't know what any
of these words even meant at the time, but I
started to notice that this was affecting my self worth.
While it made me feel pretty in that moment, it
simultaneously sent a different message and instilled fear of gaining
weight or my body changing. At the time, it was

(21:28):
no big deal. I like to eat, and began to
see being thin coupled with eating as my superpower. This
was a way to get positive attention. During a summer
field hockey camp in eighth grade, I willingly entered a
Crispy Cream donut eating competition. I showed up how many
donuts I could eat, which was like five or six,
and then I rode the bus home feeling some sort

(21:49):
of pride for winning the silly competition. I remember this
experience so vividly because of the stark difference in my thoughts.
Just one year later, the summer before going into ninth grade,
I returned to the same exact camp, but everything had changed.
Puberty had begun to hit and while I still had
a small frame, my body was starting to change, and
that change terrified me. Every time the bus hit a

(22:11):
pothole on the way to camp, I felt the fat
on my stomach jingle, and I couldn't let it go.
That summer, I put all of my energy into eating
as little as I could, which some days was as
little as a protein bar during this day of rigorous
field hockey practice. This is how it began. With attempts
to restrict it never really worked because bodies need food,

(22:31):
and I chalked up my eventual eating to my lack
of willpower. Each day I started over with my commitment
to just not eat, but the end of the day
I left feeling a sense of failure and fear for
have eaten. Where I grew up, partaking in diet behavior
was completely normalized, even if you weren't on a diet,
even if you were thin. There wasn't a body type
that was extempt from this type of behavior. We ate bagels,

(22:53):
but only with the insides completely scooped out. We drank coffee,
but only with skim milk. We drank soda, but only
diet coke. We ate cookies, but only one hundred calorie
OREO packs of cookies. A couple of years later, while
in college, I shifted from attempting restriction of total food
to latching under food rules, all under the guise of health.
I was no longer restricting my total food intake. I

(23:15):
was eating eating multiple times a day, and I even
went to the gym every single day for six months,
a streak that I was proud of. My new identity formed.
I was the healthy girl, and I like this validation.
I like people coming to me with the questions. I
liked feeling that I had something on everyone else. I
felt special. I wasn't made during a nutrition just yet,
but it was the eventual goal. So I began to

(23:36):
spend more and more time reading health magazines, perusing the
shelves at health food stores, and gobbled up any information
about nutrition that I could. Back then, no one was
into health like they are now. Me Cutting things out
and only eating certain foods seemed more woo woo than
it seemed problematic. But my internal desire to stay thinned
was a gigantic presence in my life. Because I had

(23:57):
an intense fear of gaining weight and identity that was
completely fused to what I ate and what I didn't need.
The thoughts of food started to be all consuming. I
remember not even being able to go to sleep because
I was thinking about what I'd eat for breakfast. I
remember during breakfast thinking about what I'd be eating for lunch.
I saw the red flags here and there. Deep down,
and I mean really deep down, I knew something wasn't right.

(24:19):
I was constantly eating alone when everybody else was going
out to meals with friends. I was turning down plans
that would involve unhealthy food. But I was blind to
what the problem could be. After all, it felt like
it was just me prioritizing my health. How could anything
be wrong with that. The first therapist I saw, I
didn't tell her I had dietary restrictions because at that
time they didn't feel like restrictions. I genuinely loved all

(24:42):
the food I was eating. Instead, I told her how
thoughts of food consume my mind, and she chalked this
up to being general anxiety. This made sense. I was
eating food, I felt like I was eating enough food,
so I didn't have a food problem. I had an
anxiety problem. Yes, this I could understand. I could also
address and handle this. Eventually. I went on to get
my master's in Nutrition and Exercise at Columbia University, and

(25:04):
as much as I love my degree and where it's
taken me professionally and personally studying to be a dietitian
fueled the feeling that I had to look and eat
a certain way. The food controls tightened, Only now it's
morphed into something called clean eating, and I knew deep
down again that something was wrong, But without words like
disordered eating or orthorexia existing, or my knowledge of them,

(25:26):
at least, I continue to believe that what I was
doing was not problematic. Eventually, things fell into place, almost
organically and without force, and a lot of it has
to do with practicing yoga. Actually, I started going to
yoga on my block because I hated the cold weather
in New York, and the place right near me offered
a hot room to practice in. The more I went,

(25:46):
the more I noticed the mental shifts. I started to
go through my mind and not my body, and therefore
I started to see my body on all days. Prior
to this, I'd frequently get myself into a binge and
then be too full, or feel too gross or too fat.
These these are things I would say to work out.
But now I was showing up for my mind, and
this meant I was seeing my body in the reflection

(26:08):
of the mirror every day and I was just sitting
with it. I found myself naturally showing it love as
I noticed normal folds, bulges, and my body looking like
how a body should look. All of a sudden, I
was feeling a love for myself, my being, and it
was not based on what it looked like. I was
no longer choosing foods based on how I wanted to look.
I could listen, understand, and trust my body and the

(26:30):
feedback it gave me. I exercised for my mind, not
my body, and I kept taking mental note of these
cognitive shifts and eventually knew that I had to bring
this type of freedom to people. One word to describe
my life now is abundant. Opportunities come out of nowhere,
like Amy Brown finding me and this podcast series. This
wouldn't have been possible if I continue to live in fear.

(26:52):
Instead of fear, I've gained relationships, I've found my true
sense of self worth, I've developed self trust, and I
have a life that is better than anything that I
could have dreamed of. Thank you, Lisa for sharing your story.
I know that reading it sometimes isn't easy, and each
of you listening you may have your own story that
you need to write out one day and maybe at
the end of this series, you take the time to

(27:14):
think of your story and writing can be so therapeutic.
That's what we've got going on in each episode of
this series is stories from people. I'll be sharing mine
on the next episode next Saturday, but later on in
this episode, we have stories from to other people just

(27:35):
like you. Some people stories you'll notice some similarities, some
are not similar at all. You know, I think we
have people in the spotlight celebrities that are out there
sharing their stories right now, which is super cool because
Lisa and I started dreaming this up in December, and
even since then, the last few months, it's been like
we've been able to send each other articles like oh

(27:55):
my gosh, did you see Taylor Swift's documentary Miss Americana.
She opens up about exactly what we're talking about this
area of like I don't know, was she clinically diagnosed
with some sort of eating disorder or did she just
have times where she was depriving herself of food and
got way too skinny? But she she shares in the documentary.

(28:18):
If you haven't seen it, I encourage you to watch it.
I'm a Taylor fan. Even if you're not, you'll enjoy
the documentary, and she just said that she has to
not look at pictures of herself every day, even though
she's someone that could easily be photographed every day, but
there would be stuff that pops up of her that
would then lead her to think she looked a certain
way and she didn't like the way she looked, or

(28:39):
she looked too big, or people would comment like are
you pregnant or something that would create some negative spiral
of thoughts to where then she would not eat. And
she said that she would have defended herself, like if
you would have commented on her body, she would have
been like, nope, I'm eating, I'm working out. And she's like, yeah,
I was working out all right, like a lot, but

(29:00):
I wasn't eating. And she would go on to do
her tours and she would perform and she just wasn't
feeling that great. And now that she's fueling her body
and eating food and not concerned about being a double
zero and loving her life as a size I think
she says six. Now she goes out and does a

(29:22):
tour performance and she gets off stage still full of
energy and feeling good, and she's like, oh, interesting, this
is what it should feel like and now I get it.
Not all of us are none, None of us are really,
Let's be honest, and let's Taylor's swift is listening to this, Like,
we're not all on a stadium tour doing these massive
nights where we do need that type of energy, but

(29:43):
we do have days where we're not giving ourselves what
our bodies need. And once you finally do you realize, like, oh,
that's how I can sustain getting through a day, Like
this is what life is supposed to feel like. At
least it makes me think of a post you put
up about coffee and you're like, instead of reaching for

(30:04):
caffeine or whatever that looks like for you, maybe do
you need to reach for food? Yeah, like the three
o'clock everyone's so tired. It's like it's it's after way
after lunch, it's before dinner. A snack would provide some energy,
Like why are we always reaching for energy lists substances
right when food is that it's energy And so that's

(30:24):
what you know. Taylor touched on in in her documentary,
and I think that was very powerful for a lot
of girls to see, especially someone like Taylor saying it
who when she was in it we had no idea,
and in fact, I mean I guess I had noticed
that she had gotten a little bit, like her body
had changed. But even looking now, you see where she
was and then where she is now, and she just

(30:46):
is so much happier and radiant. And that our word.
And I want that joy for for everybody, so to
have that and to know that we need to stop
trying to squeeze into whatever we think society says. And
I feel for these people in the industry. You know,

(31:07):
I just got done reading Jessica Simpsons book, and you know,
she was vocal in the book about, you know, giving
herself bruises, but trying to pinch her body fat at
night in the mirror looking at it, because when she
signed her record deal as a teenager, one of the
first things her label said to her was that she
needed to lose fifteen pounds and she's already it was

(31:27):
already a small person and that just sent her on
this you know, years year, long years and years of
stuff of diet pills and how can she fix her
body and make it what it is not supposed to be.
Demmi Lavado is another celebrity out in the spotlight, being
very vocal and talking about it, and so I just

(31:48):
think it's important and I'm thankful that we've got people
that have a huge platform like that that we're talking
about it, and it makes my job certainly a lot easier.
It pushes us light years ahead of where we ever be. Yeah,
and it gives us single sort interview or whatever they do. Yeah,
it affirmed to me what we were doing with this

(32:08):
and made me more excited about it for sure. And
I feel like even with Jessica and Taylor and Demi,
there were moments where they were reflecting on that person
that they were at that time, and I wonder what
they would say to that person. And so that's the
piece of this that we wanted to be sure to include.

(32:29):
And so with each person that's sharing a story, like
Lisa just shared her story and then we've got the
other real stories and mine were including after the story
a letter to themselves, like it just a sixties twod
like one minute or less note to yourself. So that
might be another thing that you do as you go
through this series. If you want to write down your story,

(32:51):
then take a minute to also write a letter to
yourself that self, like what what would you tell yourself then, So, Lisa,
with that said, do you want to get into your letter? Yeah? Okay,
let's do it. Dear younger Lisa, I'm proud of you.
You've overcome a lot in your life and grown into
the most aligned version of yourself. You continue to put

(33:12):
in the work day after your day, pausing in moments
most would run from having difficult conversations with others and yourself,
and creating necessary boundaries to keep living your greatest power.
If I could have helped you earlier, the one thing
I would have taught you is how to self soothe.
There was so much going on in your life during
your formative years that the outside world couldn't understand or
even know about. The inordinate amount of pressure and secret

(33:35):
keeping put more pressure on you than any teenage girl
should experience. It only makes sense that you would try
to control something amiss. The chaos of all of that
you couldn't control. Here's what I want you to remember.
No matter what you experience in your life, you will
always be on your own side. The most important relationship
to foster is this one right here. Whenever you feel invalidated, inadequate,

(33:56):
or unworthy, it's your job to pause, get quiet, re
regulate with all the self soothing tools that you've built,
and come back to living your best life as your
highest self. An extraordinary life awaits a head full of
purpose and helping others. Be sure to enjoy every moment
all Lisa, I love that letter to yourself. I think
that this is going to be good for people to hear,

(34:18):
like you opening up and sharing your story and then
your letter to yourself again. Another thing that maybe y'all
can do is you go through this series is think
about your story, think about what you would tell yourself too,
and that can be an important part of your healing.
And you know, we're gonna be sharing more stories in
this episode. But before we get to Claire and Andrea,

(34:40):
two girls that we're going to do the same thing
that Lisa just did. Um, we're gonna talk to Jennifer Rowlin.
Let's get Jennifer on the phone right now. We are
so excited to welcome Jennifer Rawlin. She is an eating
disorder therapist and founder of the Eating Disorder Center in Maryland.
Welcome Jennifer. Hey, I'm so excited to be here. Yeah,
we're excited to have you on, especially since you can

(35:01):
talk with us about eating disorder issues and topics and
your therapists. You're the expert. And the first thing we'd
love to touch on with you is orthorexia because I
think for a long time this didn't have a name.
I know I personally had it, but I didn't realize
that's what I was doing and to myself and to

(35:23):
my family and friends that I was hanging out with.
Can you talk to us about what it is? Yeah,
And I think it's so common for people to not
know that they have it. And basically orthorexia is an
unhealthy obsession with so called healthy eating. So what it
can look like just some of the name symptoms would
be rigid, fruderal, so saying things like I don't eat

(35:45):
white bread, cutting out whole food groups for non medical reasons.
We also see social isolation, so starting to avoid events
whereas the person can't get their like quote unquote healthy food,
spending hours thinking about food, googling recipes, and then this
idea of purity and morality. So if I eat a
certain way that I'm a good person, but if I
eat a different way that I'm sad. Yes, And I,

(36:07):
as someone who also experienced a version of orthorexia, you know,
didn't start like that? How does it start for most
people in your practice or your experience. Sure, So I'm
also recovered myself, and I first experienced orthorexic symptoms in
my eating to put or emerged. And I see this
with clients as well. How it usually starts as this
idea of I want to be healthier. That's how it

(36:29):
presents the outside world. So typically people to orthorexia, unlike anorexia,
they're usually very open about what they're eating, kind of
posting the Instagram images. It's beautiful, like health ified foods,
promoting this idea of health and wellness. But underneath that
is an obsession and high levels of anxiety as well
as like this need for control. So I just want

(36:51):
to be clear too, because there is a difference in
wanting to put nourishing foods into your body and caring
about that, but then being obsessive about it. I mean,
how do how do you tell the difference? Like if
someone's listening right out, they're like, oh, shoot, I do
care about like nutrients and food, and my outer wisdom
is telling me like this food is something that's going

(37:13):
to provide a lot of healthy vitamins and minerals for
my body and what it needs. But there's a difference.
That's not what we're saying. Absolutely yeah, So it comes
down to this idea of preference versus a rigid rule.
So what I always say is there's nothing wrong with
really liking kale, right, that's not unhealthy. But for somebody
with orthorexia, it's this idea of I cannot break my

(37:35):
food rules, and if I do, there's extreme anxiety. So
it's a difference between I've a preference for eating this
food this I know it's going to give the nutrients.
I've decided to have this meal because it looks good,
versus I'm eating this meal because these are my safe
foods and anything else is bad, and if I eat
anything else, you know, I'm going to feel terrible about
myself or have to compensate or think about it all day.

(37:57):
Anecdotally for myself, you know, it's started off of I
love healthy food. I love healthy food, but it was
also really just a vice to control my food in
a new way, in a way where other people wouldn't
question it that you know, I was eating, but I
was eating specific foods, so nobody would ever say, Okay,
she hasn't eating disorder. She doesn't eat. If anything, everybody

(38:19):
would say she eats a lot. Because I was always eating,
but always eating safe foods personally for me. Yeah, and
that's so typical. And we might see things and something
I did and my eating disorder, for instance, was I
would bring my own food to cook outs in like
a tupperware, and I'd be eating and it would appear
quote unquote healthy, but it wasn't enough calories for my
energy needs and it was very rigid. Yeah, I would

(38:42):
say I could speak to that too. For my family,
my dad, food is his love language and he would
love to cook for us. And I think back on
all the times where I used to just show up
and not eat what he prepared because it wasn't on
my list, and I could get away with it because
I was like, well, Dad, I'm a vegan, gluten free,

(39:05):
you know person now. But I don't even really know
why I put myself into that category. I think some
of it did start because I was trying to get
pregnant and I read a book that was all about
detoxing and how you what certain foods you could put
into your body. But for me, it took it to
the next level. But I had that as my excuse
of why meeting this way because I'm trying to get pregnant.

(39:26):
But I really I liked the results I was seeing
from it, and it snowballed and snowballed to where I
was no longer a We began to fear the things
that you cut out exactly, you couldn't be flexible. And
then if I let myself have whatever said food that
I feared, then it was like, Okay, I've gone and

(39:48):
done this, so I better eat this food that is
on my fear list for the rest of today and
as much as I can because tomorrow I'm never going
to have it again. Yeah, and that's so common that,
like in compulsive eating restricts cycle, it's incredibly common. And
I think one thing you both pointed out was also
how this eating disorder I like to call it like

(40:09):
the eating disorder that hides in plain sight because it's
often not visible to the outside. I people think, oh,
that person is just being healthy, and there's a lot
of justifications, like you said, then you're gluten freeze, then
you're dairy freeze. But secretly it's that obsession and that
desire for control and not to mention the applaud that
comes with oh I wish I could be healthy like you,
or I should have the discipline like you. Where you're

(40:31):
being applauded for this behavior that becomes your identity. So yes,
I'm going to touch on that, because you say your identity.
Somehow I became this person without even really trying to
be that person that people would come to for advice
on what is the next thing I should be doing
or how can I detox like a S A P.

(40:52):
And I was like, how did I become this person?
But I realized I became that person because it's all
I talked about, which I probably would now find myself
to be extremely annoying if but I mean, but it's
it is something that a lot of people are interested
in and they're always trying to find that next thing.
So if you're a person that's up to speed on

(41:13):
the next super food, then you know, of course it's
what you're gonna be talking about and people are going
to ask you about. And to me, there was nothing
satisfying about being that person. I think at the time
I thought maybe there was, but looking back, I'm like, oh,
that was just so miserable to be fixated on certain
foods that we're going to have all these magical powers
because they were on my my list of approved things

(41:34):
I could eat. And for people to let go of
that identity too, for some people, because they do get
so much praise from other people and it becomes part
of who they are, and they're like, without this, who
am I. The thing about orthorexia was that this was
not a word that was well known. Um. I think
it was officially created or termed coined in the nineties,

(41:55):
but we didn't hear about it until really now. And
it's one of those words that I wish I knew
about or I learned about in school, because without it existing,
I thought I was fine. I thought that okay, I
didn't have anorexia or believe a personally, so therefore I
was fine. And with the understanding that there's this gray
area which is disordered eating, which orrexia falls under, I

(42:18):
felt like I could have raised my hand and say, okay,
I see that symptom in me. But without it being there,
without a place to land, I suffered for many years. Yeah,
because so tough and unfortunately so common. Again, it's just hard,
I think, to identify that you have a problem when
everyone around you is envious of what you're doing, and

(42:38):
maybe you're surrounding yourself by other people in diet culture,
so it seems very normative. Jennifer, Can you share with
us the difference between eating disorder and disordered eating? Sure?
So for me, the way that I defined disordered eating
is that you don't have a good relationship with food.
Maybe you're following like these external diet rules, you're not

(42:59):
listening to body, you're casting judgment around certain foods is
good or bad. Perhaps you're not eating enough for your
energy needs, and all of that can be really harmful.
And I think people who struggle with disordered eating deserve
to get care as much as people with eating disorders.
For me, it crosses over into an eating disorder when
that becomes your whole life. There's a big distinction between dieting,

(43:20):
where like that's one piece of your life, and maybe
it's an unpleasant piece of your life, but it's a
piece of your life. When it's an eating disorder, it
starts to infiltrate every area of your life. And for
many people, at the height of their eating disorder. It's
like every waking thought is about food or when can
I get my next meal? Or when can I use
this behavior. Maybe there's a mom that's listening, or a

(43:42):
family member or a best friend that's listening to this
right now, and they don't necessarily struggle with some of this,
but someone close to them does. What advice do you
have for people in their life? Look for me? I'm
thinking of like if I had a friend listening to
this back when I was really like hyper focused, like
on every little thing that I was eating, to say,

(44:02):
my best friend or my sister would be listening to
us talk right now, and she might be like, oh
my gosh, this is Amy. Like Amy needs to hear this,
Like how how can I help Amy? This is her?
What is the best way to do it without, you know,
offending somebody or trying to make sure that you're there
for them, you're giving them the best help? Like what
what does that person need? What did I need from

(44:23):
someone when I was during that time? Yeah, so I
think there's a few things. I think the first step
is to express your concerns to that person and to
make sure that you're pointing out the concerns about their
behaviors and not about weight, because talking about the person's
weight can be really triggering. And then we also know
that people can have an eating disorder in any sized body.

(44:44):
They don't have to be sticked in in order to struggle.
So saying I love you, I care about you, I've
noticed that when we go out to eat, you're ordering
in a very disordered way, or you're not wanting to
go out to eat with me as much as you
used to, or you're constantly to talking about superfoods. You know,
And I wonder, you know, because I am so worried
about you, would you be open to getting consultation with

(45:07):
a therapist And then if it's not a problem, it's
not a problem, but I would really urge you to
get some professional help just to again see if there's
something going on, to kind of get an assessment. And
I would also add to be really careful not to
make comments on that person's body, and to also educate
yourself and to educate the person as much as possible,

(45:28):
so you know, maybe sharing with them the links to
our conversation or other books or podcasts talking about eating
disordered behaviors as well. One of the hardest parts. For
me was when I noticed that my thoughts were all
consuming and I went to see a therapist who was
not an eating disorder therapist. She told me that I
had anxiety, and that made so much sense to me,

(45:50):
because of course I had anxiety, but because all I
was eating healthy, I couldn't understand that I had a
problem with food. And I almost wish that that they're
best had said to me, you have anxiety because of
your relationship to food, not you have anxiety period, because
we danced around it. I danced around it for a

(46:10):
long time and I was looking for professional help, for
someone to tell me something was wrong, and she didn't. Yeah,
And I think that's why, Like another caveat of that
would be to ask when they do seek professional hope
that they seek help from eating disorder specialists, not just somebody,
because I don't know if you guys are familiar with
psychology today to find a therapist, but nowadays therapists can

(46:33):
check a box and say they specialize in something on
psychology today, so some have like dirty specialties listed, and
you want to actually, like I encourage people to interview
the therapists on the phone and say what percentage of
your caseload is people with eating disorders, Like what is
your experience to really get an understanding, because unfortunately, a
lot of therapists say they do everything, and I'm somebody

(46:53):
who doesn't believe that you can effectively have every specialization.
You know, like, I know what areas I'm great at,
and I know what I don't know. Would you say
that orthorexia or disordered eating always comes down to the
desire to be thin, Definitely, I don't think so. I
think with orthorex, yeah, you can have people who want
to lose weight as part of that illness, but you

(47:13):
also can have people who don't have body image issues,
where for instance, I had clients in the past who've
lost family members to cancer, and so their fear around
food is that you know this idea of mortality and
if I eat in a certain way, then they believe
I can protect myself from that. Right. So I think
even though thinness can be the way that some of
the symptoms sometimes manifest, but then even disorder usually there's

(47:36):
a lot of underlying core issues, which can include past trauma,
low self horrors, perfectionism, you know of anxiety, depression, a
mood disorder. So the way I described it to clients
is if we think about an iceberg, often the desire
to be thin is the top of the iceberg that's
peaking out, But underneath the surface is all of those

(47:57):
other issues of just talking about the play into that.
And how do you ration though with somebody that says,
my blah blah blah died of cancer, and so I
need to eat all these super foods only, and I
can't have gluten and a can of this and again
of that because those are all you know, because they
read that they're inflammatory. I'm not saying these is factual
information for our listeners, just things that I hear a
lot as a dietitian, right, And I think, I mean,

(48:18):
I have so many arguments around that I don't even
know where to start. But I think the main too
that I would say are a, like, really looking at
the conclusive research. And B I mean, we know a
lot of research has tainted or like facts on certain
websites by guy culture. So looking at the impact of
having anxiety around food un your health because that spikes

(48:41):
corn solid can actually be very unhealthy. And then to
Harvard did a study um for a hundred years where
they studied men, and they looked at mortality rates, and
they found that people with the strongest social connections actually
was the biggest predictor of longevity. And people who are
obsessed with quote unquote health foods often that impacts their

(49:01):
social relationships because in our culture, right, like we all
want to go out and get ice fool with friends.
So I would actually argue that isolating and sitting alone
in your room eating your salad is far more unhealthy
than going out to eat in a relaxed environment with friends.
You know, we have real people sharing their stories as
part of this series, and also in that doing letters

(49:24):
to themselves. And I think that a lot of people
with this in their past, if they are writing back
to the person they were, then so many letters would
include like I'm sorry that you missed out on going
to dinner with your friends. I'm sorry that you would
make up an excuse to skip the party because you

(49:45):
were scared of what food was going to be served
or if there was going to be cake. I know
that that's certainly the case for me. Like I think
back over the years of college to adulthood, like pass
that into my career where I legit skipped out on
social function because I couldn't control the food, and even
if I was personally showing up to them, mentally, I
was checked out because let's say eight before I got

(50:07):
there to control the situation I was, my mind was
still running rampant around, Oh my god, I want to
eat this. Can I eat this? Can I eat this?
And then I eat it and then I go into
the guilt cycle. So it's like you're just can't be
present even if you're showing up. I love that you
touched on that, Jennifer, the study of the social aspect
and how that can be so good for us, and
probably the anxiety that I caused around. I mean, I'm

(50:30):
that person with the cancer thing too. Yes, I had
the healthy eating because I was trying to get pregnant,
but my mom also died of cancer in two thousand fourteen.
My dad is in remission right now, so I feel
like I also had that to latch onto to use
in it as an excuse of why I was eating
a certain way. But again it created so much anxiety
and stress for me. That stress caused more damage than

(50:52):
than the food, right, And I think that's so common
in it again, eating disorder into eating are super complex.
I don't want to say it boiled down to one thing.
But when we have the loss of a loved one,
you know, from an illness that feels incredibly out of
control and uncertain and scary. And so if I'm sold
this idea and this lie through diet cultures that these

(51:12):
foods will protect me, it makes perfect sense why I
would latch onto that as a means of control. But
again we know it just serves to create more problems,
and that you know, no matter how much kale y'all eat,
we're all gonna at the end of the day, we're
all not going to live forever. So I think diet
culture really praised on all of our fears about mortality

(51:32):
and again latching onto something to try to control after
going through situations that feel very scary and out of control.
But the problem is the more we buy into the behaviors,
the more we're controlled by them. Yeah, and diet culture
latches onto this. Whatever we've been told is what our
bodies are supposed to look like. Any generationally, it changes.

(51:55):
But there's like, Okay, we're told from magazine covers to
all kinds of things, to celebrities they feel this certain
pressure to look a certain way and then that's what
we see, and I feel like then we're all struggling.
It's like a rat race trying to what can we
do and trying to keep up and figure out how
how is our body is supposed to look like that?

(52:17):
Or how do we get our body that way? But
why has that been decided? Like who decided that's how
bodies look? Our bodies should look how we were born
to look, and we're all different shapes and sizes and
we're all beautiful. Like that's just so I'm sure it's
frustrating for you of people that come in and are
talking to you about is that a topic that comes

(52:39):
up of like the standards that we have to live
up to and what's out there and what's your response
to that. It comes up all the time with clients,
and I think it's far worse now because of Instagram
and shape too than all these options that are out there.
But I think at the end of the day, we
all want to be loved and we all want to
be accepted, and I think that diet culture is I

(53:01):
think now it's at the seventy billion dollar industry, and
they wouldn't make any money if we all woke up
and said I like myself, I love myself. Right, So
we have these big companies that prey on our insecurities
in orders to sell products because that's how they make
their money. And then I also think there's a big
element of patriarchy and all of this, because if women
are sitting around counting calories trying to shrink our bodies,

(53:23):
then we're not enacting world change that we could be enacting.
Like I feel like that could be an entirely separate episode,
so I don't even want to dive into that too far. Well,
so you mentioned waking up and loving your body. Let's
talk about self talk and negative self talk in particular,
And I feel we'll just use since you brought up

(53:44):
social media and Instagram, Like it gets hard, Like you
can be scrolling through and like see a picture of
someone and then just be like, oh wow, dang, look
at them, like why am I so fat? Or however
you whatever that negative thought is that instantly comes in
because you saw something, or you walk by and you
look in the mirror and you instantly say something negative
about yourself. How are you seeing how we talk to

(54:04):
ourselves affect people. I mean, I think our internal dialogue
can be so powerful and often it's super negative and
critical in a way that we wouldn't talk to other
people that we care about. And so I start by
having people to be mindful of their thoughts, because I
think we go about our day and we have something
like seventy thou thoughts today, and many of them are

(54:24):
similar thoughts that we've had before that are on loop.
And so I think the first step is just being
mindful and aware of what we're telling ourselves and that
we're not our thoughts right, those are stories that our
mind max up. And then the second step is thinking
rather than asking yourself is that thought true or not?
I have clients asks is this thought helpful in terms
of getting me in the direction of a full and

(54:45):
meaningful life. And if the answer is it's not helpful,
what I like to have people do is practice either
coming up with a mantra positive self statement that they
say back to themselves repeatedly, or really practice that like
self compassionate voice. So thinking about what you would tell
a child, your best friend, somebody that you loved he

(55:07):
said that statement. And the more you practice the positive
self talk, the more automatic and naturally can become over time.
Thank you for that, Jennifer. We really appreciate you coming on. Actually,
the next couple of stories that we're going to share
in this episode are girls that got vulnerable and negative
self talk plays a role in in their story, So

(55:28):
I think we'll dive into their stories. But appreciate you
coming on so much. And if people want to follow
you on Instagram, you are at Jennifer Underscore Rowlin and
I have started following you, I don't know, in the
last month or two, and I just want to tell
you I've so enjoyed your posts. They've been a huge
encouragement to me, and I know that they will be
to a lot of other people if they aren't already

(55:51):
following you. And I'm just pulling up one that you
put up. Actually it's like three days ago when we're
recording this, but this is going to air in April.
But you put your mom had slim vest, you have keto.
Your daughter deserves freedom, ditch the diet life. And as
a mom of a twelve year old girl who all
I want her to know is that she is beautiful

(56:14):
no matter what, Like yes, I want her to have
that freedom and thankfully she is showing no signs of anything.
But I just have to pray that that continues. But
I liked that post because, yeah, every generation is going
to have their thing. But I think if we continue
this fight and you keep doing what you're doing, Jennifer,
because it's important work, our daughters can have freedom. Absolutely. Well,

(56:38):
thank you so much for having me on in for
spotlighting this issue because I think it's so important. Thank you.
Thanks Jennifer. Right now, let's hear from Claire. We've got
her story and then her letter to herself. Hey, I'm Claire.
I remember being ten years old when I first heard
the phrase I have to lose weight. My best friend's
older sister was talking about how she needed to be

(57:00):
thinner to be liked by a boy. And I was
thirteen when I first thought, I have to lose weight
because I wanted to be popular in school and noticed
by boys. And I had decided that certain parts of
my body, like my belly and thighs, were not good enough.
Within two years, not good enough morphed into gross, disgusting, fat,

(57:24):
and ugly, and those four words would determine how I
looked at and thought of my body for the next
decade of my life. Throughout Purity in my twenties, I
would at times cut out carbs, try food, combining diets,
claim to labels like low fat, go on juice cleanses,
or deny myself food altogether because I wanted to make

(57:45):
sure I was truly hungry, meaning my stomach was actually
hurting before I ate. And it felt like I was
on this chase looking for this one thing, this one
diet that would fix me. But the two scariest thoughts
I remember having where when I was withholding food as
a punishment, and when I thought about throwing up after

(58:06):
big meals. So the voice in my head said things
like someone who hasn't worked out doesn't get to eat,
or go on, try it just once, no one needs
to know. I was self conscious about what and how
much I ate, even around my family. I would never
wear a bikini because I legitimately thought no one wants

(58:28):
to see that. So losing weight and being thin became
equivalent to being happy and accepted, and food turned into
this exhausting and threatening thing which was always holding me back.
I was twenty eight when I went on a month
long restrictive diet where I cut out almost everything, and
the idea was to figure out food sensitivities. But after

(58:50):
four weeks I decided not to reintroduce certain foods because
I didn't want to put on weight again. And six
weeks later I ended up binging on pasta and it
and within two months I had gained back everything I
had lost and more. And I remember thinking there has
to be an easier way, and that's when I stumbled
across Lisa's course For the Noise. And at first I

(59:13):
was skeptical, this is gonna work? Is it worth my money?
But I cannot stress enough how fundamentally, For the Noise
changed my life because I had never learned to listen
to my bodies in a wisdom and what I had
thought of my body is trying to manipulate me, where
actually requests for help and to trust. My life before

(59:35):
For the Noise was heavy. I was going through the motions,
always worrying about food and what my body looked like
and the things people couldn't tell. How self abusive the
thoughts and my head were. Today I'd say my life
is lighter, there's room to breathe. And sure I still
have bad days where I think my values gross, and

(59:56):
someone's value is still the first thing I look at.
I sometimes I or eat. I don't always surrender to
my body. I sometimes worry if people judge what and
how much I eat. But after having had these thoughts
for more than half of my life, I can't expect
for them to just disappear. So for the noise taught
me how to identify noise without being affected by it,

(01:00:18):
because the truth is, I don't have time for that.
One of my favorite phrases of Lisa's is you ate
too much, you didn't kill someone. When I move my
body nowadays, it's because I want to connect with myself,
and I learned that the point is not to live
blissfully ever after, but to work on and with yourself

(01:00:40):
for the rest of your life. Whatever might be challenging
now might not be in six months, could be again
in two years. Everything is always in motion. But when
I tried to stick to a diet and punish myself,
I was stuck. There was no headspace to think about
anything else. And today I can ask myself what would

(01:01:02):
bring me joy, and I can also stay present when
these negative thoughts arise. Hey, gorgeous, So I've got a
couple of things I'd like to tell you, hoping they'll
help you. Firstly, when you feel like there is something
wrong with you because you don't enjoy what everybody else
is into that it's somehow your fault. Don't there is

(01:01:23):
nothing wrong with you. Secondly, when you feel lost and lonely,
unlike you have this huge weight pressing down on you,
I want you to remember that I am always, always
with you. Thirdly, whatever lights you up, I want you
to go after that and do its shamelessly, because I

(01:01:45):
promise you life is so much bigger and you are
so much stronger than looking at a piece of bread
and only feeling fear. And Lastly, even if none of
the above makes sense, there's one thing I need you
to take away from this. You're going to be okay, Okay.
Now let's do this with Andrea. She is going to

(01:02:06):
share her story and her letter to herself. Hi. My
name is Andrea, and I am so honored that Amy
has asked me to be a part of this and
I hope that my story will help you. Guys. My
story starts when I was around seven. That's when I
started to hate my body seven years old. No one,
but especially as seven year old should focus on their

(01:02:27):
body size. I grew up hearing adults tell me how
much bigger I was than my mom, how I must
be shaped like my dad, and to me at seven,
my dad looked huge. I didn't really want to be
compared to this giant man with a mustache. I wanted
to be compared to my little, pretty tiny mom, and
I started to feel embarrassed about my size. From then on,

(01:02:50):
I had anxiety over my size. I would hear comments
about how much I was eating. I was embarrassed to
wear middrift bearing dance recital costumes. I remember on multiple
occasions just crying and crying over how I looked. I
would cry looking at myself in the mirror wearing these
dance costumes. Every year, I would hate putting on my

(01:03:12):
recital costumes. I hated the way I looked in them.
I didn't want to be in front of people in
this costume. I didn't want people to see me in it,
and I definitely didn't want to stand next to the
other girls. I felt like I looked horrible and I
just was so uncomfortable with who I was. This went
on until around fifteen. That's when I turned not only

(01:03:33):
just hating my body, but I also turned it into
depriving myself of food. I would compare myself to models, actresses, girls,
I took dance class. With any girl that crossed my path,
I would compare myself to them, and I always felt
that I fell very short to every single girl. Dealing
with other normal teenage drama, I took control by starving myself.

(01:03:54):
I noticed I actually got attention. The skinnier I got,
I became addicted to that attention. I noticed the thinner
I got, the more attention I got, and that truly
breaks my heart now thinking about it. I would deprive myself,
weigh myself obsessively, and body checked myself every single time
I passed this certain mirror in my bathroom. I missed

(01:04:16):
out on fun, carefree teenage years that even flew into college.
Times that I should be having just fun with my
friends and just enjoying being young and stress free. They
were taken away because I was too consumed with outward appearances.
Times when your child, or a teenager, or even in college,

(01:04:40):
you shouldn't be focused on outward appearances or getting approval
from other people. You shouldn't be stressed or worried or
feeling less than you should really never feel like that anyways,
at any age, but especially as a child. And I
feel like that eating disorder took a lot of really

(01:05:01):
fun care for years away from me. It really shouldn't
be a thought in any person's mind, but especially as
a child and a teenager. I missed out and enjoying
my youth because I was too focused on unimportant things
and I missed out on so many opportunities, and I
didn't focus on my dreams or my passions because I
was too focused on outward appearances. The sad truth is

(01:05:24):
it was never enough. I was chasing something that I
would never achieve. It's a really dark and lonely feeling,
and it's exhausting, never giving yourself a break or feeding
yourself positive words. It's a vicious cycle of never being enough.
I focused on the wrong things for so long, and
it took me a really long time to get out
of my own head. Many years. Actually, I still feel

(01:05:47):
like I'm recovering and giving myself permission to give myself
compliments and take credit for things that I deserve. It
took a long long time, but I realized I am
absolutely different from every other person out there, and that's
what makes me beautiful. You being your truest, most authentic
self makes you most beautiful. When you find and follow

(01:06:08):
your dreams and put yourself out there, that's what makes
you feel beautiful. When you empower yourself and others. When
you put that time and effort into what a nits
your fire, you don't have time to pick yourself apart
and focus on the outward appearances. It shuts off the
noise inside your head because you're too focused on bigger,
more important things. You have to empower yourself to find

(01:06:30):
something bigger than that noise, and to silence that noise
is so rewarding. Once you realize you can live without
that constant badger inside your head of never being good enough,
or being so mad at yourself for eating or never
look going to look a certain way, you will never
want that noise to take up any more of your time.

(01:06:52):
You want to help others and never let them waste
another second of being unhappy with themselves. You'll start to
notice that when encourage and inspire others, and when you
share your true gifts, that's what's really going to make
you feel beautiful and feel good and actually feel important.
Sharing your light will light up others, and that's what's

(01:07:13):
more important than any compliment or approval from anybody else.
The key to get approval is get approval from yourself,
and that's where you can truly move forward. Except yourself
for everything that you are and own it and love it.
Here's the letter to myself. Dear sixteen year old Andrea.
I'm sorry for taking away your youth. I'm sorry for

(01:07:33):
never stopping and realizing what an amazing person you were.
Not only were you kind, thoughtful, and sweet, but you
were beautiful. Everything you wanted to be you were, and
you never gave yourself credit for that. If I could
change one thing, I wouldn't remind myself that it's not
all about looks. It's about how you make people feel,
and that's what really counts. But giving yourself kind words

(01:07:57):
is never a bad thing. I can see clearly now
that you just needed a reminder that there is not
one standard of beauty. Being yourself and being confident in
who you are and your unique qualities is what's going
to get you far in life. Own them, be proud
and happy of yourself, and find and follow your passions.

(01:08:17):
That's where you'll find your purpose. My younger self would
be proud that my goal and passion in life is
to help women see how beautiful and amazing they really are.
I get to empower women and encourage them to love
themselves daily. That's my job, and I'm so excited that
I get to do that. I was strong and creageous

(01:08:38):
enough to follow my dreams, speak my truth and hopefully
help others. Well, I think that's gonna do it for
today's episode, Lisa. But high five, first episode done, We've
got three more to go. In an episode two, I'll
be sharing my story and then again we've got other
stories from people and then other experts coming on and

(01:09:02):
we would love to interact with y'all on Instagram. I'm
at Radio Amy, Lisa is at the Well Necessities, so
you can find us on there. Let us know you're listening. Oh,
do we have a hashtag? Should? We can guess? Put
it under story with hashtag out way If you think
someone else would benefit from this, yeah, if you want
to screenshot it and share it. I think that this

(01:09:24):
is going to be something that will be a good
tool for people. So if you know someone that might
want to hear this or might need to hear it,
but that has no way of knowing that we're doing it.
Then spread the word posted online. We would appreciate it
and tag us hashtag outweigh or Another way I see
things too is four Things with Amy Brown. I know
it's under that, but this isn't my traditional four things layout.

(01:09:48):
But we just appreciate y'all so much being here with us.
I think we think this is important and we're doing
it for you and for us and my future self
I think is going to have to go back and
listen to this one day. Maybe I I never know
when I might need to go back and hear um.
Some of the interviews that we're doing are some of
the stories that are being told to be reminded that

(01:10:10):
I'm not alone, and that's why we're doing it. We
don't want you to feel alone ever. And we're going
to kind of leave you each episode with something you
can take with yourself to work on, like your homework
until the next episode, and Lisa created a worksheet that
she's going to talk to you about. Yeah, so we
thought it would be a great way to get to
know your own inner critic. The first thing we need

(01:10:31):
to do to detach from it is to start to
notice it. So you can go to fork the Noise
dot com Forward slash Inner Critic and there will be
a worksheet there where you get to know what I
call the devil voice and get to know your goddess
voice and how you can start to tap into a
little bit more goddess and a little bit less devil. Yes,
because at the beginning of this episode we talked about
how language matters and it's important. So that is how

(01:10:56):
it starts with, like, say to yourself. It's what you
say to yourself. Is not just what you say to
other people, but it's what you say to yourself. So
definitely go check out that worksheet and complete your homework
before you come back to next Saturday's episode. Thank you
for being here, and um, we'll see you next week.
Hey guys, it's just Amy here at the end, and

(01:11:17):
that's a wrap on episode one. But I just wanted
to hop on here myself. Lisa and I are not together.
We were together around March ten when we recorded this episode.
One will actually all the episodes you're going to hear
we recorded them together because she flew in town and
we just had to knock everything out while she was here,
and COVID nineteam coronavirus situation was not then what it

(01:11:40):
is now. It's early April and a lot of us
are completely confined to our houses and we're trying to
stay home and stay healthy and protect those around us
that we love, or even just protect those that we
don't even know. I mean, that's the point of staying home.
But for a lot of you, I just wanted to
hop on here because I know that this is a

(01:12:01):
very unsettling time. There's some anxiety if you are in
some sort of recovery, you're dealing with food issues, or
you're not able to go to your gym that you
love to go to every day, so you're not getting
the workouts in. You maybe had to buy extra food
to keep in the house, and that makes you nervous
because how you're around it, and then are you going
to eat it? Are you gonna not eat it? And

(01:12:22):
just there can be all these issues surrounding food right now.
I know for a lot of people, I'm seeing that online.
So since Jennifer Rowland was our guest today, I thought
I would pull up something that I saw her post
on Instagram a couple of weeks ago, and she put
a little thing up called COVID nineteen e D Recovery Reminders. First,
it says to be kind to yourself if you're struggling

(01:12:43):
right now. Quarantine can be highly triggering for people with
eating disorders, and no one was anticipating we'd be in
the middle of a pandemic. Weight gain is not something
that you need to fear. If it happens, it happens. Spoiler.
All that means is you've gained weight, nothing else. But
try not to blame your body for any shifts that

(01:13:04):
may occur. Our bodies will change and shift many times
throughout our lives. And this is okay. You've been brainwashed
to believe otherwise. And then lastly, she said, reach out
for help. No one should have to struggle alone. Now
is as good a time as ever. So I just
thought I would share that with you all because I
didn't want our episodes to be disconnected from what is

(01:13:24):
happening right now and what you might be struggling with
that you weren't a month ago. And I know for me,
I've had some moments where I'm eating more because I'm
nervous or anxious, and I'm just trying to roll with it.
I'm trying to put myself on more of a schedule.
But if I don't get a workout in, it's not
the end of the world. But for me, it's more

(01:13:46):
about a mental thing than ever. Right now, it's not
about trying to make my body look a certain way.
It's just knowing that working out is something that is
self maintenance for me, and it just good for sanity
in a lot of these people that we're having on
in this series, if you start following them on Instagram,
you're going to get some good wisdom for them, especially

(01:14:09):
as we try to navigate through a pandemic. It's just crazy.
Who would have thought we would have been here right now?
I mean certainly probably not any of us. Doesn't say
not me, but probably not you either. And to all
you moms out there, if you happen to be a
mom listening to this and you're homeschooling your kids, God
bless you, because I am on the struggle bus for sure,

(01:14:30):
and I just want you to know that you are
not alone. And if you're having freak out moments, it's
totally normal. If you have yelled at your kids. It's okay,
just go to them later and apologize, like you are
not a bad parent. I mean, I guess I should
say if we've got any dad's listening to, I shouldn't
just assume it's all women here. But you're not a
bad person, You're not a bad parent. We're all just

(01:14:51):
going through a lot right now. Thank you all so
much for listening to episode one. A big thank you
to Lisa and Claire and Andrea for sharing their stories.
Thank you Jennifer Rowling for being our expert today. And
then I got a shout out to Houston who helped
with editing of this podcast, and Sam who did the
amazing theme the intro. She did such a great job.

(01:15:16):
And uh yeah, we'll see y'all next week for episode
two next Saturday. By