Emotions are regarded as troublesome or frightening. Anger is to be avoided, sadness eliminated as soon as possible. In order to survive in this world, she must deny or downplay them. She quickly learns that in order to please others around her, she must present a pleasant, happy face and hide any other feelings. She feels like she is just going through the motions. There is a certain emptiness in her life an emptiness she tries to fill with food.
+ eating in the light of the moon + eating disorder + please + people + emotions + feelings + deny + suppress + happy + hide + empty + food + anger + sadness
For many people, food is a means to communicate thoughts and feelings they don’t know how to communicate directly. Then we become like “one-trick ponies” doing the same one thing over and over again to get love, to cope with emotional stress, to communicate our anger, to bear our sadness.
+ eating in the light of the moon + eating disorders + communicate + express + food + cope + stress + anger + sadness + feelings
For those who feel a pervasive sense of loneliness and emptiness, food can serve as a constant companion. Eating becomes something to do, a way of filling up the empty space in their lives by creating a sense of fullness in their stomachs. Others may starve themselves so they won’t notice their loneliness. That way they won’t have to take the risk of meeting new people or getting too close to others they fear might reject them.
+ eating in the light of the moon + eating + eating disorders + anorexia + bulimia + starve + purge + binge + full + loneliness + emptiness + companion + reject + close
She is plagued with a vague, uneasy sense of emptiness, so she tries to fill herself up. Since she is no longer clear about what she longs for she assumes her hunger is a physical one. And so she either eats compulsively or becomes horrified at her seemingly insatiable appetite and proceeds to starve herself. She then continues through life with the assumption that something is very wrong with her. Her struggle with food confirms that indeed, there is something wrong with her and this becomes her focus, her obsession: if she only could fix this problem, then everything else would be okay.
+ eating disorders + eating in the light of the moon + anorexia + bulimia + binge + purge + starve + emptiness + fill + hunger + compulsively + appetite + wrong + obsession + focus + problem
Addictions remove us from realities we find intolerable. They provide escape routes from the conflicts and dilemmas we find unsolvable. When we cannot bear to be in our own skins, our own bodies, where we experience both the pain and wonder of being human, our addictions throw us into a state of unconsciousness. When unconscious, we feel nothing, know nothing of our pains, struggles, confusion”.
+ eating in the light of the moon + addiction + eating disorder + reality + intolerable + escape + conflict + dilemma + pain + unconsciousness + struggle + confusion
Addictions remove us from realities we find intolerable. They provide escape routes away from the conflicts and dilemmas we find unsolvable. When we cannot bear to be in our own skins, our own bodies, where we experience both pain and wonder of being human, our addictions can throw us into a state of unconsciousness. When unconscious we feel nothing, know nothing of our pains, struggles, confusion”.
-Eating in the Light of the Moon
“the common thread seemed to be a pervasive sense of not quite fitting in, not quite seeing things the way others did, of being a “misfit”. As young girls, these woman were bright and gifted with an exceptional ability to perceive subtle realities. More often than not, a woman who struggled with disordered eating was once a girl who saw the invisible, who read between the lines, who sensed when things were not right. She noticed when people said one thing but did another. She could discern certain patterns of behavior and anticipate what was to come next. She knew when someone was being insincere of dishonest. Her family for one reason or another, did not appreciate her gift. They did not want to deal with her ultra sensitivity to emotional undercurrents, and at times they were threatened by her precociousness. Whenever she spoke the truth or questioned what was going on, she received a clear message (often nonverbal) that this outspoken and questioning behavior was not okay and even damaging to the stability of the family”.
+ quote + eating in the light of the moon + anorexia + bulimia + childhood + misunderstood + lonely
