en-US Mon, 23 Sep 2024 18:21:17 -0700 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 19504461 279 Joan Ryan 0307828557 Callie 0 to-read 4.05 1995
author: Joan Ryan
name: Callie
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1995
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/09/23
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]]> 22910900
The one who’s supposed to fight the zombies, or the soul-eating ghosts, or whatever the heck this new thing is, with the blue lights and the death?

What if you’re like Mikey? Who just wants to graduate and go to prom and maybe finally work up the courage to ask Henna out before someone goes and blows up the high school. Again.

Because sometimes there are problems bigger than this week’s end of the world, and sometimes you just have to find the extraordinary in your ordinary life.

Even if your best friend is worshipped by mountain lions...]]> 348 Patrick Ness 1406331163 Callie 0 currently-reading 3.69 2015
author: Patrick Ness
name: Callie
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/12/11
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> 119728
Inspiring, compassionate, and filled with practical exercises to help you break up with your own personal E.D., "Life Without Ed" provides hope to the millions of people plagued by eating disorders. Beginning with Jenni’s “divorce�� from Ed, this supportive, lifesaving book combines a patient’s insights and experiences with a therapist’s prescriptions for success to help you live a healthier, happier life without Ed.]]> 188 Jenni Schaefer 1487660782 Callie 0 currently-reading 4.02 2003
author: Jenni Schaefer
name: Callie
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2003
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/12/01
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> 46815
Why would a talented young girl go through the looking glass and step into a netherworld where up is down and food is greed, where death is honor and flesh is weak? Why enter into a love affair with hunger, drugs, sex and death? Marya Hornbacher sustained both anorexia and bulimia through five lengthy hospitalizations, endless therapy, the loss of family, friends, jobs and, ultimately, any sense of what it meant to be "normal."

In this vivid, emotionally wrenching memoir, she re-creates the experience and illuminates the tangle of personal, family and cultural causes that underlie eating disorders. Hornbacher's story gathers intensity with each passing year. By the time she is in college and working for a news service in Washington, DC, she is in the grip of a such a horrifying bout with anorexia that it will forever put to rest the romance of wasting away. Down to 52 pounds and counting, Hornbacher's body becomes a the death instinct with the drive to live, mind and body locked in mortal combat.

Wasted is the story of one woman's travels to the darker side of reality, and her decision to find her way back -- on her own terms. A landmark book from a 23-year-old writer of virtuoso prose, Wasted takes us inside the experience of anorexia and bulimia in a way that no one else has ever done.]]> 298 Marya Hornbacher 0060858796 Callie 5
While I understand Marya’s tone may not be for everyone, I am a 100% believer in calling myself on my own bullshit. I can’t always tell when I’m fooling myself (because my brain, when it wants to be, is quite good at it), but I agree with Marya that when you sense it—when you have some wave of reality wash over you and you then see the lines your brain has been feeding you are lies—you have to call yourself on your own BS. It’s the most important thing to do, so you can disempower that particular line of thinking from ever being able to grip you again. One fantastic example of this:

Marya talks about the “collective perfect body�� that she and many of her young peers seemed to be striving toward. Marya notes all of the girls she was surrounded by in her younger years, who were talking constantly about their weight, their bodies, their diets, etc., seemed to be trying to attain the “perfect body.�� Looking back, Marya discovers it seemed they were all striving toward the same perfect body, a collective perfect body, which, when those of us trying to recover can finally pull the veil of lies from our eyes, know is impossible.

None of us can have the same “perfect body,�� but giving up that dream is the hard part. Realizing your body, my body, can only be what it can be, nothing more, can be a harsh reality to face, but it is reality. The thought that you can attain any shape other than your own is a lie.

I also admire Marya’s attempt not to diagnose or offer a cure, but simply to explain what happened to her and why, her understanding of it at least. I do believe her analysis, that sometimes people with eating disorders seem to dramatize their disease to feel powerful and special, has merit. The thought of being normal and just eating and letting your body be whatever it is going to be seems almost so mundane that it paralyzes people. They don’t want to be mundane. They want to pursue something powerful and great and, for many, an eating disorder fills that role. This reminded me of Portia de Rossi’s struggle in Unbearable Lightness.

I agree with Marya’s assessment that eating and trying to be normal can feel like giving up, like failing. I’ve often said the hardest part for me was the letting go because that’s exactly what it felt like. Like I was striving for something hard but worth it, then I just gave up. Marya’s talk of “letting go�� toward the very end of her spellbinding tale almost blinded me, it was so spot-on with my own experience.

While I have read many eating disorder memoirs, Marya’s probably touched me the most. Not simply because of the graphic truth of it (which will, no doubt, leave images with me that I believe will help me in many future moments when I am struggling with the decision of whether to skip a certain meal because of an old impulse to deprive myself �� no more! Thank you, Marya!). But, her assessment of recovery was the most powerful to me, because I agree with her that it really never leaves you. Or, at least, it has not left me.

As Marya said, you can stop the bad eating habits and begin feeding your body properly, but the mind never forgets. Food never loses its tiny little nagging voice that picks at you. It’s not every meal, not every week, not every month, but I have never felt a moment that it has entirely gone away. But, I have felt, in every moment since I, as Marya explained it, felt ready to recover, that I am now stronger than that voice. I have tools and reasoning, and a hope and desire for the future, that can always overcome that voice, even though I believe it will never leave me.

I want to thank you, Marya, for putting yourself out there and braving the telling of your momentous tale. I appreciate your honesty, your humor, and—first and foremost—your exceptional writing. It is an incredibly powerful piece you have given us.

--Callie]]> 4.02 1998
author: Marya Hornbacher
name: Callie
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1998
rating: 5
read at: 2019/11/15
date added: 2019/11/15
shelves:
review:
My time spent reading Marya Hornbacher’s book, Wasted, was anything but that. Wasted was probably the most honest account of an eating disorder I have ever read. The most shocking and intense, too. While every other author I’ve encountered has written about their own experience battling an eating disorder has been 100% honest, Marya’s incredible writing and dark humor, combined with her courage to continue to dig beyond just the awful “this is what I did�� but, further, to the horrifying “this is why�� moved me.

While I understand Marya’s tone may not be for everyone, I am a 100% believer in calling myself on my own bullshit. I can’t always tell when I’m fooling myself (because my brain, when it wants to be, is quite good at it), but I agree with Marya that when you sense it—when you have some wave of reality wash over you and you then see the lines your brain has been feeding you are lies—you have to call yourself on your own BS. It’s the most important thing to do, so you can disempower that particular line of thinking from ever being able to grip you again. One fantastic example of this:

Marya talks about the “collective perfect body�� that she and many of her young peers seemed to be striving toward. Marya notes all of the girls she was surrounded by in her younger years, who were talking constantly about their weight, their bodies, their diets, etc., seemed to be trying to attain the “perfect body.�� Looking back, Marya discovers it seemed they were all striving toward the same perfect body, a collective perfect body, which, when those of us trying to recover can finally pull the veil of lies from our eyes, know is impossible.

None of us can have the same “perfect body,�� but giving up that dream is the hard part. Realizing your body, my body, can only be what it can be, nothing more, can be a harsh reality to face, but it is reality. The thought that you can attain any shape other than your own is a lie.

I also admire Marya’s attempt not to diagnose or offer a cure, but simply to explain what happened to her and why, her understanding of it at least. I do believe her analysis, that sometimes people with eating disorders seem to dramatize their disease to feel powerful and special, has merit. The thought of being normal and just eating and letting your body be whatever it is going to be seems almost so mundane that it paralyzes people. They don’t want to be mundane. They want to pursue something powerful and great and, for many, an eating disorder fills that role. This reminded me of Portia de Rossi’s struggle in Unbearable Lightness.

I agree with Marya’s assessment that eating and trying to be normal can feel like giving up, like failing. I’ve often said the hardest part for me was the letting go because that’s exactly what it felt like. Like I was striving for something hard but worth it, then I just gave up. Marya’s talk of “letting go�� toward the very end of her spellbinding tale almost blinded me, it was so spot-on with my own experience.

While I have read many eating disorder memoirs, Marya’s probably touched me the most. Not simply because of the graphic truth of it (which will, no doubt, leave images with me that I believe will help me in many future moments when I am struggling with the decision of whether to skip a certain meal because of an old impulse to deprive myself �� no more! Thank you, Marya!). But, her assessment of recovery was the most powerful to me, because I agree with her that it really never leaves you. Or, at least, it has not left me.

As Marya said, you can stop the bad eating habits and begin feeding your body properly, but the mind never forgets. Food never loses its tiny little nagging voice that picks at you. It’s not every meal, not every week, not every month, but I have never felt a moment that it has entirely gone away. But, I have felt, in every moment since I, as Marya explained it, felt ready to recover, that I am now stronger than that voice. I have tools and reasoning, and a hope and desire for the future, that can always overcome that voice, even though I believe it will never leave me.

I want to thank you, Marya, for putting yourself out there and braving the telling of your momentous tale. I appreciate your honesty, your humor, and—first and foremost—your exceptional writing. It is an incredibly powerful piece you have given us.

--Callie
]]> 78808 400 Susan Bordo 0520240545 Callie 0 to-read 4.11 1993
author: Susan Bordo
name: Callie
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1993
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/10/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 30461452
Developing a body that didn’t make me cry was the intention behind writing this story, although it blossomed into something greater than I ever imagined. Instead of figuring out how to create and maintain a body that resembles the flawless images I so desperately wanted to imitate, I taught myself how to love my existing body, flaws and all.

This story dissects society’s views on what constitutes a beautiful body, as well as the pressures women face to look and behave a certain way. Too much emphasis is placed on our appearance rather than our attitude, abilities and accomplishments. Investigating my insecurities gave me a chance to separate my self-esteem from the scale and realize my true value in this world. I’ve never felt more confident and capable. I pray it does the same for you.]]> 128 Jenn Sadai Callie 0 to-read 4.26 2016
author: Jenn Sadai
name: Callie
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2016
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/29
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]]> 26074156 New York Times bestselling author of Bad Feminist: a searingly honest memoir of food, weight, self-image, and learning how to feed your hunger while taking care of yourself.

“I ate and ate and ate in the hopes that if I made myself big, my body would be safe. I buried the girl I was because she ran into all kinds of trouble. I tried to erase every memory of her, but she is still there, somewhere. . . . I was trapped in my body, one that I barely recognized or understood, but at least I was safe.��

In her phenomenally popular essays and long-running Tumblr blog, Roxane Gay has written with intimacy and sensitivity about food and body, using her own emotional and psychological struggles as a means of exploring our shared anxieties over pleasure, consumption, appearance, and health. As a woman who describes her own body as “wildly undisciplined,�� Roxane understands the tension between desire and denial, between self-comfort and self-care. In Hunger, she explores her past—including the devastating act of violence that acted as a turning point in her young life—and brings readers along on her journey to understand and ultimately save herself.

With the bracing candor, vulnerability, and power that have made her one of the most admired writers of her generation, Roxane explores what it means to learn to take care of yourself: how to feed your hungers for delicious and satisfying food, a smaller and safer body, and a body that can love and be loved—in a time when the bigger you are, the smaller your world becomes.]]> 306 Roxane Gay 0062362593 Callie 0 to-read 4.17 2017
author: Roxane Gay
name: Callie
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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]]> 6449638 The New York Times restaurant critic's heartbreaking and hilarious account of how he learned to love food just enough after decades of wrestling with his weight

Frank Bruni was born round. Round as in stout, chubby, and hungry, always and endlessly hungry. He grew up in a big, loud Italian family in White Plains, New York, where meals were epic, outsize affairs. At those meals, he demonstrated one of his foremost qualifications for his future career: an epic, outsize appetite for food. But his relationship with eating was tricky, and his difficulties with managing it began early.

When he was named the restaurant critic for the New York Times in 2004, he knew enough to be nervous. He would be performing one of the most closely watched tasks in the epicurean universe; a bumpy ride was inevitable, especially for someone whose writing beforehand had focused on politics, presidential campaigns, and the Pope.

But as he tackled his new role as one of the most loved and hated tastemakers in the New York restaurant world, he also had to make sense of a decades-long love-hate affair with food, which had been his enemy as well as his friend. Now he’d have to face down this enemy at meal after indulgent meal. His Italian grandmother had often said, "Born round, you don’t die square." Would he fall back into his worst old habits? Or had he established a truce with the food on his plate?

In tracing the highly unusual path Bruni traveled to become a restaurant critic, Born Round tells the captivating story of an unpredictable journalistic odyssey and provides an unflinching account of one person’s tumultuous, often painful lifelong struggle with his weight. How does a committed eater embrace food without being undone by it? Born Round will speak to every hungry hedonist who has ever had to rein in an appetite to avoid letting out a waistband, and it will delight anyone interested in matters of family, matters of the heart, and the big role food plays in both.]]> 354 Frank Bruni 1594202311 Callie 0 to-read 3.68 2009
author: Frank Bruni
name: Callie
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2009
rating: 0
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]]> 39324901 The chocolate went first, then the cheese, the fries, the ice cream. The bread was more difficult, but if she could just lose a little more weight, perhaps she would make the soloists�� list. Perhaps if she were lighter, danced better, tried harder, she would be good enough. Perhaps if she just ran for one more mile, lost just one more pound.

Anna Roux was a professional dancer who followed the man of her dreams from Paris to Missouri. There, alone with her biggest fears �� imperfection, failure, loneliness �� she spirals down anorexia and depression till she weighs a mere eighty-eight pounds. Forced to seek treatment, she is admitted as a patient at 17 Swann Street, a peach pink house where pale, fragile women with life-threatening eating disorders live. Women like Emm, the veteran; quiet Valerie; Julia, always hungry. Together, they must fight their diseases and face six meals a day.

Yara Zgheib's poetic and poignant debut novel is a haunting, intimate journey of a young woman's struggle to reclaim her life. Every bite causes anxiety. Every flavor induces guilt. And every step Anna takes toward recovery will require strength, endurance, and the support of the girls at 17 Swann Street.]]> 373 Yara Zgheib 1250202442 Callie 0 to-read 3.97 2019
author: Yara Zgheib
name: Callie
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/29
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]]> 20959794
We live in a culture of culinary abundance but are taught to do whatever it takes to shrink our flesh. From an early age, women are bombarded with messages regarding what size and shape they should be, a campaign that takes a toll on their relationship with food, their self-esteem, and their health.

It's hard to go a day without seeing an advertisement for a new diet product, overhearing a conversation about weight between colleagues or a plan of attack between friends as they brace themselves for dining out, or reading a headline about our nation's obesity crisis.

In Does Every Woma]]> 216 Stacey M. Rosenfeld 0989851834 Callie 0 to-read 3.92 2014
author: Stacey M. Rosenfeld
name: Callie
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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]]> 2469188 Updated with a New Introduction

Fanciful dreams of becoming the next Nadia Comaneci led Jennifer Sey to become a gymnast at the age of six. Her early success propelled her family to sacrifice everything to help her become, by age 11, one of America’s elite. But as she set her sights higher and higher, Jennifer began to change, setting her needs, her health, and her well-being aside in the name of winning. And the adults in her life refused to notice her downward spiral.

Now, Sey reveals the tarnish beneath her gold medals. A powerful portrait of intensity and drive, eating disorders and stage parents, abusive coaches and manipulative businessmen, Chalked Up is the story of a young girl whose dreams would become subsumed by the adults around her.]]> 292 Jennifer Sey 0061351466 Callie 0 to-read 3.76 2008
author: Jennifer Sey
name: Callie
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2008
rating: 0
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]]> 32848271 It had been hours since I ran at track practice that winter, but I hadn't bothered to shower, let alone change clothes. No, I didn't have time for that, because I had found the answer to my prayers.

This has to be it.
Eat all the fruit you want.
Never get fat.
Raw. Food. Diet.

Rachael Steil clocked in as an All-American collegiate runner; she became a girl clawing for a comeback on a 30-bananas-a-day diet. This year-long struggle with raw food ended when she realized she had to find her self-respect beyond her identity as a successful runner on a perfect diet. Running in Silence opens the door on the secret world of eating disorders. It provides vital insights for those who don't suffer from this disease and an honest and harrowing personal story for those who do. Steil challenges the stigma of eating disorders, looks past appearance, and dives into the heart of obsession.]]> 331 Rachael Rose Steil 1633933407 Callie 0 to-read 3.97 2016
author: Rachael Rose Steil
name: Callie
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2016
rating: 0
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]]> 131062 Good Girls Do Swallow is the very black and very funny story of her downfall and her recovery.

Rachael might have taken things further than many of us, but this is a story every woman can relate to. You might not have rescued food from the rubbish bin in a moment of binge-madness but if you've ever felt lousy and reached for a chocolate biscuit for comfort, this book is for you.

'What the diet promised, I got,' writes Rachael. `I got the body that can wear the clothes. I got the job I love, I got the man I want. But I only got it for keeps when I stopped dieting.' From the Carol Brady Syndrome and Thindarella to Mutiny in Aisle Six, Good Girls Do Swallow tells how she did it.]]> 189 Rachael Oakes-Ash 1840184809 Callie 0 to-read 3.40 2001
author: Rachael Oakes-Ash
name: Callie
average rating: 3.40
book published: 2001
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/11
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]]> 927354 384 Trisha Gura 0060761482 Callie 0 to-read 3.58 2007
author: Trisha Gura
name: Callie
average rating: 3.58
book published: 2007
rating: 0
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]]> 923558
Nadia Shivack was fourteen years old when she met Ed, her eating disorder. Sometimes like an alien in her body, sometimes like a lover, Ed was unpredictable and exciting, but ultimately always dangerous and destructive.

At an inpatient unit unit of a hospital where she was taken for treatment, Nadia wrote and drew on napkins after meals in order to keep the food in and calm the outrageous voices in her head. These pictures, together with others drawn on notebook paper and a variety of other surfaces, tell an unflinchingly honest story of a woman's lifelong battle with anorexia and bulimia. Raw, brave, and brilliant, Nadia's journey takes readers to the intimate corners of these misunderstood diseases. You will never think about eating disorders in the same way again.]]> 64 Nadia Shivack 0689852169 Callie 0 to-read 3.22 2007
author: Nadia Shivack
name: Callie
average rating: 3.22
book published: 2007
rating: 0
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]]> 39169
There is an end to the anguish of emotional eating—and this book explains how to achieve it. Geneen Roth, whose Feeding the Hungry Heart and When Food Is Love have brought understanding and acceptance to tens of thousands of readers over the last two decades, here outlines her proven program for resolving the conflicts at the root of overeating. Using simple techniques developed in her highly successful seminars, she offers reassuring, practical advice on:

�� Learning to recognize the signals of physical hunger
• Eating without distraction
• Knowing when to stop
• Kicking the scale-watching habit
• Withstanding social and family pressures

And many more strategies to help you break the binge-diet cycle—forever.]]> 240 Geneen Roth 0452284910 Callie 0 to-read 3.94 1984
author: Geneen Roth
name: Callie
average rating: 3.94
book published: 1984
rating: 0
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]]> 623579 171 Marianne Apostolides 0393045900 Callie 0 to-read 3.06 1980
author: Marianne Apostolides
name: Callie
average rating: 3.06
book published: 1980
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/11
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]]> 13636615
In this real-life teenage diary Natasha records her panic at a looming LESBIAN relationship. To lose some excess fat, she starves herself of food ... whilst working in a chip shop. And just to make sure she's gay, Natasha drags five boys into bed in the space of a week, a sin for which the sexuality police threaten to kick her out of the university Lesbian and Gay Society.

In this coming out story and love story, Natasha struggles with clumsy attempts at heterosexuality, the sickening effects of weight loss techniques, disapproving shaven-headed lesbians, and sexual harassment in the chip shop.]]> Natasha Holme Callie 0 to-read 3.20 2012
author: Natasha Holme
name: Callie
average rating: 3.20
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/11
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]]> 6006098
Joyce Maynard writes about learning to make pie with her complex but adored mother. Caroline Leavitt’s chilling piece describes the overlap between power and eating. Ophira Edut explains how an outspoken “body outlaw�� wound up on Jenny Craig. Diana Abu-Jaber writes about abandoning her Bedouin customs for America’s silverware and table manners–and missing the physical, hands-on connection with food.

Exploring the bonds between appetite and remorse, hunger and longing, satisfaction and desire, this anthology is for every woman who’s ever felt guilty about eating dessert, or gushed over a friend’s weight loss, or wished she had a different body.

Feed Me! features the following

“He Called Me Fat; It Set Me Free�� by Sari Botton
“The Grief Diety�� by Caroline Leavitt
“With Hands�� by Diana Abu-Jaber
“Seconds�� by Jenny Allen
“My Worst Excess�� by Amity Gaige
“Sisi, You’re Getting Fat�� by Courtney E. Martin
“My Ten Plagues�� by Harriet Brown
“Top Model�� by Magali Amadei
“Reader, I Ate Him�� by Brenda Copeland
“The Twin Paradox�� by Susan O’Doherty
“Attack of the XL Girl�� by Laurie Notaro
“Sugar Plum Fairy�� by Dana Kinstler
“Sky Girl�� by Ann Hood
“Plus What?�� by Lisa Romeo
“Ess, Ess�� by Rochelle Jewel Shapiro
“In the House of Jean Nidetch�� by Whitney Otto
“You’re Not Fat�� by Kate Harding
“My Binge Year�� by Jane E. Brody
“Day One�� by Wendy McClure
“Quacks�� by Kathi Kamen Goldmark
“Battle of the Notes from a Decade of Body Activism�� by Ophira Edut
“Take this Cake and Shove it�� by Joan Fischer
“Pie�� by Joyce Maynard]]> 247 Harriet Brown 0345500881 Callie 0 to-read 3.84 2009
author: Harriet Brown
name: Callie
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2009
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/11
shelves: to-read
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]]> 23315461
Over the next twelve years, she developed anorexia nervosa, was hospitalised, and finally swung the other way towards bulimia nervosa. She left school, rejoined school; went in and out of therapy; ebbed in and out of life. From the bleak reality of a body breaking down to the electric mental highs of starvation, hers has been a life held in thrall by food.

Told with remarkable insight, dark humour and acute intelligence, The Time in Between is a profound, important window into the workings of an unquiet mind �� a Wasted for the 21st century.]]> 353 Nancy Tucker 1848318308 Callie 0 to-read 4.12 2014
author: Nancy Tucker
name: Callie
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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]]> 4070496
Janie Ryman hates throwing up. So why does she binge eat and then stick her fingers down her throat several times a day? That’s what the doctors and psychiatrists at Golden Slopes hope to help her discover. But first Janie must survive everyday conflicts between the Barfers and the Starvers, attempts by the head psychiatrist to fish painful memories out of her emotional waters, and shifting friendships and alliances among the kids in the ward.]]> 240 Sarah Darer Littman 0545052351 Callie 0 to-read 3.75 2009
author: Sarah Darer Littman
name: Callie
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2009
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/11
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]]> 6515263
In "Goodbye Ed, Hello Me" Jenni shows you that being fully recovered is not just about breaking free from destructive behaviors with food and having a healthy relationship with your body; it also means finding joy and peace in your life.

Combining Jenni’s signature personal advice and unfailing encouragement along with valuable exercises you can do as you read, "Goodbye Ed, Hello Me" will give you the prescriptive tools to take the final steps in divorcing your Ed completely.

Foreword by Carolyn Costin, LMFT, M.A., M.Ed.]]> 214 Jenni Schaefer 0071608877 Callie 0 to-read 4.07 2009
author: Jenni Schaefer
name: Callie
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2009
rating: 0
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]]> 235870 320 Aimee Liu 0446577669 Callie 0 to-read 3.79 1979
author: Aimee Liu
name: Callie
average rating: 3.79
book published: 1979
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/10/11
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]]> 9268629 I've never had anorexia, but I know it well. I see it on the street, in the gaunt and sunken face, the bony chest, the spindly arms of an emaciated woman. I've come to recognize the flat look of despair, the hopelessness that follows, inevitably, from years of starvation. I think: That could have been my daughter. It wasn't. It's not. If I have anything to say about it, it won't be.

In Brave Girl Eating, the chronicle of a family’s struggle with anorexia nervosa, journalist, professor, and author Harriet Brown recounts in mesmerizing and horrifying detail her daughter Kitty’s journey from near-starvation to renewed health. Brave Girl Eating is an intimate, shocking, compelling, and ultimately uplifting look at the ravages of a mental illness that affects more than 18 million Americans.]]> 288 Harriet Brown 0062008617 Callie 0 to-read 3.80 2010
author: Harriet Brown
name: Callie
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/10/11
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]]> 9219901
Portia de Rossi weighed only 82 pounds when she collapsed on the set of the Hollywood film in which she was playing her first leading role. This should have been the culmination of all her years of hard work—first as a child model in Australia, then as a cast member of one of the hottest shows on American television. On the outside she was thin and blond, glamorous and successful. On the inside, she was literally dying.

In this searing, unflinchingly honest book, Portia de Rossi captures the complex emotional truth of what it is like when food, weight, and body image take priority over every other human impulse or action. She recounts the elaborate rituals around eating that came to dominate hours of every day, from keeping her daily calorie intake below 300 to eating precisely measured amounts of food out of specific bowls and only with certain utensils. When this wasn’t enough, she resorted to purging and compulsive physical exercise, driving her body and spirit to the breaking point.

Even as she rose to fame as a cast member of the hit television shows Ally McBeal and Arrested Development, Portia alternately starved herself and binged, all the while terrified that the truth of her sexuality would be exposed in the tabloids. She reveals the heartache and fear that accompany a life lived in the closet, a sense of isolation that was only magnified by her unrelenting desire to be ever thinner. With the storytelling skills of a great novelist and the eye for detail of a poet, Portia makes transparent as never before the behaviors and emotions of someone living with an eating disorder.

From her lowest point, Portia began the painful climb back to a life of health and honesty, falling in love with and eventually marrying Ellen DeGeneres, and emerging as an outspoken and articulate advocate for gay rights and women’s health issues.

In this remarkable and beautifully written work, Portia shines a bright light on a dark subject. A crucial book for all those who might sometimes feel at war with themselves or their bodies, Unbearable Lightness is a story that inspires hope and nourishes the spirit.]]> 320 Portia de Rossi 1439177805 Callie 5
Imagine accomplishing any one of the amazing things Portia was able to achieve—getting admitted to law school, becoming an actress, working her way to the States and onto hit TV shows—while running or walking multiple miles every day (yes, miles!), doing hundreds of leg lifts and sit-ups, counting calories, restricting, forcing her body into an unnatural “what society thinks is beautiful�� mold. It’s like having two overwhelming full-time jobs at the same time and succeeding wildly at both. Of all the other eating disorder stories I have read, I believe I connected with Portia the most because of her innate drive to constantly strive for a bar she, herself, set so high.

Like I said, the very opposite of lazy.

Portia does an exceptional job of explaining why people become susceptible to eating disorders. It’s often not at all to “be skinny�� or simply “lose weight.�� No. Often the deep-seeded underlying goal of it all is to “fit in.�� In Portia’s case, that meant to literally fit into sample size clothing for modeling and acting. If the sample size was a size 6, which she was when she began, rather than a size 2, I believe Portia, herself, would tell you her entire eating disorder might never have happened.

Portia’s goal was not to be skinny it was simply to be normal in her element so she wouldn’t stand out. And, I’ve seen that premise in many other eating disorder stories I have read (which are all absolutely healing—read many!). Tabitha Farrar in Love Fat wanted only to be lighter simply to perform better as a jockey. Kathryn Hansen in Brain Over Binge wanted simply to avoid the “freshman fifteen�� so she, too, wouldn’t stand out. Often the entire goal is simply to fit in. But, when we take it too far—because eating disorder sufferers are often Type A overachievers—and it is our body and eating habits that start to make us stand out, we don’t know how to decode the drive and just be normal.

Our eating disorder (because she’s wicked smart and selfish) converts our initial benign goal to simply be normal in our situation to an unearthly drive to be better (nay, the best!), such that a decision to “stop with all this eating nonsense�� (as Portia’s mom put it) feels like being lazy. Like giving up. Like laying around as a useless fatty while our peers continue to improve themselves and be more successful.

Does that sound crazy to anyone?

Or dead-on with what maybe you or someone you know, who has suffered with an eating disorder, felt?

That’s the spear that Portia charged through my heart: all of the exceedingly hard work she put into being the best actress she could be. It was likely far more than many actors put in because her efforts required such a huge physical and mental toll. Although it was ill-placed and ineffective, that doesn’t take away or erase any of the enormous amounts of effort and drive she put into it. I can only hope Portia reads these words and knows there are so many others out there who get where she’s coming from. Who, too, would run laps in the parking lot if their brain slipped and binged in the car (even if it was on just 12 sticks of gum). Those calories count to warped hard-workers like us. We don’t give up. We’re not lazy.

WE’RE JUST WRONG.

And, that’s the sad part. We’re going about it all wrong. We just don’t know it at the time. And doing anything different, anything less, feels lazy, and we just can’t bear that. We can’t be that. Because we are not that. We are driven.

After Ellen Degeneres reads Portia’s book for the first time, she tells her: “You’re crazy.��

Which makes Portia laugh, and made me laugh, too. Ellen is wicked good at that. But, I was able to laugh because the wound has healed. Humor did that for me. If you can finally look back and laugh just a little at the fact that you (perhaps like Portia) did lunges everywhere in your house as opposed to just walking, stood as opposed to sit (because only lazy people sit!), ate less than 400 calories a day for weeks, it does look a little crazy. But, it also shows me a person who is crazy-driven, crazy-motivated, likely crazy-successful because she has a strong, anti-lazy spirit.

While I, at first, did not think I would be able to connect so readily with someone of Portia’s caliber—her beauty and success—because my eating disorder stemmed from so much more humble beginnings: the desire to eradicate my embarrassing stocky gymnast body and “stick it�� to a boyfriend who dumped me, I was shocked to find Portia and I did many of the same things.

Portia, I cannot believe you, too, found savory satisfaction in butter spray. I had to write a whole chapter on it, because when I looked back and realized I ate the stuff until my fingers turned yellow, I realized I, too, was �� just a tad crazy. Plus, her humor and honesty just struck a chord. Portia’s writing is powerful and personal and brings you right into her scene. I often felt like I was standing in the room watching Portia run every morning on her treadmill, inhale yogurt on the floor by her fridge, drinking wine and throwing it up in her hotel room. She puts you there.

Thank you, Portia, for putting this piece out there. For bearing yourself. You, a famous person who had so much to lose by showing your “crazy�� past. You should know your sacrifice in the form of your book is doing exactly what you wanted it to: helping others who suffered like you.

–C����������ձ�> 3.82 2010
author: Portia de Rossi
name: Callie
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/10/06
shelves:
review:
Portia de Rossi proves the very thing I think everyone should know about people suffering from an eating disorder in her book, Unbearable Lightness: eating disorder sufferers are anything but lazy. Just like Portia, they are driven, motivated, exceptionally hard-working, and frighteningly hard on themselves.

Imagine accomplishing any one of the amazing things Portia was able to achieve—getting admitted to law school, becoming an actress, working her way to the States and onto hit TV shows—while running or walking multiple miles every day (yes, miles!), doing hundreds of leg lifts and sit-ups, counting calories, restricting, forcing her body into an unnatural “what society thinks is beautiful�� mold. It’s like having two overwhelming full-time jobs at the same time and succeeding wildly at both. Of all the other eating disorder stories I have read, I believe I connected with Portia the most because of her innate drive to constantly strive for a bar she, herself, set so high.

Like I said, the very opposite of lazy.

Portia does an exceptional job of explaining why people become susceptible to eating disorders. It’s often not at all to “be skinny�� or simply “lose weight.�� No. Often the deep-seeded underlying goal of it all is to “fit in.�� In Portia’s case, that meant to literally fit into sample size clothing for modeling and acting. If the sample size was a size 6, which she was when she began, rather than a size 2, I believe Portia, herself, would tell you her entire eating disorder might never have happened.

Portia’s goal was not to be skinny it was simply to be normal in her element so she wouldn’t stand out. And, I’ve seen that premise in many other eating disorder stories I have read (which are all absolutely healing—read many!). Tabitha Farrar in Love Fat wanted only to be lighter simply to perform better as a jockey. Kathryn Hansen in Brain Over Binge wanted simply to avoid the “freshman fifteen�� so she, too, wouldn’t stand out. Often the entire goal is simply to fit in. But, when we take it too far—because eating disorder sufferers are often Type A overachievers—and it is our body and eating habits that start to make us stand out, we don’t know how to decode the drive and just be normal.

Our eating disorder (because she’s wicked smart and selfish) converts our initial benign goal to simply be normal in our situation to an unearthly drive to be better (nay, the best!), such that a decision to “stop with all this eating nonsense�� (as Portia’s mom put it) feels like being lazy. Like giving up. Like laying around as a useless fatty while our peers continue to improve themselves and be more successful.

Does that sound crazy to anyone?

Or dead-on with what maybe you or someone you know, who has suffered with an eating disorder, felt?

That’s the spear that Portia charged through my heart: all of the exceedingly hard work she put into being the best actress she could be. It was likely far more than many actors put in because her efforts required such a huge physical and mental toll. Although it was ill-placed and ineffective, that doesn’t take away or erase any of the enormous amounts of effort and drive she put into it. I can only hope Portia reads these words and knows there are so many others out there who get where she’s coming from. Who, too, would run laps in the parking lot if their brain slipped and binged in the car (even if it was on just 12 sticks of gum). Those calories count to warped hard-workers like us. We don’t give up. We’re not lazy.

WE’RE JUST WRONG.

And, that’s the sad part. We’re going about it all wrong. We just don’t know it at the time. And doing anything different, anything less, feels lazy, and we just can’t bear that. We can’t be that. Because we are not that. We are driven.

After Ellen Degeneres reads Portia’s book for the first time, she tells her: “You’re crazy.��

Which makes Portia laugh, and made me laugh, too. Ellen is wicked good at that. But, I was able to laugh because the wound has healed. Humor did that for me. If you can finally look back and laugh just a little at the fact that you (perhaps like Portia) did lunges everywhere in your house as opposed to just walking, stood as opposed to sit (because only lazy people sit!), ate less than 400 calories a day for weeks, it does look a little crazy. But, it also shows me a person who is crazy-driven, crazy-motivated, likely crazy-successful because she has a strong, anti-lazy spirit.

While I, at first, did not think I would be able to connect so readily with someone of Portia’s caliber—her beauty and success—because my eating disorder stemmed from so much more humble beginnings: the desire to eradicate my embarrassing stocky gymnast body and “stick it�� to a boyfriend who dumped me, I was shocked to find Portia and I did many of the same things.

Portia, I cannot believe you, too, found savory satisfaction in butter spray. I had to write a whole chapter on it, because when I looked back and realized I ate the stuff until my fingers turned yellow, I realized I, too, was �� just a tad crazy. Plus, her humor and honesty just struck a chord. Portia’s writing is powerful and personal and brings you right into her scene. I often felt like I was standing in the room watching Portia run every morning on her treadmill, inhale yogurt on the floor by her fridge, drinking wine and throwing it up in her hotel room. She puts you there.

Thank you, Portia, for putting this piece out there. For bearing yourself. You, a famous person who had so much to lose by showing your “crazy�� past. You should know your sacrifice in the form of your book is doing exactly what you wanted it to: helping others who suffered like you.

–C����������
]]> 2918314 Marcia! Marcia! Marcia!

Marcia Brady, eldest daughter on television's The Brady Bunch, had it all—style, looks, boys, brains, and talent. No wonder her younger sister Jan was jealous! For countless adolescents across America who came of age in the early 1970s, Marcia was the ideal American teenager. Girls wanted to be her. Boys wanted to date her. But what viewers didn't know about the always-sunny, perfect Marcia was that offscreen, her real-life counterpart, Maureen McCormick, the young actress who portrayed her, was living a very different—and not-so-wonderful—life. Now, for the very first time, Maureen tells the shocking and inspirational true story of the beloved teen generations have invited into their living rooms—and the woman she became.

In Here's the Story, Maureen takes us behind the scenes of America's favorite television family, the Bradys. With poignancy and candor, she reveals the lifelong friendships, the hurtful jealousies, the offscreen romance, the loving support her television family provided during a life-or-death moment, and the inconsolable loss of a man who had been a second father. But The Brady Bunch was only the beginning. Haunted by the perfection of her television alter ego, Maureen landed on the dark side, caught up in a fast-paced, drug-fueled, star-studded Hollywood existence that ultimately led to the biggest battle of her life.

Moving from drug dens on Wonderland Avenue to wild parties at the Playboy mansion and exotic escapades on the beaches of Hawaii, this candid, hard-hitting memoir exposes a side of a beloved pop-culture icon the paparazzi missed. Yet it is also a story of remarkable success. After kicking her drug habit, Maureen battled depression, reconnected with her mother, whom she nursed through the end of her life, and then found herself in a pitched battle for her family in which she ultimately triumphed.

There is no question: Maureen McCormick is a survivor. After fifty years, she has finally learned what it means to love the person you are, insight that has brought her peace in a happy marriage and as a mother. Here's the Story is the empowering, engaging, shocking, and emotional tale of Maureen McCormick's courageous struggle over adversity and her lifelong battle to come to terms with the idea of perfection—and herself.]]> 277 Maureen McCormick 0061490148 Callie 5
When I heard Maureen McCormick had written one powerhouse of a book, Here’s the Story, I was eager to pick it up. While I’m sure we all can imagine the typical child-star story where the he or she falls prey to the pressures of Hollywood and caves into the crevice that only an addiction can cause, Maureen’s story revealed so much more of that. Her internal struggle to hide the things she believed were utterly wrong, bad, and filthy about her with a smile so bright and a grip so tight spoke far more loudly to my recovery than I imagined it would.

While Maureen admits to being bulimic at times, using it as a coping mechanism for stress and inner turmoil, the overall theme of her book is about the mechanism she used—for years and years, her whole life basically—to hide her true self. It was even more heartbreaking. But I wanted to share her story here with you as I believe many of us can relate to this same struggle: hiding shame with perfection.

Often an eating disorder does not take root as the result of some emotional trauma or deadly desire to become thin. More often it simply becomes an insanely powerful habit that we cultivate to help us get through our shitty, “I hate myself today,�� days. However, once it develops �� the shame of knowing we have this problem, that we are that messed-up, gross person that no one should truly know or befriend or love �� the shame takes on its own life-force and guides us daily.

I was shocked to learn this is exactly what happened to Maureen.

Sadly for Maureen, however, her eating disorder was not the only thing she had to hide. She had to hide her raging cocaine addiction, the shame of which was worse. She also had to hide her fear she had inherited syphilis and impending insanity from her mother, the shame of which was unbearable. Any time Maureen felt her stone-cold grip, her perfect steel exterior, start to loosen, allowing the slightest human touch to penetrate, she would grab the reigns in utter desperation and yank even harder to hold it all together. In this brutally honest memoir, she readily admits that holding on that tight, to everything, all the time, often caused her to lose it entirely. Maureen will tell you how she raged and screamed and panicked for years, treating her poor body as the sponge for all of her fury and fear.

Here’s the Story is an enthralling, eye-opening piece that I’m sure took Maureen years to build enough courage to share, but I’m so grateful and glad she did. This may sound really strange, but I think knowing that someone we all worshipped as much as Marcia Brady can be just as messed up as we sometimes see ourselves helps pull the curtain. It helps us realize we’re all human. We all have fears, shame, and imperfections. And, we all do really stupid (sometimes dangerous) stuff to hide them. Maureen just had to learn the hard way (as many of us do) that our fury and fear can finally be doused by just opening up and talking about it.

Disorders feed in the dark and die in the light. If you haven’t yet, let Maureen inspire you, to open up and share your story, too.

Thank you for sharing your story, Maureen, to heal and help others.

–C���������� ]]> 3.49 2008
author: Maureen McCormick
name: Callie
average rating: 3.49
book published: 2008
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/10/06
shelves:
review:
All of them had hair of gold �� but this one was Callie-style BOLD! Let’s admit it, Marcia Brady, the oldest daughter from the national sensation of a 70s sitcom, The Brady Bunch, seemed perfect. She was beautiful, thin, smart, loved. On the screen she was perfect. But, Maureen McCormick, who played Marcia Brady, was not that girl at all. Yet, we all have a ‘Marcia�� version of ourselves that we try to stick and glue together and put out for the world to see, when we’re really not that girl, or boy, at all.

When I heard Maureen McCormick had written one powerhouse of a book, Here’s the Story, I was eager to pick it up. While I’m sure we all can imagine the typical child-star story where the he or she falls prey to the pressures of Hollywood and caves into the crevice that only an addiction can cause, Maureen’s story revealed so much more of that. Her internal struggle to hide the things she believed were utterly wrong, bad, and filthy about her with a smile so bright and a grip so tight spoke far more loudly to my recovery than I imagined it would.

While Maureen admits to being bulimic at times, using it as a coping mechanism for stress and inner turmoil, the overall theme of her book is about the mechanism she used—for years and years, her whole life basically—to hide her true self. It was even more heartbreaking. But I wanted to share her story here with you as I believe many of us can relate to this same struggle: hiding shame with perfection.

Often an eating disorder does not take root as the result of some emotional trauma or deadly desire to become thin. More often it simply becomes an insanely powerful habit that we cultivate to help us get through our shitty, “I hate myself today,�� days. However, once it develops �� the shame of knowing we have this problem, that we are that messed-up, gross person that no one should truly know or befriend or love �� the shame takes on its own life-force and guides us daily.

I was shocked to learn this is exactly what happened to Maureen.

Sadly for Maureen, however, her eating disorder was not the only thing she had to hide. She had to hide her raging cocaine addiction, the shame of which was worse. She also had to hide her fear she had inherited syphilis and impending insanity from her mother, the shame of which was unbearable. Any time Maureen felt her stone-cold grip, her perfect steel exterior, start to loosen, allowing the slightest human touch to penetrate, she would grab the reigns in utter desperation and yank even harder to hold it all together. In this brutally honest memoir, she readily admits that holding on that tight, to everything, all the time, often caused her to lose it entirely. Maureen will tell you how she raged and screamed and panicked for years, treating her poor body as the sponge for all of her fury and fear.

Here’s the Story is an enthralling, eye-opening piece that I’m sure took Maureen years to build enough courage to share, but I’m so grateful and glad she did. This may sound really strange, but I think knowing that someone we all worshipped as much as Marcia Brady can be just as messed up as we sometimes see ourselves helps pull the curtain. It helps us realize we’re all human. We all have fears, shame, and imperfections. And, we all do really stupid (sometimes dangerous) stuff to hide them. Maureen just had to learn the hard way (as many of us do) that our fury and fear can finally be doused by just opening up and talking about it.

Disorders feed in the dark and die in the light. If you haven’t yet, let Maureen inspire you, to open up and share your story, too.

Thank you for sharing your story, Maureen, to heal and help others.

–C����������
]]> 25711250 247 Tabitha Farrar Callie 5
I had often felt that way when I was suffering, like I was exercising some righteous degree of control by religiously restricting what I ate (if I let myself eat anything at all). I don’t know why or how exactly it happened, but something re-wired my brain to think eating “bad foods�� (junk food, fried food, fattening food) made me bad and deserving of punishment. This eventually grew from just “bad foods�� to “too much food�� to “any food before lunch�� to a whole list of ridiculously stupid rules, much like Farrar enforced stringently on herself for the twelve torturous years she suffered with an eating disorder.

Farrar’s story is captivating and enlightening and, I believe, could help many people struggling with an eating disorder because hers is a voice of someone who “gets it,�� who understands the reasons people restrict their eating and their eventual loss of ability to control their restrictions. I, personally, did not suffer as much with pure Anorexia as Farrar did (I stupidly chose, instead, to become a skilled glutton and bulimic), but I was empowered all the same by hearing her explain her mental struggle in much the same way mine felt.

Farrar even named her inner voices (the mind demons that constantly screamed at her to “eat!�� “not eat!�� “eat some more!��) Sister Catherine and Succubus, to which many people struggling with an eating disorder can relate as these voices are constant. We live with them, we talk to them, we argue with them, and we often eventually cave to them. Farrar truly captured exactly what it feels like to suffer everyday with an eating disorder and how pervasive the illness can become. It keeps us from not only eating but socializing, engaging, and connecting with others to a point that when we need help the most, we are the most unable to reach out for it.

Her recovery is equally heartbreaking and empowering. Farrar’s recount of the tears and shakes she suffered through in order to simply make herself eat a meal demonstrate how real the struggle truly is. For those who ask us, “Why don’t you just eat?�� and leave it at that, Farrar’s honest account can hopefully help those who want to help a friend or loved one who is suffering with an eating disorder finally understand. It’s just not that simple. And, it never will be. But, we can get better. Through disciplined mental rewiring (Farrar’s use of meditative yoga in this regard is very inspiring), forgiveness, and patience.

Tabitha, thank you for sharing your tragic but triumphant story with the world. Had I read it sooner, I believe I would have suffered fewer years. Yet, reading it after I have written my own story only solidified what I thought might be true: that there are so many of us suffering with the same mental demons screaming the same horrible things at us, but we all can quiet them. We all are strong enough to overcome and eventually learn, as you did, Tabitha, to reacquaint with our inner child appetite and once again love fat.

–C����������ձ�> 4.22 2015
author: Tabitha Farrar
name: Callie
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2015
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/10/06
shelves:
review:
“Something about restricting myself and not eating felt good. It felt right.�� Tabitha Farrar’s words in her mesmerizing eating disoder memoir stunned me.

I had often felt that way when I was suffering, like I was exercising some righteous degree of control by religiously restricting what I ate (if I let myself eat anything at all). I don’t know why or how exactly it happened, but something re-wired my brain to think eating “bad foods�� (junk food, fried food, fattening food) made me bad and deserving of punishment. This eventually grew from just “bad foods�� to “too much food�� to “any food before lunch�� to a whole list of ridiculously stupid rules, much like Farrar enforced stringently on herself for the twelve torturous years she suffered with an eating disorder.

Farrar’s story is captivating and enlightening and, I believe, could help many people struggling with an eating disorder because hers is a voice of someone who “gets it,�� who understands the reasons people restrict their eating and their eventual loss of ability to control their restrictions. I, personally, did not suffer as much with pure Anorexia as Farrar did (I stupidly chose, instead, to become a skilled glutton and bulimic), but I was empowered all the same by hearing her explain her mental struggle in much the same way mine felt.

Farrar even named her inner voices (the mind demons that constantly screamed at her to “eat!�� “not eat!�� “eat some more!��) Sister Catherine and Succubus, to which many people struggling with an eating disorder can relate as these voices are constant. We live with them, we talk to them, we argue with them, and we often eventually cave to them. Farrar truly captured exactly what it feels like to suffer everyday with an eating disorder and how pervasive the illness can become. It keeps us from not only eating but socializing, engaging, and connecting with others to a point that when we need help the most, we are the most unable to reach out for it.

Her recovery is equally heartbreaking and empowering. Farrar’s recount of the tears and shakes she suffered through in order to simply make herself eat a meal demonstrate how real the struggle truly is. For those who ask us, “Why don’t you just eat?�� and leave it at that, Farrar’s honest account can hopefully help those who want to help a friend or loved one who is suffering with an eating disorder finally understand. It’s just not that simple. And, it never will be. But, we can get better. Through disciplined mental rewiring (Farrar’s use of meditative yoga in this regard is very inspiring), forgiveness, and patience.

Tabitha, thank you for sharing your tragic but triumphant story with the world. Had I read it sooner, I believe I would have suffered fewer years. Yet, reading it after I have written my own story only solidified what I thought might be true: that there are so many of us suffering with the same mental demons screaming the same horrible things at us, but we all can quiet them. We all are strong enough to overcome and eventually learn, as you did, Tabitha, to reacquaint with our inner child appetite and once again love fat.

–C����������
]]> 36159921
Designed as an interactive, three-month daily journal with room to write, Caralyn shares the Scripture verses and quotes that were the most powerful in her own recovery from anorexia.
She weaves in dramatic entries from her own journal kept during inpatient treatment, while offering present day reflections on these daily entries - ten years later as a healthy and thriving young woman.
And she provocatively concludes each day with introspective questions meant to challenge the reader to deeper transformation.
She speaks to the heart of the matter in words that she "wished she would have heard."
A must-read and useful tool for sufferers and their loved ones alike.
Now is the time to bloom.]]> 160 Caralyn 1389768805 Callie 5
I was first drawn to Caralyn through her powerful blog, Beauty Beyond Bones. In her posts, which she began sharing as part of her own journal while recovering from anorexia, Caralyn is real, honest, funny, and—just as she described in her book, Bloom—spunky!

Having suffered, and thankfully recovered, from an eating disorder myself, when I read her first post about having to be bed-ridden for ten months due to an illness, I could immediately relate to Caralyn’s overwhelming panic that she would lay there, gain a ton of weight, and get monstrously fat.

That would be the first thing that would have infiltrated my mind had I ever been forced to bed rest while I was suffering with my eating disorder, which included exercise bulimia, an insane urge to “exercise off�� every calorie that went in (but didn’t come back up). But, as Caralyn shares with delight, miraculously her body responded with gratitude because her bedrest finally stopped her self-inflicted torture. Caralyn’s story is inspiring and encouraging.

In Bloom, she shares with readers the powerful scriptures and words that resonated with her during her recovery and asks the reader to answer many difficult questions with honesty and openness about their emotions, fears, and struggles. I am confident anyone who makes an honest attempt to journal while reading Bloom, as Caralyn encourages, will gain invaluable insight into their internal fears and demons and take great strides toward recovery. If anything, I believe you will find yourself feeling much more yellow (glowing, sunny, and radiant) with Caralyn’s words and hope inside you.

—C����������ձ�> 5.00
author: Caralyn
name: Callie
average rating: 5.00
book published:
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/10/06
shelves:
review:
If you’re struggling with an eating disorder, Caralyn wants to give you a hug. She also wants to give you a journal, a path, and hope for an amazing, healthy future.

I was first drawn to Caralyn through her powerful blog, Beauty Beyond Bones. In her posts, which she began sharing as part of her own journal while recovering from anorexia, Caralyn is real, honest, funny, and—just as she described in her book, Bloom—spunky!

Having suffered, and thankfully recovered, from an eating disorder myself, when I read her first post about having to be bed-ridden for ten months due to an illness, I could immediately relate to Caralyn’s overwhelming panic that she would lay there, gain a ton of weight, and get monstrously fat.

That would be the first thing that would have infiltrated my mind had I ever been forced to bed rest while I was suffering with my eating disorder, which included exercise bulimia, an insane urge to “exercise off�� every calorie that went in (but didn’t come back up). But, as Caralyn shares with delight, miraculously her body responded with gratitude because her bedrest finally stopped her self-inflicted torture. Caralyn’s story is inspiring and encouraging.

In Bloom, she shares with readers the powerful scriptures and words that resonated with her during her recovery and asks the reader to answer many difficult questions with honesty and openness about their emotions, fears, and struggles. I am confident anyone who makes an honest attempt to journal while reading Bloom, as Caralyn encourages, will gain invaluable insight into their internal fears and demons and take great strides toward recovery. If anything, I believe you will find yourself feeling much more yellow (glowing, sunny, and radiant) with Caralyn’s words and hope inside you.

—C����������
]]> 35655274 235 Hannah Howard 1503942570 Callie 5
Being a stocky, muscular girl myself, I could relate to Howard’s vision of herself as a young girl from the first page. Like me, she felt huge, monstrous, not at all dainty or skinny as she saw her peers. This is a seed we can all relate to, as well as Howard’s decision to change her feelings about herself by changing her weight and starving herself until she could feel her rib cage and have a space between her thighs.

One of the most powerful lines of the book was Howard’s recollection of a fellow eating disorder sufferer who struggled with anorexia, and told her the reason we try to make ourselves skinny is because it is the only part of our beauty that we can control. That sentence struck me like a spear to the chest.

For me, my eating disorder was all about control. Like Howard, I believed if I got skinny nothing would ever hurt me again and I would be happy. But, as Howard so aptly explains, once she got skinny and willed herself through extreme control and starvation to become the size she thought would make her happy, it did not make her happy. I’m confident this is the case for so many others who will themselves to skinny.

For me, Feast was not only a story about Howard’s struggle with an eating disorder, it was also about a young woman’s struggle with the most difficult parts of life that we all face: Is this a good person for me to love and share my life with? Is this career satisfying and fulfilling me? Is this a healthy size for my body to be?

While navigating those often confusing and trying questions, Howard shares one constant love throughout: her love of food, which for someone recovering from an eating disorder is so important. Food is a wonderful, delicious, necessary thing.

Howard’s story is a powerful inspiration to stop hating food, to stop trying to find happiness through extreme and unhealthy body control, and to start pursuing a healthy, wholesome love for food and for your amazing, capable body. Thank you, Hannah, for sharing your struggle and your story with us.

–C����������ձ�> 3.47 2018
author: Hannah Howard
name: Callie
average rating: 3.47
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2019/10/06
shelves:
review:
For the love of food! And, for the love of love (even the painful kind), and the very difficult love of one’s self and one’s body. That’s what I believe Howard wrote Feast for. And thankfully, also for those of us who have suffered or are suffering like she did, with the desire that she could stand as a voice of experience and hope.

Being a stocky, muscular girl myself, I could relate to Howard’s vision of herself as a young girl from the first page. Like me, she felt huge, monstrous, not at all dainty or skinny as she saw her peers. This is a seed we can all relate to, as well as Howard’s decision to change her feelings about herself by changing her weight and starving herself until she could feel her rib cage and have a space between her thighs.

One of the most powerful lines of the book was Howard’s recollection of a fellow eating disorder sufferer who struggled with anorexia, and told her the reason we try to make ourselves skinny is because it is the only part of our beauty that we can control. That sentence struck me like a spear to the chest.

For me, my eating disorder was all about control. Like Howard, I believed if I got skinny nothing would ever hurt me again and I would be happy. But, as Howard so aptly explains, once she got skinny and willed herself through extreme control and starvation to become the size she thought would make her happy, it did not make her happy. I’m confident this is the case for so many others who will themselves to skinny.

For me, Feast was not only a story about Howard’s struggle with an eating disorder, it was also about a young woman’s struggle with the most difficult parts of life that we all face: Is this a good person for me to love and share my life with? Is this career satisfying and fulfilling me? Is this a healthy size for my body to be?

While navigating those often confusing and trying questions, Howard shares one constant love throughout: her love of food, which for someone recovering from an eating disorder is so important. Food is a wonderful, delicious, necessary thing.

Howard’s story is a powerful inspiration to stop hating food, to stop trying to find happiness through extreme and unhealthy body control, and to start pursuing a healthy, wholesome love for food and for your amazing, capable body. Thank you, Hannah, for sharing your struggle and your story with us.

–C����������
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