How to Calm Your Brain

I was looking through notes I took at a workshop I attended last year on “Calming An Overactive Brain,” and found some ideas which speak directly to why it’s difficult for dysregulated eaters to not reach for food when they’re in internal distress. My hope is that by understanding what goes on in your brain […]

Please Stop Calling It “Comfort” Food

As an eating disorders therapist, I am so done with hearing the term “comfort food.” I’m not only sick and tired of it, but I’m frustrated and angry that we’re still using this misnomer, if there ever was one, and about how it’s affecting our mental and physical health. As a therapist—mostly on the binge […]

Knowing the Difference Between Prodctivity and Creativity

So many dysregulated eaters are also folks who feel a pressing need to stay busy all the time. Not just busy doing anything old thing, mind you, but filling their time with properly productive endeavors. Sadly, many are potentially or highly creative individuals who have let their need to be productive co-opt their creativity. In […]

Fit to Fat to Fit. Are you kidding me?

There is a new series that is supposed to give fitness trainers a glimpse into the world of those of us that have a difficult time losing weight. I find myself perplexed. On the one hand, I am thrilled that trainers will understand why we do not come to gyms. On the other hand, I […]

Don’t Let Regrets Stress You Out or Push You Toward Food

Many people get hung up on regrets. What they wish they’d had or done takes up more real estate in their heads than the lives they’re currently living. To dwell in regret is like walking down a street looking backwards. While making yourself miserable, you miss the only part of your life that matters: now. […]

The Idea of Food

Clients keep teaching me more and more about dysfunctional eating. For instance, that it’s not really food that compulsive or emotional eaters want but the idea of what they wish/hope/perceive food will bring them. This is a crucial distinction. Disregulated eaters turn to food to relax, unwind, kick back, let loose, de-stress, whatever you want […]

BODY EMPOWERMENT – “Emotions & Food”

As part of the weekly Wednesday posting of my ongoing YouTube series “Body Empowerment,” here’s “Emotions & Food (Body Empowerment 60)” originally posted June 18, 2012, on YouTube.com by Caroline Rothstein. In this video, Caroline interviews her father on Father’s Day about his thoughts and experience with emotional eating. About BODY EMPOWERMENT: Founded in 2008, “Body Empowerment” is […]

We Are Top 50 Emotional Eating Blog Sites!

We have been voted one of the top 50 emotional eating blogs from the Institute of Emotional Eating!   Way to go team!! Robyn (Hussa) Farrel, Editor / Author, WATRD

Shrouding — Disordered or Not?

Heather’s recent post, “Helpful Hint or Disordered Eating” at Hangry Pants really got me thinking … As Heather notes in her post, “For some time we’ve debated food destruction – ruining your food with something like salt or hot sauce so that it is inedible. Jillian Michaels pours candle wax on her food (thanks for […]

I’m not hungry, so why am I still eating?

I have been using the Sensa Weight-Loss System for a little over a month now, (I won a 6 month supply at a Twitter party last year). It has definitely curbed my appetite. It’s as if my body has no particular desire for food. Amazing right? Problem is I am still eating! “What?” you say. […]