I received a phone call from a friend recently asking me about how to manage the mindfuckery she was experiencing from her 4 weeks at Slimmers World. Her dilemma? She was always hungry, for was at the forefront of her mind all the time. Eating something because she wanted to became an action riddled with guilt, sums and feeling pretty shitty about herself, her shape and her size.
Previously she had had an enviably sound relationship with her body and food. She ate intuitively without much thought. She ate healthy foods and enjoyed foods from all food groups. Being a vegetarian she naturally ate more veg than the average person. After 4 weeks at Slimming World and 1 week of gaining half a pound instead of losing and a lifetime of being at ease with food and her body began to unravel very quickly.
“I just feel like whatever personality I had before is disappearing because all I can think about and talk about is food and this sodding diet.” I think we all recognise this either in ourselves or others. We all know someone who is so entrenched and involved with their diet that it relentlessly dominates conversation. Slimming World seems to have spread through my local community like a bad contagion. Another friend after months of his diet now responds to “how are you?” with a summary of how her dieting and weight loss has been in the last week. She surely must have an emotional experience but if she’s so incredibly focused on her diet then maybe her diet is a convenient distraction from any difficulties she may be facing in her life.
This is a problem. This is a problem because much of the advocated behaviour by dieting programmes that is praised in those society deems in need of losing some weight is the same behaviours that are a concern in a diagnosed eating disorder. The difference? Merely that some people are big enough to be deemed suitable candidates to be losing weight. In these individuals dieting behaviour and weight loss is celebrated, congratulated and encouraged. Once they become “too thin” then the same behaviours are problematic. Additionally problematic is that our perception of “too thin” is very different to a medical definition. There are plenty of people praised daily for their thin stature when they are far below any threshold their health being hindered by a low weight status.
Thin people are praised and told how jealous they make others feel. Commonly they’re asked ‘what their secret is’. You don’t know. It could be genetic, they could have an illness stopping them from gaining weight, maybe they’re not eating enough to meet their energy needs. Sometimes they may even have an eating disorder which is being positively reenforced and encouraged by people around them. I got more compliments on my figure and looks when I had anorexia than I have ever received in my life. The difference is very stark and that is a scratch on the surface of what’s wrong with weight loss programmes, slimmers world and our current body shape ideals. Much of it is categorically pathological.
The rhetoric behind the programme is not all rainbows and sunshine as the marketing material would have you believe. If you want to sign up to a social support group to fuck you relationship with food and your body then great, Slimming World is the place for you. If you’d rather build the foundations for a positive relationship with food then there are other options including HEAS and a non-diet approach. Food is fuel. Food is for nourishing our bodies and minds. It is fun and enjoyable. It can be so much more than calories, “syns” and pounds lost or gained.
Always home alone, there is comfort to be found here from the tip toeing around afraid of making a wrong move and listening to the screams, tears and punching of walls. Bingeing is a whirlwind of turmoil that she so desperately wants to stop but by comparison the retching is peaceful for her, a tranquil haven from reality. It is never enough until she hits exhaustion, until she is collapsing on the floor from violent heaving, and resting in the haze of the aftermath.
