Therapy for Eating Disorders

“What has been valued in the West in women has too often been defined only in relation to the masculine: the good, nurturant mother and wife; the sweet, docile agreeable daughter; the gently supportive of bright achieving partner. This collective model is inadequate for life; we mutilate, depotentiate, silence and enrage ourselves trying to compress our souls into it just as surely as our grandmothers deformed their fully breathing bodies with corsets for the sake of an ideal.”
― Sylvia Perera

According to ANAD statistics on eating disorders, 9% of the US population, or 28.8 million Americans, will have an eating disorder in their lifetime. Eating disorders are among the deadliest mental illnesses, second only to opioid overdose. The Mayo Clinic defines eating disorders as “serious conditions related to persistent eating behaviors that negatively impact your health, your emotions, and your ability to function in important areas of life.” The most common eating disorders are anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge-eating disorder. 

Eating disorders occur in affluent and non-affluent communities, and a disproportionate amount of those diagnosed are young women, but men also suffer from eating disorders, as well as people of any age. Entertainment and media have had toxic standards for the beauty of women for decades. Although there has been some headway in transforming this, algorithms used by Facebook and Instagram today perpetuate an unrealistic view of women’s physical bodies.

If you or a loved one are struggling with an eating disorder, I would love to work with you. I know this territory well. I have found that trauma is at the root of eating disorders. CBT or other behavior modification-oriented therapies may only treat the symptom, leaving many without truly recovering. I follow the perspective of Marion Woodmen and others, who see any addiction, including an eating disorder, as being a symptom of something far deeper: “The addict gets focused on the physical object—such as chocolate cake—and doesn’t see that the longing for sweets is really a yearning for love or sweetness.” 

Beyond this, addiction in our culture stems from the lack of Sacred Feminine values. When asked what feminine values are, Marion Woodmen responds, “ I would say fundamentally that it's the love of nature, and a belief in the body as a part of nature as we see it outside in the woods or rivers. The feminine takes time for spontaneity and slow time, honors inner reality, and gives values to feelings without brutally repressing them as ‘sissy’ or ‘meaningless.’” 

In working with my mentor Bruce Sanguin, I have learned that trauma comes from failures of love. These failures of love in our early childhood or from the dominant cultural systems we are part of, cause us to search for love and belonging in places that do not fully sustain or nourish us, although they may temporarily satiate us in some way. An eating disorder of any kind is an attempt to mend what feels broken within us, if only for a moment. 

The real work of healing from an eating disorder is centered around relationships: learning to feel safe again in the presence of another, finding a sense of belonging in the natural world, and connecting to one’s soul.