Comments on: Life-Threatening Consequences – When School Boards Fancy Themselves Healthcare Providers

By: Ana

Ana — Mon, 21 Jul 2014 18:07:34 +0000

My son is only one, so I have some time to develop a strategy around food. However, my husband and I are both obese and it runs in both families. I thought that I would teach my son about “healthy choices,” but after reading this post perhaps I should frame it as “tasty and fun” food and leave the other characteristics for adult only conversations. Thank you for the information.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 14 Jul 2014 21:01:00 +0000

I appreciate this article very much, and agree that it is reckless for schools to be promoting these kinds of poorly thought-out practices. I wanted to chime in as someone recovering from 7+ years of an eating disorder. While comments about food and weight and competition amongst peers can certainly (and often do) trigger eating disorders, I firmly believe that an eating disorder is never caused by only one thing, be that genetic loading, or school or family environment. While the salience of the obesity panic that exploded while I was an adolescent certainly influenced my predilection for anorexia in that it made me starving myself more socially acceptable (and thus my weight loss wasn’t noticed until it was severe), I would never list this as the cause of the anorexia. I really do appreciate the sentiment of this post, but I wanted to share my thoughts because too often eating disorders are put down to being caused “by society”. I wish that were the case; it would have made recovering a lot easier.
Again, thanks for blogging about this.

By: Belinda Caldwell

Belinda Caldwell — Thu, 03 Jul 2014 04:23:02 +0000

Exactly our experience and of many I have met in this journey – far more common than going on a diet to get thin or look like a modelFamilies have now been shown to be an important element of the recovery process for eating disorder sufferers but the process of caring for this specific illness is extremely challenging, requiring enormous emotional reserves and new parenting skills for many. In addition, it can result in financial challenges with family members unable to work and, at times, a need for strong advocacy on behalf of your family member in a health system which can appear fragmented and confusing!
Our daughters school measured BMI and did beep test comparisons etc. She was also taught about healthy eating messages and national guidelines for physical activity which she took on verbatim. Our kids have a biological and personality make up which makes them very good at adhering to rules and guidelines while wanting to be good at everything and please people. My daughter was thin before all this started. There is no evidence that these programs work to reduce obesity but many of us know there heartbreak of the hellish and long journey that a diagnosis of anorexia nervosa is.

By: Dr. Flanders

Dr. Flanders — Wed, 02 Jul 2014 15:31:15 +0000

By: Dr. Flanders

Dr. Flanders — Wed, 02 Jul 2014 14:40:33 +0000

Thank you so very much for all of these important and powerful stories.

By: Fran

Fran — Wed, 02 Jul 2014 14:31:03 +0000

This smart, thoughtful article is an excellent example of why a child’s nutritional needs, weight/height ratio, and overall general health be left as a private conversation between the parents and the child’s pediatrician.

Our daughter, was a cross country/track runner in HS. The fall of her senior year, her coach had a nutritionist visit and talk to her team. This woman told the group “The Snicker Bar you eat on Tuesday WILL effect the race you run on Saturday.” From that moment, our daughter’s life, and our family, were never the same. She began her restricting that afternoon. It seemed like each month more and more was being restricted and the running became excessive. By March she was running 60-70 miles/week and spending less and less time with friends. (This remark had the same impact on another girl the following spring. She was on the tennis team.) These are not elite athletes. These are our children just wanting to have fun. She was still developing, and like most teens her body, moods, and dreams changed frequently.

Her restricting began the fall of 2005. It is now the summer of 2014. As a family we have been blessed with being able to afford the best treatment for her, and to her credit, she has never lapsed in her commitment to therapy. Nevertheless, this struggle and the urge to restrict continues.

We pray every day that a miracle will pull her from this black hole. How sad is that? Families should not have to rely on miracles for recovery.

By: Louise McDermott

Louise McDermott — Wed, 02 Jul 2014 01:20:39 +0000

This is such an important conversation to have. My son’s obsession with food restriction leading to anorexia was triggered not from wanting to lose weight but from fear of becoming fat, and also fear of “disease causing” unhealthy food. He was already thin, and our family already ate healthily, but he noticed puberty turn the bodies of previously thin people into what he perceived as “fat”. The messages from within and without of the school of eat less fat and sugar, and fat is bad became something he felt he need to focus on. Further complicating things was a family member fighting breast cancer who was following an extreme diet that involved eliminating so called “cancer causing foods” and eating only so called “anti-cancer” foods. What resulted was a fear of not just junk food, processed food and foods high in fat and sugar but a fear of all “unhealthy” or “disease causing” foods, including healthy foods containing any amount fat, sugar or salt and all meat. Even now he is weight restored fear of “bad” foods persists and is a barrier to recovery. All the healthy eating messages did not teach my, then 12 year old, to make good food choices, it bombarded him with messages that made him afraid of bad choices, taught him that food makes you “fat” and food makes you “sick”. What we are doing is not working, many kids are not going home and using these messages to eat better and therefore maintain a “healthy” weight, they are just feeling guilty, confused and overwhelmed and in cases like my sons, a previously healthy, strong and fit boy now has his health compromised by osteoporosis and anorexia. There is no worse time to send these confusing and fat shaming messages to our kids than in the school years when the body needs extra fuel and fats for growth and development and healthy bones.

By: Axa

Axa — Tue, 01 Jul 2014 22:57:49 +0000

Thank you so much for this article. My daughter was 8 when she started a healthy eating club with her friend. She had heard in school, during PE’s President’s Fitness Program, that she needed to eat healthy and not eat junk food. She took it to heart and slowly started cutting out deserts and junk food. By the age of 9 she was eating lettuce and fruit and was diagnosed with restrictive anorexia and compulsive exercise. It took two years to get her to her normal weight and it was a nightmarish process. She has been in remission/recovery for 6 years but to this day exhibits brain changes as a result of the anorexia. We need more medical providers writing articles like this.

By: Lisa

Lisa — Tue, 01 Jul 2014 19:57:26 +0000

The issue raised here is critical. I am a member of Mothers Against Eating Disorders (#MAEDVocates) and International Eating Disorder Actions (#IEDAction) and also someone who is currently doing very well in recovery from Anorexia. I know first hand how devastating and destructive this disease is, and it is imperative that we take that into consideration before implementing/teaching lessons and messages to the millions who are genetically vulnerable to developing a potentially dangerous and life threatening disease as a result. Personally, my Anorexia was triggered in large part to me adapting a “healthier” lifestyle simply because I thought it would be good for me. Though weight loss was not my intention, it happened VERY rapidly and nearly cost me my life. Thank you so much for this excellent and educational article!

By: Dr. Ellen Davis

Dr. Ellen Davis — Tue, 01 Jul 2014 17:03:10 +0000

I am a psychologist who specializes in the treatment of eating disorders in children through young adults. I can say with absolute certainty that in my practice, the biggest trigger for children and adolescents to “begin to diet” has been one thing – the assignment that they get in health class to track their intake to become more “healthy”. This seems to especially be a phenomenon that often occurs in the 5th grade curriculum, at least here in Pennsylvania. So, it is not just when these vulnerable children get weighed in school that they often fall down the hole of an eating disorder but also when they are told to ‘track” their intake and make “better choices”. Something so innocent like this type of assignment can become deadly for so many in that once they learn to “be more healthy”, they can not turn the switch off and end up experiencing a deadly disease that they can no longer control.