Thought provoking ssure. I wonder about b2b from the perspective that it is a much shorter fasting time than two separate fast days ( 2x 36 vs 36 +24). It also means a lot longer between fast days, eg 5 days of potentially overeating without the reset trigger in between. I think this could well result in an eating disorder.
I guess using any form of eating can result in eating disorders though.
We like the regular up and down that Mon/Thursday fasting creates. It doesn’t give us time to increase our portion size between fasts. What do you think? P

Ssure you have touched on quite a sensitive subject. Could it be possible that in terms of eating we find it very difficult to walk the middle ground?

I actually googled “eating disorder” and am now thinking that most people are at least on the spectrum of an eating disorder.

Wikipedia: “Eating disorders are psychological illnesses defined by abnormal eating habits that may involve either insufficient or excessive food intake to the detriment of an individual’s physical and mental health. Bulimia nervosa and anorexia nervosa are the most common specific forms of eating disorders.[1] Other types of eating disorders include binge eating disorder and OSFED.

Bulimia nervosa is a disorder characterized by binge eating and purging. Purging can include self-induced vomiting, over-exercising, and the usage of diuretics, enemas, and laxatives.”

It seems that over eating, excessive food restriction as well as OVER EXERCISING ie overly controlled eating/fitness is on the spectrum.

I am wondering if my daily weighing and (at the moment) controlling food intake quite diligently could be regarded as an eating disorder. Never thought I could have an eating disorder but who knows?

Hello All
I’m so grateful that this thread has started: it’s good to be aware of the point where vigilance crosses into obsession, and a forum whose main aim is mutual support and help in weight loss/maintenance could so easily stray into the territory of the ‘ana’ promotion sites so dangerous to people with eating disorders.

I’m not medically trained, and I’m definitely no expert, so please don’t anyone take what follows as definitive – but I have worked pastorally with eating disorder sufferers, and can throw into the discussion a few things which might be reassuring:

One: the ‘ana’ sites aren’t about encouraging maintenance of a healthy weight, as this one is, but exhortation to lose more, and more, and more….often in the face of photos of painfully thin people, who still think they are fat. I haven’t yet read a post on this forum claiming that the poster still needs to lose x pounds…is disgustingly fat….etc – just grateful rejoicing in newly found (or recovered!) health and slimness.

Two: those who do work closely with eating disorder sufferers mostly agree that the desire to be thin (nb not slim) is rarely the driving force behind the disorder, but most often the means of expressing a much deeper problem, to do with issues of identity, value, self esteem or the need to control some aspect of life which is causing feelings of powerlessness. .

Three: if you are concerned that you may have an eating disorder, it doesn’t mean you haven’t – so please, if you suspect, or find yourself veering toward obsession (over-frequent fasting, weighing or exercise / the desire for unrealistic levels of ‘wriggle room’ / use of laxatives etc / temptation to ‘just see if I can if I can lose a bit more, to prove I can do it’, even after reaching a healthy weight ) – see a doctor – but it’s probably less likely. Most sufferers would vehemently deny, even / especially to themselves, that they have a problem – at least until it’s so severe that they can no longer do so.

It’s a serious subject, as we all know, and I’m so glad to see it aired and know we’re conscious of it. Perhaps our friendship and support for one another should include the commitment to challenge (gently) with no offence taken, if we notice anything worrying about one another’s posts? (But while we’re all enjoying our ‘treats’ with such guilt-free glee, we’re probably ok!). How about it, folks?

Hi FastFastSlow,

There was a point this summer where it occurred to me that, if I was that way inclined/ I felt the need to take control of something, fasting could lead me down a dangerous path. It has been very easy for me to lose weight and I could have just continued to see where I got to.

I think your suggestion is sensible and responsible. While we are all fairly level headed and sensible at the moment, you don’t know what life will throw at you. Having friends who can be honest with you/ give you a jolt if need be sounds like a plan to me. And of course some of the more senior ladies might lose the plot and forget to eat… eh P? 🙂

…or forget we’ve eaten (‘have I had my dinner…?) and eat it all over again? More likely for me, I think….My Ma tells me she ‘doesn’t bother too cook just for one’; I can’t imagine ever becoming sufficiently un-greedy to stop…just cook differently now…

G’day zuzan. Great to hear your input 😉
Totally agree about the addictive nature of white processed carbs. I make my organic sourdough every week. It is the only bread we eat (even GF OH!), just one small slice every few days max. My starter, Charlie, lives happily in my fridge to remind me of a dear friend 😉

Cooking our own foods from fresh organic produce bypasses the insidious problems of modern foods.

Happy girl, I deserved the dig BUT …having forgotten to eat yesterday morning and despite a yummy small tapas and cocktail meal last night, I cracked the 8 stone mark this morning. ..56.7 kg /8st 13lb!!!! Dementia has its advantages. 🙂 P

Ma used to iron nappies…

Enough from me for one night… I’ll give it a rest now. G’night all.

Sorry Lizzie! P started it, trying to bait me yesterday….

I don’t think any of you are old enough for senior moments yet (except P, in her bath chair, eating cat food…when she remembers 🙂 )

Fastfastslow and Zuzan (I remember) 🙂

Loved your differentiation of physical (addictive) and psychological binges and the caution to be vigilant with ourselves and each other.

Interesting topic. Probably safe to say most people in 1st world countries place greater importance on our food intake than necessary for a number of reasons. 1) being slim is seen as a sign of success 2) abundance – an overwhelming array of foods at our disposal.
Consequently we are all over nourished and affected by the refinement of foods – unless you are very careful you can be eating a diet of purely processed foods which brings its own set of problems such as sugar addiction etc.

I dare say a number of you will have seen that doco/video that shows the amount of food eaten by different cultures around the world. What was most obvious was the wealthier people ate the most food, wider variety of food (although mainly processed) and had the diet with the least colour in it. There was also an English program hosted by a dietitian that did a similar thing working with overweight people. She put all the food they ate over a week on the table so they could see the volume of it and also observe the bland colour of it all.

I think those of us on this site are some of the enlightened ones. I for one know that being overweight is possibly the greatest contributing factor in morbidity and mortality. I don’t think weighing every day is a sign of an eating disorder for myself, I see it as monitoring. I must say though when I first started IF and had some success I found the act of fasting very powerful and could understand easier how some people may get a bit carried away. I don’t think that is going to happen to me though because I love food! BTW Happy you were right, I dropped a bit more since FD on Monday.

That’s why I weigh before a morning cuppa Happy. 😉 P

Me too. In fact if I forget to weigh first thing, I don’t weigh until the following day. 😆

Hi Carol, I try to eat green veges and red capsicum and orange carrots and green celery every day. Along with a little red onion, it’s kinda fun looking at all the colours on the plate.

Hi MCers, As its now warm weather here, I’ve been painting the walls and skirting boards to repair the nicks and splashes from the floor tiling job. It looks fresh. Now I am quite tired. No problems sleeping. 😉 we are having 30 C tomorrow. Off to look for some new light fittings.

Cheers, Bay 🙂

Hi Zuzan. welcome 😉

Just had time to go back and read the discussion of eating disorders. I agree that what I experience is physiological. I find all processed carbs and sugars to be addictive. In that they trigger a desire for more food about two hours later. If I stick with green veges and salads and lean proteins and normal fat yogurt and nuts and berries etc, then I don’t have the desire to eat between meals. 😆

I agree with Happy, that this is how my slim friends eat. If they go out to dine, then the next day they eat very sparingly. If they have a treat, it’s a small treat. Through 5:2 Intermittent fasting, I have re learnt to eat the way that slim people do. I prefer Mondays and Thursdays (not b2b) so that the time in between fasting is not too long.

Cheers, Bay 🙂

Very fine contributions and comments.

I think it’s too easy to medicalise everyday behaviour – hence all the controversy over the latest revision to theDiagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM V). Lots of people argued that the diagnostic creep makes it impossible not to be diagnosed on a continuum of a vast number of disorders and that ‘newly included’ disorders encompass too much of the general human condition.

I know that Debra Sapp-Yarwood has referred to herself on occasion as the Human Measuring Cup (she knows how much she consumes in a gulp or mouthful) and occasionally wondered where the boundary is between successful maintenance and obsession.
http://justmaintaining.com/2011/03/15/overreactions-the-price-of-being-a-maintainer/

I, too, think that merely weighing yourself regularly/daily and being aware of what you’re eating is a very long way from having a diagnosable Eating Disorder. The volume and speed of consumption of people with bulimia/compulsive over-eating seems to be physically painful and sometimes not even allow for chewing before there’s an impulse to swallow. The people with anorexia can drive themselves to exercise for hours a day on little more than a lettuce leaf. As was said above, as maintainers, we’re not experiencing what they experience.

Where my thinking gets very muddled is that I believe that our obeseogenic environments are causing a shift in our perception of what is ‘normal’ and there’s no longer a shared understanding of that in many ways. E.g., all of the studies that indicate some demographics have a poor sense of when an adult or child is obese/morbidly obese; or any sense of an appropriate portion size. When our environment has changed so much around us, anyone who’s had to change their weight has to be hyper-vigilant in order not to be so deeply affected by the ‘normalisation’ of larger sizes (in people and food portions).

For some age-groups, it’s now more ‘normal’ to be overweight/obese than not to be. If we’re in those age-groups, then we’re being subject to a substantial number of triggers, and, at this stage, it feels like we can manage them by heightening our awareness at particular times. Maybe during prolonged seasonal festivities (why, hello Christmas and New Year, I was thinking about you) – or Winter seems to be a common time for gain.

PVE – the guidance my mother used was to ‘Eat a Rainbow’. When I was trying to come up with vegetables to accompany the vegetarian main dish, I used to think, “Eat a root, a shoot, and a fruit. Eat a rainbow” in order to give me some inspiration. 🙂 You will understand that, for my mother’s generation, it was a given that there would be greens every day. 🙂

Ssure, I find the normalisation of eating behaviours very striking when I associate, usually weekly, with two different friends, both lovely fun people to be with. I do cultural activities with both.

One is living her life flat out. Enjoying her retirement by eating and drinking out every day, despite the massive health implications of her behaviour. She weighs well over 100 kg, can barely walk up stairs and has major joint problems. When with her, it always involves eating.

My other friend has had several cancer scares which she has overcome. She eats small healthy lunches, always brought from home. We go for long walks together between commitments, moving at a brisk pace. She weighs about the same as me and plans for a long healthy retirement.

The differences couldn’t be starker. If I was only with the larger friend, I could easily see that as normal. In fact, 2 years ago, I probably did.
Now I make excuses to avoid the excessive behaviours and choose the healthy ones. How many people aren’t so lucky to see the stark differences between health and certain ill health? P

Yes Happy. And the changed dress sizes hasn’t helped.
Off to bed. G’night all. Thursday fast tomorrow. P

As a fellow 50s kid, Carol, I enjoy looking at old tv footage (eg The Sixties that played recently) and how thin we all were.
My own kids were skinny too, and never took lunch to school. They preferred to run around at lunch time and eat when they got home. Usually apples.
We had no takeaway food, not even icecream. Mum made horrible stuff from condensed milk. No wonder I’m no fan of icecream even now. We did have a lot of stewed fruit with custard on it though.
I raised my kids on a farm in the Hunter Valley. We had chooks, goats and a Jersey cow. I made all our cheese and yoghurt from our milk and bread from wholemeal flour. We never ate out…it was too far and we had no money.
I was listening yesterday to Dr McBride (a Russian) being interviewed by Dr Mercola. She talks about improving health by doing exactly what we did in the 70s and 80s (let alone the 50s). Modern processed food really is a huge problem and doesn’t even taste any good.
Give me delicious home produced meals every day. P

Can anybody imagine the outcry in the media, if our doctors’ surgeries displayed posters of a superimposed thin person on top of a fat one? :-)).

My childhood in the sixties was similar. I grew up in a village and can’t remember a single overweight child in my school and very few adults, (they probably had a medical condition) We had no car, most food was home grown, meat only on a Sunday, cake on birthdays and holy days. Take away and fast food did not exist. After school we played outside until it got dark, all holidays were spent meeting friends outside for (ball)games and den building in the woods. With no television or computers we did not even go much to each other’s houses – indoor playing was far too boring. We had a slice of bread with jam for breakfast every day, potatoes for lunch or other home made stodgy food made with flour and eggs because it was cheap together with masses of veggies and fruit which grew in the garden. Carbs (and loads of it) did not seem to be an issue then as they came without sugar.

Writing this post I was truly amazed when I realised that there were no overweight kids in my class or school (over 400 kids). I even dug out a few class photos to jog my memory.

I feel sorry for so many children who have to watch their diet all their lives and have to endure bullying at a very young age. What a burden and worry at a time in their lives that should be care free. So many people think over feeding their children constitutes love. I think psychologically we find it very hard to deny our children food if it is available. I think throughout history in times of scarcity to secure the future of the human race children were probably always fed before the older generations. It is such a strong instinct.

It takes a lot to override these instincts with reason.

Ha ha Lichtle,
I’m not a parent so I’m afraid I would have no problem denying a child more food than they need, or ‘unhealthy’ food. Tears and tantrums don’t work on me…

Is it just me or do other people have this feeling that our generation is the last one to have glimpsed the old life. Even if we ourselves had relative modern inventions like indoor baths, washing machines, frigdes etc many old people at the time didn’t have all these fancy mod cons and lived simple lives. I am very grateful for that.

No, I don’t think we are the last. Happy is a fine example of a thinking young’n!
All my kids seek health benefits from the foods they prepare. One is vegetarian who home makes absolutely everything from natural products only and never buys anything new, one has a wife who studies everything about food additives, another a vegan who is a fabulous cook but too poor to feed himself properly and a daughter who loves the good life, but understands nutrition.
I think the trick is for kids to learn to cook early and to have inquiring minds. We can’t legislate intelligence unfortunately. P

No, no Happy. He’s not. He’s just like yours!
I put 3, yes three, finely sliced pieces of cucumber on his fd salad last night to ‘bulk’ it out…he pushed it around the plate grumbling “you KNOW I don’t like this”. I told him I didn’t care! Such a baby!!!!
Your pizza sounds great. How did you bind the base? Pity we don’t live closer. We’d love to eat each other’s cooking 😉 P

Hi P,

The hazelnuts were roasted and smashed. The base was bound with oil and water. I’ve never used spelt flour before, but it was nice to work with. Will do more with it… when OH is away!

He did eat his pizza, bless, as I had ‘told him off’! He then said HE would make me a pizza. He does make a very fine pizza (white flour base, meat, lots of cheese), but he’s just missing the point I feel!

How’s the back and the eye?

Purple, in my book far worse than ‘you KNOW I don’t like it’ is a man who when eating somewhere other than home who asks his other half ‘Do I like this?’ I’m ashamed to say my ex used to do just that. A kind, decent man, but not the brightest bulb on the Christmas Tree. And if ever I was unwell he always hoped I would be well enough by the evening to cook his dinner.

Hismaj, I’m proud to say, is in a much higher league. Not only a good cook but a great baker and not a bread-making machine in sight.