Eating disorders
Weight and body awareness
Not all people who are overweight necessarily have an eating disorder like bulimia or uncontrollable binge eating. But these disorders are not rare, especially for overweight people, who deprive themselves or set up restrictions to control their weight. Weight loss diets promote cognitive limitations with loss of food control, which in turn could lead to weight gain.
Diet after diet, the vicious cycle leads to more and more weight gain. Pounds lost on a diet are quickly regained, and sometimes more weight is gained in the months that follow.
To break this cycle, the chosen approach tackles obesity, weight, body image and eating in every dimension: biological, social and psychological.
In terms of food, it promotes a varied and balanced diet where all foods are “legal”. The concept of foods being permitted at will or forbidden is abandoned in order to bring back the body’s signals of hunger and satiety. The body’s signals tell us when it is time to eat and how much to consume. We learn or relearn to trust ourselves with a new awareness of what we eat and the evolving perception of our body image.
The impact of a devalued body image and somatic complaints associated to the overweight person’s body mass should not be overlooked. For this person, living in his or her body is a challenge. In fact, “the perception of body weight is the cause of the subject’s psychomotility, emotions and the quality of body image and identity” (Pierre Dalarun, Psychometrician, Paris). It is therefore important to work on body awareness.
In this context, it is a fascinating discovery to combine pleasure and comfort with complete freedom.