Besides my wedding date and the birth of my children, November 2, 2019 was perhaps one of the most significant dates of my life.
That day was when the "lightbulb" turned on, and I realized how deeply entangled I'd become in the world of high control diet-wellness cults.
The following is an excerpt from HOW BEING A WEIGHT LOSS SUCCESS STORY TRIGGERED AN EATING DISORDER. (full article linked below)
This particular story happened on November 2, 2019:
"My tipping point was being in the midst a group of people who’d lost a significant amount of weight.
We were instructed to line up in a hallway for a photo shoot.
One by one, we were each in the spotlight.
The photographer wanted a front view, side view, and back view.
Our bodies were on display.
As I stood there waiting my turn, I felt as if we were livestock at the county fair lined up for the judges’ critiques: front view, side view, back view. . .blue ribbon, purple ribbon, Grand Champion ribbon.
I should’ve bolted.
But I didn’t.
I succumbed to the peer pressure.
I dutifully stood in front of the camera lens. Exposed. Feeling objectified and exploited.
And that was my breaking point. . .the moment my eyes were opened, the scales of denial fell off, and I realized I was grossly entangled in a high-control diet cult.
The cognitive dissonance was real. The psychological discomfort of promoting food as medicine while simultaneously participating in weight loss marketing ads and campaigns felt uncomfortably incongruent.
I didn’t have the language to articulate my inner turmoil at the time—but that was the day I decided to jump off the toxic conveyor belt.
However, it took several more years to actually make the leap.
As I sought professional help, the rose-colored glasses of diet-wellness culture slowly came off.
Ironically, the further I removed myself, the healthier I became.
The past couple of years have been a slow and gradual healing process.
I’ve had to unlearn. . ." (the full article is linked here)
What this picture doesn't show:
the extreme anxiety and anguish that developed as I regularly displayed my body for public scrutiny (it's called scopophobia--the fear of being seen and judged by others)
the orthorexia that eventually developed (obsessive preoccupation with food and body size)
the hypochondria that developed (worrying about developing a serious disease if I didn't eat perfectly--or achieve an arbitrary ideal size)
onlookers who could notice a 5-lb weight gain (literally)
the suffocating shapewear underneath my garment that "held everything in"
the days of skipped meals leading up to this event in order to have the flattest stomach possible
celebrity-like status and praise based on my appearance
the binges in secret when my body could no longer tightly restrict food; not realizing the bingeing was my body’s survival mechanism and not a pathological issue
the cognitive dissonance of promoting food as medicine while simultaneously participating in weight loss marketing ads and campaigns
the loss of autonomy in favor of being objectified; being viewed as a weight loss persona rather than a whole person; focus on physical appearance over sense of self
the mental energy spent on appearance-monitoring consumed my attention and resources; leaving less energy for other tasks and cognitive performance.
Emily Boller, wife, mother, painter, and author is on a mission to create expressive works of art in her lifetime; and to bring awareness to the potentially harmful traps of diet-wellness culture. In her free time, she loves to chase sunrises, grow flowers and vegetables, and can homemade soups.