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My unexpected but, oh so worth it, journey from being diet-obsessed to body positive!

I can’t recall exactly when my journey to becoming diet-obsessed began, but I know my journey to becoming body positive took me by surprise. There was a time around puberty where I began wondering what boys thought of me. Of course, I wondered and worried the most, what the other girls thought and said about me when I wasn’t in the room. Did they whisper and say nasty things about the way I looked?

Before that, I always assumed that adolescent girldom was the way I saw it in the movies. The normal/average size girl playing sidekick to the blond-haired model that had it all.

By aged 14, the word diet meant to me that you had to eat specific foods in a specific way until you reached your ‘goal weight’ and then everything would be ok. Of course, it never was, and I spent those formative years trying to balance my love of food with my hatred of exercise.

The University Years

When I moved to university the scale range moved more. I constantly charted my weight, but I didn’t see it as a problem. Instead of losing the initial planned 5 pounds, I’d just have to lose 10 instead. Then came the months of fad diets; Keto, Paleo, Cambridge, Atkins-you name it, I tried it. I charted them all. At first, I used paper but then I got a Fitbit.

At 24, I reached my heaviest. I was two years into therapy at this time and one thing became glaringly clear: whatever ‘it’ was, I certainly did not have it together. This was abundantly clear when it came to my body. I consumed myself with day to day life-university, working part-time and the inevitable social life that comes with being a student. I didn’t realise my initial weight obsession started with sheer neuroticism. Controlling what I ate and how many steps I took made me think I was in control of my anxiety.

With my Fitbit by my side, I was constantly reminded of my daily goals. My daily achievement was to make that thing buzz and I could not rest until it had done so, even if that meant missing out. I recall times of jogging on the spot until midnight, excusing myself from events so I could take long walks, and having extra-long toilet breaks just to complete those goals.

There were days when I didn’t achieve it and I mentally scolded myself and guilted myself to make up for it the following day.

Awakening The Past

Before therapy, it had never occurred to me that my anxiety and eating were linked to something bigger. That gaining weight during this time was linked to reliving repressed memories.

When I looked through old diaries from my teenage years one thing became obvious: every few months I would start a health kick hoping that this was ‘it’. The content read the same: when I am X weight I will be happy; my anxiety will disappear, and I will not feel the need to binge eat my feelings.

Now at my heaviest, I have realised this bout of weight gain is different. This time I don’t hate myself for it. I’ve discovered that I am much more than my weight and for the first time I don’t feel exhausted from the cycles of weight watching. I know that being healthy is not about vanity. I was, without knowing it being ‘body positive’!

When I joined a gym but, this time on my terms. I did question whether I was being true to my new self as surely ‘body positive’ cannot go with working out, weight loss and eating healthy. Of course, it can. Body positivity for me is a mental state that involves, accepting my body the way it is today.

“It is not about the destination but the journey itself.”

Cheesy yes, but true. My journey involves swimming because I enjoy that, but I also enjoy the chocolate workshops I attend with my friend.

There is more to a healthy life than chasing something that is unsustainable.

For more information relating to talking therapies for subjects covered in this story please contact us using the form below.

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Techniques to combine talking therapies with physical therapies to create wellness

Unsurprisingly our emotional wellbeing has a direct impact on our physical health. The world is increasingly aware of self-care and mindfulness, but we rarely see this in beauty treatments. We have a massage to de-stress or a facial to help with tired skin, but what if the root cause of our ails is our mental or emotional state? What if our physical ailments are symptoms rather than a cause?

Holistic wellness therapist Sue Francis has honed an approach to wellness through Light Touch Therapy. This incorporates combining Ayurvedic Kansa wands, healing, massage and talking therapy to help clients feel de-stressed, energised and lighter.

From a practitioner’s perspective: When treating a particular concern, holistic treatments treat the whole person. Stress can affect many aspects of the body including the mind but it may only manifest in physical ailments. By treating holistically, you can work at a deeper level treating the whole person, rebalancing and aligning both the physical and emotional.

Treatment sessions go far beyond what any spa can offer in that we have time to talk to clients. We ask them how they are feeling and what is happening in their lives that may influence their well-being. During this time, we ascertain which treatment is best suited to them. This allows the client to feel listened to, understood and lighter.

“The talking therapy part is to actively listen and understand what the client’s presenting problem relates to and the potential cause.”

It is different to be asked in such an in-depth way about your emotional state during a pampering treatment such as a facial or massage, but it does create a connection that ordinarily wouldn’t happen. Clients state that they feel lighter because they have not only received a beauty treatment but have off-loaded. They have gained an understanding of how their mental balance has affected their physical balance. The two need to be in alignment with each other for them to work in harmony.

To book your Light Touch Therapy Session with Sue Francis Telephone us on 01803 500300

Self-hypnosis could help you to overcome difficult issues and situations in areas of your daily life.

For some, the idea of hypnosis conjures images of magicians telling us to “sleep” before “clucking” across a stage like some performing puppet. In stark contrast, hypnotherapy is quite the opposite.

Hypnotherapy has been recognised as a talking therapy by the British Psychological Society and is considered a useful treatment for anxiety, addiction, IBS, fears and phobias.

Celebrities Lilly Allen and Geri Horner have turned to hypnotherapists to lose weight and Kate Middleton reportedly used hypnobirthing to aid labour pain.

We can all use self-hypnosis to get ahead:- be it to ace a presentation, stick to those gym goals or feel less stressed.

The unconscious mind is incredibly powerful and by using it you can really use it to your advantage.

The idea of hypnotherapy and self-hypnosis is to induce a mild trance – meaning a relaxed state. This state is similar to when our minds wander off or when we switch to autopilot. An example of this is the morning commute. Whether you dive or take public transport: you are fully aware of how you got to your destination, but you don’t quite recall the entire journey. It is during this period that suggestions are introduced. These suggestions are of things that we would like to change such as feeling more positive, less afraid of something, and more confident in our ability.

It is estimated that up to 90% of behaviour is governed by the unconscious mind. It is during this relaxed hypnotic state we are more open to accepting these suggestions.

Think of the brain as a computer. It is not the computer itself that’s the problem, it is the software programme that has the bug. Hypnotherapy aims to fix the bug allowing the programme to run efficiently once again.

Work Smarter

If you have a presentation or a speech coming up, it is only natural that you worry something may go wrong or merely push it to the back of your mind.

Instead, try self-hypnosis to focus on it going really well. In this context, self-hypnosis works like a powerful shortcut to building skills in an area you are not confident about.

Super-charge your health

Hypnotherapy with a trained professional has been found to help an array of physical conditions from aches and pains to insomnia.

A recent study in the Netherlands found that 6 sessions of hypnotherapy were more effective for IBS than standard supportive care. 40% of hypnotherapy patients reported relief from symptoms, often for several months afterwards.

When aiming to lose weight or lead a healthy lifestyle, hypnosis can improve results by changing a person’s mindset.

Research has shown that those who regularly use self-hypnosis techniques before eating felt more full than those who hadn’t.

Using hypnosis and hypnotherapy for your health and fitness is about making definable aims that are achievable and maintainable.

Contact us today and see how self-hypnosis can benefit you.

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We Don’t All Fit The Same Box

A study found that 31% of patients with Anorexia Nervosa had all the cognitive features and physical complaints without being underweight.

University Melbourne dietitian Melissa Whitelaw is calling for a change in the diagnostic criteria after finding patients with atypical anorexia suffer serious health concerns despite not meeting the criteria for the condition with regards to their weight.

The study published in the Journal of Adolescent Health looked at 171 patients between the ages of 12-19 admitted to hospitals with eating disorders between 2005 and 2013. It found that:

• 51% were ‘atypical’ with significant eating disorder psychopathology but not underweight.
• Rather than being underweight, a greater weight loss was associated with life-threatening low pulse rates, a complication of starvation in anorexia that requires medical intervention (hospitalisation).
• Those atypical patients also suffered from low blood pressure and unbalanced blood electrolytes.
• No complication was independently associated with being underweight, the so-called hallmark of anorexia.
• No participant was being monitored by health professionals for weight loss, their relationship to food, or their methods for weight loss during the study.

Whitelaw says many atypical patients have been encouraged by family and/or health professionals to lose weight which frequently resulted in positive re-enforcement.

Atypical anorexia nervosa patients might have lost about a quarter of their body weight, but the body can go into starvation mode if as little as 10% is lost quickly, causing the heart to slow to preserve energy.

“The face of eating disorders is changing against a backdrop of an increasing prevalence of overweight and obesity”

Melissa Whitelaw.

If an adolescent chooses to lose weight, it doesn’t matter what their start weight is, a health professional should monitor them to ensure the loss is both safe and appropriate. This way their nutritional intake and relationship with food and exercise can be monitored for signs of concern.

Upon entering starvation mode the only way to increase the heart is to re-feed in order to regain weight, which requires careful monitoring thus hospitalisation.

Whitelaw says that people can understand why an extremely thin person needs to gain weight, but they struggle to understand why someone within or above a healthy weight range requires re-feeding.

Contrary to common assumption health consequences of atypical anorexia can be just as dangerous and it is about time the outdated diagnostic criteria were changed. You do not have to be underweight to be anorexic, the evidence is there to prove this.

Atypical anorexics are just as ill as those with typical anorexia. They have the same thoughts about food and eating.

It is about time we updated the criteria to fit our modern world and started to listen to the individual instead of judging them on whether they fit the box or not.

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