I have never done this before but there is a first for everything...I saw a very insightful comment written yesterday and I thought the subject matter and the comment was so interesting, I just copied and pasted it for everyone to see. I want to thank "Anonymous" for taking the time tom write something so insightful..I look forward to hearing others' comments in response to this entry.....
Anonymous said...
Doctor Posner I have a suggestion for a topic: The connection between weight loss and emotional over eating. This is a real problem for losing weight and keeping it of after the weight is lost. Many overweight people have one common character trait – we do not know how to express our anger and frustration. Emotional overeaters are incapable of channeling those emotions toward the appropriate source of the problem. This is very common with women who are raised to be nice – not to get into fights. So we play nice and polite when inside we are raging. Many times I have come out of situations calm as a cucumber and congratulating myself on how cool I was but was I? I refuse to feel my anger and grab a bag of chips instead – and let me explain it is automatic and completely unconscious. I usually become conscious when I am at the bottom of the bag. And then the anger I felt towards that person or that situation now turns into anger and disappointment toward myself. That becomes another reason why I cannot express my anger at other people because in my mind now, what right do I have to be mad at others when I cannot even control what I put in my mouth. So it becomes a vicious circle. That was the first thing I noticed when I started reading your blog. You rage against the diet industry, evil TV shows, etc. etc. I thought to myself…wow tell us how you really feel doc. Some things you say sometimes make me really, really mad too. Like sometimes you seem to imply that all people have to do is say no and control themselves. But you know something lately I have been able to catch myself. That is because I have been reading and doing a lot of research about this problem. And one day when I was particularly mad about some comment you made implying that it was as simple as choosing what you wear in the morning…I realized that I haven’t eaten anything in response to how I was feeling in sometime because I had decided that I was not going to do that anymore. (I decided) As a matter of fact, I had let myself feel pain, sadness, hurt, anger and rage and the world had not come tumbling down. So what was I really defending? The belief that I had no control over eating when I was in emotional upheaval or that there is a possibility that I can develop new skills on how to cope with uncomfortable emotions? That has opened a brand new world of possibility for me. So thank you for challenging and not enabling.