CEDA Book Reviews 2

Anorexics On Anorexia: Edited by Rosemary Shelley
Theories and opinions about anorexia abound, but what does anorexia feel like from the inside? Anorexics on Anorexia presents 19 thought-provoking accounts of sufferers’ own stories told in their own words. Obviously, this occasions a considerable amount of often extremely harrowing reading; but in the majority of cases it is heartening to note a prevalence of generally positive outcomes, offering hope and encouragement to those still caught in anorexia’s grip. These accounts pull no punches, however, and are frequently brutal in laying bare the inner anorectic experience. Yet time and again our sufferers eventually come to realise that they are not the iron-willed paragons of supreme self-control they believed themselves to be. No, they have been taken for a fool all along, and it is in fact the anorexia that is controlling them. One feature of Anorexics on Anorexia that is particularly commendable is the extreme diversity of experience being related here. From male sufferers to mothers with families of 6; from early-onset 12-year-old recovered veterans to those still fighting decades later; from backgrounds tainted by alcoholism and sexual abuse to childhoods of idyllic bliss, the stereotype anorexic of popular myth is shown simply to not exist. Rosemary Shelley, herself a recovered anorexic, writes a perceptive introduction to her wide-ranging collection of contributors’ tales. This is not the gentlest of reads, nor does it offer any easy "explanations", but if you want to know something of what anorexia feels like from within, this book offers a kaleidoscope of haunting self-portraits.

Intuitive Eating :
EVELYN TRIBOLE & ELYSE RESCH
Written by two nutritionists, this is a highly recommended book for all who want to normalise their relationships with food. Whatever the degree or nature of your problems with food, weight and eating, this book can help. Other similarly excellent titles in the same vein are “Overcoming Eating”, by Jane R. Hirschmann and Carol H. Hunter, and “ It’s not about food” by Carol Emery Normandi and Laurelee Roark.

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The Golden Cage : HILDE BRUCH
Subtitled “The enigma of anorexia nervosa” this is a highly perceptive study by a pioneer in the eating disorders field.
Dr Bruch blows away the smoke screen of food / weight issues to reveal the real illness of feelings and self-esteem. Essential reading for anyone wanting to go beyond skin-deep in trying to understand the anorexic’s world.

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Bulimia Nervosa:Cognitive Therapy Programme.Myra Cooper etal
Cognitive therapy has long been recognised as one of the most successful approaches to the treatment of bulimia, and this structured self-help manual draws on both cognitive theory and cognitive therapy to offer a comprehensive programme for recovery. This book, then, is ideal both for those who, for whatever reason, might not want to work with a counsellor, and for those who, again, for whatever reason, do not find themselves with a counsellor readily to hand. I imagine, however, that more or less anyone with an interest in eating disorders in general and/or bulimia in particular will find something of interest in this well-paced and very accessible volume. Of all the various eating disorders, bulimia certainly does seem to be encouragingly amenable to this kind of self-help approach. This is possibly because such an approach generally makes extensive use of strategies which tend to engage the sufferer’s own inner experience and self-talk to explore the emotions, feelings, thoughts and behaviours that underlie and promote bulimia’s vicious circle in the first place. Thus, the sufferer identifies her own problems, and sets her own goals and pathways to change, in solely her own words and terms. The importance of this for someone who desperately wants to change but at the same time desperately fears what that change may mean cannot be emphasised enough. Overall the authors manage to strike a good balance between reassurance and encouragement on the one hand, while not offering any glib and patently false assertions that any of this is going to be easy on the other. The experience of shame, self-hatred and feeling out of control for the bulimic is all too often painful in the extreme. If you are looking for help and/or understanding with this demoralising disorder here is a book you may find well worth reading. .

eefo.net. A site particularly for issues facing young people in Cornwall

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Somerset and Wessex Eating Disorders Association.
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Psychological Services, Professional therapy and training.
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