“You should really eat to live, not live to eat.”

My step-mom said this to me when I was around nine or ten. Before this, my body was something that propelled me on the playground. It was for fun and function. It never occurred to me that I had something to be ashamed of, or that food and eating was something I should feel bad about. In hindsight, this comment was probably not intended to be hurtful, and I’m sure it was promptly forgotten.It’s certainly not the worst thing ever said to me under the guise of helpful parenting. The problem is, those words were the first shots in the war against my body that has lasted for twenty plus years.  Continue reading →