Tag Archives: anorexia

on the scale (guest post by kendall privette)

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on the scale (full well)

me on the left, friend in the center and my twin on the right
c. 1978 (an era of confidence)

i liked myself as a child
you know,
before adolescence and an awareness
of
others
it was maybe fourth grade when
i began building this
ramshackle self-image
on the shoddy foundation
of the world’s eye
that saw
stringy hair, ruddy complexion,
spectacles and old clothes
in my thirties
i befriended
the scale, the world’s voice
fluent in lies as well as numbers
she interprets weights and assigns blame
she dictates our days and strips us of self-worth
she is power
(if we allow it)
and i fell for it
the husband, moms, sisters, doctors wanted me to know
what david-god’s-beloved knew….
he had a heart tuned to
god’s eye
god’s voice
and he sang
i praise you because i am 
fearfully and wonderfully 
made;
your works are wonderful, 
i know that full well
this breath-taking verse revisited yesterday

and i retucked it into memory
for when the world tries to speak
and i need her to
hush

so, what is your relationship to the scale?

(guest post by Kendall Privette at A Spacious Place)

in which i implore women everywhere

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we are the heartbeat of the home.

but more than that, sisters…

we are the heartbeat of the world.

i see a woman’s Facebook status rejoicing that she’s lost 45 pounds, and multitudes are clicking “like” and it’s triggering me to check what i’m eating, to hop back on that anorexic train to skinny-ville.

and i think we can be more. more than our weight, more than our looks, more than our jean size, because i have two chubby-faced boys staring up at me as i write and they see me as so much more.

they see me as Mama. as nurturer, as creator of love and life and they see me as HOME. they see me as soother of fears, as prayer warrior, as getter-of-, as lover-of, as hugs.

they call me always, they never stop calling me, and they smile every time i enter a room. cry, when i leave, and one day, i will stop being their world, but they will never stop being mine.

i have a 52-year-old friend who is single, and stunning, and she wants to get married but God hasn’t opened that door and so she waits. pure, and holy, she waits. and she is one of the most radiant women i know because she is more. MORE than what the world says she is. MORE than single, she is steadfast and faithful and prayerful and devoted. she reads the Bible more than anyone i know, and God is currently using her to mentor fathers of daughters. every week, her living room is full of married men, and she helps them get back on track with their families. this single lady is not letting a stereotype define her.

we aren’t just the reflection in the mirror, friends. we are the reflection in our family’s faces. we are the reflection in our friends, in the people we disciple or mentor, in the face of the fast-food server, because how we treat others and ourselves is what we look like.

so i implore you, as bearers of life, as vessels of God’s creative spirit, be careful what you say on Facebook, be careful what you write on your blogs, be careful how you talk to your neighbors and your husbands and your friends and your children.

because you are MORE.

you are the heartbeat of the world.

Chasing Silhouettes Webinar with mental health expert Gregory Jantz, Ph.D., and the founder of FINDINGbalance, Constance Rhodes

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In this webinar, Chasing Silhouettes author Emily Wierenga is joined by bestselling author and mental health expert Gregory Jantz, Ph.D., along with author and founder of FindingBalance.com, Constance Rhodes, as they discuss how you can help a loved one struggling with an eating disorder. From simple steps that help identify if someone you know has an eating disorder to ways to intervene to tips on how to help someone begin the road to recovery, this webinar is full of practical information for those who want to help a friend or loved one.

To learn more, visit Emily’s website at www.emilywierenga.com.

Other Web Resources:
http://www.FindingBalance.com
http://www.APlaceOfHope.com

To purchase a copy of Chasing Silhouettes, click HERE.

A Parent’s Role in Recovery

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SheReads, Week 3: An excerpt from Chasing Silhouettes: How to Help a Loved One Battling an Eating Disorder, by Emily Wierenga with Dr. Gregory Jantz. Used with permission.

“Even if you don’t believe this, practice saying it to yourself, for with God, anything—including full recovery—is possible.”

By Emily Wierenga | Twitter: @Emily_Wierenga

Some say an eating disorder is a plight one has to live with for the rest of one’s life. And in certain cases, it may very well be a “thorn” in one’s flesh such as Paul speaks of in 2 Corinthians 12. But this should not be assumed.

God rebuilds minds. He delights in making whole what once was broken. “Be transformed by the renewal of your mind,” He urges in Romans 12:2. If this were not possible, would He ask us to do it?

This, then, is what we must pray and work towards, and believe in. For, “If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.” (Matthew 21:22)

What to Do

Perhaps your child has just emerged from a treatment program. He/she is intent on getting better, and has made significant process. You’re wondering, What now?

Coming home can take its toll on a newly recovered disordered eater. Because of this, it’s important to make the transition as smooth as possible…

(for more of this excerpt from Chasing Silhouettes, please visit SheReads HERE, where we’re doing a study of the book)

*also check out this article in Allure Magazine on the “F Word”


~Chasing Silhouettes now only $10 at Amazon.com; also available at Amazon.ca, ChristianBook.com and Barnes and Noble.

On Blog Talk Radio Tonight (and announcing one week off from blogging)

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I will be sharing my story, the one in which I relapse as a young married woman, the one in which Trent becomes Christ incarnate for me, on Blog Talk Radio HERE, tonight; will you pray for me, that God be glorified? Thank you friends.

Also, I will be taking the next week off from blogging… I am going to spend it reflecting, and praying, and seeking God for direction… last week was particularly hard, and I’m in need of a respite. I will resume with Imperfect Prose on Thursdays the following week, after Thanksgiving.

May you all know Christ’s undying love in a resurrected way this holiday, and may your celebrations be full of him.

So much love, e.

“Christ has no body now, but yours.
No hands, no feet on earth, but yours.
Yours are the eyes through which
Christ looks compassion into the world.
Yours are the feet
with which Christ walks to do good.
Yours are the hands
with which Christ blesses the world.” (St. Teresa of Avila)

on learning to love ourselves as women

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…we’re in bed, and my husband leans in, and i ask him to tell me, just one more time. “but why?” he says, this farm-boy that walked me through my relapse when i was 23. “don’t you know it by now?” he says.

i shake my head. “tell me again,” i say.

“i love you.” he pulls me close. “i’ve never stopped loving you,” he says. “and i never will.”

i let him kiss me then.

and i’m learning to stand up for myself this way, to treat my body with kindness. and i know it has nothing to do with me. i know it has everything to do with me being a product of God’s genius. his hands molding dust into skin into breath.

he’s the one who makes me beautiful. so i sit boldly at the kitchen table in the afternoon light and eat a bowl of ice cream, my sons beside me, eating theirs, because we need to do this together, this life. this learning to eat, this learning to be gentle with ourselves and others. …

(so delighted to be over HERE at (in)courage today where Chasing Silhouettes is being featured as a Fall Recommended Read… won’t you join me?)

ALSO, She Loves Magazine is doing a book study on Chasing Silhouettes HERE through the month of November, so purchase the book for only $10 at Amazon, and join the study group! we’re considering these questions together, today:

1. What was your view of God like when you were young, and what factors influenced this view of him?
2. How has your view of God changed since then, and why?
3. What was your view of food like when you were a child, and how has that changed? What factors have influenced how you view eating and mealtimes in general?
4. How do you talk about God and food within your homes, with your children? Do they/you associate God and food with love, or fear?
5. How do you seek to affirm your children, and to speak their love language to them?
6. Is being skinny important to you? If so, why?
7. How do you talk about yourself around your children and husband?
8. How does your husband talk about himself, and others, around you and your children?
9. What are some efforts that can be made by yourself and your husband to foster a more affirming,positive environment when it comes to food, faith and self-confidence?
10. Do you suspect yourself, your husband, your children, or any other loved one of having an eating disorder, and if so, why?

the boy who wanted to kill his brother

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(guest post by duane scott)

He’s not a tall boy, I notice, and so thin.

Almost sickly. His arms look like a boy half his age.

We’re in Canada at a boy’s retreat and my heart goes out to him so I look him square with empathy because I’m ready to hear his story, whatever it might be. Because there is healing in the telling, in the opening of one’s heart and mouth to give voice to the fears residing there.

Fear exposed is fear crippled, so he opened his mouth and began.

“It started a year ago… and it nearly ended one night in the emergency room five months after.”

Twenty boys sit quiet, listening.

“I have a twin brother. He’s the popular one. He’s more accomplished. Girls liked him better. I think my parents did too. And I hated him for it.” …

(for the rest of this post, and a giveaway, follow me to Duane Scott’s place HERE?)

What drove me to my eating disorder (over at Prodigal Magazine today)

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Funny how being thin is so important until you realize it accomplishes nothing but hunger.

I wish I’d known this before I tried to starve myself to death.

I wish I could have known how good and beautiful I was in spite of my mushroom-cut and big-rimmed plastic glasses. In spite of my pastor-dad who was never home and my homeschooling mum who didn’t like herself and in spite of my thrift-store clothes.

But I didn’t.

It’s hard to be nine and to feel like you have no one, and it’s even harder to be 13 and to nearly lose yourself. To see the shock on nurses’ faces when they marvel that you’re still alive and then to run a hand through your hair and find your hair in your hands.

But maybe it’s all about being hungry.

Because hunger is something you feel you deserve.

If we feel unloved as children, we begin to think we deserve to be punished, and hunger is a knife that cuts deep.

I don’t want my children to ever go hungry.

But how do you convince your daughter that she is worth more than the world, or you, or your interpretation of God could ever describe? How do you help her see love in the mirror, past the freckles and the wide eyes and the stringy hair which she inherited from you?

My mum didn’t know how lost I’d become until she lay down one night beside me, as I slept, and couldn’t find me. All she found, instead, was bone.

And she cried at the moon, at the stars, at the faith she’d accepted in university because no one had ever told her that she was loved, growing up. So how could she tell me?

And we wonder where God is in all of the hard until we realize that it’s only in the hard that we can find him…


(Follow me here, to Prodigal Magazine, for the rest of my story, friends? Love you.)

a love letter to my body: you are more

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Dear Body,

I hear you rooting around in the darkness, searching for your sippy cup and you find it, and I’m so proud of you, taking care of yourself, in your playpen by the window.

We’re sharing a room together this week, at camp, and you’re over there, too, in the toddler bed beneath your Thomas the Train blanket, and when I held you today I nearly cried for the way you’re growing in leg and in vocabulary.

And I turn in the darkness, find you silhouetted next to me in the arc of a German nose and high cheekbones and you’re pulling at the covers, and I tuck them tenderly around your toes.

Because you are more than a size 34-B, more than a 31” waist, more than the five-foot-nine-inches that fill out your second-hand clothes. You are a size that fits 11-month onesies and 2T Spiderman shirts and a men’s pair of flannel pajamas.

You are your grandmother in your son’s earlobes, your father in your infant’s lips. You are the love in your husband’s eye, the longing in his hands, in his legs, in the neck that reminds you of the tree in his parent’s backyard where he inscribed your initials.


(For more, won’t you follow me here, to She Loves Magazine, where I’m humbled to be a new contributing writer? Love you, friends. Thank you for all of your support and love this week… it’s meant so much to me.)