Eating disorder

They sound like healthy habits, but are they? And many people want to lose weight or are told to lose weight.

But is that really what we should be aiming for? I sat down with naturopath Casey Conroy to talk weight loss and the blurry lines between wellness culture and disordered eating and why so many of us health conscious folk and practitioners alike are missing the red flags hiding in plain sight.

Casey Conroy is a dietitian and naturopath with a particular interest in eating disorders, disordered eating, and helping practitioners practice in ways that support health without causing more fear around food or bodies.

This is an honest, wide-ranging, and I personally think fascinating conversation covering body image and how practitioners and everyday people can build a healthier, more compassionate relationship with food, one rooted in curiosity and care rather than control.

I really hope you enjoy diving into this topic with us.

I think people's access to information about their health and understanding how their body works is amazing, but it does come off with, it does come with a bit of a trade off, I think.

So I'd love to hear your point of view.

Does wellness culture create disordered eating? And if so, how?

is on

eating disorders.

Eating disorders and addiction result from the root sin of idolatry.

Due to the devastating effect of idolatry on a person's five areas of strength, you may be required to rebuild your life in your spirit, soul, body, relationships, and finances.

So, eating disorders and addiction are spiritual problems.

Eating disorders and addiction come about through inherited demonic doorways.

Both eating disorders and addiction illustrate how idolatry, coupled with emotional turmoil in the soul, can have a negative effect on the body.

And it conveys how complex issues may need to be resolved from many angles.

Like, I, I had lost a l- I don't know if it was just, like, lights in my eyes or what, but I just remember I literally had to, like, feel down the hallway in order to get to, like, the school office because I couldn't really see.

So what happens next is more so my symptom kind of turned into a, an eating disorder.

So I developed an eating disorder in high school, but during that time I didn't really have migraines.

I think because my body's like, "Okay, you're distracted enough with this eating disorder.

We don't also have to give you a migraine.

You're okay," right? And so that kind of traveled with me kind of into university a little bit as well.

But then once I got my period back after stopping breastfeeding and all of that, then that's when they became more frequent.

Mm-hmm.

And sometimes both things are true at the same time.

Today, we're going to talk about autism, food rigidity, and eating disorders, specifically the complicated ways autistic traits can both help and hinder recovery.

I want to spend some time with this topic because autistic people can enter eating disorder treatment and quickly receive the message that anything repetitive or inflexible around food needs to change.

And if we don't understand why a pattern exists before we try to remove it, we may end up taking away something that was helping that person stay nourished.

The harder question is what happens when autistic rigidity and eating disorder rigidity overlap.

There isn't always a clean dividing line.

Eating disorders can attach themselves to patterns that were already there.

Someone who has already relied on routine can develop anorexia and restriction may be may begin operating within that existing preference for sameness.

Only the older one, not the younger one.

Kevin, I want to address the eating situation because the podcast does give us a trigger warning about eating disorders.

And we do hear about the boy's diet, which clearly is an eating disorder.

But as of the end of episode four, that is addressed as eating behavior disorder.

And a lot of you are really liking the guest that I had on also.

So I'm keeping it going with some interesting things coming up in Season 2 from CEOs of companies, from a young teenage girl who fought an eating disorder for a really long time and finally won the battle with it.

There are so many interesting things that are coming up in Season 2, starting with a two-part episode called which was so good when I filmed this episode, I decided that it has to be in two parts.

So season two starts with a two-parter.

So see you next

time.

So for me, for some reason, and I actually have found this and I don't know, I can't speak for anyone else with an eating disorder, right? But I can speak to speak to my own experience and friends of mine who are female actors or actresses whatever um the way that i have found that like in when i'm acting my body literally is just like a tool that's telling a story so you don't really think about has nothing your body on the screen and the image of it my body i yes but from a story perspective my weight doesn't determine my even while my eating disorder was still kicking my my weight on camera was telling a story my weight off camera determined my worth that's so weird you understand like

well i'm trying to understand because it's so different from what other people i know who are in the limelight or have

One of the other things I would add is that saliva is a really important aspect of oral anatomy.

And just as you said, people with significant eating disorders, whether that's anorexia nervosa, bulimia, a purging disorder, or eating disorder not otherwise specified, saliva should ideally have a pH between 6.2 and 7.6. And there's a really fantastic study, if any of you are particularly interested on the biomarker nature of saliva, Bollinger 2013.

Essentially, the way saliva regulates the mouth.

But unfortunately, one of the other things that happens, not only do we cause xerostomia, which is dry mouth, because patients obviously need antidepressants and antipsychotics depending on their diagnosis and whatever it is that we're needing to manage for them so that they can live a hopefully full and healthy life.

And that's an area that our oral maxillofacial surgeons do a lot of amazing work in to try and help people, as well as prosthodontists.

And they're the people that make the splints and try and improve the oral health of people's teeth with physical implants, as well as the periodontists that look at gum disease.

Erosion is actually quite different because erosion more commonly occurs in people with eating disorders because often people with eating disorders have actually quite good oral hygiene.

But especially in the presence of self-induced vomiting, the acidic contents of the stomach will basically erode the enamel and basically evaporate.