Caroline Dooner

These are two concepts that I think we are all a little confused about. Even writing on this topic for four years, it’s taken me time to master explaining the difference between emotional eating and bingeing. We often use those two terms as if they’re interchangeable. But they’re absolutely not the same thing!

Have you ever noticed how cultish fad diets can be? I didn’t, because I was in the cult. And cult members never think they are part of a cult. I’m going to go out on a limb and say that today’s diets may be filling the same human societal role that religions fill, and not in a good way.

I have a confession: Until recently, I didn’t even know what “patriarchal society” meant. Yeah, I’m one of those feminists who grew up believing I didn’t need feminism.

Pretending you’re OK when you're not is lying — lying to yourself. And it will keep you not OK.

How many diets are out there? How many of them are backed by doctors and gurus who claim they know “the most natural way to eat” or “the fastest way to burn fat and never gain it back!” or “the most definite way to never be hungry again, become beautiful, have everyone love you, and have all your dreams come true!”? So many.

But here is the secret I've learned from years of misery and failure: Food IS naturally comforting to us. And that is perfectly fine.

Food, TV, alcohol, exercise, rest, intimacy, and sex, are all perfectly acceptable, natural ways that we humans get comfort.

It’s really hard to exist in this culture as a woman who does not talk about or complain about weight. Why? Because we are so conditioned and used to talking about weight that it is a big shift to leave it behind.

In response to Nicole Arbour's fat shaming video. . .

We have been told that that's how it works: calories in vs calories out. "Eat less than you expend and you'll lose weight."

We haven’t quite escaped the influence of the Puritans yet...We still tend to regard our bodies, our eating, our desires, and anything else of this earth as “bad,” “weak,” or “sinful.”