food – and so she thinks

What it’s like having anorexia during Covid-19

admin — Thu, 09 Apr 2020 06:38:32 +0000

I have had anorexia for fifteen years. It’s horrible. I’ve been in and out of hospital and treatment for that time, determined and doggedly committed to recovery. But never quite getting there. Covid-19 and the impact it is having on daily life really isn’t helping.

We are all struggling. But for people with eating disorders the effect is compounded by both practical considerations and the impact on mental health. It’s anxiety provoking, hugely challenging, and really tough.

For a start, being underweight means that my immune system is supressed, and I am more at risk than healthy individuals. I am angry at myself for being in this situation, and struggling to give myself the compassion that says that this is an illness, and one I am working hard to fight. I’m washing my hands regularly, keeping away from people as much as humanly possible, and doing my best to limit contact with any object outside my house. But the concern is still there.

Like many people with or in recovery from an eating disorder, I have quite a limited diet. There are the foods I feel comfortable with – my ‘safe’ foods – and those I find more challenging – the ‘fear’ foods. I am terrified of going into a supermarket and finding the shelves stripped bear of those safe foods that enable me to get through the day. Whilst I would like to think that I could be more flexible if this situation occurs, really I fear I would use this as an opportunity to cut back even more, unable to face a challenge. We are being told to only shop for essentials. It’s very easy for the anorexic voice to convince me that my food is not an essential, and it would be perfectly justifiable for me to spend months hidden away with only cereal bars to eat.

The supermarket is a daunting place for me at the best of times. With panic buying, lengthy queues, product restrictions and militant frontline workers (who are doing a brilliant job) the anxiety is made worse, and the experience far from easy. One thing that is good is that supermarkets are streamlining their ranges a little, so the anxiety that comes from an overwhelming choice is lessened – as long as that streamlining doesn’t come from removing my ‘safe’ foods.

When in the weight restoration phase of anorexia recovery, individuals need much more to eat than people of a ‘normal’ weight – often thousands of calories. What might look like stock piling is actually only food for a few days. The voice telling me I’m greedy and overeating is exacerbated and amplified, the idea that I shouldn’t be eating so much reinforced in my head.

I have come a long way from the days when only an intense and lengthy gym session or run would allow me to let even a meagre portion of food to pass my lips. But I do still rely on my daily walks, just as much for mental health as to allow my body to move a little. Despite protestations from the public, we are still under a fairly limited lockdown in the UK, and allowed out for daily walks. I worry this freedom will be curtailed as people flout the rules and take advantage of our freedom (is sunbathing and having a picnic in the park really necessary?) and am terrified that I might not be even allowed out for my regular amble around the streets near where I live.

Social distancing, which whilst entirely necessary, isn’t helping. In recent months I have been doing really well at trying to go out for dinner and drinks with friends. Now I am at home, and those challenges ceased. We are having regular video calls and checking in, but it’s just not the same. The great steps I have taken feel like they are being curtailed.

If you’re in treatment and used to seeing a therapist or nurse regularly, all this will have stopped. Most therapists are doing online or phone check ins, so that people have some continuity of contact. But a lot of the benefit that comes from sessions is the in person relationship, some of which is lost online. And monitoring of weight and physical symptoms through blood tests can’t happen, so there is a risk that any deterioration will not be noticed.

Diet culture is all pervasive, even at the best of times. But at the moment there are numerous posts and memes about gaining weight and overeating during lockdown. The idea that this would be the worst thing to befall us doesn’t help with the notion that weight gain is bad and being thin is good, which, whilst not the cause of my anorexia, certainly doesn’t aid in my recovery. Everyone is doing home workouts and bragging about it, and it would be all too easy to fall down a rabbit hole of home exercise videos. That is something I need to steer away from.

Having anorexia at any time really sucks. It’s the biggest killer of any psychiatric illness. It ruins lives. But during a global health pandemic it’s even harder. I know I have to keep fighting, to be healthy and strong during this period, and to come out of it able to keep on going, working on my recovery. Maybe I can use this opportunity to be forced to be more flexible, adapting my meals, challenging myself, and working on what matters to me.

But right now, it all feels a bit much.

How to Feel the Fear and Eat It Anyway by Eve Simmons and Laura Dennison

admin — Thu, 17 Jan 2019 15:05:34 +0000

We’re obsessed with eating. What we eat, how much of it, when we do it, how we do it, and what it looks like. But this enthrallment with what’s on the plate (or artisan slate board) and in our bodies is making us miserable. With eating disorders at endemic proportions, disordered eating the new norm, and a nationwide ‘war’ on obesity, as a nation we’re confused about food, worried about health, and ultimately, feeling wretched about it all.

Eve Simmons and Laura Dennison set up Not Plant Based to help debunk some of the myths around healthy eating. Both of them have had eating disorders in the past, and they saw the danger of some of the misleading messages that the wellness brigade and healthy eating police were putting out there. Not Plant Based’s mission to help you love food again. The principle is very simple: eat what you like and don’t worry about it.

And that’s also the premise behind their new book How to Feel the Fear and Eat It Anyway. Each chapter focuses on an area of food and health where myths prevail and common sense needs to be brought to the fore, such as sugar, exercise, and fat. Alongside the no nonsense presentation of the evidence and personal stories are recipes thrown from the likes of Ruby Tandoh, The Angry Chef, The Hairy Bikers, and Angela Hartnett.

It’s a joy to read, especially when we’re faced with so much sadness and shame around food. Taking as its standpoint the enjoyment of food, it offers a bright and radical (it shouldn’t be radical, but it feels it) approach to fuelling our bodies and feeling great about it. Letting go of the hangups around food won’t be easy, but if it lets you live life to the full, it’s totally worth it.

Published on 17 Jan 2019 by Mitchell Beazley.

Compassionate Living

admin — Fri, 12 May 2017 08:29:38 +0000

Read all about Compassionate Living at Barefoot Vegan.

Grandma vs Food Rules

admin — Thu, 30 Jul 2015 18:58:00 +0000

Sometimes I tie myself up in knots thinking about the different food rules out there. A basic need has become pretty confusing. With magazines, bloggers, public policy and organisations all espousing to us what we should and should not be eating it can be difficult to follow the body and eat a diet that works for you. Added to the bombardment of information is the bombardment of emotion. The messengers may claim to be educating us for health and environmental reasons, but there’s a substantial amount of judgement in there too, as though by ‘eating clean’ the soul is purified, or moral fibre is in inverse proportion to food miles or the price paid at a farmer’s market.
It’s in times like this that I need someone to guide me. Ideally that would be my inner self and intuition, but for now, let’s look to grandparents.
Obviously age and generation varies, but as a broad sweep, let’s say that grandparents tend to be old, and their experiences of starting out building a family being around the 1940s onwards, living through rationing, a war, economic depression and changing norms.
Where we have analysed and dissected every diet, chewed over food choices, seen a meal as a philosophical and emotional representation of character, and concocted recipes for wellbeing which say more about the author’s judgement than the consumer’s health, people of a certain generation simply got on with things. But, their attitude may well have been the precursor to some of our own modern food fads. In fact, granny has been doing it all along.
Vegetarianism
Vegetarianism isn’t a fad, but it was less common once. Arguments for vegetarianism vary, but it can be generally held that we are eating too much meat, both for our own physical health and the ecological balance of the world, and should cut down. With meat rations being a measly 8oz per week (around 2 chicken breasts), and prices of meat being much higher than vegetables for much of our lifetimes, whilst our grandparents generation may have eyed up fully fledged vegans and vegetarians with suspicion they would have been in agreement that meat should be saved for only a few times a week.

The ‘Plate’
The ‘plate’ refers to the ‘revolutionary’ new concept of portioning your food. Basically, a balanced meal consists of a third protein, a third carbohydrate and third vegetables. Adults of a certain generation cannot fathom a meal which does not consist of meat, potatoes and vegetables (and in my father’s case, gravy). A square meal may sound quaint and boring, but it’s balanced and healthy.
Organic
Got a garden? Grow some vegetables. Of course your carrots are organic if they have been pulled from the soil with your own hands. Organic means living, which all fruit and vegetables are. Similarly even the fruit and vegetables you don’t grow. Produced by local farmers and bought at the market, there was a tacit trust and relationship which extended to knowing what was on your potato. Usually just mud.

Food miles
The butter? 8 miles up the road, Blackwell farm. Turnips? 300 yards along, the neighbour’s back yard. Eggs? 15 yards, Penny the hen in the garden. If things were not grown locally you were unlikely to get them. When a banana cost £5 (in July 1943, actor Derrick de Marney auctioned off a single banana which fetched £5) and oranges were the stuff of dreams, there was little thought of importing and exporting fresh goods. Which is why eating seasonally was the only option.

Clean Eating
Back in the day food resembled food. Not a science experiment. By of being natural, it was clean. Most stuff didn’t come in a packet, and if it did, the ingredients were recognizable and pronounceable.

Eating seasonally
The cost and time of importing goods from abroad made it prohibitive, especially when such delicious produce grows on our fair isles anyway. Spring was for rhubarb, summer for strawberries, blackberries could be found in autumn and the hardy turnips were winter vegetables. And mangos…never.
Food waste
Take a roast dinner. Potatoes and vegetables are peeled. Peelings go into the compost to help new vegetables grow. The vegetables are boiled, and the water, containing any leaked nutrients, used to make the gravy. The meat is roasted, the best cuts served for this meal and the rest saved for tomorrow. The juices could be siphoned off and left to set, used as a spread for bread at tea time. Boiled bones made an excellent broth. And as food was at a premium the chances of you having too much on your plate and not being able to finish it were pretty slim. Seven million tons of food are thrown away every year. And as our grandparents would tell us, that’s unnecessary.
First published on Alt Magazine.

The Yoga of Food: Wellness from the Inside Out by Melissa Grabau PhD

admin — Sun, 22 Feb 2015 16:40:00 +0000

For something essential to life, we have a complex relationship with food. So many of us see it as the enemy, fighting against it and our bodies, in a battle that we do not truly understand. New diets, expert rules, nutrition guidelines and celebrity fads have left many of us feeling confused about what to eat, and the only answer is to listen to and work with your own body seems unhelpful. What are our bodies saying, and how can we tune in to understand what they mean?
In The Yoga of Food: Wellness from the Inside Out, a book filled with questions and exercises to prompt self-reflection, Melissa Grabau applies the principles of yoga to the relationship with food. Looking at the self through the different physical, mental and spiritual lenses of yoga, and taking a compassionate approach, she encourages the reader to bring attention to appreciation of the food they eat and the bodies they inhabit, learning more about themselves as they do so,
Much of the work involves investment of time and facing uncomfortable feelings. by slowing down to consider how food is used. For many of us it is more than simply energy, and its entanglement as a tool to bury or deal with emotions has left it in a difficult position in our lives. Yoga and meditation, as a ‘deep affirmation of your interior world’ strengthens the self and enables a slowing down to seek the answers within.
The book does not shy away from explaining how the spiritual principles of yoga apply to our physical person. Grabau encourages perspective of mitri, which means expressing love and kindness to all living beings, moves the personal energy from one of criticism and deprivation to one that is loving and nurturing, and this warmth and compassion for the self is crucial to ‘learning how to eat.’ Rather than fighting against the body or blocking out discomfort, willpower is seen ‘not a practice of restraint, but rather, a practice of expansion and exploration.’ A lovely description of the yogic breath, pranamaya, as the ‘subtle buzz of life that animates you’ acts as powerful reminder of the beauty of life and the role of energy within it – and the role that food and exercise plays.
We might think that we should instinctively know what to eat, and how much of it, but so many of us have lost touch with our basic needs. This book helps carve the space to reassess. Through time and via the navigation of the self in the space created by yoga, meditation and thought, growth and positive adjustments can occur. By literally turning the gaze inwards, and gaining ‘in-sight’ we can embrace possibility and affirm positive changes. Disengaging from the idea that our body and the feelings associated with it are permanent, and noticing the transience of moods and emotions, we become more empowered and cement our responsibility to make change.
‘Food is a lovely feature of life on this planet’ writes Grabau, and this book is a useful guide to how yoga helps us to embrace this and become aligned with our own needs, enjoying the process, harnessing our energy, and seizing the opportunities afforded as a result.
See the original on Om Exchange.

Kickstarter – Recipes for Recovery

admin — Tue, 13 Jan 2015 15:42:00 +0000

Recipes for Recovery
I’m producing a small recipe book to raise money for BEAT, the UK’s leading charity for support for recovery from eating disorders. Conversations and experiences with therapists, professionals and those suffering and recovering from the illnesses, have taught me that learning to love and connect with food again is a huge step on the path to a normal relationship with food.
I am therefore asking people to share simple, tasty recipes that matter to them. For example, something your grandmother used to make, a dish that reminds you of a holiday, or your default choice for a lazy Sunday evening. Each recipe page will have the ingredients, method, and a short story behind the dish and why the contributor chose it.
BEAT have approved the project. The booklet will be sold for a small donation, and all funds will go to the charity. I’m asking for your support through the recipes you love, the books you buy and the awareness that you are able to raise.
Check out Kickstarter below or get in touch for more information!

Cooking a feast in Chiang Mai

admin — Fri, 27 Dec 2013 04:47:15 +0000

Home is where the hearth is. Just like mum used to make. The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. The belly rules the mind. Tell me what you eat, I’ll tell you who you are. Ask not what you can do for your country; ask what’s for lunch.
Food is far more than sustenance clearly. An emotional resonance, a spotlight on personality, a window to a way of life, a social tool – food’s importance in our lives is paramount and challenged by very few things. What better way then to discover a new country than via its stomach?
There can be few things more thrilling than discovering a delightful new cuisine when venturing abroad. It’s not only the food but what it reveals about a country. The street food culture in so many countries is exciting and inviting, and one of the best ways to really immerse yourself in the epicurean environment and social sense. Avoiding chain restaurants and glitzy hotels is something most travelers seeking authentic meals and an sensation do anyway.
But the best way to truly learn the importance and significance of food to a country, and immerse yourself in it is by whipping up the dishes yourself. It’s not easy though. Local markets are buzzing with different foods, fresh aromas, varieties and variations previously unknown. But what do you do with them? The chef creating your dinner may do it with ease and grace, but how easily can you do the same without ending up whisked into a frenzy?
A cooking class can be a great way to discover and really engage with what goes on the plate. Enamored by the meals I have been consuming and keen to liven up the rice at home, I undertook a cookery class in Chiang Mai. There are a number of schools in Thailand offering 5 or so hour courses in which visitors purchase ingredients from the local market, and cook up a feast with them, creating traditional Thai dishes with the family twist of the teacher. Ann, who runs the Zabbelee Cooking School (meaning delicious in Thai) aims to deliver healthy dishes like her mum made, full of flavour, and taught with fun. So a sunny morning, and three of us gather together to undertake the class.
You can’t build a house without bricks, and you can’t cook good food without fresh ingredients. Song Thep market in the east wall of the city is our starting point. She smiles at our bewildered faces by the stalls as she picks up a small green marble sized vegetable, and calls it an eggplant. As far from the large purple fruits I know as it is possible to be, it’s just one of many signs of the differences that abound not only by culture but nature. I learn that glass noodles are made of mung beans (read super healthy) and the yellow noodles are egg (unsuitable for vegans). Lemongrass should be removed, not stoically chewed as I have been doing, and kaffir lime leaves are ludicrously cheap here. It’s all fascinating stuff, the frantic pace of the buying and selling adding a frisson to what would be mundane in the average supermarket, and leaves me dying to get my wok on.

Back in Ann’s garden kitchen we get chopping. With five dishes to make this morning, it’s busy and bubbling, the learning curve steep, and tasty. Less than a dab hand with the knife and the chopping board, I learn not only what to put together but the best way to do so. Each plate of ingredients contains the substance and the flavour, one enhancing and enlivening the other.

The aroma of lemongrass and tamarind is more than alluring, and there is something tantalizing about getting hands on and moulding rice paper around lush green vegetable, or spooning smooth fish into the banyan leaf baskets I have just clipped together. I’m struck by how vibrant the ingredients are. Even when not strictly necessary for flavour, like the traffic stopping chili or monk robe hued turmeric, Ann chucks in some carrot or basil for colour. It’s a truly multi sensory experience, taste, smell and sight are all challenged and illuminated, the sound of the sizzle and the delicate chop, and the feel of the food all combining.

Thai food cooks fast. A hot wok and small pieces (necessary when eating with chopsticks) means that the process is swift, the food piping hot, and the flavours immediate.
Cooking is hungry work, and so we sample and stop as we go. But five meals before lunch time (after breakfast) is too much for me, and so I parcel it up for a picnic. I am laden with Stuffed Cabbage Soup, Red Curry Paste, Spring Rolls, Steamed Coconut Fish Curry and Chicken and Cashew Nut Stir Fry. I feel full. My recipe book in my pocket, I go to lay down into a food stupor.
Technically, we all know how to cook. We’ve fed ourselves for this long. In the global world it’s not often though that we munch on truly local food created not for sale but sample, not for mass production but mass enjoyment. Learning how to cook is more than an education, it’s an experience. A feeling. And the food tastes all the better for it.

It's All Happening! festival – Alessi's Ark!

admin — Sat, 14 Apr 2012 21:19:11 +0000

The very first It’s All Happening festival! A day of folk music, acoustic indie, original art, craft, spoken word, performance poetry and film – in short our favourite things. Taking place at the Gallery Cafe in Bethnal Green, on June 23rd, from 1pm til late, tickets are available now!
We’re thrilled that the lovely Alessi’s Ark will be headlining – the first of a run of festival performances for the charming folk singer.
Alongside the mix of solo artists strumming in the garden, bands captivating the cafe throughout the day and evening, and entertaining and enrapturing spoken word in the chapel, will be a craft market, delicious array of food and drink, a photography and art exhibition, and tunes to get you in the mood to dance til dawn. (Although not with It’s All Happening necessarily – cafe curfew!).
Anja McCloskey, Soulmates Never Die, Fallingham Fair and The Cooling Pearls will all be playing, alongside The Ruby Kid and Joshua Seigal, and acoustic artists Thom Byles and Larissa.
For any more information, please get in touch.

Brain Box! Some helpful alternatives.

admin — Sun, 09 Oct 2011 19:34:05 +0000

Holland & Barrett, probably in an effort to reward my loyalty (their share of my spend makes other retailers envious) recently landed a Brain Box through my door. Well aware that it is harder for us to get up and running in the gloomy winter months than the vibrant summer days, this is a package of foods, drinks and supplements designed to boost brain power.
You’ll be pleased to know that you can be sure that this review is objective. When PR company Perishables and damageables delivered by post they run the risk that their new product will arrive not showcased in the best light, and such was the case of my Crips, an ‘oven baked wheat and potato snack.’ Therefore to trial said crisps, I had to go and purchase a pack myself, and I don’t loquaciously elaborate where my hard earned cash is earned. You want to know the price of journalistic integrity? 70p. More like crackers than regular crisps, these Crips are far more satisfying than the usual insubstantial light options offered. The price means they are not competitive to the normal bag of crisps to have in a lunchbox, but for a snack on the run, I’ll be back.
I like fruit. A lot. Five a day? Pah, give me a real challenge. As such I generally have little time for the novelty new products that claim to make it easier for us to consume those essential vitamins and minerals, and in this hand holding also take us back a few years, generally resembling the consistency of baby food. But Be Fruity Fruit Bars are good. With more of a bite than most pureed bars and a range of flavours means that they add something above the usual raisin options. ( I can’t eat raisins or sultanas and therefore seen to be excluded from apples, fruit, nuts, muesli, cereal products. Anyone know of any?) Not too sticky, not too sweet, and surprisingly substantial – they managed to survive a festival and flight to New York. At only 55p, they’re pretty purse friendly too.
Speaking of New York and festivals I am in the enviable position of exhaustion from too many holidays and too much partying, and as such the supply of Gingko Biloba (£5.39 for 60) that landed on my desk could not have come at a better time. At the moment I haven’t noticed a huge jump in my mental alertness, but give me sixty days and the Times crossword will be no match for my mental agility.
I can’t really review Walnuts, they are what they are, and can only reinforce countless pieces of information from doctors, nutritionists and health experts, in that they are an excellent source of protein, vitamin B and do boost energy. Plus they’re yummy. If you want to get them from Holland & Barrett, they’re £1.89 for 100g, which I guess is about standard.
To wash it all down is the new EQ8, a lightly fizzy drink that contains fruit sugars, ginseng. guarana and L-cartinine. Based on fruit juices, the Orange & Passion Fruit flavour was a good mid morning lift, and as a far more natural lift than Red Bull, I’m hoping the Cranberry & Apple tastes just as good with vodka. Although for £1.49, I could probably double up.
So now Autumn is officially here, and my brain needs a hand, I know where to shop for those wiiiiiings…