Posted: 13 Mar 2011 01:56 AM PST
When I was a little girl, while the other girls were playing with dolls and taking ballet classes, I was asking my mother to go grocery shopping so I could walk through the aisles looking at all the beautiful fruits and vegetables, the fresh baked breads and cookies, assorted cheeses, cereals, beverages and snacks.
I loved getting the Sunday paper and looking at the grocery store circulars to see what was on sale that week. I loved learning about how food worked in the body. I would ask my mother to buy me books about the human body so I could learn about the parts of the gastrointestinal tract. You could say I was passionate, maybe even obsessed with food and nutrition at an early age.
Then, during my early years of high school, all the positive passion I had about food and the human body changed for the worse. I developed a terrible eating disorder at age 15 and began to turn all the obsessions with food against myself. I began a 10-year battle with food and myself. I engaged in unhealthy, life-threatening eating and exercise behaviors that consumed every waking moment of every day of my life.
I convinced myself that enjoying food was wrong and I was a bad person to be excited about eating.
Slowly, I got better. I received psychological counseling and learned how to have a healthy relationship with food, my body, myself and the world in which I lived. I worked at every meal of every day to fuel my body and not to use unhealthy eating and exercise behaviors as a coping mechanism to feel better. I fought back and regained my healthy obsession with food. I went to the grocery store and bought those wonderful foods I loved so much. I began enjoying foods with breathtaking colors and flavors and textures. I relearned all the ways food benefited my body and helped fuel me and give me energy. I regained the deep appreciation I had previously had for feeling physically and psychologically strong.
All during the years I was sick and then in recovery, I studied nutrition in college and graduate school. I attended Rutgers University and received a bachelor of science degree in human nutrition and foods and then I got a master's of science degree in nutrition and physical fitness at New York University. Shortly after graduating, I turned my healthy food obsession into a career devoted to helping people challenge their unhealthy beliefs about food and their bodies.
I created the BeginWithin Center in Red Bank, where I specialize in the treatment of eating disorders (anorexia, bulimia and binge-eating disorder) and disordered eating as well as pediatric, adolescent and adult weight management. I teach my clients how to put structure and sanity back into their eating habits and regain a healthy perspective on what normal eating is. I help them see the connections that exist between their emotions and their eating. I explain to them that to be healthy in mind and body, they must possess a kinder view of themselves.
I treat women and men with eating disorders ranging in age from 5 to 75, from as far away as Atlantic City, Pennsylvania and upstate New York. When the college students I treat go away to college and need additional support, I have phone, e-mail or Skype sessions with them to help them in tough times. I do therapeutic lunch sessions, home sessions and grocery store sessions. I offer a free support group for those in recovery from anorexia and bulimia.
In my center, there are also several therapists and nutritionists who treat clients with eating disorders and with other medical and psychological issues. In addition to my practice, I teach nutrition and health at Monmouth University and I speak at middle schools and high schools on the topics of healthy eating, body image and eating disorders prevention and awareness. I am also almost finished writing a book on adult women with lifelong eating issues and I write a blog on health and wellness, especially focused on eating disorders.
I try to practice what I preach in my own life. In my home, we don't emphasize weight and size. We appreciate each other for our diversity and do not allow the word "diet" to be used. I have a plethora of food in my house so that there are plenty of choices for all.
So yes, I am obsessed with food, nutrition and helping people in their recovery. I am ultimately grateful for suffering from the disease because it gave me the insight and compassion I needed to help others.
