eaeting disordered women

For those who have a family member with an eating disorder you know that just talking about ‘thee’ eating disorder can be challenging. Never the less, trying to purchase a gift for someone in recovery can be a tight rope of difficulty. Therefore your favorite eating disorder recovery blog is here to help!

While working as Support Staff I found it inspiring how many women wanted to wear T-Shirts, bracelet’s and even get tatoos’s symbolizing their eating disorder recovery. The very disease that they once hid under lock, key and piles of lies was now a badge of honor to share their own struggle and hope with others. What better way to celebrate that honor than to give a gift that ‘gives back to eating disorder recovery’?!?!

I have compiled a list of some very artsy, cool and legit products that either a.) Stand for eating disorder recover and/ or b.) Donate a portion of the proceeds of the gift to eating disorder prevention or recovery. Check out the goods here!

Happy Recovery (and Holiday Shopping!)

Irvina 

Let Them Eat Cake Tee

This top is part of the My Body ROCKS Collection.
$5 is donated to benefit eating disorder awareness.

Rewrite Beautiful T-Shirt 

This is one very sweet T-Shirt for eating disorder prevention! For one thing, It's a reversible image that the person wearing can see when looking in the mirror. The words 'Rewrite Beautiful' are across the front reminding the person wearing it that it is up to each and everyone of us to 'Rewrite' what we call 'Beautiful'. American Apparel, gray T-Shirt benefits eating disorder prevention through Street Art Workshops held by the non-profit Rewrite Beautiful.

Dragon Fly Necklace

Dragonflies symbolize strength, courage, happiness and moving past self-created illusions and so much more! If you would like to honor someone you know that battles a disease/disorder or would like to display a beautiful, meaningful and yet discreet badge of your courage and strength, this necklace is for you! Because this Necklace features a Dragonfly, 10% of the purchase price will be donated to NEDA to support and honor Eating Disorder Recovery and Awareness.

Dragonfly Bracelet

This is a hemp macrame bracelet made to show awareness of eating disorders. Whether you are suffering, recovering, recovered or know someone who has, this is a great piece for you. It is made from hemp string and decorated with a metal dragonfly charm and purple and red glass beads. Red symbolizes anorexia and purple symbolizes bulimia. The dragonfly represents both. 

 Anorexia + Bulimia Bracelet

Our blue awareness bracelet features 3 brilliant strands of bright blue lapis lazuli, freshwater pearls, and silver plated beads. Bracelet measures approx 7" and has an adjustable clasp. Silver plated awareness charm measures 1/2" from top to bottom. 

Believe Bracelet

Our blue awareness bracelet features a caged 6mm cobalt blue fiber optic cat's eye bead and silver plated charm (measures 12x23mm). The charm is stamped with your choice of 'Hope', 'Faith', or 'Believe' on both sides. Silver plated double link chain, each link is 9x6mm. Adjustable clasp (silver lobster claw) can extend bracelet to 8". Please specify which charm you would like at checkout, 'Hope', 'Faith', or 'Believe'.

 Lip Conditioner

I was approached by an amazing, smart, kind, beautiful girl named Nikki to create a lip conditioner inspired by a very serious epidemic that she is facing. The complete story & idea was written & inspired by Nikki & her loving dog named Javo (they are in the artwork). Please, see below... 'Princess Nikki & Her Hero Javo the Dog'

Once upon a time there was a beautiful princess who could only see ugliness and fat when she looked in the mirror even though she was thin. She would lock herself in the highest castle tower and obsess over how thick every part of her body was. She would cry every night. Then one day, a stray dog came to the tower base and whined and whined until she came down. The dog gave her big sloppy kisses and told her she was the most beautiful girl in the world and that she should eat because he would be very lonely if she were gone. They became the best of friends, helping each other along in the journey of life and never leaving one another's side. (an edited version of this story appears on the lip conditioner label)

She Decided She was Worth it, Magnet

I can't think of a better lift-yourself-up, confidence-boosting, you-go-girl saying than this one. I want to scream it from the rooftops to myself when I'm feeling crappoo. "You're worth it!" Not worth it like buying a car I can't afford, or spending money on stuff I don't need (ewww, like jewelry?), but worth loving myself. Worth knowing that I'm okay, I'm doing my best and Im' not such a bad person, anyway! That kind of worth it! 

Mosaic Scale

Made to order “Perfect” scale. You pick the colors for glass, bottom and leg finishes. See pictures for option examples from past works. The listing price is the base price. The final price for your special order scale, will depend on the completed mosaic.

 

Rewrite Beautiful Bracelet             

Keep the message going that beauty is found in your actions! Creative + Kind + Strong = Beautiful!                                            

 

 

 

See you in 2012!

One of my favorite stories to tell is one I heard at a 12 Step Meeting of Overeaters Anonymous. A woman who has suffered greatly from Bulimia and Compulsive Overeating made a pact with her daughter-in-law to do everything they could to prevent an Eating Disorder in this woman’s grand daughter, Stella. Eating Disorders are a genetic disorder, like alcoholism they can be passed down from generation to generation. The daughter was on board to prevent Stella from an Eating Disorder; so from the day Stella was born her mother always told her, “Stella you’ve got a great body!” Fast forward and Stella is 5 years old, she is playing with a little boy in her neighborhood. The boy tells her, “Stella you’re ugly! You need some makeup!” Stella response was priceless… she said, “First of all, I’m very pretty. Second of all I’VE GOT A GREAT BODY!”

Can you imagine? A 5 year old sticking up for herself? Not doubting her physical worth? I think it’s partly an amazing story because you just don’t hear stories like this. It’s more common to hear stories about little girls coming home in tears that someone called them fat. What was it that happened for Stella that this little boy couldn’t shake her up? Why was she so strong and sturdy in her self worth?  I believe it’s because she was repeatedly fed confidence and strength in exactly who she is each and every day for the past 1825 days of her life.

So what are the rest of the little girls in our society feasting on? Well we have anorexic Barbie’s, glossy celebrity magazines and Disney films with ONE princess and coincidentally no mommy. This void of mommy’s in Disney movies only became apparent to me recently. But if you think about it, Cinderella’s mother was dead, Jasmine’s mother was dead, The Little Mermaids mother was dead, Belle’s mother was dead, Snow White’s mother was dead and  Sleeping Beauty’s mother sent her to the forest with some granny fairies. So the message we get from these stories absent of a mother is that in order to be a shiny beautiful princess you have to figure out the lessons of life on your own with your colorful animal friends.

But, does that work in real life? No.

So where did all the mommy’s go? Apparently here they are dead. That’s one thing, but what about the rest of the mommies on this earth who have daughters with Eating Disorders where are they? Are they telling their daughter that she is beautiful in body, mind and spirit? That she deserves to be respected and valued for simply existing, outside of her good looks and good grades? I’m not sure they are because we have 7 million women in America with Eating Disorders. Yes, Eating Disorders are genetic, but they are also somewhat preventable. Preventable by you and me.

I would like to request a “Resurrection of the mommies!” If you are a woman in any young girls life, whether you be a sister, aunt, nanny, teacher, soccer coach or dance instructor it’s your job to tell the little princesses in your life, “I think you are a beautiful, strong and amazing young woman. You have a great body and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise!”

Society can be messed up and it can create messed up kids. But as human beings we have a choice on which way we choose to go. WE can either build strong women like Stella or create juvenile princesses with no purpose but entertainment value. The choice is all of ours.

The article discusses the misunderstanding that Eating Disorders root from the media images of emaciated models. R.A. Botta, who is the writer of the 1999 study, “Television Images and Adolescent Girls’ Body Image Disturbance” states that the media doesn’t make one Anorexic. Anorexia is a psychological disorder that is found to be a genetic disposition from birth.

The reason I bring this up is I think it’s quite poignant that my friend and others would be surprised to hear that Anorexia and other Eating Disorders are not rooted from our medias expectations on the human figure, but really are psychological. What bothers me is that I have found people outside of the Eating Disorder field to refer to Eating Disorders as a “phase” or “vanity” and “self absorption.” Those statements themselves are myths.

Eating Disorder Myths

Eating Disorders are intricate and deep rooted Psychological disorders. Anyone who has worked in the field or has experienced an Eating Disorder themselves can attest to that.

I think the best way to describe it is the difference between an Anorexic and woman who diets is that the Anorexic has no threshold with dieting and starving. Women who are not Anorexic will diet, but then get hungry, blow their diet and just eat. An anorexic will keep going even after she is told how ill she is, how brittle her bones are and how close she is to a heart attack….she has no self-preservation...which makes it a mental illness.

I remember this study that polled 10,000 women about body image and dieting. They asked the women "If I gave you a pill that guaranteed you would be skinny, but taking the pill had a side affect of you possibly dying would you take it?"...10% of those women said, "Yes." That 10% is the group of Anorexics/Bulimic/Eating Disordered women. Willing to die to be thin is an illness.

If you still aren’t convinced take a read at the article from DicoveryNews.com yourself by clicking here. Education is the key to destroying these myths that block the women who are truly sick with this disease from getting help while they wait for this “phase” to pass and end up dying. Blog soon! Irvina