Part 2 - another EXCERPT from Debra Mazda's book ”EATING MY SECRETS” due out in Fall 2012.

From as far back as I can remember my mother never asked me about what I ate despite the fact that my weight was escalating before her eyes. She never asked me where all the food had gone, never. This has always amazed me because when I do health/fitness coaching with women most of them tell me at some point their mother’s confronted them about their eating. Mine was just the opposite, she totally ignored this problem altogether. There would be bowls of candy around at any given time in my childhood. I can see the bowls as I write this. Every time I turned M&M’s, Reeses peanut butter cups and peanut chews were staring at me. When the candy was gone she would just fill the bowl up again.

Today, I realize that she was unconsciously sabotaging me and did not care enough about me to address this. If she wanted to be fat, then let her be fat and leave me alone! However, on her behalf I am not sure she knew how to address my life as she had her own issues to deal with that I was very unaware of at that time, even though at family dinners I ate as much as I wanted and the silence from my mother was putting me at a higher risk for the emotional death I would suffer in future years. My mother was gorgeous and always kept her weight down but she had a fat daughter. While she never came out and said she felt embarrassed, there were many times she made comments about my body and what I wore, but never about what I ate despite being enormous by age 10. It was never an issue.

Debra Mazda, Excerpt from “EATING MY SECRETS” due out Fall 2012

The Missing Link --- EXCERPT from ''EATING MY SECRETS" due out in Fall 2012.

We are a country obsessed with weight. We can't stop talking about it. "Carbs are making us fat. "Soda is making us fat. "Video games are making us fat. Oprah is losing weight, Oprah is gaining weight. The government has declared a war on obesity. The more we talk about it, the fatter we are becoming. But maybe part of the reason that we are losing the battle against obesity is because we have not adequately acknowledged the significance of trauma as a root cause of obesity. Largely missing from our public debate has been the recognition that trauma,  in particular sexual abuse and its after effects including anxiety, depression and other symptoms of POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER drive compulsive eating for millions of people. What we are learning from the fields of neuroscience, psychology, bariatric and social science is that the damage inflicted by trauma not only results in addictive eating but becomes part of a cycle that makes it nearly impossible for many survivors to lose weight and keep it off. 

EXCERPT from ''EATING MY SECRETS" due out in Fall 2012.