“I chose a craft not made in my image”
“ I chose a craft not made in my image”
She said this as her mantra when speaking of her muscular, melanin rich body and the craft of ballet. I love watching dancers. They can use their body to convey meaning to their audience. I especially loved this Hot Chocolate Nutcracker special on Netflix because it was full of diverse body shapes and colors engaging in joyful movement.
Like this dancer, I feel my body was not made in the image of my craft. When I first entered into dietetics I was in the throes of anorexia and excessive exercise addiction so I appeared the part. The field is full of thin, white, females and I blended in perfectly. My disordered eating and movement behaviors were defense strategies to wounds, deep emotional, developmental wounds. How many of us in the system of healthcare have these wounds? How many have not come into contact with another way to cope? Does the system seem to attract these professionals?
In 2017, published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, researchers surveyed 2,500 registered dietitians for signs of an eating disorder and/or orthorexia nervosa. After analysis “ 49.5% were at risk for ON, and scores on the EDE-Q suggested 12.9% were at risk for an ED, with 8.2% of RDNs self-disclosing treatment for an ED. Both the group disclosing ED treatment and the group at risk for ON had a lower mean body mass index, lower scores on the ORTO-15, and higher scores on the EDE-Q and all its subscales than the comparison group.” The more scary part of this story is that educated, nutrition professionals throughout the world also scored close to the US group, showing a systemic issue with how RD’s approach their personal relationship with food and body. These studies exposed the strategies that many of us share…Personal Trainers, Physical Therapists, Doctors, Nurses, Therapists may all share defense strategies aligned with disordered eating and body image. Society glorifies these behaviors and they become the experts at their own strategies, like a band aid to a wound that needs air.
As I was chatting with my colleague,Tracy Brown RD, she pointed out that many of us have defense strategies that are disordered behaviors around food and body. If we do not work on these behaviors then we are not able to come in contact with the “trust model” that we need with the language of our body. The trust model also speaks to a more intimate, connected, compassionate relationship with our body and the providers who support us in caring for it. Most caregivers get less than 15 minutes to assess and give an intervention for an issue that a patient might present with so how is the healthcare system supporting a trust model?
The intersection of both an individual issue and a systemic issue show that my chosen craft needs more caregivers just like me, comfortable in their fatness and knowledgeable about how to support others in gaining more trust around the language of their body.
Tremelling K, Sandon L, Vega GL, McAdams CJ. Orthorexia Nervosa and Eating Disorder Symptoms in Registered Dietitian Nutritionists in the United States. J Acad Nutr Diet. 2017 Oct;117(10):1612-1617. doi: 10.1016/j.jand.2017.05.001. Epub 2017 Jun 15. PMID: 28624376; PMCID: PMC5623148.
Tracy Brown https://www.tracybrownrd.com/
