Going to Food Is Not Your Default

Feeling blue? Eat comfort food. Want to celebrate? Eat chocolate. Sexually frustrated? Eat ice cream. Stressed out? Eat anything in sight. As one woman recently asked, “What do you do when you have all these feelings if you can’t eat?” For many women, turning to food...

The Judgments of Summer

The class reunions, the family reunions, the vacation at the beach, the afternoons at the neighborhood pool – and all those judgments you’re imagining are taking place in the heads of onlookers or in their conversations behind your back! “Wow, she’s really gained...

Do You Just Need to “Get Right with God”?

In the face of some troubling coping behaviors, a friend recently told me, “I need to get right with God again.” I winced because I knew such a statement came from pain and shame. I also knew it came from a misunderstanding of justification versus sanctification....

Self Punishment and Overeating

A friend emailed me today about something she’d done that resulted in her feeling as though she needed to binge-eat and “beat myself up and be mean to myself.” She was ashamed that she’d communicated in anger and said things she felt were more than the other person...

Living in Light of Your “Audience of One”

Many women are extremely concerned with—even panicked by—the negative judgments they perceive are directed their way by what I think of as two overlapping categories of people: the people whose opinions do not matter and the people whose opinions are wrong. The people...