TRALEE PEARCE

Globe and Mail Blog

Posted on Thursday, March 22, 2012 8:50PM EDT

A curvy, glowing Jennifer Lopez may be peering out from the cover of the new April edition of Vogue’s annual Shape issue. But it’s a hauntingly cute 8-year-old inside who may end up getting more attention.

At the age of seven, Bea’s mother, Dara-Lynn Weiss put her on a strict diet after her doctor said she was clinically obese. Then, Ms. Weiss decided to write about it for Vogue readers.

In one episode, Ms. Weiss dresses down a Starbucks barista for not being able to clarify the number of calories in a child’s hot chocolate (it was listed at 120-210).

“Well, which is it? When he couldn’t provide an answer, I dramatically grabbed the drink out of my daughter’s hands, poured it into the garbage and stormed out.”

Ms. Weiss is also very upfront about her own eating and body image issues, which she said started in her youth: “…I hated how my body looked and devoted an inordinate amount of time to trying to change it.”

(The article is not available online.)

Ms. Weiss details her history of using Weight Watchers, Atkins and a series of other slimming techniques, including laxatives and FDA-banned appetite suppressants.

“I have not ingested any food, looked at a restaurant menu, or been sick to the point of vomiting without silently launching a complicated mental algorithm about how it will affect my weight,” she writes. “…Who was I to teach a little girl how to maintain a health weight and body image?”

Critics are beginning to line up to tell Ms. Weiss that she was, indeed, not the person for the job, even though she managed to help her daughter lose 16 pounds in a year.

Jezebel blogger Katie J.M. Baker contacted the doctor whose children’s weight-loss method, Red-Light, Green-Light, Eat Right, Ms. Weiss started with, before veering in another direction.

Joanna Dolgoff “wasn’t thrilled” by the article, Ms. Baker writes.

“The program has to be run by the child,” Dr. Dolgoff told Ms. Baker, “and the truth is that making a child feel bad only causes problems. It’s not going to help with weight loss, and it’s definitely not going to help the child emotionally.”

Other observers are using the piece as a positive tool to talk about how to put your child on a diet.

Beyond the legacy of having been written about in Vogue magazine, does this kind of severe dieting under the watchful eye of a weight-obsessed mother set a girl for long-term issues?

TRALEE PEARCE
Globe and Mail Blog
Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2012 9:19AM EDT

The Internet has long been a boon to women with eating disorders looking not for help, but for “pro-anorexic” encouragement to get or stay thin.

Now, Pinterest, the new social media site devoted to the sharing of images, appears to be the next platform for the worrying trend. Some members devote their pages to images of skinny women with jutting hipbones, hectoring diet mantras and more than a hint of self-harm.

One code-word to watch for is “thinspo,” an abbreviation of “thinsporation” according to the Urban Dictionary.

Amid posts of very skinny women are admonishments like “Because when you cheat the only person that loses is you,” which may sound as innocuous as a Weight Watchers slogan, but it’s paired with a despairing (and thin) young women, head in hands, sitting next to empty junk food packages.

While there are occasional disapproving comments from pinners’ friends, many posts appear to be strictly aspirational.

According to The Atlantic’s Rebecca Greenfield, this glorification of dieting and eating disorders has infiltrated Pinterest after being the target of a crackdown on Tumblr.

“The ‘Tumblrization of Pinterest’ is now complete, with ‘thinspo’ bloggers setting up camp on the site, as we suspected they might after Tumblr announced its crackdown on these sorts of self-harm blogs,” she writes. “…This stuff has existed since the dawn of the Internet. And, with Pinterest working a lot like Tumblr, it’s no surprise the movement has begun to populate this up-and-arrived social network. The only mystery here is, how will Pinterest deal with it?”

Ms. Greenfield says “Pinterest does not appear to have guidelines to deal with this burgeoning issue.”

Tumblr only instituted its policy a few weeks ago, she says. The policy, in part: “Don’t post content that actively promotes or glorifies self-harm. This includes content that urges or encourages readers to cut or injure themselves; embrace anorexia, bulimia, or other eating disorders; or commit suicide rather than, e.g., seeking counselling or treatment, or joining together in supportive conversation with those suffering or recovering from depression or other conditions,” she reports, adding that she is waiting for a response from Pinterest.

Does the glorification of ultra-skinny role models pose a particular threat to the physical and mental health of young girls and women? When does the inspirational photo pinned to the fridge of a dieter cross the line?

There is a rabid “revolutionary” epidemic infecting the social media sector of the internet these days, to which, I have no doubt, many – if not all – of you have encountered; Kony 2012. In the course of 48 hours, the American based charity Invisible Children succeeded in causing mass hysteria with their video, which outlines (or rather, attempts to) the plight of Ugandan society. As I sat at my computer, guilty of hitting play on the viral video, situating my mind to absorb the forthcoming 30 minute exposure to a brutality that many of us in the, how does mainstream cultural reference it now, oh yes, “First World Problem” sector, have never known. I saw a face to a familiar name pop up, that of Joseph Kony; the murderous / rapist / sex slavery rebellious leader of the LRA ( Lords Resistance Army.) I fell in line with the rest of the 14 million plus viewers who took in this small documentary in the course of 48 hours; I was angry. I was pumped. Fuck yeah. Let’s get this bastard. Let’s revolt. Let’s string him up for the crimes to which he has forced in barbaric fashion onto unwilling victims for over two decades. Let’s make this man suffer. He is sick. He is evil. He is the devil residing deep in the bowels of the African heartland…

KONY 2012 from INVISIBLE CHILDREN on Vimeo.

Then I stopped and wondered; what the fuck? Why am I getting so enraged over a topic to which I have known about, read about, and been an active protester within for many years? This story isn’t news to me, and while this snippet may chime as an arrogant rant from a know-it-all-snob, I don’t bow down in saying that yes, if you’re hearing about Joseph Kony for the first time because of this video, then media and mainstream information has failed. Drastically. But then again, how hard have you, have all of us looked to educate ourselves on global events? How hard have we dedicated ourselves to being apart of a global community outside of Facebook? Outside of Twitter, of Youtube, of Yahoo and Google? How many of us have taken our thought provoking brains to digress outside the realms of Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, to wade outside the cultural norms and wade deep into the unknown seas of reality? For that matter; how many of us are actively being a protestor, advocate, or volunteer within our local communities? How many of us are taking notice of provincial, state, national atrocities which are occurring in our own backyards? Oh, that’s right, to concentrate on local inhumanness is to become consumed with those “First World Problems”. How dare we even consider that…

Back to the Kony 2012 debate. Now, while I am fully for the arrest and trial (not blatant murder and execution) of Joseph Kony, I am very much against falling in line with a fashionable protest built by three American men, who, admit, that most of the funding (amassed through donations) does not go back to the charity. And I am not the only one who is choosing to be an independent and disengaged from a trendy take down of the most prolific warlord on the global front today.

From The Globe And Mail article titled Invisible Children and its Kony 2012 Campaign In The Spotlight:

“But the wild success of the campaign has provoked an angry backlash on social media sites and from many Africans, and from scholars who study Africa. They say the campaign is simplistic and manipulative, with deceptive claims, murky finances and a questionable strategy. The U.S. activists are “selling a pack of lies to unaware youth to raise money for themselves,” said Ugandan blogger TMS Ruge in one of a series of critical tweets.

Not a single African is a member of the executive staff or the board of directors of Invisible Children, he noted. Instead, he said, Africans have been relegated to a “sideshow” without a voice in their own story. “Stop treating us like children,” he said. “I refuse to let my voice stay silent as one more NGO continues to perpetuate an expired single story of us.”
Another Ugandan writer, Rosebell Kagumire, said the video campaign “sensationalizes” the issue and makes it all about “America saving us.”

An excerpt from the blog Foreign Policy, award-winning Ugandan journalist Angelo Izama states:

“To call the campaign a misrepresentation is an understatement. While it draws attention to the fact that Kony, indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court in 2005, is still on the loose, its portrayal of his alleged crimes in Northern Uganda are from a bygone era. At the height of the war between especially 1999 and 2004, large hordes of children took refuge on the streets of Gulu town to escape the horrors of abduction and brutal conscription to the ranks of the LRA. Today most of these children are semi-adults. Many are still on the streets unemployed. Gulu has the highest numbers of child prostitutes in Uganda. It also has one of the highest rates of HIV/AIDS and Hepatitis.

If six years ago children in Uganda would have feared the hell of being part of the LRA, a well documented reality already, today the real invisible children are those suffering from ”Nodding Disease”. Over 4000 children are victims of this incurable debilitating condition. It’s a neurological disease that has baffled world scientists and attacks mainly children from the most war affected districts of Kitgum, Pader and Gulu.”

So, then, where does an eating disorder advocate come into play on this whole issue? It’s actually in a rather roundabout way, brought to light by this “revolution”. As I promoted my take on the Kony 2012 epidemic on the platform of Facebook yesterday, I quickly came to be the outlet for others frustrations, opinions, and lack luster argumentative blabber. Which is fine, to each their own, we are all entitled to share our opinions, thoughts, and ideas. However, condemning the work I do in the ED community, stating I am a “lazy bitch” who sits at my computer all day “picking apart the positive movements by people in the world, not helping anyone” is rather obnoxious. Then there were the emails that went into more depth, stating (and how they drew these conclusions, are rather hilarious in a brutal candor, is beyond me) that I was the following, for opposing this “positive movement of change”: slut, whore, bitch, fat-cunt, ugly privileged white woman, stupid idiot, hating hipster, self-aggrandizing moron, and the list goes on. Well. Good to know that those out there advocating for the execution of Joseph Kony are open to respectful debate and discussion…how tragic your minds are.

But really what makes me enraged is how closed minded people are in declaring that the EPIDEMIC OF EATING DISORDERS is lumped into this new-age notion of “First World Problems.” It’s disgusting. Vial. Incorrect. Wrong. Horrendous and completely disrespectful to insinuate that those living with, and helping to advocate, educate and irradicate this disorder are simply over privileged North Americans who just like to complain and moan about trivial diet failures…come on. If there has been anything that the Kony 2012 revolution has taught me, it’s that social media has eradicated any hope for individuals to experience, enlighten, and engage themselves in global events, to learn fact from fiction, and to open their minds to the possibility that there is a whole differing story outside the online world of complete celebrity fabrication.

Now, excuse me, I am going to get back to sitting here on my ass, doing nothing. Because hey, that’s what I do here, nothing. My work as an eating disorder advocate, is clearly just one of those dreaded “First World Problems”…

Saw this video up on a friends Facebook page this morning, and I thought I would spread the message. Interested to know what folks thoughts are on this video / reality? I know mine; equality and respect need to a reality now. NO more of this bull shit “positive reinforcement” that a woman is valued for her body, her sex appeal, her willingness to bow down to man. Bah…no thanks.

Miss Representation 8 min. Trailer 8/23/11 from Miss Representation on Vimeo.

Recently I have been asked how one approaches, or address the suspicion that a loved one is suffering from an eating disorder. Too often do I “lecture” the need to advocate education to youth, and the populace in society. But I neglect to view the approach from the eyes of a person who has no direct connection with this illness, as I do. How do you offer help, guidance, when you’re just as lost, confused, scared, nervous, about an illness as the one suspected of being victimized by it?

Being the 29th day of Eating Disorder Awareness Month, I found my morning spent perusing my usual blogs pertaining to ED awareness, and came across a refreshing post by Matt from …Until Eating Disorders Are No More. If you have not explored his blog, I highly recommend doing so. Matt is a wealth of knowledge when it comes to the male perspective of anorexia (having overcome the illness himself), and is an active member of the Eating Disorders Coalition in the US. Today he touched on a wonderful article by Something-Fishy, which outlines helpful tactics to adopt when addressing the topic of eating disorders with loved ones, friends, family, etc. Following in his footsteps today, I too would like to promote this insightful informative write up, in hopes that it may help you in your willingness and want to promote the education of eating disorders. Or to help guide you in the difficult task of offering help to one who is suffering. Below is the article from Something-Fishy.

Approaching Someone You Care About

Here are are some ideas you should take into consideration when approaching a loved one with the possibility they are suffering with an Eating Disorder.

Be gentle and caring, and be prepared to listen without offering mounds of advice. You are not the person’s therapist, nor should you pretend to be. Being a good listener means your ears are open and your mouth is shut, you are not intervening with “yeah, I know what you mean, that happened to me once when….” - just listen. If they then finish and ask what your thoughts or opinions are, be honest and caring.

Don’t make the person feel threatened. It is not your job to dictate what they should and shouldn’t do. If this person has finally decided to talk to you and trust you, cherish it and uphold your role in holding their confidence.

Be encouraging. The recovery road can be a long and uphill battle, with pitfalls and setbacks. Don’t be disappointed or disapproving when a sufferer displays signs of falling back, just encourage them to continue pushing forward. Recovery is not only hard work, but can be very confusing and painful, be sure to remind them that you understand this, and that “you cannot always continue to stride forward without a stumble from time to time. It’s okay.”

Read as much as you can on the topic of Eating Disorders. The more you know, the more equipped you will be to offer a helping hand. Photocopy or print out articles of interest and if time presents itself share the info with your loved one, but do not overstep your boundaries. If the person has asked you not to do certain things, or talk about things, then respect their wishes.

Do not talk about food and weight! Don’t continuously ask what the person has or hasn’t eaten, how much weight they have lost, or how great or bad they look after gaining or losing. This is rude and very threatening and you cannot win either way. Saying they look “healthy since you’ve put on some weight” is heard as “you are fat,” and expressing disappointment or concern in weight loss comes across as “you’re a failure” or “you’re a burden.” By the same token, don’t be afraid to talk in front of the person about your own day to day living (such as, “yeah, Fred and I went out for dinner last night and the steak was so good.”) Your stumbling to avoid topics will be as noticed as your persistence in discussing them. Don’t watch the person “like a hawk” when they are eating, or give looks when they excuse themselves from a meal or from the table. Recovery is not easy and does not happen overnight! Be respectful and courteous and do not try to be The Food Police.

If your loved one is looking for recovery resources try not to let him/her get discouraged. Unfortunately, there are doctors and therapists out there that do not know what they are doing, or who do not recognize Eating Disorders as the serious issue they are. Be supportive. If you feel it’s within your boundaries, offer to help – find names of local support groups and therapists, and offer to go with them their first time if they’d like the company. If they are getting discouraged be patient, supportive and don’t push. Recovery is a very personal choice each sufferer will need to make for him or herself.

Encourage them to find support in others who share the same experiences, through support groups, on-line bulletin boards or chat rooms, or through larger meetings like those of Overeaters Anonymous. There is a list of national organizations in the Links and Resources Section which will give you and your loved one a good place to start.

Don’t pretend to understand, if you have never had an Eating Disorder yourself…. it will sound condescending and disingenuous. You can be supportive without living with Anorexia, Bulimia or Compulsive Overeating yourself, and your loved-one will appreciate that more than you putting on a facade of empathy. The sufferers of Eating Disorders can do better in their own recovery with a good support network behind them… consider it this way — don’t we all do better in life when we know we have people we can count on? Learn to be a good listener and what “being there” for someone truly means.

If you have anything you’d like to ad to this section that you think could be helpful, please feel free to write to us.

On Monday night, I gave a presentation to The Comox Valley Girls Group about the impact of eating disorders, an overview of what the “details” of this illness are, and had the opportunity to share my own story to these young women. I have to confess, while I have conducted interviews in the past, and had gallery showings about my bulimia, being in a casual setting (couches, snacks, open floor of honest discussion between other women) made me swell with anxiety. As I stood outside the door ready to knock, I felt a twinge in my mind; will my story conduce more harm than awareness to these young girls? It’s been an unsettling query of mine since back in 2010 when I chose to document my bulimia for a photographic gallery show. My audience back then had been adults, as well as peers who had been unwillingly participants with eating disorders. Yet, on Monday night, I was about to sit down with young women – aged 13 to 15 – and share with them my life story about what I had been doing to my body, perceived my body,  since I was a mere child. Entering the room made the story seem much more painful; staring back at me were a handful of innocent girls, young women curious to know who I was, and why I was there. Looking around at each of them, it was hard not to see a child version of myself in their eyes. Now, years down the line, I was being the voice of education for an illness that was so strange to me back then; I was standing in the shoes of the “help” I had wished for in the early years of my illness…

Sitting down next to Wendy, the program director, I smiled back at the curious faces, and tried to compose my exterior.

“I love your ears!” Quipped one of the young ladies. I noticed the piercing in her ears, as well as her septum. For those who don’t know, I have tunnels in my earlobes; large gauge holes big enough that I can easily put my fingers through.

“Thank you! I love your glasses, and your septum ring!” I quipped back. She was sporting a thick black vintage pair of horn rimmed glasses.

Introductions were made around the room, names were put to faces, their eyes continuing to bore into my mind. They were peculiar little women, each with a different story and character to bring into the room. I, in turn, was very curious to know about them. Such is my nature. I began my discussion about who I was, why I was here.

“My name is Meghan. I am an artist. I am a writer. An author and journalist for Zouch Magazine. I am also a bulimic / anorexic, in recovery.”

For almost 2 hours I spoke openly to these young women about my illness, and what life was like being held captive by a disorder that had no logical sense. My nerves slowly relaxed as each girl felt compelled to share their stories, their questions with me. Yet, my fear continued to rise when it became clear that, while media often touches or glorifies those who have been touched by anorexia; eating disorders are still an unknown topic. While many of the girls had heard the words “anorexia”, and “bulimia” before, they had no idea what each illness was, nor the clinical diagnosis for an eating disorder. Which, at this stage in my life, I find baffling. Hearing this from them made me feel, sick, to be honest. Which, in turn, compelled me to push on with my discussion…

I first began demonstrating the perils of body dysmorphia when I was still in grade school, at around the age of 8 years old. From there I learned that skipping meals would make me skinny, not fat, and children wouldn’t pick on me. On and on the cycle progressed until I was well into my 20’s feeling the effects of years of starvation, or purging, wishing I had been told, been educated, of what it was I was letting my mind, and body, partake in. Because I didn’t have any semblance of understanding what harm I was doing to my body back then, I couldn’t explain the reasoning behind the euphoria. All I knew was I loved it, it stopped the bullying; why would I want to stop that? And these girls were experiencing the same dynamics I was at their age; anxiety, depression, self doubt, hate towards their bodies. Why was I so hesitant about the discussion? For this very reason; I was asked to sit in a room of young women who were exhibiting the same symptoms I had when I was developing an eating disorder, and they too, had no help, no understanding, of what was happening to their minds, their bodies. They have no education in how lethal this illness is, the long-term physical ramification of what may happen to their self-confidence into adulthood.

Perhaps the most jaw-dropping moment of the evening was when I shared the photographs from Disorder Control; the tryptic in particular. Each image I described fully – the before binge, during, and the purge, showcasing a clear plastic bag filled with vomit. 14 times a day, I shared. That’s how often I would binge / purge in an attempt to drown out the stress, anxiety, doubt and self-loathing I had manifested in my mind. More questions came. More shock and awe. It was frightening to be in a room of youth, who had no idea what hell is possible when positive, nourishing environments are not enlisted within the mind at a young age.

I left that night knowing more education needs to be done in schools about eating disorders. I believe in prevention, and our current awareness tools being used to educate the public about eating disorders is appalling…if I have one purpose on this Earth, I believe it’s to advocate, change, and help those out there dealing with this illness. Until that day comes, I will continue screaming from the rooftops to get the message out. Don’t be afraid to ask for help, don’t be afraid to talk about it, don’t be afraid if you’re scared. There is help. There is health. There is love. Always.

(CBC News Posted: Feb 23, 2012 9:40 PM AT )

The plight of 13-year-old anorexic Shelby Fillmore has prompted another young woman who has struggled with anorexia to speak out about treatment programs in N.S. and in other places.

Fillmore left for Arizona Wednesday to enter a residential treatment facility specifically for eating disorders.

The province originally agreed to pay for her out-of-province care, but then, her parents said, the IWK Health Centre rescinded its recommendation that she be funded.

Jessica Inkpen struggle with anorexia began 16 years ago, when she was the same age as Fillmore.

Inkpen said treatment in Ontario likely saved her life.

“My doctor gave me five years — tick tock,” she said in a YouTube video made last year, before she hit rock bottom.

She grew sicker despite years of eating disorder treatments and hospital stays in Halifax. Rock bottom for Inkpen included isolating herself from loved ones, and rarely leaving the house.

Her psychiatrist urged the province twice to pay for her care. On appeal, it was approved by MSI.

“I’m really not sure if I’d be alive right now,” she said, if she hadn’t gone to Ontario.

She said the problem for her with the Halifax outpatient program was that it lacked the same intense structure the 24/7 treatment centre in Ontario gave her during her four-month long stay last summer.

“I gained coping skills to replace what I was using my eating disorder for — anxiety problems,” she told CBC News. She said it also taught her to figure out who she was aside from her eating disorder, because she said “that becomes your identity.”

Less than a year later, the 28-year-old has gained weight and is now a first-year university student.

Jessica Inkpen spent four-months at an intense eating disorder clinic in Ontario.(CBC)

She said by coming back to the outpatient clinic following her out-of-province treatment, she’s been able to stay in recovery.

Programs in N.S.

Psychologist David Pilon chairs the Nova Scotia Eating Disorders Treatment Network and he said while it’s not always ideal to send people away, for some it’s necessary.

“Individuals with eating disorders have probably the highest mortality of any mental health or psychiatric condition and sadly sometimes they tend to be trivialized or glamorized in some way,” he said.

It’s hard for people sometimes to transition to being home after being sent away for treatment, he said, and a typical hospital stay could cost taxpayers somewhere in the range of $1,200 to $1,500 per day.

“In some of the residential programs for example in Ontario as well as in British Columbia, they have more resources to be able to offer programming and care not only throughout the day, but into the evening hours seven days a week,” Pilon said.

“Our programs here simply don’t have that amount of programming resources.”

Capital Health and the IWK are designing a 12-hour day program to ensure not only a smooth transition for those individuals who may need it as they move from adolescent to adulthood, but to make it available across the province — and not just in Halifax.

Ideally, people struggling with eating disorders would come every day for care, participate in groups and treatment, they have three meals a day there and support after the last meal.

For Inkpen, just because there’s more weight on her body, doesn’t mean she’s 100 per cent better.

“It’s still a struggle every day. Recovery is not a cure, it’s like a journey, so every day it’s with me,” Inkpen said.

Jon came home tonight after playing squash, deciding his head needed some change. Out come the clippers, I whip out the camera. An opportunity to enjoy some quality time together demolishing strands of his hair, is always a recipe for laughs. Happiness can be found in the simple, “mundane” aspects of our lives. Never miss out on a chance to enjoy laughs, love, and smiles all around

I am not interested in the science of this disorder ; I am interested in the candor. There is a rage inside my body, a passion that is fueling my mind to push in new directions, hoping to finally be heard. Heard. Years of screaming LISTEN only to be probed as some alien entity, rabid without reason, sense or discourse. Listen. What a loaded word…

The minds that are telling us what eating disorders are, what mental illness is, are often backed by a series of letters in their names. Often PhD’s, or MD’s, or what have you. While I listen to their perspective on what this illness, this disorder is, they don’t listen to me when I share what my life is like living this way. They don’t listen. They hear me. They are civil and don’t interrupt when I express how exciting eating a package of chocolate chip cookies is, knowing that I can throw-it all back up without remorse. That those “evil calories” are not going to make me unhealthy. That I am the smart one because I figured out a healthy way to abuse myself without using drugs, alcohol, all those “bad” evils we were told about in school. I was the good kid. I figured out how to use food as a weapon, I figured out how to eat junk food (those tasty morsels of nutritional sin) without actually consuming it; purging. The miracle of so many ailments in my life.
These doctors hear me, but they don’t listen. As soon as I walk in the room, they have their answers to my woe; it doesn’t matter what I say to them. I am not an individual. I am an illness. The same as all the others. There is no hope for me. I am chronic. I am over the edge. There is no cure. They hear me. Their pads have already been penned with prescriptions for mood stabilizers for my anxiety, my depression; magic mouthfuls of hope that toss me into the realm of nullity. They don’t listen to me. I tell them every detail, nothing is held back, I express what is happening…but they never listen.

I am listening. I listen to the “experts” who speak at conferences and shout out statistics, who deliver the scientific notion of what it is to be me, to be sick, to have lost all rational momentum in my mind, to be held captive in a brain that was broken so long ago. They vacate the stage in standing ovations, declared heroic for sharing their data, provided by the sick, the dying, the damned. I watch them as they speak, I listen to their words, and wonder where the honesty lies. How can someone who is so far removed from this illness, be declared a hero? Be known as an expert? Where are those who want to speak out about their pilgrimage from illness to health? Where are the anorexics, the bulimics, the EDNOS and over-eaters? The bingers, the purgers, the starvationists? Where are the recovered, the recovering, the soldiers who are deep in these trenches, who are begging to be heard. To be listened to. Their words carry more momentum for cures, for understanding, than strangers in white-coats distinguished by letters emblazoned on their chests. The answers are simple, and will never be found in the labs of science. They are found in the voices of those who are sharing, who are living this life each day. Open your ears and listen…

The voices of the dying are not from the living. I want to listen to the truth, to the reality, of those who are here with me in this life. Together we are hope, we are a cure, we are a healthy beginning.

I love Eve Ensler. The connections she weaves between poetry and the physicality are remarkable. Last night, during a rather uncontrollable collapse of emotional proportions; I turned to Ted.com for inspiration. It was here I was re-united with the woman who helped fuel me with the courage to not label myself as an outsider, but rather, a curiosity learning to merge mind with body.

Eve Ensler: Suddenly, My Body