Be Comfortable and Breathe

For years, many of us have tried, usually with little or no success, to portray a certain image and we have been brainwashed into looking outside of ourselves to decide exactly what that image is. We have been told how to dress and how to feel about it. I recall being in seventh grade and feeling simultaneously excited and nervous about starting ballroom dancing classes. Shortly before the first lesson, my mother presented me with a garter belt, nylon stockings, a girdle and a long line bra. Imagine that! Seventh grade and already I had to fuss to hide every bulge and jiggle. My emotions, as I recall, were mixed. Partly I was excited to make my grand entrance into this mysterious grown up world and partly I was horrified. I remember the flesh of my thighs overflowing the tight little stocking tops and I remember smiling through my misery as I tried to look absolutely beautiful gliding across the dance floor. What was to be a magical, wonderful experience turned into a strained and difficult one. Did you ever find yourself in such a predicament? Were you ever dressed to match an image that didn’t quite fit? Did you ever eat to soothe those emotions?

We do not live in a culture where we are encouraged to be creative. We do not celebrate differences in body shapes, sizes and styles and we do not learn to love and appreciate our bodies as unique and beautiful no matter how large or small. Instead, for the majority of us, we are shown how to hide our curves and “flaws.” This is unfortunate. Our self-esteem certainly suffers and we might go through our entire lives feeling unacceptable, inadequate, unattractive, constricted and ashamed.

A number of years ago I attended a women’s music festival in Michigan. Thousands of women attended the week-long event and no men were permitted on the festival land. The summer weather was deliciously warm most of the time and the majority of the women wore little, if any, clothing during the day. All ages were represented. There were little girls and elders, and there were women from many different countries. I saw women of all shapes, sizes and colors. These women walked freely about the land and appearance mattered little. I thought what a beautiful sight it was to see these women moving about freely, uninhibited by social expectations or clothing constraints.

Now I know we can’t all walk around without our clothes on. Nor would we want to. Buying clothes that please us is fun. We can choose colors and materials that we love and think of our own needs when we purchase clothing. We can dress for comfort and still look stylish. One of the reasons we may overeat is because we fall short in our vain attempts to look like the models we see. If we try to emulate these women, who are perpetually young and unrealistically thin, nearly all of us will fail. Please do not dress to look like or be someone else. Be yourself. Be comfortable and breathe. Choose what suits you.

Can you help me find a new title?

Dear friends,
I am hoping to begin the publication process of my new book by the end of the week. At the moment the title is:
Peaceful Mind/Perfect Body: Six Spiritual Steps to Stop Overeating - I like it quite a lot but I am not in love with it so I am asking for feedback and ideas… Here are a few other possibilities:
You’re Not a Failure and It’s not Your Fault: Six Spiritual Steps to Stop Overeating
Peaceful Mind/Wonderful Body: It’s Not about Being Thin
Or???
If you have any ideas please let me know. I will credit any helpers in the book, of course! I would be SO grateful for your help if you have a minute…. No idea is too silly!!! Contact me at denise@deniselamothe.com ...
Biggest thank yous and blessings….Stay warm,

To Drink or Not to Drink

In his book Natural Health, Natural Medicine Andrew Weil, M.D. addresses alcohol use: “Heavy alcohol use puts us at risk of developing cancers of the mouth, throat, esophagus, and stomach, probably because alcohol irritates these tissues directly.” Weil also states that heavy drinkers are more likely to get liver cancer and that this danger is compounded if you also smoke tobacco. He recommends drinking moderately or minimally or not at all.


Besides the physiological dangers of alcohol use, there are psychological dangers as well. Many women report that after drinking, they feel out of control, are more likely to throw out their plans to eat sensibly and to binge. Alcohol weakens their resolve to restrict “forbidden” foods and drinking often precipitates weeks or months of “out of control” behavior. This behavior is accompanied by feelings of remorse, guilt and self-disgust which can lead the drinker to drink or eat even more in an attempt to “medicate” these negative feelings (classic emotional eating).


Harvey and Marilyn Diamond report in their work that alcohol impairs calcium absorption by affecting the liver’s ability to activate vitamin D which is important in the metabolism of calcium. Christiane Northrup, M.D. associates excess alcohol consumption with increased risk of breast cancer, menstrual irregularities, osteoporosis and birth defects. She also explains that “two drinks of alcohol per night effectively wipe out rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, which is the type of sleep associated with dreaming.” She wisely points out that dreaming is part of our internal guidance system and wonders why anyone would choose to suppress that guidance with alcohol. Consensus of opinion appears to be that water is best and that alcohol offers no beneficial effects. You decide.

Make Today Count!

So what will you create today? My little puppy Sapphi takes full advantage of every single moment! She is always in the present and is my role model! No kidding! Many of us go through the majority of our days on auto-pilot. We get up, shower, dress, maybe eat and then are off to work or we get involved in things at home. The first thing we know it is the end of the day. We may eat supper, watch TV or read and then we collapse into bed and the alarm clock soon warns us that it is time to get up and do it all over again. Days, weeks, months or years later, we look back and say, “Where did that time go?” and wonder what we did and why we don’t feel better.

It is easy to go through each day on auto-pilot but is that really what you want to do? Existing in a “no think” may be customary for you but what would you like your day to be instead?

How can you make today count? Please take a little bit of time each day to ask yourself this vital question. Mix up your routine a bit. Give yourself some time to play, to be joyful and to relax. Perhaps you can forego a half hour of television to engage in some activity or pastime you enjoy. What could you do differently today?

Think about you day as a gift and consider what is the very best way to use that precious gift today. Maybe you would like to call a friend you haven’t connected with lately, visit someone you’d like to see. Allow time to soak in a warm bath or to read a book you are enjoying. Give to yourself and you will consequently have more time and more energy for everything and everyone else.

Funny how that is!

Be the creator today and create your day as you would like it to be. Do this consciously. Do this daily and watch how much better you feel and how little importance to give to food. (No more emotional eating!)It will make all the difference!

Self- Image and Emotional Overeating

Our self-image is our conception of ourselves. It is not stationary or solid. It is fluid and evolves over time. As we grow and change, the way we view ourselves and present ourselves to the world changes. Most of us grew up being told how to look and act and feel and we developed standards for ourselves and expectations of ourselves based on the messages we received from others – from our families and friends, from institutions such as our schools and churches and from the larger society. It is no wonder that so many of us turned to food and began emotional overeating to soothe ourselves. These externally imposed messages may not have matched how we truly wanted to be and chances are we didn’t look, act and feel the ways we thought we “should.” We most likely received messages to be smart, thin and pretty – to be ever-smiling and nurturing of others’ needs. Many of us struggled valiantly to fit into the picture of ourselves that others painted for us and we were led to believe that this effort would bring us acceptance, approval and love. What happened instead was that we learned through our struggle that we were not acceptable just as we were. Please know that you reached a false conclusion. You are so much more that acceptable. You are perfect!

The Power of Sugar

Sugar is an interesting substance. It is extremely addictive for many people and many women report that if they have one bite of a sugary food (especially if combined with fat and salt) it precipitates a binge. There are a number of psychological reasons for feeling out of control after eating sugar and I will discuss some of these in another post, but for now let’s consider what happens on a purely physical level. When we take sugar into our systems, a series of events occurs. Our blood sugar level rises quickly and our body begins to manufacture insulin. Adrenaline floods our system and our heart rate increases. Our blood pressure goes up and we feel “high.” This “high” feeling doesn’t last long, however, and soon our blood sugar level drops causing our body to beg and plead for more sugar and more “energy.”

When this happens we may feel exhausted, irritable and depressed. If you experience mood swings, mental dullness or become tired easily, try eliminating sugar from your diet for a week. You will most likely notice a significant reduction of all of these symptoms. This is the physical process everyone experiences when eating sugar – not only when bingeing. It is as simple as that but many people do not realize that eating sugar can cause such powerful, often irresistible physical cravings. So next time you are cravingsugars and simple carbohydrates, ask yourself what’s going on physically and, if you have been eating sugar, drink a big glass of water, get some exercise and do something nice for yourself that doesn’t involve food. The urge to dip into the gallon of ice cream in the freezer will pass…. really.

Life Changes and Emotional Eating

We are always evolving from one stage of life to another, from one body shape to another. We travel over time from babies to little girls or boys, to adolescents, to women and men, to elders. These life passages happen gradually and have profound effects on the ways we view and care for our physical bodies. Do you recall when you first noticed your body was maturing? How did you react to these changes? How did your feelings towards your body change over time? Were you fearful, excited, curious, anxious, or ashamed? Did you talk to anyone about the changes you were noticing or did you struggle with unanswered questions all by yourself?
Many women and men report that they felt confused and lonely through these life changes and most agree that certain life changes were a least somewhat disturbing to them (and most likely led them to eat to soothe their emotions). As we mature our bodies change but society tells us they should not. So, as our bodies change in natural ways throughout our lives, we may see ourselves in negative ways – as fat, unacceptable, unattractive. It is nearly impossible to feel good about ourselves and our bodies in this culture. Most of our bodies could never match those we are taught to view as ideal and even man and women who have achieved this look are often frightened that they will be unable to maintain their thin appearance over time. For a number of my clients, maintaining weight loss has proven far more difficult and stressful than achieving the weight loss in the first place.
It is no wonder that so many of us have been struggling with compulsive eating behaviors for years. Here are these bodies we received at birth behaving in ways that we have no control over. We cannot stop our bodies from developing any more than we can stop our hair from growing or the sun from coming up. Yet we punish our bodies for simply doing what they are supposed to do. We want to look different than we look – be taller, thinner, have curly hair or a different tone to our skin. Part of stopping compulsive eating behavior permanently means accepting each bodily change as a natural part of life and ourselves as exactly who we’re supposed to be. Change those negative, self punishing thoughts to positive, self-loving ones…. This will help!