Oh 100%. Pain in general is fake if it’s women, lol. And anything women’s health (endo stuff too) is like, lightyears behind. I had a doc ask if I was “getting enough attention at home” after he said it was impossible I’d torn my ACL because I’d be “crying” and in more pain.
Narrator: She had torn her ACL.
ETA: Also my urge is always to be sexist back, in a really shocking way. I’ve never done it but here’s what I have been kicking myself for not saying because I’d love to see his dumb face.
not pc humor
“well maybe you cry when you tear things, but I’m not a pussy.”
I just think that coming calmly and smoothly out of what I look like would have been priceless in terms of reaction.
This is a belated comment on the attractiveness/grooming issue, but I still want to mention it.
I wonder how much regional variation there is in the grooming thing? Because though I haven’t worked in a professional setting here in the crunchy granola pacific northwest, I was brought up with a “makeup and other such things are totally optional and maybe even discouraged” kind of environment and I just never succumbed to the pressure to start doing stuff like wearing makeup, getting my nails done, spending a ton on hair, etc. And I don’t think I have ever been discriminated against for it. Though I did feel a bit more pressure when I lived in NYC.
I don’t think I would ever survive in a place like LA…
I wanted to report a small win for the universe! We have to do a biometric health screening to get $360 off of health insurance every year. Results don’t matter to get the money you just have to do the test.
The woman who took me in asked my height and weight (BMI is unfortunately one of the metrics that they need to check) so I told her my stats. She walked me to the room with the scale and height and said “stand with me here for 30 seconds I’m not actually going to weigh you, we just have to make it look like I am”. She then said “BMI is such bullshit I’m sorry I have to give you a number”. Also, in past years they have measured waist circumference too and this year she just put a big X through that section.
Small wins and I’m not sure how much importance to give this but it did make me happy and have faith for future improvements.
That is so awesome! I’ve been refusing to get weighed at the doc ever since I became one BMI point “overweight” a few years ago and they immediately gave me a lecture about “calories in and calories out.” Since then, though, I’ve never had a nurse push me when I said I wasn’t going to be weighed and it’s a relief each time.
I just listened to the moon juice taste test episode. 10/10 recommend. It’s so hilarious that I kind of wish they did more weird product tests on themselves!
I have a random question about the term “safe foods”.
Question, reference to ED but not graphic
I have been noticing a lot of body positive/anti-diet people using the term “safe food” lately and I’m wondering what this means in this context? My background with that term is that it’s something I heard girls with restrictive eating disorders say about ultra low or no calorie foods, like celery is a “safe food” meaning a food that will not cause weight gain. Obviously anti-diet people are not using it in this way but I find it really odd/interesting that a pro-ana term has made its way into anti-diet space. Any ideas on what this means? Usually there is very little context, like this:
“I wasn’t sure what to have for dinner so I went with one of my safe foods.”
or
“I served my kids a new meal tonight but I had safe foods available for them as a back up.”
or
“I couldn’t deal with meal planning so I had a safe food instead.”
In the context of feeding toddlers, they have a lot of neophobia, fear of new foods. Developmentally appropriate but can lead to very restricted eating. Advice is to always have a food offered at every meal that is one of their safe foods- ie something you know they’ve eaten and enjoyed in the past, is pretty reliably something they’ve eaten. So you can OFFER the new foods, but you also offer them something known and safe as a fall back so they can fill up on that if they prefer. Tolerated Proximity to the new food is a step to acceptance whether or not they consume it.
This whole model is part of the “division of responsibility” approach to child feeding. As pioneered (I think? At least popularized) by Ellyn Satter
Ohhh, ok that makes sense. I hear a lot of adults use it in reference to themselves too, but perhaps neophobia is something adults can have too? Or something similar?
ETA: just did some quick googling and it looks like adults can have it too!
It absolutely is, and I’ve used the approach on myself. You can use the same exposure tactics to broaden your diet as an adult that you use in childrens feeding therapy. Play with food, grow food, tolerate food near you as you eat something else, tolerate touching it to your tongue but not eating, etc. Each is a step toward expanding your diet.
I imagine with ED in particular it’s foods you might have a lot of baggage with? Like, if you’ve always seen cake as the ultimate Bad Food, you’ll need to reprogram your thinking around it to comfortably consume it. I could see how specific foods could be very triggering, and you’d need to re learn tolerance of their presence? I don’t know for sure that’s how it’s integrated into that community but I could absolutely see parallels.
(ETA so these foods would NOT be safe foods, because they’re your “new” foods. The safe foods would be the not triggering ones)
for me it’s high risk vs. high probability of success
At home, zucchini fritters are the safest for me. They are super easy. I am unlikely to screw them up because my brain is fried. My throat won’t close on them (like it will sometimes for things in the brassica family).
In restaurants, I could risk the curry at a pub (could go wrong in so many ways), but they are unlikely to screw up the chicken fingers or fried fish tacos.
As someone who considers herself recovered from ED, I don’t use this term very often anymore. In the context of my ED I definitely had “safe” foods that were low calorie. But the term developed a new meaning for me when I was recovering… I considered safe foods to be things that I didn’t have anxiety about eating, but also would give me the amount of calories I needed to fuel properly. So for me for a longggg time it was a big bowl of oatmeal + pb + protein powder + nuts, etc. I had probably 3-4 meals that were “safe” and when it was harder for me to want to eat properly, those are the foods/meals I would turn to to stay on track with eating enough.
Ironically enough now, I have a really hard time eating those safe foods because they were my go-tos for sooooo long…and now I’ve rediscovered so many other foods I wouldn’t let myself eat for years, so I have a hard time imagining making like…a bowl of oatmeal and enjoying it, when I could have hash browns and scrambled eggs and bacon, haha
That’s really interesting. I wonder if that’s happening for a lot of people using that term. I found it so startling in the context of anti-dieting because I only had the one reference point, but it makes sense that someone would go from using it in a restrictive way to using it in the way you’re saying.
My ED is ARFID or the “picky eating” disorder that is exactly what children do and therefore all the advice i find on it assumes i am 7 years old but yes, i use the term “safe food” exactly how BJ describes and wouldn’t be surprised if the meaning changes depending on context as for MountainMustache. Especially since mine is not what people normally think of when discussing EDs.
but yes, i use the term “safe food” exactly how BJ describes and wouldn’t be surprised if the meaning changes depending on context as for MountainMustache. Especially since mine is not what people normally think of when discussing EDs.