Posts Tagged ‘Holidays’

Valentine’s Day may be commercialized and over-hyped. For some it’s an obligatory gift-giving day, for others it’s a reminder of a broken heart or an unclear relationship status. But for those who do choose to celebrate, the holiday is an occasion to recognize love in all its forms.

This Valentine’s week, we’re exploring love in the context of the relationships we have with ourselves. Like other types of love, self-love is an action we practice and develop, one cultivated through self-compassion. And self-compassion bestows physical and mental health benefits worth celebrating in this season of love and beyond.

Lose weight. Exercise more. Eat “healthy.”

These resolutions seem as synonymous with the New Year as the midnight ball drop and fireworks display. Amid popping corks and clinking glasses, we hear the same tired promises each turn of the calendar year, as if they’re verses in “Auld Lang Syne” themselves.

As New Year’s marks the passage of time, so too it shows our sociocultural pressures and values. In the most popular resolutions, we see society’s expectations—the “goods” and goals worth pursuing in the name of personal betterment.

In a culture preoccupied with weight and food, it is no surprise that New Year’s resolutions frequently reflect these obsessions. Striving to lose weight—arguably the most popular resolution each year—is to affirm our cultural fixation on thinness and view of weight loss as a universal good. And while exercise and eating patterns can indeed influence health, many resolve to make these changes with the primary or sole goal of losing weight. Weight is mistaken as a proxy for health.

The busy season is here.

In holiday calendars full of shopping, baking, decorating, and wrapping, many people are also squeezing in routine check-ups and impromptu visits to the doctor. Clinic lobbies and waiting rooms are hosting college students home on winter break, workers using holiday PTO, and insurance holders maximizing healthcare benefits before the year’s end.

Episode description:

The holidays can be especially challenging for those experiencing or recovering from an eating disorder. Guest Kezia Reeder, a passionate advocate for recovery, joins Peace Meal to share how her eating disorder affected her holiday plans and celebrations. She discusses how to navigate these food-centric occasions or support those who are, and then reflects on the gift of recovery.

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Thanksgiving is more than turkey and trimmings. At The Emily Program, we’re celebrating the holiday by thanking our bodies for all the ways they protect, defend, and care for us.

We hope these quotes and poems help inspire gratitude for your body as well.

You are not alone.

You are not alone in wondering why—or how, rather—your friends and family enjoy Thanksgiving with such abandon. You are not the only one who sees this Thursday as the first trial of a long holiday series, the first of many get-togethers where you feel extra eyes on you and your plate.

You are not the only one just trying to survive.

Others will pull up chairs to Thanksgiving tables with similar worry, self-doubt, and guilt. They’ll feel equally distressed by the platters and bowls and dishes before them, their fears garnished with cranberries and french-fried onions. Others too will feel confused and resentful, maybe even angry, as their company gives thanks for their food and then, in the same breath, condemns it for sabotaging their diets.