Self Help Resources
Book Recommendations
The Longest Match: Rallying to Defeat an Eating Disorder in Midlife
by Betsy Brenner (ANAD Mentor)
The chance for recovery increases the earlier an eating disorder is detected. Therefore, it is important to be aware of some of the warning signs of an eating disorder. This isn’t intended as a checklist. Someone struggling with an eating disorder generally won’t have all of these signs and symptoms at once, and the warning signs vary across eating disorders and don’t always fit into neat categories.
The book is a memoir illustrating the trajectory from early childhood, through adolescence and early adulthood, to midlife when eating disorder thoughts and behaviours took over the author's life. Journal entries reveal occasional negative thoughts about her weight or food in younger years, but the stressors of midlife knocked this high functioning woman off her feet.
There were two editions of the longest match; I have updated it to the latest as the old edition is not available on Amazon.
Body Kindness: Transform Your Health From The Inside Out—And Never Say Diet Again
by Rebecca Scritchfield
Body Kindness: Transform Your Health From the Inside Out—and Never Say Diet Again, by Rebecca Scritchfield is a great book for anyone to pick up – a practical, yet empathetic take on shifting mindsets. Rebecca’s approach to working towards a “healthier self” spans way beyond diets aiming to achieve some strange idea of physical perfection. Instead, she walks readers through easy to adopt tips and tricks, to move towards a happier (and therefore, healthier) self. A book filled with diagrams and graphs, action plans and self-assessments, Body Kindness makes for an easy yet insightful read.
Eating In The Light Of The Moon
by Dr. Anita Johnson
While Eating in the Light of the Moon does directly address women with eating disorders, we feel it is practical and applicable to anyone who identifies with a struggle with food. The book does a great job at bringing out multicultural myths and the biases that mess up our relationships with food. Through simple exercises and anecdotes, this book will help you rewire how you think about food. It’s an easy, digestible length and will not disappoint.
Just A Little Too Thin
by Michael Strober and Meg Schneider
This book will bring to you an earnest account of a family who isn’t sure whether or not their teenage daughter’s frequent diets are “normal” effort to stay healthy or something more serious. Just a Little Too Thin by Michael Strober and Meg Schneider is not a book about Eating Disorders. Instead, it is like a guide for parents trying to gauge when certain behaviors among their kids start to become less about food or health, and more about deeper rooted emotional concerns – because these, if left undetected early on, can turn into serious disorders.
Good Enough
by Jen Petro-Roy
Through Jen Petro-Roy’s touching novel, Good Enough, you will be taken through the heart-warming and realistic journey of a 12-year-old girl battling anorexia. Riley, the protagonist, has so much going for her before she falls victim to the grim world of eating disorders. Jen’s impeccable writing takes us into Riley’s new, scary world inside an inpatient facility where she now must receive treatment for her anorexia. It’s easy to see how she feels torn between wanting to get better for friends, family and old self, and following her instincts of continuing her disordered eating behaviors. Jen Petro-Roy is an eating disorder survivor, and paints a very touching picture of inpatient facilities and the difficult road to recovery.
The Incredible Jake Parker
by Angelo Thomas
The Incredible Jake Parker by Angelo Thomas delivers an important message, and makes for a quick and light read. While the book may have some grammatical errors here and there, it is one of the few books that walks its audience through the journey of living with an eating disorder, but this time through the lens of a young boy named Jake Parker. Jake is no ordinary boy. He riding a career high, as a music sensation loved by all, when he his entire life is put on hold because of severe anorexia. We think this book, while it has its flaws, is a great book for people to get their hands on, to read about how eating disorders from a male perspective.
Hunger for Connection: Finding Meaning in Eating Disorders
by Alitta Kullman
In ‘Hunger for Connection’, psychoanalyst and eating-disorder specialist Alitta Kullman expands on the "body/mind" personality organization she calls the "perseverant personality," illustrating how food and thought are linked from infancy, and for some, can become the primary source of nurturance and thought-processing for a lifetime—leading to what we call an eating disorder.
