The following Declaration of Self-Esteem, author unknown, would do well to be integrated into the belief systems of all people - women in particular.

Further consequences to women as a result of the current idealized body image obsession is the self-oppression suffered by the bulimics, the anorexics, and the women who use food and/or fat in place of being able to cope with life.

In our society, where a woman is the caretaker or nurturer of others' needs, by and large her own needs remain unfulfilled. Under these conditions many women often turn to food, either to repress their needs or to comfort themselves in some way. (Hooker, Convisser, 1983) Food is able to serve this purpose or meet these needs, in a symbolic way, because of the power that has been invested in the food itself.

We allow food to serve as a reward to us. (Hooker, Convisser, 1983) This may have started innocently enough when we were babies and we walked/talked and were rewarded with food. Once in school there were snacks for us after school because we had had a long day and worked hard. As adults this reward system could now extend itself to jobs, careers, housework, errands, etc. We tell ourselves internally that we deserve to eat (which we do) and that we earned it (which is questionable). Did we only perform in order to get the reward of food? Or was the act we performed meaningful in and of itself?

And since food can be used as a reward, it can also be used as a punishment. (Hooker, Convisser, 1983) We can not allow ourselves to eat foods we truly enjoy (thereby punishing ourselves) or we can eat the foods that we truly desire, but since we believe that these foods will make us fat, this is a means of punishing ourselves with the end result.

Eating is a great way to procrastinate. Even thinking about food takes up time. One could choose to do something else other than the thing one is procrastinating about, but that would not be as rewarding. One could choose to do nothing and accomplish the procrastination just as well. However, this leaves time open to get bored, which is another way compulsive eaters use food - to fill the boredom or emptiness. (Hooker, Convisser, 1983) Eating takes up time and nurtures a woman when she believes no one else will or could.

Food can also serve as an anesthetizer, to numb intense feelings or stifle feelings that we do not want to experience or are afraid of. (Hooker, Convisser, 1983) This use of food does not give us an opportunity to grow. Food is used as a block to risking, and without risk there is no change, no progressing. Risking is moving from a known to an unknown in search of a new known - perhaps a better known. Food, when used to stifle feelings, does not allow them to surface and be examined. You have to move through your thoughts and feelings to get to the other side.

And lastly, we can buy into the current dream that life can begin when we get thin, and since we aren't thin, we can indulge ourselves in food to take our mind off of the real issues we need to be dealing with. We become obsessed with food and eating to the exclusion of almost anything and everything else.

The use of fat is equally as creative. It can be used as a means of maintaining the status quo (I can't change anything until I'm thin). (Hooker, Convisser, 1983) But these women have the story backwards. For things to change (meaning them), they have to change. (Rohn, 1978) Things in life will change, but not for the individual so long as they don't change themself. You have to take action to make things different.

Fat can also be used as an excuse. If a woman sees her fat as an excuse then she can use it that way with a clear conscience, and believe herself. She can validate that she is not in a relationship because she is fat. Who would want someone like her? And if someone did, she certainly wouldn't want someone who would want her the way she is. It becomes a vicious cycle of excuses. The excuse can function as an extension of a fear. The fear of failing, succeeding, of rejection can all be excused with fat (if one chooses). (Hooker, Convisser, 1983)

Fat can serve as a form of rebellion or communication. (Hooker, Convisser, 1983) It can definitely communicate that the woman does not choose to conform to the social ideal (nor should she be made to feel that she has to). Fat can communicate pain and/or anger that the woman does not know how to communicate otherwise.

In our society men have power by size and a woman may choose to be acknowledged by her size to feel that she has more power also. This would serve to counter, in her mind, the current belief that women should take up less space, thereby getting smaller and smaller in size.

And what better way to protect oneself than inside a fortress of fat? Fat can work to isolate, insulate - whatever the need might be. It can serve to protect us from our own fears - sexuality, relationships, commitments, risking, growth, change, unknowns, life and more. But it is very important to remember that the only reason that food and fat can accomplish what they do (symbolically speaking that is), is because we empower them to do so. It is our belief in the power of food or fat that protects us, not the food or fat. Just as it is our belief in ourself that can set us free.

Our societal obsession with food, eating and body image is masochistic. (Shainess, 1984) Even as we eat our food, we inflict verbal or mental abuse on ourself for doing so. Our eating disorders are primitive manifestations of masochism, expressions of self-hate and self-punishment, that have crystallized around the issue of eating. (Shainess, 1984)

Anorexia nervosa is voluntary self-starvation to the point of losing 25% of body weight, which sometimes leads to death. (Arenson, 1984) An anorexic is someone who chooses to starve herself. Her focus on controlling food intake is a cover-up for feeling powerless and ineffective in other areas of her life. Anorexics suffer from major body image distortions and inaccurate sensing and interpreting of bodily sensations. (Bruch, 1973)

According to Levenkron (1982) the following are the psychological symptoms of an anorexic: (1) phobias concerning changes in bodily appearance; (2) obsessive thinking about food intake; (3) obsessive-compulsive rituals; (4) feelings of inferiority about self and aspects thereof; (5) all or nothing thinking and behavior; (6) disinterest in sexual activities; (7) denial of reality with delusional thinking about visual input.