Eating Disorders & Pregnancy: What’s the Relationship?
The relationship between eating disorders and pregnancy is complicated. Women with eating disorders are more likely to struggle with infertility and are at an increased risk for pregnancy complications, such as preterm birth, low birth weight, birth defects, and even miscarriage. At the same time, pregnancy can be a trigger for eating disorders in women who are vulnerable to developing them.
I grew up imagining life like most do… get through high school, choose a career path, go back to school, get married, have cute kids, and live happily ever after. Call me old fashion, but that’s how I envisioned it all happening.
Fast forward to my adult life - half of those things happened…I got through school, chose a career, went back to school, got married…
Pregnancy is a wild time. Not only are you flooded with hormones and opinions, but your body is changing. The body that you have been told to strive for perfection in, will no longer be the one you know. Messages targeted to cis women during this time mostly focus on the “bounceback”:
“Grow your child. But just big enough—the bigger they are, the harder it is to get your body back.”
I am a 32 year old female, raised in the millennial generation. This means I should be eligible for compensation from damages received by being subjected to shows such as America's Next Top Model, The Biggest Loser, and pretty much every single MTV music video ever created in the 90’s and 00’s while I was navigating puberty.
No Diet Day was started by Mary Evans Young in 1992 and is an annual movement to reject diet culture. NEDA would like to encourage you to consider the impact diet culture has on your relationship with your body and join the movement to practice body kindness and acceptance.
You came into this world
A beautiful being
How amazing!
Only one of you
Only one of me
Mama wonders about your personality
No thoughts of a child hating their body
As you grow up, messages pop up on the tv
Photoshopped images fill your phone screen
The noise gets louder
You used to love your body
Twirling through blades of grass
Breathe in the unapologetic atmosphere that’s embraced you from the moment you breathed out into the cosmos.
Before you strive to make yourself smaller, before you fight to disappear… Who can demand that you do so?
How young were you when you first dieted?
I was a very young 12 years old when I first jumped on the diet train, and I rode that train one way or another for ten years of my life. For the entirety of my adolescence and beginning of my young adult life, I wanted to change myself so badly to fit the idolized thin ideal that I was willing to do just about anything to achieve this goal.
I am 20-years-old. I haven’t been on a diet, or restricted my food, in over four years. I eat intuitively, honoring my hunger and my cravings. I am free.
