New Year, New Newsletter!

Just a quick note to say, HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! And....I have a brand new e-newsletter! After many hours devoted to drafting e-newsletters that I used to send out manually through gmail, I finally decided to automate the system to serve you better. I still draft the emails, but now they're delivered to your inbox from an outside vendor so I don't have to worry about exceeding the limit of email addresses on gmail.

The new format now includes pictures, recipes and other content from me -- all in pretty pink. I've included a place to sign up for the newsletter to the right, so be sure to do so. In this month's issue I gave out a coupon good for 10 percent off Eat When You're Hungry coaching if you sign up between now and Jan. 31. And yes, I'll extend that offer to you for reading my blog, too.

I'm also toying around with forming a set of group coaching sessions, so if your'e interested, sign up for the newsletter so you don't miss out.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Eat When You're Hungry -- at Thanksgiving Too!

I can hardly believe Thanksgiving is already upon us, and my apologies for not posting sooner. I've been very busy to say the least. I've also noticed a recent increase in form submissions on my Web site and book sales. I don't have a magic crystal ball to tell me if this will continue through the holiday season, but I suspect it will. And, to be honest, it doesn't surprise me in the least. While the holiday season has reason to be depicted as warm and fuzzy in commercials – it is a wonderful time to spend with family and friends – it also brings with it loads of anxiety or even depression for some people.

Why? Well, let's count the reasons. Loss of loved ones, recent breakups, having a life that doesn't seem to "measure up" to what it's "supposed to be" at this time of year, and….food. For those of you currently in the midst of trying to make peace with food once and for all, the holidays bring with them, food. Lots of it, and lots of feelings about it.

I remember when I was in the throes of my very restrictive behavior around food, I used to do any number (and sometimes a combination) of the following:

- Worry if there'd be anything "for me to eat" at Thanksgiving dinner
- Feel guilty (or weird) that I wasn't starving myself all day for the big meal
- Worry about what people would think of me if I only ate the leanest of the turkey and the least "offending" of the vegetables and skipped dessert altogether
- Tried to figure out how I could pull off the above without anyone thinking I was doing anything differently than anyone else

As I write (and re-read) this now, it seems absolutely ludicrous to me that my mind used to operate this way. I say that not from a place of judgment, but actually from a place of gratitude that I really, truly, have overcome all of the issues I used to have with food. When I was in the throes of this mindset (and once I finally wanted to be free from it), I thought I would never FULLY recover from it. You read all over the place that, "once and eating disorder, always an eating disorder." And I guess what I've been astonished by is how untrue that has been for me. Yes, I still have times when I wish I could rely on food to create a sense of control in my life or to give me a feeling of a "fresh start," but after about 30 seconds of going down that route, I realize I couldn't make myself go there even if I tried. It's just not me anymore.

I've probably gotten off track with this post, but I've been struggling with blog content lately because I actually feel so far removed from my previous dieting mindset. I am still 100 percent committed to helping as many people as I possibly can to stop dieting and start living, though. So plan to come back to my site often. We'll see how it transforms in the new year.

In the meantime, I wish you a happy, healthy and delicious Thanksgiving filled with all of the things you want. And remember, it's okay to be a picky eater, even at Thanksgiving. I can't wait for my mom's chocolate walnut pie (which tastes like a giant chocolate chip cookie) and you can bet that I'll be skipping the sweet potato brulé (I don't like sweet potatoes or brulé, but particularly not together) to save room for my favorite part of the whole meal.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Fat Talk Free Week

These are the kinds of videos I've dreamt about making, but I'm just not skilled enough in technology to pull it off. Watch this. It's powerful, poignant, well-executed and oh-so-important. If you were caught up in your head when you arrived at my blog today, watch this. It'll bring you back down to earth. Turn on your volume, hit play and enjoy. Then pass it on.

20/20 Tackles Orthorexia

I am both thrilled and crushed all at the same time tonight. Thrilled to see that 20/20 aired an extensive story on orthorexia, and crushed because I missed it. I'd actually talked to one of the producers of this episode to share my personal story of orthorexia and recovery. And frankly, I thought the story was dropped. It wasn't. And I'm so glad it wasn't. I guess 20/20 stories just take a lot of hard work, research and time to get produced.

I'm so glad these producers found the resources they needed to complete the story, and I certainly hope I'll be able to get my hands on a copy of it. In the meantime, if you missed it too, you can at least read the online version of the story here.

I want to give a big shout-out tonight to Miguel Sancho, John Stossel and 20/20 for diving into orthorexia, a disease that's often quite perplexing to those outside of it.

If you're not familiar with orthorexia, it's basically an unhealthy obsession with healthy eating. People with orthorexia become obsessively fixated on the purity and health of every morsel of food that goes into their bodies. And thanks to the saturation of our airwaves with dieting messages and dieting gurus and diet, diet, diet, it's no wonder that orthorexia has become our nation's next eating disorder.

As you know if you've read my book, orthorexia was my eating disorder of "choice." I am living proof that you can recover -- FULLY -- from it, and it's my mission to help you do exactly that. Food doesn't have to be an obsession. And if we all commit to seeking out supportive, rather than diminishing, resources, we can end our nation's unhealthy obsession with dieting. Statistics show that 80 percent of eating disorders start out as diets. Don't be part of that statistic. Easiest way to achieve that -- don't diet.

Instead, learn to eat when you're hungry, stop when you're full and love your self. And...send a message to 20/20 to say, "Thumbs Up" for giving a voice to a previously silent eating disorder.

The Joys (and Tastes) of a 3-Day Weekend

I don't know about you, but I'm eating up this three-day weekend. My husband and I decided to stay at home for this holiday and we haven't regretted our decision once. Particularly since we re-discovered the beauty of our favorite appliance ever: the bread machine. When we were deciding what to make for dinner last night, I said, "What about homemade pizza?" and his eyes lit up about as bright as my were shining when I thought of the idea.

We'd never made pizza dough before, so the whole process was new and therefore fun and oh-so-yummy. I got the ball rolling on this one, but as soon as the dough was ready to come out of the bread machine Jeremy couldn't take his hands off it. There's something about digging your hands into real homemade dough without the emulsifiers and pectins and guar and xanthum gums...and whatever else comes in the pre-packaged stuff.

And I have to say -- this pizza was the best pizza I remember eating in a long time. As you'll see above, this wasn't a picture-perfect pie because we had to break the dough into two oblong pieces to fit in the cookie sheets we had. But it made it even more fun to eat.

If you're wondering what was in Maggie & Jeremy's best pizza ever, here are the ingredients, which I'm proud to say are fully pronounceable and amount to only 8 ingredients! Dough: warm water, olive oil, all purpose flour, salt, sugar, dry yeast; and then cheese and pepperoni, which came from Whole Foods. DELISH!

We were planning to go to our favorite gelato store in the city after dinner, but both of us were so satisfied with this meal (with also entailed broccoli cooked with garlic and olive oil) that we didn't want dessert -- and that's practically unheard of for us.

I'm telling you -- Eat When You're Hungry (make it good-quality stuff), and stop when you're full. It's the only thing you ever need to know when it comes to food and feeling good.

Happy Labor Day!

America The Beautiful

I just found out about America The Beautiful, a documentary exploring our nation's obsession with beauty. I am turning my schedule upside down so I can see it this weekend, and I encourage you to do the same. Check out the trailer below. I'm so excited about this film. I think it's going to be an important one. Come out and support it with me!

Way To Go, Margaret Cho!

Despite being a person who rarely uses a bad word -- it just doesn't come naturally to me -- last year I shared a piece written by Margaret Cho that, aside from being filled with f-bombs, was brilliant. Today I'm happy to follow that up with this "news." Cho's weight loss is making headlines this month and for once in my life I'm happy to share the news of someone's weight loss on this blog.

Why? Because Margaret Cho reminds us all that beauty comes in all shapes and sizes. Because Margaret Cho reminds us that she eats ice cream and pizza and chips. Because Margaret Cho reminds us that diets don't work, and that listening to our bodies -- even when they want cheeseburgers -- does work. It works by helping us tune into our own hunger and fullness signals. It helps us learn to appreciate our curves, our strengths, and yes, even our weaknesses.

Back to watching the Olympics. Just wanted to share this with you before the "news" is forgotten.

And so you're not surprised, I plan to re-post Margaret Cho's original piece as long as the link is live. It just doesn't go stale.