Perhaps nowhere is the impact of culture more pronounced and pervasive than in the realm of body image and eating disorders.

By: Gabrielle Morreale M.A. LPC. C-DBT. When it comes to social media and eating disorder recovery navigating a balance can be difficult. I don’t know about you, but I often feel like I am in information overload when it comes to social media. I strongly believe our brains were not meant to consume all of this information at once!! Now don’t get me wrong, are there times that I am cracking up over a TikTok sure, but are there also times when I am in a deep anxiety spiral or w

By: Gabrielle Morreale M.A. LPC. C-DBT. Progress over perfection! It’s a phrase we say when it comes to many things, especially in recovery! Now don’t get us wrong we wholeheartedly stand by this statement. Any steps you are taking toward recovery are amazing! Eating disorder therapy is a long, hard road full of twists and turns so whatever it takes we believe in you ! This saying, however, got us thinking about what else should be over perfection. Well …everything really, pe

By: Rachel Dodson RD. LDN. Almost every single one of my clients tells me that their long-term goal is to have a better relationship with...

By: Dana Kippen, Clinical Intern If you’re reading the title of this blog and thinking to yourself, “Celebrate my body? That’s absurd!”...

By: Gabby Morreale M.A., LPC, C-DBT Eating disorder recovery is challenging, brave, exhausting, and lifesaving. As someone who is personally recovered, I will never be able to thank my support system enough. So, what do we do when a loved one or a friend is struggling with an eating disorder? This is a question I get asked often, and also one that our family therapist, Becc Leatherman, helps people navigate all the time. Eating disorder recovery can be taxing on families and

5 common myths about eating disorders debunked and de-mystified!

By: Rachel Dodson RD, LDN As the weather gets warmer, it’s a perfect time to have a conversation about set point theory. Sadly this time...

By: Abby Emmert M.A. A large and challenging step of recovery is making peace with exercise. A question I get very often in sessions is,...

By: Rachel Dodson RD, LDN & Gabby Morreale M.A. LPC. What is Intuitive Eating? Intuitive Eating was developed by two Registered Dietitians, Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch, in the 1990’s in an effort to combat what we’re sold in diet culture. The authors define Intuitive Eating as, “a personal process of honoring health by listening and responding to the direct messages of the body in order to get your needs met.” Intuitive Eating is an anti-diet and weight-neutral approach to

By: Gabby Morreale M.A. LPC. DBT-C. With the Christmas Holiday fast approaching, stress and anxiety about family interactions are often at an all-time high. I know that interacting with family can be fun and exciting but also challenging and difficult. It is a true example at dialectics at its best!! Sometimes these difficult interactions make us want to engage with our eating disorder behaviors. Gentle reminder: not now- not ever, is your eating disorder the answer. Remember

By: Breanna Potts, Clinical Intern DBT is a therapy that helps people understand and navigate their uncomfortable feelings in a way that...

By: Rachel Dodson RD, LDN Fighting diet culture and all of the noise surrounding food can be tough all throughout the year, but especially during the holiday season. Now, I LOVE THE HOLIDAYS. The movies, the activities, giving (and getting lol) gifts, seeing people who you don’t get to see regularly and all the flavors of the seasons. This time of year is magical but can be a stressful time filled with tension and anxiety surrounding your relationship with food during recover

By: Hannah de Groot, MEd. Close your eyes and envision who comes to mind when you picture a person with an eating disorder. What does that person look like? For most of my life, the person I envisioned matched the images you’d get with a quick Google search - a young, white woman in body that looks very malnourished. For years, I imagined that the only way to actually have an eating disorder would be to look like that woman. To have an eating disorder, a person had to be whi

By: Gabrielle Morreale LPC When we hear the word safety behavior we often think that this is some type of coping skill, something that will keep us safe. Right?!! Nope…wrong although at times a safety behavior is a coping skill they oftentimes do not keep us safe but stuck. Safety behaviors provide short-term relief in an attempt to prevent some type of uncomfortable feelings or a feared catastrophe or anxiety producing event. For people with eating disorders this can range f

By: Abby Emmert M.A. & Gabrielle Morreale LPC A lot of times we see those that struggle with eating disorders also struggle with their relationship with exercise. Exercise can be weaponized as a way to control how our bodies look and feel. It can also be used to compensate and “make up for” the food we eat. It can often come with feelings and emotions such as guilt and shame. It can also come with, what we call in the counseling words, musturbations. These are words like “mus

By Hannah de Groot MEd. Loneliness is universally one of the most painful and challenging emotions to face. It can exacerbate our...

by: Hannah de Groot Med. August fading into September can be challenging as we begin to transition into a new season and a new school year. Summer festivities come to rest for the year and we sometimes have to face realities we’ve been avoiding for the past few months. Change is hard! Life transitions can bring up unresolved habits and unwanted emotions, which might draw out and intensify our stress. This week, let’s talk about managing stress effectively and continuously to

By Abbey Emmert M.A. and Gabrielle Morreale M.A. LPC. If you have struggled with an eating disorder, or know someone who has, the topic of values may have come up. Just like living with an abusive partner, after a certain amount of time of living with this opposite force, it can be hard not to start adopting the other’s values and replacing your own with them. You can be months into the relationship before you realize it's caused you to lose friendships, family members, and

By: Abby Emmert M.A. You know that needle in a haystack saying? Yeah. That’s what labeling your emotions in your ED is like. Throwing a dart at a bullzeye that isn’t there. Something like that! It’s hard, and sometimes feeling almost impossible. What we know is that those that struggle with eating disorders often struggle with emotion regulation, as well. If you don’t know what this is, it’s one of the pillars of DBT (Dialectical Behavior Therapy), which is one of the therapy