Academia and eds
I've re-discovered frozen mixed berries. 26cal per 80g serving and full of fibre and antioxidants. Not too expensive, either. I like them with fat free vanilla yoghurt or microwaved with a pinch of cinnamon. One of my all time favourite safe foods, especially in winter when I need something brightly coloured and relatively fresh to counteract the grey muckiness of the season.
Boyfriend relented and let me stay in rather than run errands today because I was depressed and scared of going out. It's these moments on non-assholery that keep us together. That and neither of us can afford to move out. Oh, the romance.
I just finished reading Dedication To Hunger: The Anorexic Aesthetic in Modern Culture by Leslie Heywood. I can't argue with her reading of our culture as patriarchal, Cartesian-dualist and 'anorexic' in it's values and logic but it's more a book about female disenfranchisement and literature than it is a valuable insight into eating disorders (not of course that it is advertised as such). I'm always wary of over-emphasis on the socio-cultural aspect of EDs, I think it's dangerous to make them too abstract and intellectual and lose sight of the fact they are diseases attacking individuals. Yes, carving out a feminine identity in a mysoginist culture is something all ED'd women struggle with but so do all non-ED's women, too. I think it's a great, insightful book and well worth reading but it left me wanting to emphasise that the 'anorexic aesthetic' it describes is not the same thing as anorexia nervosa the disease and sometimes I worry that there is too much confusion between the two in critical discourse.
As Laura of Laura's Soap Box (interesting lady and Maudsley advocate) blogged "I don't think eating disorders need a feminist analysis any more than I think cancer or asthma do." I'm inclined to agree with her on this point. Because if we lived in an ideal feminist society I'm sure we'd still have EDs. And don't get me started on the over-emphasis of the media's role in EDs. It's insulting and obfuscating to keep suggesting ED'd women are brainwashed, vain and stupid.
Yeah, ok, rant over.
ETA literally just came across this blog post and it's so relevant (and more articulate than me!)