Speaker 1: I won't let my body out out everything that I'm made,
Speaker 1: won't spend my life trying to change. I'm learning to
Speaker 1: love who I am. I get I'm strong, I feel free,
Speaker 1: I know who every part of me. It's beautiful and
Speaker 1: I will always out way if you feel it with
Speaker 1: your guys in the air, She'll s love to the boom.
Speaker 1: I get there, say good day and time did you
Speaker 1: and die out? So welcome back to outweigh today. I
Speaker 1: have a pretty cool guest with me. His name is
Speaker 1: Matt Strandberg, and the reason he's pretty cool is because
Speaker 1: I know him from grad school. Matt and I went
Speaker 1: to Columbia together. I believe we had the same major, right,
Speaker 1: you were nutrition and exercise physiology or just exercise physiology
Speaker 1: as well. You're both as well, right. I transitioned a
Speaker 1: little bit later, so I think I got to know
Speaker 1: you with the later part of my girl duate career. Anyway,
Speaker 1: Matt is brilliant and has always been. He's always kind
Speaker 1: of been the person in class who speaks up and
Speaker 1: says the thing that you know kind of goes against
Speaker 1: me norder, but also like very confidently will really look
Speaker 1: at the literature and come up with your own opinions,
Speaker 1: which can you know, go against the grain, especially in
Speaker 1: a classroom setting when we're being taught. So I always
Speaker 1: looked to you for you know, the answers and definitely
Speaker 1: made the class a little bit more fun. So I'm
Speaker 1: excited to be talking to you today. Well, thank you
Speaker 1: for having me here. So, yeah, I didn't expect you
Speaker 1: to go in the route that you've gone. Actually, you know,
Speaker 1: you're really passionate about exercise physiology, and I know you're
Speaker 1: still passionate about helping people form healthy relationships to exercise,
Speaker 1: but you ended up going down the eating disorder path professionally,
Speaker 1: I believe, right, yeah, totally, and so that's my specialty.
Speaker 1: And as you pointed out, it wasn't really expected. When
Speaker 1: when I tell people what I do, oftentimes the assumption is,
Speaker 1: oh my, like wow, that must be your vocation. You
Speaker 1: must have like, you know, seen the light. And I
Speaker 1: wanted to do this for so long, and really it
Speaker 1: was like, you know, balancing from thing to thing, experimenting
Speaker 1: with so many different eras and be like, okay, know
Speaker 1: what interests me? You know, you know, how can I
Speaker 1: make this work? And really, um, I had always had
Speaker 1: an interest in these topics. And at the same time,
Speaker 1: you know, when I was graduating my dietectic internship, once
Speaker 1: again faced with that existential crisis of going back out
Speaker 1: into the real world, like now what. And when I
Speaker 1: was thinking about my experiences, I had a lot of
Speaker 1: experience in stranding conditioning with athletes, I had experience in nutrition,
Speaker 1: had experience in counseling, and I'm like, okay, is there
Speaker 1: a way to put this all together? And so when
Speaker 1: I looked out there, you know, with the research literature
Speaker 1: as well as like in general, you know, I found
Speaker 1: that there wasn't really many resources available for athletes or
Speaker 1: people engaging in physicotivity who maybe we're struggling mental and
Speaker 1: whether it was disordered eating or inert behaviors or relationship
Speaker 1: with exercise and so for instance, like you know, growing
Speaker 1: up as an athlete but also as a coach, you know,
Speaker 1: you just hang out with so many different people and
Speaker 1: everyone's there training, but you know, you begin to realize
Speaker 1: that people are struggling at times, and there's this always
Speaker 1: this pressure to put up this image of you know,
Speaker 1: I'm fully in control, I'm stoic, and you know, I'm
Speaker 1: dedicated and I have every you know, handle on everything,
Speaker 1: and so when things are not going as one would
Speaker 1: expect or someone's struggling, really people will start to feel
Speaker 1: scared to reach out because they don't want to be
Speaker 1: perceived as weak, or they don't want to be perceived
Speaker 1: as less than or they don't want to be um shot,
Speaker 1: you know, shadow this image of you know, this athlete
Speaker 1: and then be considered, well, it looks like you're struggling.
Speaker 1: So I don't know, if you can maintain your position
Speaker 1: on the team, you should probably go take some time off.
Speaker 1: And all of this is just really not conducive to
Speaker 1: providing a supportive environment. And to make matters worse, a
Speaker 1: lot of the environments were pretty toxic in many respects,
Speaker 1: and that's something that really kind of not talked about
Speaker 1: in relations to sports, and so, you know, that really
Speaker 1: inspired me to try to make a change, and that
Speaker 1: led me to working together with a great researcher. Her
Speaker 1: name is Paul Quatrimony. She's at Boston University, and together
Speaker 1: we came up with the idea of, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: why don't we actually create a program to help athletes
Speaker 1: struggling with eating disorders and problematic physical activity. And so
Speaker 1: the last five years that's what I did. You know,
Speaker 1: I pitched a program to all the behavioral care called
Speaker 1: the Goals Program and helped lots of different athletes in
Speaker 1: that program and created curriculums and various initiatives and produce
Speaker 1: some research back into efficacy of the program and its
Speaker 1: methods with the hopes that it would spur some more
Speaker 1: interests in the area. And you know, just recently I've
Speaker 1: opened up my own private practice to help people in
Speaker 1: other areas as well. So it's been a it's been
Speaker 1: an interesting journey, but eventually I ended up here. And
Speaker 1: it's it's hard because whether you're an athlete or not.
Speaker 1: You know, I'd say most of our audience, probably probably
Speaker 1: a handful of people do resonate with being an athlete
Speaker 1: or athlete in their past. But regardless or not, I
Speaker 1: think athletes have that extra pressure of eat healthy, you know,
Speaker 1: to perform better or whatever. But all of us are
Speaker 1: really taught that healthy living looks like something we can
Speaker 1: check off on paper or easily quantify, whether it's that
Speaker 1: number on the scale or certain food choices or regular exercises.
Speaker 1: And I think it starts for a lot of people
Speaker 1: that were doing these things in the name of health,
Speaker 1: and then all of a sudden, people are hearing, wait
Speaker 1: a second, your pursuit of healthy eating is actually disordered.
Speaker 1: And when we're just looking at this stuff on paper, right,
Speaker 1: like the behaviors eat more vegetables or move your body
Speaker 1: every single day, it can be really confusing for somebody
Speaker 1: to say, well, you told me to do these things
Speaker 1: to be healthy. How can you be saying that they're dysfunctional?
Speaker 1: So how how can this happen? And what are we
Speaker 1: miss saying when it comes to our healthy behaviors? Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: this is a really great question and something that I've
Speaker 1: thought a lot about because in the past I was
Speaker 1: very much that person where I was being told and
Speaker 1: congratulated and reinforced for certain types of you know, approaches
Speaker 1: to exercise and food and body composition, all these different things.
Speaker 1: And then you know, it was beginning to wonder why
Speaker 1: I was struggling, and you know, why why am I
Speaker 1: struggling so much if people are telling me I'm doing
Speaker 1: the right thing. So that was very much a point
Speaker 1: of confusion. And when I went into the work that
Speaker 1: I've been doing, you know, it actually is very much
Speaker 1: actually what I would say at the focal point for
Speaker 1: most people I talked to. And so as you've mentioned, like,
Speaker 1: you know, how the heck do we tell the difference
Speaker 1: and you know, what's going on, and so in relation
Speaker 1: to answer this question, I think actually it's important to
Speaker 1: kind of back up a few steps um to really
Speaker 1: understand kind of what we're talking about, and you know,
Speaker 1: define you know what we're talking about. So the concepts
Speaker 1: that you've put forth are healthy and healthy is contrasted
Speaker 1: with unhealthy. And then maybe people will say, like what's
Speaker 1: functional in this contrasted with what is considered dysfunctional order disorder.
Speaker 1: So when when we look at like, you know, what
Speaker 1: is this way of categorizing stuff, this is very much
Speaker 1: an a binary and and kind of like a dualistic
Speaker 1: way of thinking. So there's a you know, there's a
Speaker 1: definition of something, and then the reason why we know
Speaker 1: it is something is because it's contrasted with what is
Speaker 1: not and and you know, this is kind of a
Speaker 1: baseline level thinking for for most individuals when they come
Speaker 1: into the world, Like we come to the world and
Speaker 1: people talk about what is safe or unsafe, edible versus inedible.
Speaker 1: So just from the start in many instances. You know,
Speaker 1: culture communicates you know, what is desirable versus what's not desirable,
Speaker 1: and and that guides us in our day to day. Uh.
Speaker 1: And so like in the past, you know, this would
Speaker 1: be like the local elders in the village, or the religion,
Speaker 1: or the state, or various authorities such as like the
Speaker 1: father in the household, and they would define, you know,
Speaker 1: what is a good Christian, what is a good citizen.
Speaker 1: You know what's a good son, a good daughter, good wife.
Speaker 1: This is right, that's wrong. And you know, this has
Speaker 1: been very much drilled into our day to day that
Speaker 1: it almost appears natural as if it's a reflection of reality. Now,
Speaker 1: you know, thinking about you know, how this relates to
Speaker 1: our current situation. It's also important to kind of look
Speaker 1: at the development of these ideas and so, for instance,
Speaker 1: like science and the post Enlightenment, you know, after the
Speaker 1: eighteenth century was very much thought to help elucidate the
Speaker 1: truth about the world and demystify and personal opinion and
Speaker 1: intuition and religion. These are subjective, kind of touching, feeling things,
Speaker 1: and they're not based in science. And so if we
Speaker 1: adhere to scientific principles, then we can really understand what's
Speaker 1: going on. So part of this was actually applied to
Speaker 1: very much like every topic, including humans themselves. So when
Speaker 1: we think about you know, Darwin and you know, theory
Speaker 1: of evolution, some people begin to think about this as
Speaker 1: like fitness in terms of evolution. And some people took
Speaker 1: that even further and said, well, you know, maybe we
Speaker 1: could actually improve the human race if we understood what
Speaker 1: the ideal human would look like. And and then from
Speaker 1: there we can now categorize humans based on superior humans
Speaker 1: versus inferior Now, at the time, this is very popular thinking,
Speaker 1: and now we would say, you know, this is eugenics.
Speaker 1: You know, this is very much you know, shady and
Speaker 1: and and not really something that we want to reinforce.
Speaker 1: At the time, though the Nazis, the communist but also
Speaker 1: lots of American scientists and the American establishment very much
Speaker 1: adhere to these ideas. And this actually is you know,
Speaker 1: where we have the origin of dietetics in many respects.
Speaker 1: Dietects was originally called home economics. How do we view
Speaker 1: food in a way that is economical so we can
Speaker 1: help optimize the human and optimize the diet, and then
Speaker 1: from there we can create an ideal workforce. And so
Speaker 1: we have these ideas emerging at the turn of the
Speaker 1: century that conceptualized humans as machines, and then we also
Speaker 1: conceptualize them as machines that are imperfect that could be analyzed,
Speaker 1: reduced into individual components and rebuilt um and restructure through
Speaker 1: ideal diets, ideal exercise, ideal medications, ideal you know, environments,
Speaker 1: and we could socially engineer you know, the ideal worker,
Speaker 1: the ideal soldier, and then the ideal societal machine. Now
Speaker 1: you know, Nazism, communism, and eugenics kind of faded out
Speaker 1: of the picture, but a lot of these ideas regarding
Speaker 1: fitness have very much for me the basis of how
Speaker 1: we conceptualized health. And so when we think about it
Speaker 1: from a public health standpoint, public health and like the
Speaker 1: scientific management of the population, examines everyone and then categorize
Speaker 1: them as such and create these various categories like B
Speaker 1: m I, blood work, dietary patterns, exercise patterns, and you know,
Speaker 1: from American psychology, how do we systematize the human psyche
Speaker 1: into understanding what is mentally healthy versus mentally ill? And
Speaker 1: similar to you know what I mentioned before in terms
Speaker 1: of this has not always been the case. This was
Speaker 1: not always the case. And at the same time, because
Speaker 1: it was very much repeated over time and constantly ingrained
Speaker 1: into our psyche, these categories that were based in you know,
Speaker 1: these um conceptions of biology and conceptions of psychology became
Speaker 1: naturalized to the point where now we think of the
Speaker 1: world in this way in many respects that you know
Speaker 1: that these categories that were devised over time are actually
Speaker 1: reflections of reality. And you know, another question that I
Speaker 1: want to ask when we talk about what is defined
Speaker 1: as healthy or functional, is like, is this actually reflection
Speaker 1: of reality or is this sign of like what the
Speaker 1: society values. So, for instance, is it a sign of
Speaker 1: health to be well adjusted to a six society that constantly,
Speaker 1: you know, views the individual as merely in you know,
Speaker 1: a machine, you know, who is supposed to control themselves,
Speaker 1: a spouse, you know, rationality and be obsessed with productivity
Speaker 1: and self governance, trying to obtain a particular body and
Speaker 1: a perfect way of eating, to check all these various boxes.
Speaker 1: And so you know, I'll pause right there, but essentially
Speaker 1: this is stuff that's talked about that is just naturalized,
Speaker 1: but in many respects it's missing a lot of different
Speaker 1: factors that we can really go into on a tuper
Speaker 1: level to help elucidate, you know, what do we make
Speaker 1: of this? These are obviously more intellectual conversations than we've
Speaker 1: had on this podcast before, and certainly the framework of
Speaker 1: looking at history, it's very interesting to really see how
Speaker 1: it came from, what it came from, the cultures that
Speaker 1: came from, and some of the different ways that that
Speaker 1: we've come to view what is fit meaning, you know,
Speaker 1: survival of the fittest, And that first sentence you said
Speaker 1: really struck me is people were trying to survive and
Speaker 1: they qualified or quantified what a body type looks like
Speaker 1: that would survive. But the truth is the times have changed.
Speaker 1: We live in much more modern world. You know, we've
Speaker 1: expanded our lifespan without having to fight off animals to survive,
Speaker 1: you know, so our idea of what health looks like
Speaker 1: or be quantified wasn't really updated, even though the way
Speaker 1: we live and the way we think and the way
Speaker 1: we behave has. So I think that's super interesting and
Speaker 1: definitely allows us to expand out that black and white
Speaker 1: that you talked about between you know, is this healthy
Speaker 1: or is this dysfunctional? It's not black and white, it's
Speaker 1: why are we doing this? What are we thinking about?
Speaker 1: What is our motivation? What other things are kind of
Speaker 1: missing there in relation to you know, how can we
Speaker 1: relate this to our lives. That the frameworks that have
Speaker 1: been presented to us as deemed functional and healthy are
Speaker 1: often reflections of what society values in relation to what
Speaker 1: is considered acceptable or desirable. And so you know, going
Speaker 1: back to the fitness category, it actually in many respects
Speaker 1: reflects what the conception was of creating que unquote you know,
Speaker 1: a fitter population in terms of you know, ability to
Speaker 1: compete on you know, this huge scale. So for instance,
Speaker 1: like how can we have the deal worker, how can
Speaker 1: we have the ideal soldier? And and that is constructed
Speaker 1: in relation to health is primarily you know, a function
Speaker 1: of one's ability to function within um the framework that
Speaker 1: society values. Now that being said as m S before,
Speaker 1: this is often conflated as this is the objective reality.
Speaker 1: So when we look at like these values of you know,
Speaker 1: understandings of research that relate to weight and and biometrics
Speaker 1: and you know, dietary patterns and exercise patterns, these are
Speaker 1: archetypal or like patterns that essentially describe predictions or describe observations,
Speaker 1: and we can relate them to lots of different things.
Speaker 1: But it would be a mistake to view these maps
Speaker 1: as the territory. So, you know, these are maps that
Speaker 1: help us navigate various things and relate them, but that
Speaker 1: doesn't mean it's the actual territory itself. So, you know,
Speaker 1: how do we actually deem what's healthier functional? The way
Speaker 1: we do this in terms of what works for the
Speaker 1: person is to sit down with the individual and to
Speaker 1: actually get to know them and and understand, you know,
Speaker 1: what their values are, what you know, how do they
Speaker 1: think about the world, how do they conceptualize, how do
Speaker 1: they feel, how do they experience, and how do the
Speaker 1: you know, the multidimensional aspects of their life relate to
Speaker 1: each other. So, for instance, something that's talked about a
Speaker 1: lot is you know, healthy eating, this that, blah blah, exercise,
Speaker 1: But not many people talk about social connection and the
Speaker 1: meaning that they have in their life, and you know,
Speaker 1: how they approach and think about food and how it's
Speaker 1: felt and experienced. Most people want to just break it
Speaker 1: down into simply just numbers, and it's like, you know,
Speaker 1: what's the lab value how much saturated as opposed to
Speaker 1: you know, do you sit down and relax and like
Speaker 1: have a nice conversation with someone when you eat, and like,
Speaker 1: how does this relate to the other values in your life?
Speaker 1: And you know, you're thinking about losing weight and at
Speaker 1: the same time, how might this affective relationship with food? Like,
Speaker 1: there's lots of more nuance that can only be really
Speaker 1: fleshed out if you get to know some on an
Speaker 1: individual basis. The problem is this isn't really easy to
Speaker 1: systematizes across the population if you're looking at it from
Speaker 1: like a bureaucratic managerial standpoint, right, But when you know,
Speaker 1: you do work with athletes, or you've worked with athletes
Speaker 1: in the past, and I think there's such an interesting
Speaker 1: population just because they quote unquote look like the healthiest,
Speaker 1: the fittest what we've come to deem as the goal
Speaker 1: for every human to become in some way. But when
Speaker 1: you talk to these individuals, how do they describe their
Speaker 1: emotional experience despite being quote unquote healthy. I think something
Speaker 1: and this can also relate to insurers as well, is
Speaker 1: you know, there's a difference between you know, the behaviors
Speaker 1: that we're doing versus kind of what we're experiencing on
Speaker 1: the inside as well, and and how all these various
Speaker 1: aspects relate. And so in many respects, the system that
Speaker 1: you know, the managed healthcare system but also sports as
Speaker 1: well very much emphasizes, you know, what is called like
Speaker 1: procedural authenticity, where essentially, how does one's actions essentially relate
Speaker 1: to like external values or external you know boxes that
Speaker 1: we can check that signify a particular concept um, and
Speaker 1: not many people really think about, you know, other aspects
Speaker 1: such as you know, epistemic authenticity, where you know, you know,
Speaker 1: what that means is essentially it's like how this relates
Speaker 1: to your internal experiences and your intentions and how you're
Speaker 1: experiencing this. And so a lot of athletes check a
Speaker 1: lot of quote unquote the boxes in terms of what
Speaker 1: is considered healthy and desirable and functional, and in many respects,
Speaker 1: no one sits down and actually asked them, you know,
Speaker 1: what they're subjective experiences like as well as their intersubjective
Speaker 1: experience in terms of how they relate to other people.
Speaker 1: And that right there opens up a lot of you know,
Speaker 1: potential avenues for exploration because no one really digs deeper.
Speaker 1: They look at the image of the representation and never
Speaker 1: say how does this feel for you? You know, how
Speaker 1: is this experience? How does this relate to the other
Speaker 1: spects of your life? And when you have those conversations,
Speaker 1: you get to see the difference between what someone is
Speaker 1: doing versus how they're experiencing it and how it relates
Speaker 1: to the other aspects of your life. But specifically, tell
Speaker 1: me what is their emotional experience? How do they describe it?
Speaker 1: When I'm sitting down with an individual, They're checking all
Speaker 1: the boxes, you know, they're winning the awards, they're doing
Speaker 1: all this stuff, and in some respects they feel proud
Speaker 1: and they feel maybe good about that, and at the
Speaker 1: same time, the way that they've achieved that is through
Speaker 1: these intense repression of their feelings. And similar to like
Speaker 1: a boogie board, like you know at the pool, like
Speaker 1: you push the board underneath the water and it just
Speaker 1: ends up flying you up, you know, and hitting you
Speaker 1: back in the face. A lot of the athletes I
Speaker 1: work with are constantly feeling torn and stuck in these contradictions,
Speaker 1: and like you can see this in terms of um
Speaker 1: They're getting padded on the back, uh to win the
Speaker 1: award and at the same time, they're feeling depressed, anxious,
Speaker 1: and suicidal because their mental health has been uh you
Speaker 1: know that they've been anxious and isolated for so long
Speaker 1: and and they feel like they have to constantly suppress
Speaker 1: their feelings. And so there's this deep emptiness or deep
Speaker 1: sadness that you know, I hear, But like, who am
Speaker 1: I if if I'm not winning? Am I allowed to
Speaker 1: feel sad? Or is this a form of weakness? You
Speaker 1: have these contradictions when I'm working with like football athletes
Speaker 1: or mixed martial arts, where in one mode they're supposed
Speaker 1: to be ultra violent and and hurt the other person
Speaker 1: as much as possible, and then just like that, they're
Speaker 1: supposed to stab their fingers and transition out and all
Speaker 1: of a sudden no longer feel angry, and and now
Speaker 1: they're supposed to integrate, you know, into the society that
Speaker 1: is non violent, and so you just you see just
Speaker 1: so many internal conflicts across the board, and oftentimes, unfortunately,
Speaker 1: similar to the military people I work with or people
Speaker 1: you know in the police force, athletes often conceptualize their
Speaker 1: emotions as as weaknesses or as barriers to success, and
Speaker 1: often kind of over emphasized rationality as a means of
Speaker 1: guiding them and you know, controlling their emotions. But usually
Speaker 1: of what this leads to is people suffering for prolonged
Speaker 1: periods of time and thinking that it is a failure
Speaker 1: of their personal will, a failure of their rationality, and
Speaker 1: they shouldn't be feeling this. But eventually, you know, people
Speaker 1: can only take so much and it really takes its
Speaker 1: sole you know, we don't get to really hear about
Speaker 1: men a lot on this podcast, and we get a
Speaker 1: lot of listeners that do enquire about their significant others
Speaker 1: or their sons or their brothers. And you know, the
Speaker 1: assumption is that eating disorders are way more common in
Speaker 1: women in the US, and as a male, I assume
Speaker 1: that you attract male clients who might feel more comfortable
Speaker 1: with you. Perhaps perhaps not. Do you find that this
Speaker 1: is really true? Are eating disorders more common in women?
Speaker 1: In terms of research, the research is fairly limited in
Speaker 1: relation to in disorders, and it often asks questions that
Speaker 1: don't really necessarily capture kind of like you know, what's
Speaker 1: going on. I mean, this is still a challenge that
Speaker 1: is very much laden with a lot of stigma. So
Speaker 1: it's unlike for people to show up and say, oh,
Speaker 1: by the way, yeah, I know, I'm experiencing all the
Speaker 1: stigma and I'd love to participate in this research study.
Speaker 1: This is already present in women, and it's way more
Speaker 1: present in men. Who really have you know, in our
Speaker 1: country in many respects, you know, mental health services and
Speaker 1: talking about you know, therapy, talking you know, having conversations
Speaker 1: about your feelings, uh, is not something that is really
Speaker 1: promoted up until kind of like recently, and really where
Speaker 1: athletes and people in the military are coming forward, you
Speaker 1: know and saying, you know, I'm struggling, and so the
Speaker 1: research doesn't necessarily capture the full picture. So looking at
Speaker 1: the research, yes, it shows a higher degree of prevalence
Speaker 1: in women compared to men. That being said, um, it
Speaker 1: really is unknown and it's likely a significant underestimate. And
Speaker 1: then also, you know, a conversation for another time is
Speaker 1: the constructs that you know kind of map out what
Speaker 1: is considered disordered or you know, uh used for etcetera
Speaker 1: might not fit well within how men or just people
Speaker 1: in general from a wide variety of backgrounds might experience
Speaker 1: these areas. And because they quote quote don't fit nicely
Speaker 1: into a box, they won't be essentially identified by research tools.
Speaker 1: So the standard answer would be yes, it's more prevalent
Speaker 1: in women. And the realistic and you know, probably more
Speaker 1: real answer is that we don't really know, and that
Speaker 1: a lot I meet a lot of people and and
Speaker 1: see a lot of things, and I would say that
Speaker 1: more people are suffering than the research captures. For sure.
Speaker 1: That's kind of what we wanted to hear more your
Speaker 1: personal experience. Obviously we can't reflect that into a hard fact,
Speaker 1: but you know, I think all of us in our
Speaker 1: own experience can kind of see that men can easily
Speaker 1: silently suffer and oftentimes not know that they're suffering, just
Speaker 1: like many women here were in pursuit of health and
Speaker 1: found their way towards orthorexic tendencies or disordered eating in
Speaker 1: some way and didn't know that could be a cause
Speaker 1: of suffering until you know, this podcast, for many people
Speaker 1: open their eyes to say, you could have disordered eating.
Speaker 1: It's normal that you feel this internal disarray. Something doesn't
Speaker 1: feel right, even though you look right on paper. So
Speaker 1: I feel like I'm very hopeful that the next wave
Speaker 1: of conversations around eating disorders and disordered eatings are going
Speaker 1: to bring men into the picture so that they know
Speaker 1: that they also don't just have to be you know,
Speaker 1: tough guys and those those stereotypes that you were talking about,
Speaker 1: and they too are allowed to have the softness and
Speaker 1: imperfect diets and they don't need to be the strongest
Speaker 1: or the you know, the bulkiest at the gym all
Speaker 1: that stuff. Yeah, totally, and and so like you know,
Speaker 1: similar with the stuff I've been talking about. You know,
Speaker 1: men have various constructs that have been constructed over time
Speaker 1: to emphasize certain qualities and to emphasize other qualities, and
Speaker 1: in many respects that has been really harmful, and you know,
Speaker 1: for instance, privileging rationality over emotion and privileging stoicism over
Speaker 1: intimacy and has really left a lot of men with
Speaker 1: incredibly dysfunctional relationships with themselves and others, and not really
Speaker 1: sure why. There are so many times in my life
Speaker 1: where I've been around men who say things that if
Speaker 1: those exact words came out of a female's mouth, I
Speaker 1: would flag it immediately as disordered eating or needing disorder,
Speaker 1: and when men say it, we just kind of brush
Speaker 1: it off. Is there a way to help men to
Speaker 1: see differently without getting them defensive, to get them to
Speaker 1: start thinking about their relationship to food, without belittling them
Speaker 1: or making them feel like there's something broken. Yeah, totally.
Speaker 1: And I think actually this supplies beyond men and applies
Speaker 1: to everyone in general. Where first and foremost the first
Speaker 1: key is to establish trust and report and get to
Speaker 1: know them as a person. Um, you know. And that's
Speaker 1: the problem with all these DSM five diagnoses and you know,
Speaker 1: all different stuff, is it doesn't it removes a lot
Speaker 1: of the personal elements. And the personal elements are really
Speaker 1: you know, what is needed for people to explore uncomfortable thoughts, feelings,
Speaker 1: emotions and sensations. You know, people want to feel heard,
Speaker 1: they want to feel witnessed, they want to feel understood,
Speaker 1: they want to feel safe, they want to feel that
Speaker 1: they can trust you. And so I think the first
Speaker 1: step would be to talk to them as a as
Speaker 1: a person and get to know them and and and
Speaker 1: listen and actively listen and and build trust and build
Speaker 1: reports and then from there, you know, once you have
Speaker 1: a good relationship with someone, instead of you know, saying
Speaker 1: oh this is disordered or like that's concerned it whatever
Speaker 1: you can you can say, like how do you feel
Speaker 1: about it. You know, I noticed that you're really upset
Speaker 1: the other day when this didn't happen, you know, what
Speaker 1: was going on for you, And and and approaching it
Speaker 1: in a curious and inquisitive, exploratory manner and and not
Speaker 1: necessarily seeking an outcome opens the door for people to
Speaker 1: start to share. And and because it's you know, so
Speaker 1: difficult for so many people, and since it's like, you know,
Speaker 1: behind so many different walls, and also in addition to that,
Speaker 1: it's it might even be very threatening in many respects
Speaker 1: to you know, what they perceive as you know, kind
Speaker 1: of like the things that hold their house up. You
Speaker 1: know that those supports, if we approach as a problem,
Speaker 1: is gonna list a lot of defense. And if we
Speaker 1: approach it with the assumption of pure or false, it's
Speaker 1: kind of a matter of perspective. However, if you get
Speaker 1: to know someone and you start to explore and you
Speaker 1: notice things, and you're like, hey, you know, and how
Speaker 1: it relates to other aspects of the life, asking questions
Speaker 1: and being there's a support without judgment allows them to
Speaker 1: start exploring these things. And then when the time is right,
Speaker 1: you can ask for permission to say, you know, would
Speaker 1: you be open like it's you know, for instance, I
Speaker 1: have noticed that you're feeling really upset about your body,
Speaker 1: or feeling really upset about food or exercise, and you know,
Speaker 1: I have some thoughts if you'd be open and hearing it,
Speaker 1: and then you say no, and then you go okay,
Speaker 1: I hear you, and then you just move on and
Speaker 1: maybe bring up another time if if it's warranted. But
Speaker 1: if they say yes, you could say, well, you know,
Speaker 1: I actually know some people who might be able to
Speaker 1: help explore those those areas because it, you know, it
Speaker 1: makes me sad seeing yourselfer so much, or it makes
Speaker 1: me sad seeing you struggle with you know, your relationship
Speaker 1: with food, or feel so stressed about the gym, and
Speaker 1: and I'm wondering if you'd be open to exploring that
Speaker 1: with someone who could help you navigate those areas. And
Speaker 1: they say no, like, Okay, I hear you. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm here as a support. But if you say yes,
Speaker 1: now you have an opportunity to like you know, introduce
Speaker 1: and explore like would you be open to listen to
Speaker 1: a podcast like you talked about or would you be
Speaker 1: open to reading a book? Would you be open to
Speaker 1: talking to someone and if you do it very much
Speaker 1: in a non judgmental, non confrontational manner and coming from
Speaker 1: a place of empathy and you know, kindness and being gentle,
Speaker 1: I mean that can really shift the overall experience and
Speaker 1: allow them to make their own choices that work best
Speaker 1: for them. And you could be there as a support
Speaker 1: that you know, whether they say yes or no, you're
Speaker 1: always there to support, super helpful, And I think that's
Speaker 1: kind of the first step we all need to proactively
Speaker 1: take to let the men in our lives know that
Speaker 1: they are heard, seen, invalid, and no better way. I
Speaker 1: think like even just hearing these tools from you, they
Speaker 1: feel so implementable, Like I feel like I really could
Speaker 1: walk into a situation where I'm around either a loved
Speaker 1: one or not and really handle it differently because rather
Speaker 1: than see it as a problem that I need to
Speaker 1: fix right, because that's kind of jumped the gun. Especially
Speaker 1: those of us who are in our own recovery, we think, oh,
Speaker 1: we know the answer, let me speed it up and
Speaker 1: get them there. We need to bring patience and curiosity
Speaker 1: and allow for them to go through the stages essentially
Speaker 1: that we went through, which is often you know, denial
Speaker 1: not ready, and sooner or later those introspective wheel start
Speaker 1: turning and things come together. So don't be let down
Speaker 1: if your first try at speaking to a mail in
Speaker 1: your life, or if you are a male, if your
Speaker 1: first try at getting through this stuff is more difficult,
Speaker 1: then you imagine that it would be right. Those different
Speaker 1: constructs of what we need to heal maybe different for
Speaker 1: different sexes in theory, yeah, totally. And essentially, if if
Speaker 1: you're there and they know you're non judgmental and you're
Speaker 1: supportive and you respect their individual autonomy, they'll feel a
Speaker 1: lot more comfortable likely to come back when they already
Speaker 1: and say, hey, I thought about what you said, and
Speaker 1: I think i'd like to start talking. And that might
Speaker 1: take days, weeks, months, years, But if they know that
Speaker 1: you're there, you know, you might be the first person
Speaker 1: they talked to and they feel that they can trust
Speaker 1: you and help start that path, and so I think
Speaker 1: that's something worth trying. Awesome, I agree, Thanks so much
Speaker 1: for your time, and the good news is we're going
Speaker 1: to have you back on for another episode where we
Speaker 1: talk about exercise addiction, what it looks like and how
Speaker 1: we can really change that conversation so thanks for today
Speaker 1: and we'll see you real soon. Mat sounds great.