The 90’s are back, baby. 

I mean have you looked at what’s back in style today? The extra wide leg pants, hot pink everything, hair scrunchies, bike shorts, overalls, cargo pants, combat boots and my personal favorite, the sweater vest. The fact that there aren't any Blockbusters in the strip malls anymore is the only way that I know I'm not back in 1992. 

I feel like I've lived a long time since I've seen the sweater vest be the coolest wardrobe accessory followed by the-ugliest-thing-I've-ever-seen-I-can't-believ-I-wore that back to closet hero. Wow. It's almost like I used to walk a mile to school way back in the day or something. Even my puffed sleeve Laura Ashley floral extravaganza dress is making a comeback. See kids, I really did used to be "cool". 

You know what hasn't made a comeback from the 90's? Snackwells. You remember those boxes of fat free cookies? Forget the Creme Sandwich, I went for the Devil's Food Cookie Cakes. Ah, yes, those...

The rest of our crew heads back to school tomorrow which is just as well with 90% chance of rain and 66 degrees in the forecast. The new year feels equal parts fresh and daunting. Aside from the new markers, pencils, binders, folders and paint (Target aisles are the best) that I bought, the labor of getting through another school year feels real and is not giving me low-key vibes (teenage lingo for "kinda cool"). 

The work of recovering from diet culture and disordered eating is real. I'm not gonna lie and tell you it's easy if you just follow my formula. It's not easy, but it's a lot less difficult doing anti-diet work with someone like me who's walked the path and understands what you're going through. 

I don't usually write to you on holidays, but it felt appropriate to remind you that you're not alone in doing this work and that I admire you for making strides away from diet culture. Making peace with food is hard work and we can do this labor together because it's...

The sunscreen tubes are empty, the goggles have gone missing and the crumbs on the car floor have been replaced with sand, yet this cruise director isn’t ready to see her passengers disembark from their summer adventure.

As I forced myself to look through our summer homework and piles that came home on the last day of school (which may or may not have been touched in 8 weeks) to make sure my passengers were ready for school, I was reminded of the beauty of summer. 

Yes, its those sun-filled, agenda-less, pool and popsicle filled days, but its also the ability to give your kid the right messaging around food without worry about what counter messages they’re getting at school. 

In our piles, I found an all school assignment to take a photo of yourself over the summer doing various things and one option to photograph was, get this, “a photo of yourself eating something new AND HEALTHY”. The shouty all caps weren’t in the directions, I’ve...

Kids lined up twenty deep in anticipation of the annual spaghetti dinner the night before their all-city swim meet. Large pans held spaghetti, red sauce with fresh basil, alfredo sauce, and freshly grated Parmesan cheese. At the end of the line, more platters from parents held delicious desserts, fruits and bread to mop up any leftover sauce. 

Sure, the annual spaghetti dinner is billed as the perfect “fuel” or carbo load pre-event meal, but it’s much more than that. 

It’s about the kids celebrating their hard work all season. 
It’s about parents celebrating that they don’t have to convince their kids to get out of bed early in the morning and into a (sometimes very cold) pool. 
It’s about the joy of being together as a team and community. 
It’s about the pleasure that a good meal brings. 
It’s about tradition because every kid and parent I know looks forward to this event.

Food isn’t just about...

My late Father-in-Law loved a good joke. 

One of his favorite one liners was asking my Mother-in-Law if we were having honeymoon salad for dinner. What’s that you ask? Lettuce alone!

Cue the knee slap. Ba Dum Bum.

I couldn’t help thinking about his salad joke when a mom at our neighborhood pool gathered her three children to see that neighbor Molly was eating a salad BY HER OWN WILL. 

“Do you see what a great job she’s doing eating vegetables all by herself without her mom forcing her to eat them? She’s being such a good role model and setting such a good example for all the other kids!” 

Her kids stared at her blankly and jumped back in the pool while Molly sat uncomfortably in her poolside chair munching away.

I’m sure they were all thinking, lettuce alone. 

Putting certain foods on pedestals and demonizing other foods is exactly what diet culture teaches and perpetuates through countless diet rules and...

My daughter was poised to jump with water dripping off her swimsuit while she hollered,

“Don’t catch me, mommy! Do it by self!”

A seasoned swim instructor and fellow mom-tot chorus singer of wheels on the bus said, 

“Good for her, she’s loving that body autonomy.”

I thought about how much body autonomy feels good whether you’re two years old, twenty-two years old or seventy-two years old. Despite the government trying to take away female’s basic body autonomy rights, they can’t take away that you know how good it feels to have control over your own body. 

Body autonomy is a fundamental human right. 

Body autonomy is also the foundation of finding peace with food. 

My two year old daughter knows it feels good to do things she can by herself, even if her clothes are on inside out and backwards and her shoes are on the wrong feet. That’s what feels good to her right now. 

As a kid, you had the same...

The sound of daytime tv along with the familiar pump of the sewing machine surrounded me and the other customers standing against the picture windows trying to dodge the Monday morning rain. I could feel my heart sink when my tailor looked at me and said, 

"It's hopeless".

Let me back up. 

I go to our beloved tailor almost weekly. They've fixed everything in our house from soccer and NFL jerseys to fancy graduation dresses. They must expect my weekly visit and wonder what goes on at our house to have so many items with holes, rips and tears. All I can say is it's messy living with six kids and two busy parents, ok? 

This particular week, I brought in my not very fancy, but went with everything blue JCrew linen shirt that I've had for years. I noticed a hole right next to the pocket and took it straight to my people because I was determined to save my shirt. It’s one of those feel at home pieces of your wardrobe that makes every outfit work even if you...

"Beauty isn't essential, but food is." 

Author Angela Garbes brilliantly summed up the opposite of what our culture promotes with this quote.

Living in America, the typical woman is brainwashed to believe that beauty is essential (see Karadshian family and Kim K who recently said she'd be willing to eat poop everyday if it made her look younger) but food is the enemy to achieving the stereotypical thin, white, young, able-bodied beauty standards. 

The truth is, food isn't the enemy. Diet culture is. And we're all victims of diet culture, so don't blame yourself for where you are. 

It's hard to fathom that our country congratulates women for their own self induced hunger. My girls and I just read the book When Stars Are Scattered and the part of the book that struck me the most was the very real and critical hunger crisis. In the book, the main character talks about how the very few and lucky students who did make the long walk to school...