It’s time to Win the Diet War! Introducing Dr. NINA SAVELLE-ROCKLIN

This week is very special for us here in Psicocontexto, because we had the opportunity of interviewing an excellent professional in the field of psychology: Dr. Nina Savelle-Rocklin. Who is a recognized psychoanalyst that lives in Los Angeles, USA; and works with people that are suffering from body image issues and eating disorder. She is known for writing an award-winning blog called “Make Peace With Food”, she’s host of the popular podcast “Win the Diet War with Dr. Nina”, and produces a video series called “The Dr. Nina Show”

She also has a wonderful web site, where she gives thousands of advises, and has an amazing program that will help you find a lot of things about yourself and your relationship with food. What makes Dr, Nina even more special? Well, she suffered from eating disorders for many years, and she overcame them through therapy, but she NEVER said a word to her therapist about the war that she was living on daily bases with food. The story of this amazing woman is really inspiring, and it was an honor and a pleasure for us being able to talk with her about her experience, work and projects. We invite you to meet her:

First of all, we want to tell you that we love your web site, and your videos. We think that everything you say there it’s so important. And when we were watching them, we instantly thought, that all the things you explain there are so accurate in many ways.

I’m so glad to hear that. Because many people think that whatever is going on with food, or weight or body image is “THE PROBLEM”, when actually it’s just a symptom of the problem, and nobody is talking about that. So with the videos, I thought “I need to talk about it, because nobody else is doing it and people live with the wrong idea of what body image issues are”

I don’t know about in Venezuela, but in The United States people go to this 12 steps programs and things like that, all about “you’re addicted to food” and it’s very destructive because it only makes people feel worse about themselves.

No, actually in Venezuela psychology hasn’t evolved much compare to other countries. In fact, many people still say “I don’t need a psychologist, I’m not crazy”.

People in The United States say the same thing: “I’m not crazy” and what I tell them: it’s not that you’re crazy, it’s not that you’re broken and you’re coming to be fix. Psychology is to come to a deeper understanding of yourself, in the service of having the life you want. It’s to learn how to be reflective and not reactive.

We have read your story about your struggle with disordered eating through your adolescence. Can you tell us what was the signal that made you realize that you had a problem and that you needed it help?

I think that, to answer that, I have to tell you my story. Because really, it began when I was 5 years old. When I randomly and suddenly decided that I had “fat legs” and I was a normal weight kid. But, I suddenly got this idea, at 5. I remember the exact moment that I thought that if my legs were thinner I would be perfect. So this just became an obsession, and it got worse as I got older. And throughout adolescence and college, my last though at night was “what did I eat today?” and the first thought in the morning was “have I lost weight?”. If I went out dancing with friends, I wouldn’t think “oh I’m having fun, I’m dancing with friends”, I’d be thinking “oh, I’m dancing, I’m burning calories”. It just preoccupied my mind, and was in an absolute constant state of anxiety.

So actually, right after college I went to a therapist, and I shared my boyfriend issues, my golds, my dreams, my hopes, my parents stuffs, my friends stuffs. I was open to my therapist about every single thing in my life, except one thing: She had no idea of what was going on with me and food. I went once a week, for 3 years. And I never told her about my eating disorders: anorexia and bulimia. And at first, I didn’t want to quit that relationship with food, because when I was starving, I felt superior and good, and I didn’t want to give that up. And then when I would eventually become bulimic I felt ashamed I didn’t want to talk about that. And then, after a while, I became aware that I wasn’t feeling superior, I was feeling hungry: for food, for life. I develop an appetite for life.

So I guess that was the moment when I realize that there’s more to life that what I weight. And I became aware of feelings that I denied. I learn to process emotions instead of denying them. I began to use words to comfort myself, I talked to myself in a different way, and by the time I left therapy, I had zero eating disorder. Without never telling what was going on with food. And people say: how is that possible? And I tell them: of course it’s possible!, it’s necessary, because an eating disorder is a symptom of the problem. So by improving my self-esteem, by changing my relationship with myself, I changed everything. And I know how is like to struggle, I learned that there’s hope, no matter where you are, or what is happening to you, there’s always hope. I’m a living proof. And I always say that:

“Counting calories, fat grams. And thinking that they were good if they didn’t eat something, and they were bad if they did. It’s exhausting. It’s time consuming and weakens your soul”

In your videos, you talk about making peace with food. How can we make this happen?

Well if you’re turning to food, it’s for a reason. It’s to comfort, to alleviate anxiety, it’s to distract from painful thoughts, it’s to go numb, to relax your body. For so many different things. In other words, eating is a way of managing difficult inner states. I read this in a book that was written like in 1970 or something, the tittle of the book was “It’s not what you eating, it’s what’s eating you”. So, really to make peace with food, you have to make peace with yourself. You got to identify why you’re turning to food, and then find new ways to connect with yourself. So if you’re focusing only on food, you’re missing the core issue. And you may not be in touch with whatever is going on inside.

I had a patient, and one day she said. “Dr. Nina maybe something is going on emotionally with your other patients, but I’m addicted to ice cream, I’m a food addict”. And I said: “really?”. She told me that the other night, she came home, she had a great day at work, she was chilling, watching tv, relaxing and feeling fine. When all of the sudden ice cream was calling her name. That’s why she thought she was a food addict. So then I asked “what were you watching on television?”. And she said she was watching her favorite show: Charmed. And that she was happy watching her favorite show, nothing was bothering her. Then, I asked her “what was the show about?”. And she said: “well it’s about 3 sisters, and then the devil came, and there was a huge fight, and it got ugly…” and then she stopped talking and said: “Oh”.

Because that’s when she realized that she had her own sister issues. Watching the show activated and trigged her sister issues, but before she can even realize that she was upset by the show at her sister, she went straight to ice cream, to distract herself. And then she got mad at herself for eating ice cream. But, who’s she really mad at? Her sister. So it became this way of avoiding the conflict but also expressing the feeling she couldn’t let herself acknowledge she had. And so to make peace with food, she had to really make peace with her sister relationship. You have to identify what’s going on both consciously and also unconsciously, and find new ways of dealing with whatever that is.

That is really interesting! Because many people use food when they’re upset or stressed as an escape from these situations.

Exactly, and people ask all the time “why food?”, one woman said to me “why can’t I be a drug addict?, at least I’d be skinny!”. And she was serious about it. So when they asked “why food”? I tell them, that the answer to that comes from the moment we are born. When we are babies the person in charged to feed us is usually our mothers, so food, and relationships and be held, and feeling safe, and comforted, is all bound up in the experience of eating. So often, turning to food when you’re anxious, is really wanting to be comforted by somebody, wanting a relationship that you don’t have, or that you can’t give to yourself. If you can comfort yourself with words, you’re going to use food.

It’s impressive what you have told us, especially the story of this girl who prefers an addiction over being overweighed. And we believe that comes from society, because people will always judge you for being overweighed, for the way you look, even for the way you dress.  Do you think that society has a lot to do with these body image issues?

There is not a simple answer to that question. Yes, absolutely. The truth is our appearance does matter, if it didn’t, we would all never brush our hair, we would never wear clothing, and we would walk around looking like zombies. So appearance matters, but the point is in what measure for some people it becomes in EVERYTHING. I definitely think that there’s a correlation between society and the messages that we get on the media, and body image satisfaction. There’s no doubt of it.

I don’t know if you’re familiarized with the study that was made in Fiji in the 90’s. In 1997 or something, there was no television in Fiji, and the Fiji culture was very different from ours. They liked bigger bodies. Like to say: “oh you’re looking thin” would be an insult, to them. And their culture for hundreds of years was isolated, and they considered that having a plump body, was good. And nobody had body image issues. They would feel bad if they were thin. And then television came to Fiji, and within 3 years of people seeing tv shows like Melrose Place, and things like that, many girls started having body image issues and even a couple of them developed eating disorders. So that points to how much society, television and culture influences our sense on what’s acceptable. They can wipe out hundreds of years of a cultural standard in just a few years.

But that’s body image dissatisfaction, which it’s not the same as eating disorders. Body image dissatisfaction leads for some people to an eating disorder. It’s correlated, but I don’t think it’s caused by. There are so many other features and issues that go on and leads people developing an eating disorder.

And by the way, why did you think that at age 5 I decided that my legs were fat? Because my parents were very academics, both college professors, very calmed. And I was a very energetic child. And I was always being told “oh you’re too much”, “oh you’re too loud, you’re too sensitive, you’re too much” and that “too much” in my little child brain, became in “oh I’m physically too much”. There should be less of me.

It’s impressive how our childhood has such an impact in the development of our personality! Do you think that the situations that occur in our childhood affect people’s attitude in different circumstances in their lives? 

Absolutely, people say “oh the past it’s the past”, except that the past is NEVER the past until you deal with it. I’ll give you an example, I was at the park with my daughter, and I was watching this little babies playing, like a year and a half old toddlers. A little girl and little boy, and they’re playing in the sand, and all of the sudden the little boy got up, and takes the little girl’s shovel and runs it away. Then the little girl starts crying, because you know, she’s playing with some little guy and he leaves (set her up for later in life right? *laughs*), but then her mother comes running over and tells her “oh don’t cry, stop crying” all worried, and of course the little girl is continuing to cry because her feelings are hurt. And the mom keeps saying “stop crying” and deeps in her dipper bag and pulls out a cookie, and says “stop crying, here, have a cookie”.

And at first I thought “wow way to set your daughter up for having an eating disorder, to turning to food when you’re upset, for learning that it’s not okay to cry, and that crying makes other people anxious”. And then I realized that what I saw between that mother and daughter, was also a representation of the internal experience of someone who turns to food when they’re upset, so maybe that little girl it’s going to grow up and a part of her it’s going to identify with her mother, and her mother’s anxiety, and her mother’s cookie giving. So maybe that little girl one day it’s going to feel like crying her another part of her internally will say “don’t cry, have a cookie instead”. And that’s how the past lives on in the present, and you have to identify how you’ve been impacted by that past. And parents do their best, I mean, I’m a parent and I do my best. But still, “their best” can affect their kids. So I don’t like to blame, but I like to explain how did your childhood affects your present life.

It makes a lot of sense, because we live in a society where maybe without wanting it, our parents teach us NOT to cry “because crying is something bad”, and finally we grow up keeping those feelings to ourselves, because we’re afraid to look vulnerable or annoying. 

It’s true, if you’re mad then you have an anger management problem. If you’re sad, then you’re depressed take a pill. If you’re anxious, take a pill, even if you’re happy, “oh you’re too happy, you’re bipolar”. You just can’t win. And when people don’t know how to be with feelings, they don’t know how to be, they don’t know even how to identify those feelings much less process them, much less feel them, and they’re going to use all kinds of things whether is food, eating disorders, gambling, alcohol, whatever to manage those internal states. That’s why we psychologically minded people have to help the word realize that we are humans.

Since we have been talking about the unconscious, we know that you are a psychoanalyst, which is really interesting, there for we’d like to know, which techniques do you use in therapy when you’re working with people that struggle with body image issues?

Well recently I wrote a chapter in a book about what psychoanalysis is, and what psychoanalysis isn’t, because there are so many misconceptions. And in fact, when I was in school, I was only taught about Melanie Klein and Freud, and basically nobody does that anymore, that’s archaic thinking. And what surprised me, is that there’s so much more to psychoanalysis than what we were taught. And psychoanalysis is also a theory of the mind. There’s about 20 different ways, there’s a lot of within the umbrella of psychoanalysis, because there’s a lot of different theories within it, and the theories are always fighting with each other about what’s right. So Freud and Jung is still happening, the past returns with them in some studies.

But the principal part of psychoanalysis is recognizing that what’s there’s something out of awareness, but not out of operation. Like my patient who watched the tv show Charmed. A psychoanalytic theory would say: maybe something is going on with her that caused her to reach for that ice cream.  Where maybe a cognitive-behaviorist theory would be focused on ways that she should not go for ice cream.

So basically I make an analogy between to a weed and a root. A weed is what you see and it’s grown by a root. You can’t see the root, just like you can’t know the unconscious, but it’s there, in the dark. If you just focus in the weed, it keeps growing back, so you have to go underground, unconscious, to be able of get to what’s hidden, and bring it into the light, and then deal with it.

It’s like making the unconscious, conscious and work with it. You can’t fight an invisible army, you’ll just get bitten up. And the army is all the problems in your life, and all that bothers you. But if you make it visible, then you can do battle, then you can fight, but you can’t fight if you don’t know what you’re fighting against.

For much people, the best way to deal with daily problems that affects their emotions (like anxiety), it’s avoiding them through different habits, like an unhealthy relationship with food. How can they realize if their constant eating is happening because they’re actually hungry, or just because it’s an emotional necessity?

Well there are some ways that you can tell the difference. You can tell the difference between physically hunger, and emotional hunger. Signs that you’re physically hungry, it’s physical, you’re feel it in your body. Your stomach growls, maybe you’d fell weak, or you have a headache. Those are physiological signals that you need food. But, if you’re emotionally hungry…it’s when you think “oh that looks good, or that sounds good” you want to reward yourself, you want to calm down or feel better. When you’re using food to change the way you feel emotionally, that’s emotional eating. That leads you to being able to figure out what emotions or conflicts are going on, that you’re wanting to use food to resolve.

I always tell people “you have to learn to identify”, because people think the food is the trigger, but the food is not the trigger, there’s a situational trigger that leading you to the food. And that’s why you need to ask yourself, what’s going on? Are you angry? Are you sad? Are you lonely? Are you anxious? Are you bored? Are you tired? I cannot tell you how many people say things like “I was so tired so I ate some ice cream”, but actually the answer to being tired is to sleep or to rest. But so many people don’t see it that way, and this leads us to talk again about: babies.

Some mothers don’t figure out if their kid is tired, or needs to be held, or needs to eat, so no matter what, when the baby cries they just give him a bottle. And eventually the baby learns: anything that is upsetting to me, whether I’m tired, whether I’m hungry or whether I need to be held the answer is: food. But the truth is: food is not the answer to everything, if you’re tired you need to sleep, if you’re sleepy maybe you need a cup of coffee, if you’re lonely, you need either another person or you need to relate to yourself in a different way, if you’re upset you need to express those feelings. So identifying what is going on, what would you be feeling if you weren’t eating, what would you be thinking about if you weren’t thinking about food, helps them to being able to identify the root.

I also say to people: cut off for 3 minutes. Because they always say “I’m hungry but I don’t know”. So if you’re hungry and you wait 3 minutes, because anyone can wait 3 minutes. If you’re really hungry, you’re going to get hungrier in those 3 minutes, but if you’re emotionally hungry, and you start to tune in with whatever is going on in your life, you’re actually are going to get less hungry.

In your videos, you say that our self-criticism is painful and it makes us more likely to use food as a distraction or escape from the pain. How can we eliminate this thoughts of our mind? Is it necessary to have a balance among emotions, thoughts and behavior?

That’s great question. Because not only there’s the need to be a balance, but there needs to be an understanding of the relationship between thought, emotion, and behavior, which is that thoughts and beliefs, some of which you may or may not be aware of, lead to emotions, which then lead to behavior. And getting back to my ice cream lady, she had a thought, the thought was: I’m mad at my sister. But she couldn’t let herself have that thought. So the thought made her feel anxious, angry and, how did she deal with these emotions?: Ice cream. So, there’s a correlation between what you think leads to what you feel, leads to the behavior. 

And that’s why dealing with the behavior itself is always temporary. That’s why there’s always a new diet book, a new thing. Because you have to get to: why are you doing what you doing? And there’s a lot of people who lost weight either by dieting, or even gastric bypass which is very dangerous operation, and they’ve lost a lot of weight, but then they start gaining the weight back. Because they realize they never dealt with the thoughts and beliefs that lead to the feelings, which let to not knowing how to be with those feelings, because our culture says “don’t have feelings” and they use food to distract.

So, is absolutely essential to change the way you think. And some times when I ask them to talk to me about way they talk to themselves, I’ll hear something like…an example of one patient who went out to dinner with her husband. The bread came to the table, and she had a piece, and her husband looked at her like “do you really need that? And she said “I felt so guilty for eating that bread, I thought: you have no willpower, you have no self-control, you’re a loser, even your husband knows it, and you suck”. And then of course she felt terrible, and used food for comfort, and she said “why do I use food, when it’s the enemy?” By the way noticed how she went from first person “I ate the bread”, to second person “you’re a loser”? And that’s important because the way you talk to yourself has strong impact.

if had she said to herself “ok, I ate a piece of bread, it’s a normal thing to do as a human being, it’s okay, there’s nothing wrong with me, I’m not a bad person and I’m not a loser, I’m going to enjoy my bread”, then she would feel fine, and she wouldn’t think something destructive. So, changing the thought pattern and that self-criticism it’s absolutely essential.

In your website, you offer a service where you can help people to crack the code to emotional eating in a 3 day challenge. Can you tell us more about this? How can people do this in 3 days? (That sounds amazing by the way!)

Well cracking the code helps you make the army invisible, more visible, and then you have to do the real battle. But cracking the code is the first step, you can’t deal with what is going on, unless you know what you’re dealing with. So what I do is I help people identify the conflicts, and emotions that are impacting them but they don’t know why. And in the 3 days challenge, I show them how to find the real triggers, so they can figure out why they’re eating instead of focusing on what they’re eating, and I help them change their focus. A lot of  people tell me that they feel very self-conscious about their weight, and no matter what they weight. I have seen 92 pound people told me they feel self-conscious and 302 pounds people told me they feel self-conscious. And I wanted to really addressed that and help people to feel less self-conscious. Because when you’re feel better about yourself and you don’t feel that are eyes looking at you, it really helps your sense of self-esteem and it helps those thoughts. I want to help them to get that too and I give them a diet plan, a diet plan that doesn’t involved food, it’s super quick and it will help you for the rest of your life. It really is for people who think they know everything about diets, they’ve benn on every diet in the world, but their focus is in the symptom, and whatever is going on with food is a symptom of the problem, it just feels like THE PROBLEM.

One of the things that I hear a lot is: “I know something must be going on with me because I’m eating”, just like my ice cream lady said. But sometimes you just don’t have idea of what’s going on with them, so I develop this strategy, which I talk about in my program, to help you figure out what’s going on in your life, and that’s why by what you’re eating can help you figure out what’s going on inside you. For example, ice cream and things that are smooth and creamy are correlated with the need for comfort. The things that are filling like cakes and pasta, that’s associated with the loneliness. And crunchy food, is associated with anger. So when there’s something that’s bothering you, you can figure that out by what you’re eating and correlating it to certain needs and wants.

That theory about the types of food is really interesting, we had never correlated those aspects with the emotions.  

Well, I sore of develop this after listen to people over many years. For example, she was angry and she ate chips, she was lonely and she ate cake. And there are men too! There are so many men in my practice and so many older adults. And I was surprised, and this is unscientific, because I haven’t done a scientific study, but absolutely it’s almost to a person accurate.

It’s great how much we can watch, study and learn from our patients!

Of course!, and I think  the day you think you know it all, is the day you should close your practice. I’m constantly wanting to learn from and about the people who do me the honor of coming to see me and being vulnerable and sharing their lives, their fears, and their wishes with me. And I think that you have to never take the stand that you know everything, because you’re going to learn something new from everybody who comes in your office. I love what I do, it’s always new, and different and inspiring.

In what measure our self-esteem, self-knowledge, and self-image are involved in the development of healthy alimentation habits?

Well when you feel good about yourself, it’s easy being good to yourself. When you have self-esteem and you care about yourself, you want to treat yourself with care, you want to satisfy your needs, all of them, even the emotionals needs, and you want to take care of your body instead of attack it. So many people that I see with eating disorders are in conflict with their bodies almost like they don’t see their bodies as  part of themselves. They hate their bodies, and they’re attacking their bodies. And when you look at your body and your physical self, as a part of you, it’s a part of you to be care for, nourished and respected, then you’re going to take care of youself in all aspects. You’re going to give yourself a nice sleep, have good friends, and meet all your needs. So self-esteem and self-care is the key to a relationship with yourself in all ways.

It’s funny you said that because our next question is about what you just mentioned. Do you believe that self-esteem is the key to have a better mental health?

Absolutely! When you mention mental health, people think about mental health and they think of: CRAZY. Crazy is crazy. Mental health is having a balance and being able to recognize that you have intellectual, emotional, creative, physical, even spirituals aspects to yourself. And that they all need a balance and that you need to be able to think about what you need, feel and want in relationship to yourself and the world. And it’s really to have a very holistic view of yourself in the world. And being able to reflect about how you think, to think about what you want, about your needs versus other needs. And a lot of people say: “I can’t think about my own need that would make me selfish”. And for then it’s either selfless, they don’t think about their needs at all, but they think about take care of everybody else, or if they start to think about what they really need they feel selfish. I tell them in the middle is self-care, that’s balancing. You know when you flying a plain and the flight attended says “parents if the oxygen mask drops, do not put on your children, put it on yourself first”, because you’re no good to anybody else if you don’t have oxygen. So mental health, is about giving yourself that oxygen.

In what way do this eating disorders affect people’s relationships with their family, friends and loved ones?

I think that when you don’t feel good about yourself, it’s very hard to imagine that other people can feel good about you. And if you don’t like yourself, how can you take in that other people can like you or love you? And we all need as humans to love and be loved. But if love isn’t available or it’s not consistent, that can be very humiliating, because it’s painful to want something you can’t have. And so, often time people don’t even allow themselves to want relationships, or they’re afraid to connect other people because to them it gets connected with pain. Even if you are there, they might not respond the way you want, they might disappoint you, they might hurt you, they might abandoned you, and the reality is of course, people can sometimes be unpredictable, they can be unavailable, they can be unreliable.

And in contrast, food becomes very compelling, because in contrast to people, food is predictable, it’s always what you think is going to be: ice cream never tastes like fish. Food is reliable, it doesn’t change on you. So like I said before, the first experience of relating and relationship is food. And when people become scary food becomes safe. Looking at attachment style and how that relates it’s super important because people who are securely attached they feel safe, they feel loved, they feel lovable, and they usually are not struggling in their lives. 

But people who are anxious, preoccupied. You know like “stay right here, stay close, because if I let you go you’ll leave me”, have a lot of anxiety about relationships. People who don’t want to be close, they’re afraid to be hurt or whatever, they keep people at a distance. People who are afraid of attachment, or avoidant like: “I want a connection but If I get it, I’m not going to want it anymore”, those are related to some kind of eating disorders. Like the last one, fearful and avoidant is a lot of people with bulimia: “I want it, oh no I don’t”. “I want people, oh no I don’t”, so they start to binge on people and then purge on people, or then they binge on food and then they get rid of food. And you can see that whatever that goes on with eating disorder behavior also goes on with people. So if you want closeness, but you’re afraid of intimacy, you might binge but then you may purge. If you can’t get enough, can feel safe enough in a relationship, you might binge on and feel terrified of letting go of a person, or terrified of having a person because then they can let you go. So I think really looking at attachment styles, it’s so important because there’s usually some kind of correlation between disorder eating and disorder relationship styles.

When you can meet your needs for love and connection, you don’t need food to express that. When you can fill up with people and relationships, think about the word “fulfilling” is to have a fulfilling relationship, it’s so much related to being filled up with food. So if you can fill up on people, you’re not going to fill up with food. Often people who are anorexic, they restrict people as well as food. They don’t connect to people and they don’t take on any food.

In Venezuela, the stereotype of “perfect body” for a woman is transmitted by beauty pageants like “Miss Venezuela”, so most of the girls wish to have this curvy body figure (like an hourglass), and summit their bodies to plastic surgery and strict diets. What message would you send to these girls who are dealing with this problem right now?

This is a problem all over the world, it’s also a problem here in The United States. Although it’s less about being curvy, and more about being sort of skinny and curvy. I think that either way we’re talking about girls thinking of themselves as objects, as things. They devalued themselves. And when people say “myself” so often people think about their physical self.

One woman told me, for example, we were talking about self-care and she said that she practices excellent self-care, and then she proceeded to tell me she gets her hair done every week, her nails done, she gets massages, she gets facials. She said “I’m the queen of self-care”. And I said: “that’s not self-care, that’s grooming. That’s not about yourself, that’s about your body”. And she looked totally confused and she said: “what do you mean, what other self am I?” and it was so tragic, in a way that’s what you talking about in Venezuela. The primary and only “self” is the one in the mirror. And that so many girls, whether here or in Venezuela, are learning to measure their value by looking in the mirror or standing on the scale, by what they look like. As if they were mannequins and there’s nothing inside. And we have to not objectify ourselves, and we have to become subjects of our lives, not objects.

So I would say to girls in Venezuela; there are a whole range of qualities that make you special, and if you only focus on the image in the mirror then you’re missing who you are, and you need to identify, embrace and love all those parts of you. Because I don’t know about you, but before I met my husband, I went on a lot of dates, with very attractive men, who were very boring! And I was like “who cares how good looking you are?” And ultimately it’s so shallow to only look at yourself by your appearance, you have to look at yourself as a WHOLE PERSON, and love you, and be a person, don’t be a thing.

It’s tragic that being smart, being adventured, being vibrant, being a WOMAN it’s no longer looked at as something good. Sometimes I look at movies from the 40’s, when women were WOMEN, and actually women were treated more like women then. Now, everybody has to be a GIRL.

That’s so true! We have read about that in your web site and we also read excellent news. We read that you’re writing a book and it will be publish next year. Can you tell us more about it?

Well I just turned it into the publisher a month ago, so now I’m waiting to hear, there’s a whole process where they send it out to readers and then you get it back, and I have to do revisions and all of that. So I’ll keep you posted it. Basically I talk about psychoanalysis, it’s more like a scholarly book, because it’s from a scholarly publisher, so it would be good for psychologist and psychology students. And it’s about the psychoanalytic treatment of eating disorders, much of which I talk to you about today.

Dr. Nina is an amazing person and an excellent professional, and if you still have doubts, just take a look at this video:

If you want to know more about her work just log in here, it’s a link to her web site:  http://http://winthedietwar.com/

And follow her on Instagram: @win_the_diet_war

And Facebook: Dr. Nina Savelle-Rocklin ( https://www.facebook.com/DrNinaSavelleRocklin?fref=ts )

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Psychologist Ana Vasconcelos

Psychologist: Andrea Guerrero