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Past traumas trigger food focus, understandably

Posted by on Remember that a coping strategy allows us to remain in an uncomfortable situation without being aware of how uncomfortable we are. Well, what if the uncomfortable situation is now within us? It is years after our trauma, and we have turned against ourselves because of years of feeling the anxiety and distress of that trauma. These were perfectly appropriate responses at the time, but no one ever validated or acknowledged them. We are tired of feeling anxious and constantly insecure. Nothing we try seems to make a difference. We must get away from ourselves because we can’t seem to find a way to live with ourselves. Bring on the behaviours. Bring on the big guns. Take my mind off my feelings and thoughts that keep me stressed and preoccupied. It can be a relationship so I can now focus on the other person and project my feelings of anxiety and frustration onto them. It can be food or drugs so I can numb out. Whatever! Just get me out of myself! This is how many of us come to find ourselves obsessed with and enmeshed in substances, in other people’s lives, and in food. It’s something obvious in the present to which we can attach this distress. Maybe even something we have some power over.

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre

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Living in the present helps ease anxiety

Posted by on Ask yourself right now, in this moment, if you are physically and emotionally safe? Or are you being threatened, judged or pressured by anyone or any outside influence – not five minutes ago or possibly in one hour, but right now? The answer will very likely be no. Okay then, why the anxiety? Why the distress? Why the level of dis-ease that you are feeling right now? The answer is that your Drill Sgt. and Authentic Self live life in the past and the future – not the present moment. The past was painful and scary, and you were powerless. And on some level you felt overwhelmed by the behaviour of others. For the record, your pattern of worrying, planning and holding on to the anxiety is definitely not protecting you or keeping you safe. It is sustaining a life of fear and suffering, and enhancing your need for food to cope.

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre

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The process of recovery

Posted by on The process of recovery is dependent on: 1) your being able to notice when you are using an old coping strategy and then identifying what triggered this thought, feeling or behaviour; and 2) what action you need to take, internally or externally, to meet the need which was triggered. That’s it in a nutshell! Coping strategies impact you in terms of unfinished business, the permeating level of anxiety, and the hopelessness and despair of feeling out of control and powerless to do anything about it. Your coping strategies are only signposts. They are meant to make you aware of your unmet needs in that moment. Don’t spin your wheels focusing on the coping strategies themselves. Always look to the underlying need which triggered them initially.

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre

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Boundary setting

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Boundary Setting


In exploring your feelings about boundary setting and why you might feel resistant to it, it can be helpful to explore your beliefs too.

Think about a current relationship in your life where you often find yourself feeling anxious, insecure, overrun or resentful and then take a moment to consider your answer to the following questions:


What is it about this person or the relationship you have with them that triggers these feelings?

What would you like to see happening in this relationship that would reduce the anxiety and insecurity etc. that you feel with them?

What commitments would you need to make with yourself about what you will or won’t do in order to lessen those feelings of being overrun or of resentment?

What would you need to ask them for or tell them you will or won’t do in order to make that happen?

What thoughts and feelings surface when you consider setting those boundaries with that person?

Are you fearing judgement, anger, labeling as needy or high maintenance; or maybe you fear that they would reject you?

Why are you settling for patterns in your relationships that don’t feel good to you?

Where did you get the idea that you are not worthy of being treated with dignity and respect? That you are not worthy of getting what you need and desire in your relationships?

And then considering whomever gave you those ideas or treated you that way in your past ask yourself this:

Why am I willing to believe that they were healthy, functional, ‘right’ people?  

What do you know now about them and their lives that could, if you allowed it, change the way you interpreted those events? Maybe they were struggling with their own depression and self-esteem. Maybe they were abused as children and lacked the ability to be nurturing and considerate of your feelings. 

Allow yourself to see the truth of these relationships. And then think about the present and ask yourself:

If those people who taught me to feel so worthless and afraid we not 100% well or secure in themselves, why am I continuing to live my life as though they were right to treat me badly and as though there really is something wrong with me?

Stop living in the past. Let yourself see the reality of the present and find relationships that will mirror what is true about you – you are worthy of love and acceptance and of peaceful, loving, fun relationships. You are worthy of asking for what you need.

Let’s get started!!!

I’m here to help.

Love Michelle
mmorand@cedriccentre.com

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre, Relationship with Food, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self

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Fatigue begets more fatigue

Posted by on Many of us who use food to cope resist going to bed at a decent hour and force ourselves to stay up, yawning and exhausted. We frequently eat at those times, often because we’re tired. This only adds to our emotional and physical fatigue. Sometimes we stay up late because we are desperate for some time for ourselves. If we have partners and/or children at home, roommates and so forth, we will find it challenging to have space to let ourselves just be. If late at night is the only time available for just us, we will covet that time and be very reluctant to give that up, even to the concept of self-care and sleep. If this sounds like you, clearly there is a lack of balance between the social you and the independent you. You are stuck in “giving” mode, and it is imperative that you begin to carve out some time each day that is just for you. You’d be surprised what 20 minutes of uninterrupted you time can do.

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre

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Unrealistic goals from within and without

Posted by on The diet industry nets billions of dollars each year convincing you that goals are attainable through a program of restriction and tuning out to your body’s natural signals of hunger and fullness. And those goals may be attainable, but the methods through which they are attained are certainly not sustainable. It is this truth that leads to what is commonly called in our society “falling off the wagon” or “being bad”. The judgement of our inability to “stick to the plan” leads to the establishment of more unrealistic goals which, in turn, leads to more and more experiences with disappointment and failure.

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre

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Resistance inquiry

Posted by on It is important to not let your resistance prevent you from making the changes you desire. Having said this, we absolutely must acknowledge the trigger(s) which cause us to feel resistance, and we must determine why this might be. For example, I might feel great resistance to going out for dinner with a particular person. On the surface, I might judge myself for being anti-social or think I’m just being lazy. Perhaps though, if I asked myself where my resistance was coming from, or in other words, what I was telling myself about dinner with this person that had triggered me to feel resistant, I would discover quite readily that this person has a habit of putting me down or making rude comments which undermine my sense of security and/or value system. In this light, no wonder I’m resistant to spending time with this person. More power to me!

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre

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The Inside-Out Dilemma

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The Inside-Out Dilemma


It is shocking that so few of us, as we are spiraling down the hole of Diet Mentality and into Disordered Eating, ever hear a message which offers us another way of seeing the inside-out dilemma we are living.

We are rarely blessed with the gift of hearing a friend, relative, or media person say, “Just work on your relationship within yourself. Trust your worth. Stop trying to change the inside by changing the outside. It is the inside that created the outside, and you must attend to the creator before you can experience lasting change with the creation.”

If diets truly did offer a solution to what is going on for you, wouldn’t you be free of it now?

Yep, you would. But the diet industry doesn’t tell you that. They help you to continue to believe that it’s you – you just don’t have enough willpower; you just don’t want it bad enough; you just don’t care enough about yourself; you’re not smart enough; you’re just plain not good enough! At least that’s what that voice in your head says isn’t it?

But why are you so willing to make it about something wrong with you when hundreds of millions of men and women worldwide are also struggling with the same unreasonable expectations and the same flawed approach to feeling more self-esteem and getting a grip on binging and weight loss?

It isn’t your fault. You come by it honestly. Now stop beating yourself up and get some support and some tools to change the way you’re thinking about yourself and about life and watch how quickly your relationship to food changes – then watch in joyful awe as your weight naturally changes too! 

Check out our Diet Mentality Worksheet. This can be a very helpful tool to keep on hand or put on the fridge!

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre

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Uncovering unfinished business

Posted by on The Permeating Level of Anxiety (PLA) is often triggered by what I call “unfinished business”. Your unfinished business is compromised of your unmet needs from the past and present as well as projections about the future. Mostly, it speaks to past experiences which feel, well…unfinished! Most of us at the start of our recovery process have a mountain of unfinished business, such as: conversations which need to take place; relationships which have no closure; tasks left undone; and life experiences that feel unresolved or incomplete. In the cycle of addiction, you have legitimate unmet needs but are unaware of them. You then use various thoughts, feelings, and behaviors to try and feel okay. But feeling okay for long is not possible when there is something legitimate that needs to be taken care of before you will feel peaceful and okay.

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre

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Perfectionism increases anxiety and isolation

Posted by on It is ridiculous to expect yourself to do anything perfectly the first time. It just is. When you start a new job, your supervisor doesn’t say, “Screw up once and you’re fired!!” No, they say, “Here’s Georgette. She’ll train you. Ask her any questions you have and don’t worry, we understand it takes a good six months to really find your stride in a new position.”  In other words, we know you’re not perfect, we don’t expect you to be, and we want you to let us know the limits of your knowledge so we can educate you further, and we all win. If you had key adults in your life who shamed or blamed you for making mistakes, it quickly became unsafe to let anyone know what you didn’t know. Unfortunately, that approach to life usually leads to more mistakes, not fewer. It certainly leads to great anxiety and distress and a sense of isolation that rarely leaves us because we are afraid to let anyone in. Second chances must be a part of life. Life is for learning. That means we aren’t going to know what we’re doing much of the time; we learn as we go, and sometimes (more often than we’d like) we learn by what didn’t work rather than by what did.

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