News & Blog

Coronavirus: Our Practice Policy

Coronavirus: Our Practice Policy

March 9, 2020

Until we receive clearer directions, CFIH is adopting a “better to be safe than sorry approach”. Please support us in our efforts to reduce the spread of Coronavirus.

International Women’s Day: Our Message

International Women’s Day: Our Message

March 8, 2020

On International Women’s Day, we passionately strike the #EachforEqual pose. To us, this pose symbolises equality, compassionate boundaries, allyship, and the disruption of destructive gender-based cycles.

Exercise and eating disorders

Exercise and eating disorders

February 20, 2020

In an interview with Hack on Triple J, CFIH Psychologist, Ashleigh Olive, proposed a number of red flags that can help to identify someone with or at risk of an eating disorder.

How accurate are nutrition information panels?

How accurate are nutrition information panels?

October 2, 2018

Diet-culture loves numbers – we’re sold the idea that we can achieve tight and calculated control over food and our bodies through counting, tracking, weighing and measuring.

5 ways to shut down diet-talk in the office

5 ways to shut down diet-talk in the office

August 15, 2018

Office diet-talk can be relentless, triggering and difficult to avoid. If 8 hours of carb, keto and cleanse commentary is making you want to ride your wheelie chair down the fire escape, here’s a few ideas for you: Excuse yourself and walk away. After a few smoke-bomb moments they’ll start to get the picture you’re … Read More

When Intuitive Eating Becomes Another Diet..

When Intuitive Eating Becomes Another Diet..

July 23, 2018

Being surrounded by a diet-obsessed culture full of rights and wrongs, dos and don’ts, can make it hard to adjust to a totally new concept in which there is no “right way”. When developing the skills of an intuitive eater, one can become stuck in thinking that they can only eat when they are hungry, … Read More

Show up, do the work, trust in the process

Show up, do the work, trust in the process

July 12, 2018

I’ve recently returned to running after abandoning it for some time, with the goal of completing a marathon at the end of the year. During tonight’s run, I got to a point along the course where I would normally fatigue and slow down before stopping..

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Recovery from an eating disorder isn't just about getting treatment, it's about getting the right treatment at the right time with a specialist practitioner. A big "thank you" to CFIH's Clinical Supervisor, Danica, for providing this morning's refresh to the team on what the evidence tells us about who should get what treatment and when. We have some exciting changes on the horizon in our endeavours to support everyBODY have a healthy relationship with food, exercise, and themselves.
How often do we ever stop and consider the our body that we judge and shame for being "too X" or "not enough X" does for us? Our body is an amazingly sophisticated machine. It does so much more for us that merely provide aesthetic appeal to the material world. Today, our Clinical Psychologist and Art Therapist, Vera, invites you to join her in celebrating and appreciating how incredible the physical body really is. Dear body of mine, .. thank you for breathing in fresh oxygen to keep me alive even when I am asleep. .. thank you for allowing me to move and walk, cycle, and dance. .. thank you for letting me delight in taste, smells and sounds all around me. .. thank you for the many processes I don't ask you to do but you do anyway: digesting my food, distributing the energy where it is most needed, pumping blood with this amazing muscle that is my heart. Vera
Please join us in welcoming Provisional Psychologist, Freya Young, to the CFIH team for the remainder of 2020. As part of CFIH’s efforts to support those with an eating disorder to have access to evidence-based treatment, as well as supporting new psychologists to the field of eating disorders, we are offering a low-cost CBT-E treatment option for individuals struggling with financial hardship. Individuals deemed suitable for this treatment option will be able to access a course of CBT-E treatment with Freya, at a cost of $30 per session until the end of the year. Freya will be consulting at our Brisbane clinic on Thursday and Friday. … Freya is a provisional psychologist who has a special interest in working with body-image concerns. She has experience working with anxiety and mood disorders, psychosis, personality disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and substance use. Freya strongly values feedback from her clients to ensure clients feel heard and their needs are met. Freya’s warm and compassionate approach helps her clients develop a greater understanding of their problems, and helps them to feel more empowered to make lasting changes in their lives.
There are many reasons why weight loss should never be praised. Praising weight loss reinforces the idea that a smaller body is worthy and desireable and thus upholds continues to perpetuate fatphobia. Praising weight loss literally says to a person, "I only love you now that there's less of you." I know that may sound a little harsh, but when we peel back, this is really the essence of the message that we send. . . We also have no idea whether someone is experiencing an eating disorder, and praising weight loss could also be enabling the eating disorder. Somebody could also be experiencing a chronic or terminal illness - imagine praising somebody who has lost weight because of a terminal illness - "Sorry you're dying, but at least you're thin!" People can be experiencing stress, or trauma - weight loss can be a result of all of this. . . People's bodies change. Our weight can fluctuate. Commenting on people's bodies is so intrusive and completely unnecessary. When we stop praising weight loss, we contribute to changing the dominant discourse we have around bodies - we stop reinforcing the idea that there is only one right way to have a body. We push back against diet culture. We stop putting weight loss on a pedestal as if it's the ultimate prize. We start changing the narrative, we value ALL bodies. We show that there is so much more to folks than their bodies.
How incredibly talented is our Clinical Psychologist and Art Therapist, Vera?! We are excited to have the opportunity to share Vera’s skills and passions this week when we host a group art therapy session for our friends at End ED Butterfly Foundation house.
As of July 1, Ash Olive joined the CFIH team full time and officially moved into the role of Clinical Director. Please join us in officially congratulating Ash. Ash is responsible for overseeing CFIH’s service provision - ensuring we continue to stay abreast updates in the field and uphold our commitment to delivering the best possible approaches to treatment for individuals with eating disorders and body-image concerns. Ash is a huge asset to our team and we are excited to see CFIH’s growth and improvement as a result of her leadership.
Be thin. But not too thin. Be disciplined. But don’t be “that girl” (who diets obsessively). Eat the cake. But don’t gain weight. Lose weight. But don’t develop an eating disorder. Recover from your eating disorder. But don’t get fat. . . Just like the narcissistic abuser who benefits from keeping you in a state of doubted reality, diet culture keeps you as it’s victim by consistently shifting the goal posts. Just as the only way of resolving a toxic/abusive relationship is through ending it, the only way to restore your self esteem is to prioritise making peace with your body over attaining arbitrary standards or the approval of others.
Whilst in the midst of a restrictive eating disorder, a sunset such as this one would register only cognitively for me. I was devoid of any visceral connection with the experience. I knew factually that the sight in front of me “was beautiful” and that witnessing such occurrences was something that people “should do”. However, my experience was one of checking boxes (“Tick! I did the thing. What’s next on the agenda?”) as opposed to one of connection with nature’s beauty. . . This is what an eating disorder, such as Anorexia Nervosa, does to you. What starts with a disconnection from the body’s hunger cues leads to a total loss of connection with oneself and the surrounding world. As the physical body is starved, so too are the emotional and spiritual selves. . . As we start to refeed ourselves through recovery, not only do we rediscover our appetite for food but also our appetite for life. Life starts to have sharper edges and we begin to experience it more intensely; it is beautiful and painful and overwhelming and... exactly what a full and meaningful life looks like.
Yes, your body might get bigger through recovering from your eating disorder. Your life however, most certainly will.