You guys might be (or not) surprised by how much those HLB/Inspiration Role Models lie or are misleading you:
- about their intake: they either make the food appear huge so you think they eat a buttload (see how they make you believe they are just naturally skinny here), or they post tiny meals so that you think they eat healthy and all (when some of them just restrict during the week and go crazy during the weekend)
- about their issues related to eating disorder tendencies or exercise addiction
- about whether or not they have an ED, etc.
They are no Pringle. They are Lays.
Lay's, you are a liar!!
Believe me. I know a few big/popular bloggers that claim to be ED free, but they either:
- are aware that they have a problem and don’t address it to their readers. So not ‘lying’ per say, but misleading (hence why I was so adamant to point out that I was NOT recovered)
- are in denial about their healthy/unhealthy relationship with food/exercise, and influence their ED-free public with unhealthy behaviors and enable their eating disordered public into keeping those unhealthy behaviors.
Now…why do they do that?
- They don’t care about that 90% of their readers are suffering from a mental illness, they like the page views. If a restricted food diary blog is working, then they won’t change it.
- They like being portrayed as a role model, whether it is as a Recovery Queen or as a Health & Fitness Queen or as a Chia Seed n’ PB Queen. They need to protect their Empire.
- They like the attention the readers (eating disordered or not) give to them
- They are scared of confrontation. They don’t want to have to explain themselves. They much rather do as if there wasn’t any problem with them to begin with, and get page views as usual. Opening up means changes. The readers’s attitude would change. Changes are scary.
You know, that Seventeen mag? Well, they are doing some kind of Healthy Living movement and chose 3 young bloggers to give tips about healthy living. Or more recently, 2 bloggers, because according to the mag, Taralynn ‘dropped out of the program by herself’. Personally, I think she has been kicked out after several people complained to Seventeen about this girl having an eating disorder and promoting anorexia.
Now, you might think ‘Oh, people are overreacting, nowadays every disordered people see disordered tendencies in everyone!’, which is understandable since a lot of ED recoverers are overly sensitive.
But this is batshit crazy. As in, there is no doubt that this girl has an ED, and lied to all of her followers. Note that she changed her username after she has been discovered, but people quoted her. Here’s a blog where there are proofs of her stealing people’s recipes and pictures, and photoshopping them onto her own plates.
So, all in all (because I know some of you just skimp the post and look for pictures of food or recipe, in vain):
- Seventeen mag is stupid
- Taralynn needs to improve on her Photoshop skills and donate her fancy plates if she’s not even going to use them
- We lie. That’s what humans do. Healthy Living bloggers are humans. HLB can also lie, so don’t take for granted that all the shit that comes out of their mouth is 100% true, whether it’s about their personal issues or whether it’s about their fitness/nutrition advice, especially if they are not qualified or eat so much protein they are like a walking fart machine.
Q: Which type of those misleading bloggers do you think is worse, those who are aware of their issues but don’t address it, or those who are in denial and perpetuate unhealthy behaviors?
By the way, sorry for the excessive linking. But since I’m not getting paid for blogging, I don’t feel bad about making you giving me page views.
I know I do follow a lot of blogs that either A.) claim to be recovery blogs but are still very eating disordered, or B.) HLB blogs that are just overall not very healthy. Even though I am well aware that they are not blogs that I should be looking to for inspiration, I still find some sort of pleasure in reading them. I guess in a way for me its almost like me doing recovery, but having a tiny bit of my eating disorder by watching others engage in theirs (except I am still not even close to being recovered). Or maybe its to justify that my unhealthy obsession with eating healthy is okay, because all these healthy living bloggers do it, and all these girls who are “100% recovered” are fueling their mornings with a ginormous bowl of fruit covered in maybe a tablespoon of RAW oat groats, and of course chia seeds.
Regardless of why I read their blogs religiously, I do know the majority of them really are not as healthy as they are given credit for being. I think the blogs that pods me off the most are the ones that claim to be so healthy, and so naturally skinny, and in total denial about how messed up their eating is. And then shelling out advice to people including ways to make their intake lower. My top complaint: CCK. I know their are bloggers just like her, but she pisses me off the most because she has so many people worshipping her and believing that she is a Goddess. And because she has been called out so many times and continuously denies it. And yet she still goes on national television to talk about how to healthify her recipes.
I’m sorry this rant was so long. And I really hope I’m not being a hypocrite by posting this (except I’m pretty sure on my blog I make it pretty clear that I’m still struggling with an eating disorder).
Yes, reading HLBs is a twisted way to still cling on the eating disorder. It’s like you are scared to drop that label. Hence why some people wants to create their niche and call themselves a HLB. This bugs me to no end. If you are struggling with binging, bulimia, anorexia, orthorexia, or whatever, don’t call yourself a HLB, dammit. Those people just want to ”fit in”.
The comments on CCK’s blog are awful. I once saw something like ”I use you for thinspiration, thank you so much!” or something like that.
I wish there were enough evidence to say she has an eating disorder. Maybe she really is just naturally skinny then?
I apologize, I didn’t mean to come off as accusing her of having an ED, because obviously I don’t know. But the things she says are definitely very questionable in that regard, especially since she is very visibly underweight.
Well, she brought vegan sandwich thins at a party to replace their bun. Vegan normal sized buns do exist.
My opinion: I don’t care if you eat sandwich thins. I don’t care that you watch your weight. I don’t care if you have or had or don’t had or didn’t have an ED. But I do care if your misleading your readers and/or dishonest.
However, I can say she has a disease called ”Unstoppable Linking Back” syndrome. It’s when you link back to a Calorie and Nutrition page, where it says that you have to click on this link to see the nutrition facts, and if you want the nutrition fact with the almond extract instead of the vanilla extract, you have to click on another link, and the cycle continues.
My biggest peeve are the lies. I don’t care if someone’s struggling with an ED, I can even kind of cope with someone who is blogging and obviously in denial about their so-called ‘healthy life style’. What I can’t stand are the ones who go ALL OUT to LIE ON PURPOSE. Cling wrap to make food bigger on the plate, tiny plates, photoshopping someone else’s food to your own plate etc.
Please.. if you don’t want people to know exactly what you are eating just DON’T post your food at ALL. Quit it. It’s just childish, pathetic, pointless. Irritating.
FOR THE EMPIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRE
I agree with Fiona. It frustrates me immensely when it’s so evident that the blogger/writer is struggling, yet is in total denial about the situation. I find it even more infuriating when they actively encourage the disordered habits.
That’s why I have less of a problem with the ‘pro-ana’ side of the internet (and I don’t mean the ones who glamourise ED’s or pretend to have anorexia or bulimia). Most of them acknowledge their problems, write about them, but they discourage the disorder itself.
I respect them more than any of the fake, ‘healthy living’ blogs. At least they are honest.
Also, that undressedskeleton girl (I forget her name, too lazy to scroll back and find the link again), I remember reading her tumblr a long time ago. I really did wonder about her back then.
What I wish more than anything is that people on the internet learn that pretending about anything – whether it’s their eating disorders, depression, self-harm etc. – is far more dangerous than the alternatives of either posting about what is going on for real, or just keep the details off the ‘net.
Personally I find sharing my own fight with anorexia more difficult now as I’ve progressed through recovery. I prefer to stay within the community as a whole and offer some advice from another perspective. It’s just such a tricky subject, especially on the CC forums. You can be attacked for expressing a different opinion (this in particular happened to me recently, about personal details concerning hospitalisation and my incredibly bad treatment there).
This is precisely why I love your blog: it’s honest and sometimes downright rude, but I’d rather that anyday over ‘OMGGG CUTESY WUTESY PORRDIGE that looks fantabuloussss’
agree, i hate it when you can’t even say something different without being omg a haterrrr.
And i had some really bad and downright dangerous experiences in hospital but if I talk about them to the wrong people I’m told how ungrateful I am because they saved my life didn’t they, even if they did break me more than i was in the first place?
What irks me MOST about pro anas is when people call themselves ANA when they are NOT anorexic – whether they actually have an ED or not, if you are overweight or obese you do NOT have anorexia. Maybe EDNOS, maybe bulimia, or BED or something, but ANA is not a weight loss diet. For some reason this just really, really sh*ts me.
I think this comes from the fact that many people think of anorexia as ”more glamourous” than bulimia, BED, EDNOS, etc. It’s sick, but that’s how it is. I remember on CC, someone who wasn’t meeting the criteria for Anorexia Nervosa was calling herself anorexic, then somebody pointed that she didn’t have AN, but EDNOS, and other members bashed that person, saying that she was ”rude, triggering” for saying she had EDNOS. I was like, WTF, criteria are criteria, AN is not ”better” than EDNOS, there’s nothing rude in pointing out that she had EDNOS and not AN.Man, I really should do a post on CC pet peeves.
oh i hope you do, that’s a peeve of mine too, happens on FB and on blogs too. One of the things they say is “Sure i don’t fit the criteria but I have the thoughts, that makes me anorexic” Uh, no, it doesn’t. If someone who is anorexic constantly thinks about food and eating it does that make them a binge eater? NO.
I hate that people think it’s glamorous. It’s not. It’s like saying cancer would be awesome to have. It’s not. Duh
I also find it harder to talk about my recovery. When I was into the whole “Cutie Sweetie pie Recovery blogger/CC pet”, I didn’t mind that much. It gave me a reason to ‘fit in’ with other people who were struggling, so I would share and share, then I would be blogging about my food and my oatmeal, to the point where I was almost pretending. I found that the people who aren’t so open about their ED are the one who are the most honest, because they aren’t looking for attention. Now, I simply don’t care about fitting in: I have my own opinions about recovery, about CC and about the over the top cutesy language among Recovery bloggers (or CC members). I should do a post about my pet peeves on CC. Tricky subject…
You are REAL> and yes you are being more honest with YOURSELF. I think it’s so easy to be caught up in all the cutesy, rainbows shooting out of your ass, “In Recovery” fluff that you do end up doing a lot of pretending. I know I have. To myself, and to the others I just couldn’t let down. I can’t afford to let the negative thoughts have a field day, but I do have them, and I do have hard times. Admitting it doesn’t mean I’m not trying or i don’t want to get better. I get so tired of all the bullshit going round now. on the flip side to the fake-wonderful is the emo stuff. The constant “noone knows just how much I’m suffering and I am going to go kill myself right now bye” stuff. God I hate that. I feel like saying, ‘Yeah bye. Call me when you are tired of dying”. Because it’s not real. It’s attention seeking. If they can’t get attention by being OMG the BEST they will get it by being OMG the SICKEST.
Hey, I found your blog through GOMI, and have read through every post in like a day. This is the best blog… ever. Thank you for writing! You are a breath of fresh air!