Hee hee - thanks Paris. I enjoy your writings, too. I like your blog.

Theresamay, I completely agree with you. What I was getting at but didn't get across very well is that there's a lack of acknowledgement of the emotional harm of food issues. Everyone is aware of drug addiction, and society at least partially deals with it by making alcohol and other drugs either illegal or controlled. At least people have an awareness that those substances could become a problem in your life. But many people who are food addicts are made to feel that they're just weak, victims of genetics, etc; and I believe this is what leads so many people to think, "I just need to figure out which diet will solve my problems. This diet will fix me. I'll just use some willpower, and I'll get thin and healthy." Many people are simply unaware of how easy it is to have a bad relationship with food and what a struggle it will be to fix and maintain that relationship.

I just think that if our society respected sugar and junk food for what it is - the way we respect alcohol and drugs for what they are - instead of embracing it as normal, it would harder for people to develop a problem to begin with. How are you supposed to treat food responsibly when you're raised not knowing what that is?