Customer Reviews

Sensing the Self: Women's Recovery from Bulimia

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Finally, a book that gets to the heart of how a person with an eating disorder really feels and what is really helpful. As someone who previously had an eating disorder, and has read a ton of books on the subject, I can honestly say this is the best one I have read so far. A little more expensive but WELL worth it, to anyone struggling with an eating disorder. It hits home so much sometime that it just made me cry - very, very helpful.

This book is incredible. After suffering from anorexia and bulimia for the last four years, I have constantly looked for books on eating disorders. I found it not only easy to relate to all of the people who contributed their stories, but also extremely inspiring to know that other people out there have had the same "crazy" thoughts as me! This is a open-to-any-page-and-start-reading book. Truly awesome.

After combing through several books on bulimia, this one was like a breath of fresh air. It was like reading about myself, actually seeing how women contracted and healed from bulimia. It gives me hope that we all can.

This book offers a thorough, systematic investigation of the psychological aspects of Bulimia Nervosa.
The author is a psychologist at Harvard who also has her own private clinic, and what I like best about this book is that it combines both scientific literature and personal stories in a way that gives the reader enough of both.
This is finally a book that goes beyond the shallow suggestions or anecdotal stories that one finds in most books about recovery, but it is an actual high-end psychological investigation who treats the reader (or rather patient) as the smart women she is.

I would definitely recommend to those that are looking to gain more understanding into the psych of the disorder, and to those who are on they're way to recovery =)

Having read several overly cheerful, annoyingly personal "I had an ED, and beat it, and you can to!" books, it was amazing to find a simple, objective, yet far more true understanding of women with EDs and how they recovered. It's a pretty dense book,so not for the reader who wants to breeze through a self help book in an hour, but well worth the time and effort.

This book reaches to the core issues related to recovering from Bulimia. As a recovering bulimic for 2 years it helps me see some of the deepest issues and how to deal with them to remain recovered. It's an excellent book though it is a bit clinical.

I've read a lot of books on the subject, and this is one of the few that really has concrete info on recovery. Most books are fascinated with how people get sick and how sick they get, but aren't very helpful about how to recover. This has really useful info on the root causes of bulimia, and how to successfully address them. Definitely worth the money.

I read about this title in Gaining: The Truth About Life After Eating Disorders and when Liu described Reindl's theories about re-training the bulimic to tune into her senses, I thought it sounded like the perfect book for me. (If you haven't guessed, I am a bulimic--of seven years.)

However, transitioning from Gaining to Sensing the Self proved difficult. While Gaining had its flaws, it contained an emotional, personal element with which I could empathize. Sensing the Self, on the other hand, proves quite clinical and impersonal in the presentation of its otherwise engaging material (it's probably geared towards therapists). This made it difficult for me to read the entire book without getting bored.

A good portion of the book consists of long block-quotes transcribed directly from patient interviews. While they certainly provide an interesting snapshot of bulimic recovery, these parts quickly become tedious reading due to the inherent informal and unpolished nature of colloquial speech. Also, the emphasis on quotes can become problematic for a bulimic, if she compares too deeply her condition with that of another; this can't happen so much with generalized facts.

For somebody seeking tools to facilitate his/her recovery from bulimia, though, I offer a moderate endorsement of this book. The book doesn't really provide any therapeutic advice or techniques as I'd hoped it would. Instead, it mainly summarizes research--literally. It seems that every other paragraph included, "The women report that..."

I wish the book had summarized the research and suggested a practical use of that research. Perhaps that is beyond the scope of one book, however. Therefore, for those aiming to learn more about bulimia--and this group should include sufferers--I do recommend this book.

Indeed, many times the book's facts caused something to click in my mind, in the sense that I would connect event X in my life to aspect Y of my eating disorder, thus causing another piece of the recovery puzzle to fall into place. For one concrete example, Reindl talks on length about the bulimic issue of not knowing when "enough is enough" -- enough food, sleep, exercise, anything. And I noticed I'd long ago lost interest in reading the book but had forced myself to continue, for no particular reason. I took a break then and there.

While the core concept of this book is spot on, that eating disorders are about the inability to self-reference, the inferences and generalizations about the role of parents in the development of eating disorders is vituperative. I have just finished the second chapter of this book and am on my way to the garbage can to throw it out. (I am quite good at self-referencing!) As the parent of a teenager with an eating disorder, this book has not been helpful to me. The author actually states that the beginning of an eating disorder can be traced to a "lack of attunement" to the child, on the part of parents. The author writes of the significant factors, including people that acted as positive intermediaries, contributing to recovery; parents are not mentioned. Boyfriends, husbands, friends, health care providers and, of course, the exalted therapist, are mentioned as support persons (see page 77). While this may be the case in some situations, it is most definitely not in others. If you are a concerned, and yes, in- tune- with- your- child parent who is groping to find help for your child and yourself, don't bother spending your money on this book. Counter to the author's scathing portrayal of parents, there are parents who are - and have always been- loving, supportive and concerned for their children. Up to this point our concern as parents has been THE primary source for our daughter, in receiving the help she needs. This book was written nine years ago and, so, might be out of date. Much has changed in the understanding of those factors contributing to eating disorders.