Eating disorders: Shalhevet girls hear empowerment talk

Temimah Zucker, a speaker on body image and eating disorders, spoke with each grade individually, focusing on self-evaluations and how to increase the ability to “feel good about ourselves.”

Zucker is a recovered anorexic who confronted the disorder at age 18.

In the course of her program, she asked the girls to judge themselves in every aspect including appearance, relationships, and academics. Many gave themselves low grades, prompting a discussion “on how society puts emphasis on appearance or how we look,” she said.

“They discussed how we can feel good about ourselves without relating to our ap- pearance [and they] came up with most of the answers,” said Zucker.

Their suggestions included focusing on chesed, hobbies, other accomplishments, “sending yourself little notes about the great qualities you have, letting loose and having fun.” The stress on acts of chesed (kindness, charity) was important, she said, because it leads to “feeling good by doing good, to feel good as a person and not on how you look. We should feel good about ourselves and who we are as people, our character. Our feeling from self-judgment shouldn’t come from our appearances but who we are as people.”

Zucker also brought halachik (Jewish legal) aspects to the talk, noting that the Torah “focuses on being healthy, to guard our bodies and stay strong” and that the Rambam stated that our bodies are meant to be strong and healthy. She also acknowledged that the Jewish community has been concerned with “looks, what size you are and shiduchin (matches for marriage),” although she did not recommend that the girls should com- pletely disregard how they look “and walk around in a garbage bag.”

She pointed out that people often “get up in the morning and don’t feel good about their looks” and it’s important “how we counter it.”