SPT-Fall2014

information together in one succinct
place; the idea of a book took on a
life of its own. At first it was going to
be 7 Steps to Binge Eating
Treatment—based on all those 7 step
books out here. But as I was writing
the steps, I realized there were way
more than 7 steps. It’s a complicated
disorder. So I thought I would just
include everything here (there are 34
steps in the book). I wrote with the 12
-step model philosophy in mind—
take what you need and leave the rest
behind.
“I wrote every day, and before I
started writing, I said a little prayer.
It helped my Ego, my inner critic,
that judge who was saying, ‘Who are
you to be an authority? How are you
an authority on this subject?’ I
decided, well I’m not an authority,
but I am empathetic, and I want to
help other people, and that’s all you
have to do. I asked the Universe to
write through me. I felt that if I could
be a vessel for the information, then
that's all I had to do, just be open and
write. If I could do that, then maybe I
could leave my ego behind and let
the voice come through me. This
endeavor wasn't about me or my ego,
this was all about helping people.
That is how I go about working with
my clients in individual sessions and
that is the way I chose to work on the
book. My intention was to be open,
aware, allow myself to follow
direction, almost like following a
trail of breadcrumbs left for me. I did
my best to be open in my writing and
sharing.
“It was difficult to write about my
own experience. Here I am the
therapist, I’m supposed to be a blank
slate, and it’s all about the client, but
as a writer that’s not going to fly.
People are not going to identify with
the book if they feel talked down to
rather than felt with. As a writer,
there has to be some transparency in
order for people to feel heard and
seen. I wanted my readers to feel as if
I was there in the room with them,
that I was going to hold
their hand and say, ‘Look
I’ve been there; I know
it’s painful and I know
it’s hard, but we can do
this together, we can
recover...’ That was my
intention.”
The book is divided into
two sections. The first
helps readers understand
binge eating disorder
while the second offers
steps—action steps and
internal steps—to change
actual eating behaviors as
well as internalized
thoughts and feelings
associated with food and
with the self. One of the
first steps is to give up
dieting. Fulvio suggests
trying it for one day, then
a week. “Dieting is
something people cling
to as a support, as a self-object
really,” Fulvio says.
Another step deals with the inner
critic— identifying the critic that is
telling you that something is wrong
with you, that you need to change.
This voice says things like ‘you are
bad if you binge eat’ creating a
vicious cycle. Here’s this voice
telling you that because you binge eat
you’re bad and you believe it. And
then self-hatred comes. To cope with
this emotional onslaught, you binge
again. Fulvio suggests you approach
the concept of judgment and criticism
by looking at how you judge and
criticize others, first. She also helps
readers establish healthy boundaries.
“Life is a lot easier with
boundaries,” she says. “When you
recover from an eating disorder, you
go from either having rigid
boundaries or no boundaries. I teach
people how to have loving, helpful,
adult boundaries and then how to
teach these boundaries to their inner
self, their inner child.
“People will resonate with different
techniques, different ways into their
healing and recovery. I saw a need
for this book because I have read a
lot, I don’t want to say I’ve read
every book out there on binge eating,
but I have read a lot of them. There is
so much work out there,” Fulvio
says. She reflects on writers such as
Geneen Roth (author of When Food
is Love) and Christopher Fairburn
(author of Overcoming Binge
Eating). “I wanted to interweave
their work and offer tangible steps
you can take and make happen. I felt
the cognitive behavioral stuff was a
little dry in my own recovery; yet, I
resonated with the tangible need for
some assignments to try to put it all
together.”
Fulvio explained that there is a
misperception that women with binge
eating disorder are all overweight.
The majority of the people she works
with are at a normal weight, she says.
“I’ve even had people down right
skinny with binge eating disorder.
Somatic Psychotherapy Today | Fall 2014 | Volume 4 Number 2 | page 53