Strength TogetHER 11 - Session 3
Facilitated by Lokopakar, "Strength Together" is a virtual space where girls with different stories share their experiences and opinions. Within a brief period, this platform has been expanded to various parts of Nepal. It has been walking with the motto "girls supporting girls."
On 3rd July 2021, we had the third session of cohort 11. The topic of our session was “Eating Disorders and My Insecurities.”
We talked about our insecurities and fears related to our bodies as well as eating disorders in this session. Also, we shared our experiences regarding how we managed to overcome those insecurities and fears little by little, how important it is for us to be confident about our bodies, how our bodies function, and how the eating disorder is not something to be ashamed of.
Our session was moderated by a very dynamic and enthusiastic clinical dietician Ms. Anushree Acharya. She is the Managing Director of The Nutrition Cure Nepal- an Australian-operated nutrition and diet clinic based in Kathmandu that provides world-class medical nutrition therapy and nutrition interventions. She is practicing Nutrition and Dietetics counseling under the supervision of a dietician from the Nepal Army. She was the official Miss Nepal Dietician for the 2019 batch from Hidden Treasure and official Dietician for the cycling team of the S.A. Games. Besides that, she serves as the president of Rotaract Club of Kathmandu- Midtown, Rotary International District 3292, Nepal Bhutan for Rota year- 2017/18.
In the session, we talked about how every one of us is striving in one way or the other to be fit in other's definition of beautiful. Our speakers shared their experiences regarding how they were made fun of just because they were skinny/fat/short/tall , etc., and how they felt being a chubby kid was not acceptable, so they started dieting. We talked about eating disorders. And also how hard it is for us to normalize that eating disorders are not a big deal, at least not big enough to feel insecure about.
- Our 1st Speakers shared their experiences regarding how hard they strived to overcome their insecurities. How she used to think that being chubby is so bad and how dieting could help her and how later on she realized that somebody types are made perfect not to reach the so-called standardized type. And now that she is skinny and still gets a lot of comments.
-The second speaker shared her terrible relation with eating habits, such as not eating for a few days or throwing away all the foods, or how they used to hide junk from parents and eat it, and also how it led to severe health problems.
-The third speaker shared how they were so concerned about their body that they started eating foods by counting calories and led to nasty habits of not eating what they crave.
-The fourth speaker shared her experience of not being able to eat healthy because she stays in a hostel and how they usually go for eating junk, and how it has led to some health issues too.
Our moderator gave us very insightful feedback, and the session was so fruitful. She shared her opinions of how we shouldn't control ourselves while having food. And we should be able to love the food and enjoy eating it. She also shared that change doesn't happen overnight, but we can take smaller steps and start eating healthy foods.
This session was indeed so fruitful, for we got to share our experiences, and we knew that we're not alone. Our speakers seemed so satisfied with the session that they wanted to meet our moderator and talk about it. There were almost thirty participants, and we got to learn so many things from each other. Most importantly, this session indeed helped us take a step towards accepting and loving ourselves just the way we are.
Written By - Prapti Dhodari (Cohort Coordinator)
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