Overview
For readers of Melissa Febos, Roxane Gay, and T Kira Madden, the story of one young woman’s years-long struggle with eating disorders and how she finally came to realize that her body wasn’t the problem
This is the story of an awakening.
When Amy Scheiner was 8 years old, she started gaining weight at an unprecedented rate. It was the 90s, and she had been raised on the diet culture of the time: eating low-fat, counting calories, counting points, and hating her body.
At 17, her family thought they had found the solution to her body problem in a non-FDA-approved bariatric surgery. Instead, she found herself obsessing with weight loss even more—restricting, binging, purging, and using drugs to make herself smaller.
By the time she was 24, she had been in and out of treatment centers and eventually found herself across the country at a center in Oregon that promoted a philosophy based on a comprehensive therapeutic approach to full recovery. While there, her journey of self-discovery and healing began as she came to understand the connections between her upbringing and the solace she found in food throughout her childhood.
Who I Once Was chronicles Scheiner’s journey to find wholeness while grappling with complications of generational trauma, cultural norms, and complex family dynamics. She reflects on the complexities of growing up with an undiagnosed mental illness and trauma in an environment where her mind was ignored and her body was vilified.
Deeply personal and honest, Who I Once Was reveals that the “problem,” whether it be mental illness, addiction, or any other dysfunction, is a symptom of much larger societal issues.
This is the story of an awakening.
When Amy Scheiner was 8 years old, she started gaining weight at an unprecedented rate. It was the 90s, and she had been raised on the diet culture of the time: eating low-fat, counting calories, counting points, and hating her body.
At 17, her family thought they had found the solution to her body problem in a non-FDA-approved bariatric surgery. Instead, she found herself obsessing with weight loss even more—restricting, binging, purging, and using drugs to make herself smaller.
By the time she was 24, she had been in and out of treatment centers and eventually found herself across the country at a center in Oregon that promoted a philosophy based on a comprehensive therapeutic approach to full recovery. While there, her journey of self-discovery and healing began as she came to understand the connections between her upbringing and the solace she found in food throughout her childhood.
Who I Once Was chronicles Scheiner’s journey to find wholeness while grappling with complications of generational trauma, cultural norms, and complex family dynamics. She reflects on the complexities of growing up with an undiagnosed mental illness and trauma in an environment where her mind was ignored and her body was vilified.
Deeply personal and honest, Who I Once Was reveals that the “problem,” whether it be mental illness, addiction, or any other dysfunction, is a symptom of much larger societal issues.
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