NEDA and Love Your Body Week: Everything You Need To Know
February 22nd-28th marks the week of National Eating Disorders Awareness week sponsored by the National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA), a non-profit organization. It also marks Elon’s celebration of Love Your Body Week 2021.
This week is a national holiday that many citizens acknowledge in order to bring awareness to eating disorders and encourage treatments to those suffering. And Elon has picked this week to promote their Love Your Body Week.
Eating disorders are a mental health issue that affect at least 9% of the world population, according to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders. Nine percent might seem small, but this number is equivalent to 28.8 million people worldwide. Eating disorders affect both men and women, and are more harnessed on young adults ages 12-24.
NEDA week was established in order to spread awareness about eating disorders and the many different forms of disorders which range between anorexia, bulimia AFRID, binge-eating, etc. It is also important to gain awareness about the disease and allow people who are suffering to seek treatment. NEDA encourages treatment and care in order to help people get back on their feet.
Love Your Body Week focuses on body positivity, healthy eating, and loving your body. Campus Recreation and Wellness, Counseling Services, Elon Dining, and others are helping sponsor this event.
“This week is filled with events, workshops and speakers that emphasize the importance of maintaining a healthy mind and body,” says Elon Recreation Center on Instagram.
Love Your Body Week is all about promoting body positivity and cultivating holistic wellness. Each day of the week is celebrated with different workout classes, motivational speakers, healthy food discussions, and a fitness marathon to conclude it. The days consist of Mindful Monday, Treat Yourself Tuesday, Wellness Wednesday, Thoughtful Thursday, and Feel Good Fitness Friday.
“Love Your Body Week is an important time of focusing on body positivity, body image, and overall well-being,” says Charlotte Williams, the associate director of Campus Recreation and Wellness for student wellness. “In that message we expanded this year to include a focus on different dimensions of wellness including physical, emotional, social, community, purpose and financial.”
Williams explains that Campus Recreation and Wellness intentionally aligned their dates with National Eating Disorder Awareness week, which usually occurs during the last week of February.
“When we talk about body image this discussion includes topics of food, nutrition, weight and of course disordered eating,” she says.
Love Your Body Week and NEDA week are very important to a variety of Elon students for different reasons. For senior Kiersten Borket, this week is important because she is a former NEDA internship employee. She worked for NEDA this summer as a remote helpline intern.
“I answered calls and emails to the national helpline and was trained to speak to people with eating disorders/loved ones of people with eating disorders and give them basic empathy and guidance as well as answer any questions they might have or do a search for treatment options in their area,” Borket shares.
Borket explains that this week is very important to her because she admires that this one week can amplify awareness about eating disorders, diet culture, and weight stigma.
“I think if people can realize that eating disorders, body image issues, weight stigma, and diet culture as a whole is one big complicated web of issues and that there is no one reason why these things develop that would be a huge step forward,” Borket says. “I think so often eating disorders are just written off as people trying to be ‘healthy’ and that’s why they’re so misunderstood. There are so many factors that contribute to eating disorders, whether it's psychological, biological, or social-cultural, and if people can just understand even one of those contributors, then I think we’d be one step closer towards making our world just a little bit more aware.”
Similar to Borket, many students at Elon agree that NEDA week is extremely relevant to society today and having Elon’s Love Your Body Week at this time is fitting. First-year student Charlotte Beeler attended a multitude of activities sponsored by Campus Recreation and Wellness over the past week in order to show her support.
“I attended the gym’s activities a few times this week,” Beeler says. “I went to Ladies Lifting on Monday night, which demonstrated different gym exercises and discussions on how to be your healthiest self. I thought it was a really great fitness class which taught me more about body positivity and self-love.”
Elon students ranging from first-years to seniors attended Love Your Body Week in support of National Eating Disorder Awareness week. This year's celebration of Love Your Body Week and NEDA week were put in place in order to spread awareness about the dangers of eating disorders and encourage healthy eating and mindsets.
“Loving our bodies means that all bodies are good bodies and that wellness is not a one-size-fits-all journey,” Williams says. “Wellness comes in many shapes, sizes, abilities, races, genders and so on. Loving your body is a personal journey and looks different for each person.”