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A few weeks ago, we spoke about this thing that I saw, which was basically that there is research that's happened in the UK that shows that putting calories on certain foods, like foods that are considered fast food or treats and snacks like that, there's this research that suggested that maybe we should put on how much exercise you need to do to burn off the calories. We were discussing this on the show, and I, personally Frooms here, thought it was a really bad idea, And I want
to do a trigger warning with this one. We're going to be talking about disordered eating and that kind of stuff, so you don't have to listen to this. But essentially I was saying, I think it's a really bad idea as someone who's experienced a disordered eating situation myself, knowing how much exercise it takes to burn off calories personally sends me into a spiral. As always on the Flex and Froom show, I often have opinions that I haven't
fact checked. But I thought for this one, we're going to bring in an expert, so I'm talking to a woman called Sarah Barracat. She's a registered psychologist, a PhD candidate and she works at Inside Out Institute at the University of Sydney. I have her on the line. Hello Sarah, Hello, Hi listener, how are you going.
I'm good, I'm good.
Good Now I send you an email. We've worked to the before because I've done one of your programs for disclosure, I had a binge eating disorder a few about this time last year and I really needed help, and you've created a program called BEAT Binge Eating e Therapy. Could you quickly explain what that is?
Yeah? Sure, So BEAT is an online treatment program. So it's ten sessions long, and it's based upon the type of treatment that we know, I guess has the most evidence for what works for people who are struggling with binge eating and that's called cognitive behavior therapy.
You might have heard of it in other contexts before, but yeah, So it's ten online sessions that.
You work through either by yourself or you can do it alongside the support of another clinician. And it helped to a target those factors that we think maintain bingingie behaviors and dietary restriction.
Being one of those the main ones, I guess.
Yeah right. Something that I took out of that that really helped me that I think about to this day is making sure food isn't demonized or not putting food into certain categories. So one of the big things that I found was in my therapy, I didn't have to eat dessert, but after dinner it was kind of encouraged that you're going to you know, you can have dessert, you can have treats, you can have this or that,
and not bringing certain labels on food. So when I heard about this story, I kind of thought of you, and I thought, I wonder what Sarah would think about this. So just to clarify, this research was called the PACE program Physical Activity Calorie Equivalent and it was urged to be adopted in Australia. I don't know how far along that is, like if it's actually going to be implemented in Australia. But what were your initial thoughts on this.
Well, it's brain spread flags to me, and I guess that wouldn't be too surprised. I think ifn I work in the field of disorders, but I think it, I mean, you don't have to work in the field.
I think for this to be quite concerning. I think it's clear, really obvious how this could cause some real problems for people. So if you think about it from kind of a clinical.
Perspective, we know that most eating disorders kind of have this hallmark feature of a real fixation and preoccupation with
one point in shape. And if we're using a system such as PACE, where we're intentionally bringing someone's attention to the amount of exercise that you need to almost burn off or counteract food with the real goal here of not gaining weight, I think that can be really distressing for people with an eating disorder anden triggering and I guess triggering for them to then go and engage in disordered eating behaviors.
And we know one of the common.
Behaviors, ironically, is actually exercise. So I guess it's quite concerning that we might be promoting or reinforcing eating disorder behaviors through adopting such.
A system totally. I spoke about it last week. We were talking about the difference between personal responsibility versus reality.
I'm team drink all the Bevies, right, I don't know how much sugar was in this. Sometimes i'd look in I was like, how.
Many teaspoons just in this is small container?
And so for me it's the context of knowing, Oh, like that's what they mean, Like this isn't even touched in the sides, and if I eat this it means I'm over consuming. That's fascinating. But then I don't have a quote unquote unhealthy mental relationship with food. Is it fair that a bunch of people who do are now going to be exposed to something that could be detrimental to their health? Not particularly, But then I feel like it's like the micro issue versus the macro issue.
Would knowing that about the drinks change your desire to drink them?
In some ways?
Yes? And no.
But I think what would be beneficial is that I find it difficult to make healthier decisions because things have been categorized as good and bad, right, And so it's like, oh, you could never have a juice because that's really really bad and always have water because it's good. I would much rather be able to understand why it's bad and why it's good, you know. So, like if I'm going to choose beween having two bad drinks, which one is less bad, I'd like the information to do so.
So we were talking about, you know, just because something is going to trigger certain people, other people might find it is actually helpful. What do you think about that. Should we be leaning more towards making sure people feel safe and comfortable or something like this helpful for the obesity epidemic that's in inverted commas because I personally don't know how much there actually is an obesity epidemic.
Yeah, well, I'll go to the first thing that you said around kind of kind of treading that line between helpful versus harmful. I think, you know, on one hand, you could see how this program could provide really easily unders of information. You know, food labels be quite tricky to understand at times.
We're all really busy.
We want really quick and easy ways of you know, understanding things. But I think it's a really narrow view. We need to adopt more of a holistic approach when we're thinking about food choices. You know, there are so many factors that play here, not just how many calories need to burn off after eating something.
And I guess if in the PATI.
Intervention they're trying to target or kind of to achieve a balance between calories in and calories out almost I think that's what they're trying to achieve. I think you need to consider, you know, the broader system at play here and the things that are influencing you know, more of a sedentary lifestyle versus an active lifestyle.
And I think a blurb on a packet isn't going to do it.
You're just going to make people feel guilty, in some cases worthless. And I think people with eating disorders are going to most definitely be triggered to engage in eating disorder behaviors. So I think when you're thinking about behavior change and thinking how you know behaviors are ingrained by much larger systems at play, I think that's the way
that it needs to be approached. Really like, I think it's almost impulting to give people this public health message on a package without addressing any of the other factors that are kind of involved in the situation.
Totally, totally. Yeah, it's a broader, broader issue. It's not just yet you you can't be explained in a packet. And what do you think about? Because I'm really interested in this topic obviously having been through it. I love reading about it. I read about it a lot when I'm in the groups of it, trying to kind of like self self soothe and help myself and figure out what was right and wrong. And I subscribed to a
few different newsletters on it. A lot of them are American and they kind of disprove the idea that there really is an obesity crisis. Like I think for a long time, there's kind of like, very how would I describe the headlines when it's really sensational headlines it's a massive crisis. How much is that true? How much is obese a problem in Australia, And if so, what are your thoughts on how we can tackle it?
Yeah, yeah, well I know what you're talking about. And you know it's often that you know, news article you'll see with the person and a larger body sitting in front of like.
A billion plates of food.
Like I think there's lots of you know, stigma around it in a way it's brought up as being an issue if you.
Look at the stats and look at the data.
I mean, I'm not an epidemiologist or an obesity researcher, but if you look at the data, rates are increasing in terms of obesity and even in less developed nations. But again, the problem goes so much deeper than packaging. I think that's the main thing that's a play here. And I think adopting systems like this, although they can seem quite attractive, I think what you're doing is you're
promoting more shame around eating certain foods. And that's not the way to address any kind of problems with obesity, you know.
I think this is actually a problem for the community as a whole.
We shouldn't just be kind of stigmatizing people who are in large botsodies. I think if we think about okay as a society, what.
Do we want to achieve.
We want to achieve healthy relationships with food and healthy relationships with our body.
And when I say healthy, I don't.
Mean, you know, that kind of clean eating approach, and I mean kind of being flexible in your relationship with food and balanced.
And you know, not having it be riddled.
By beliefs about making up for bad foods and guilt and shame and all these kind of complicated algorithms. And I don't think we should be promoting this cultural norm in any way to try and I guess fix this issue. I think, you know, people are getting quite desperate into the messages that they're getting more and more twisted. But I think if we also think about future generations and having people kind of young kids looking at.
This packaging, you know, what we're just going to be teaching.
Them is that you get as much as your life as long as you.
Burn it off. And that's not really what we need to be educating people around. And I think it's you know, if you think you're going to fix an issue or.
You're going to, I guess, have someone change their whole relationship with food by reading a packet in the store, that's not really reasonable or fair.
I think it's actually, in.
A way it's harmful because what you're trying, or what you're saying in a way, is that it's as simple as compensating or exercising off food to address you know.
What's what's going on.
And it kind of adds to a lot of the stigma that we already know in terms of research around you know, people in larger bodies are often judged as being kind of lazy or disciplined or lacking control in some way.
And I think by kind of adopting an approach that.
Just pace you're reinforcing this really narrow view around it being a personal issue to address.
But if you step back and look at it.
I mean there are so many sociocultural things that need to be addressed, like the cost of food, you know, in today's day and age, especially with inflation and what's going on. I mean, how expensive is it to eat foods that are unprocessed as compared to processed foods or kind of both fast foods. There's I think there's a lot more going on here, and I think you know that there are better ways to be addressing that.
Really, I totally agree. I want to have my KitKat in peace.
Yeah, of course you too. That's the thing, and it's not bad to have a kitcat. You know. Everything needs to happen.
In context and in Yeah, I just think in isolation and without context, I think this system could really do quite a lot of damage.
I like that. Well, thank you for doing a little bit of myth busting with us.
We're welcome.
If you're listening to this and you want some more support or you want to hear more, you can go to the inside Out website, Is that right, Sarah?
Yeah, you can.
There's also Butterfly and Butterfly Foundation if you want someone to talk to their helpline.
Yeah, these are great websites. I feel like with a lot of things that we talk about that are a bit sensitive, you can say, oh, go to this, go to this line, or do this. But definitely something that I found really was like actually seeking support and knowing that disordered eating and eating disorders aren't about a lack of control. They aren't about you know, they shouldn't be
shame based. If you're actually having issues with food and hyper focusing on it, you can get help that will can definitely change your mind and make you feel a bit more peaceful around food. And Inside Out Institute is a really great way, a great place to start. And also if you experiencing bingeing disorder, you should google bee t Inside Out Institutency if you can do the program, Yeah, definitely.
It'll be released to the public in a few weeks time, so definitely keep an eye.
Out on our website.
Amazing. Okay, thank you, Sarah.
Thank you. You've been listening to the Flex and Frooms Daily podcast.
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