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Lisa Pfister

Do you find yourself at a crossroads, ready for change, but uncertain how to proceed? Perhaps you want more out of life, yet sense that something is off or missing. Or maybe you feel motivated and ready for personal growth while struggling in your current relationship. Do you feel ready to explore how messages and behaviors from your family of origin may have shaped your sense of self? If this is your story I will hold space for you to get curious about exploring relational trauma and taking steps to heal from these experiences, while making necessary changes to build your self esteem and learning how to set and maintain boundaries.

Processing trauma with me means that you will have empathy and support as we take time to grieve together. We will also redefine and repair the narrative of negative self talk, helping you move toward your authentic self and your place in the world. Together we will work on skill building to better understand, tolerate and regulate emotions, thoughts and the body’s nervous system.

I am interested in listening to what you have to share. I provide an empathetic, safe and non-judgemental environment where you can share your story, begin healing, and make changes to move forward. I look forward to getting to know you. Please call for an introductory visit where we can learn more about each other and the potential for working together.

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Arizona Connection Counseling

Arizona Connection Counseling is a licensed counseling agency with a team of experienced and trained therapists throughout Arizona. We utilize a range of highly researched. clinically proven forms of therapy, including Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), EMDR, and more.
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Eating Disorders - It's Not About the Food

By Kelly Lopez

If it’s not about the food, what is it really about?

The eating disorder serves a function, it does a job. Despite the problems an eating disorder creates, it is an effort to cope, shield against, communicate, and solve problems. Behaviors may be a way to establish a sense of power or control, self-worth, strength, and containment. Bringing may be used to numb pain. Purging may be a way to release emotions. When one cannot cope in healthy ways, adaptive functions (behaviors) are created to ensure a sense of safety, security, and control.
According to Carolyn Costin*, some of the “adaptive functions that eating disorder behaviors commonly serve are”:
  • Comfort, soothing, nurturance
  • Numbing, sedation, distraction
  • Attention, a cry for help
  • Discharge of tension, anger, rebellion
  • Predictability, structure, identity
  • Self-punishment or punishment of "the body"
  • Self-cleansing or self-purification
  • Protection or safety (through creation of a small or large body)
  • Avoidance of intimacy
  • Proof for self-blame instead of blaming others (for exampl, abusers)
It’s not about the food, it’s a way of coping with low self-esteem, negative emotions, physical, emotional, and sexual abuse, unstable home, difficulty resolving conflict and much more.
*Costin, Carolyn. The Eating Disorder Sourcebook: A Comprehensive Guide to the Causes, Treatments and Prevention of Eating Disorders. 3rd. edition, McGraw Hill, 2007.
Fuller, Kristen. “Eating Disorders: It’s Not All about Food.” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, 22 Mar. 2017

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/happiness-is-state-mind/201703/eating-disorders-it-s-not-all-about-food