Harriet Brown’s ‘Body of Truth’ Dissects How We View Weight [REVIEW]

Super thin supermodels. Muscular jocks with six-pack abs. They’re all-over social media, in magazines, and on television, telling us we need to look like them to live our best lives. Even when you diet and work out religiously, you may still have a hard time squeezing into your favorite jeans. At times like these, it can be difficult to stay body positive. What are we to do? It’s time to reevaluate how we look at our relationship with our bodies. Harriet Brown’s Body of Truth helps us do just that.

Our reasons for consuming food vary. We all eat out of necessity. After all, food is fuel. Yet sometimes we rely on tasty eats to comfort us in times of distress. The foods our friends and loved ones fed us as children can make us nostalgic for simpler times.

The way our bodies store the nutrients we eat also varies. Some can eat all day and never gain an ounce. Others carefully examine every bite they put in their mouths, but simply looking at the dessert tray seems to make the pounds appear in all the wrong places!

In Body of Truth, Harriet Brown helps us sift through the various myths that affect how we view the food we eat and our relationship with it. I found this book timely, informative, and thoroughly researched. After all, all we have to do look at social media to notice how preoccupied and obsessed we all are about our weight.

Even during a walk through the supermarket, we’ll see men and women painstakingly reading labels, counting calories and examining fat and sugar content in the products we purchase. Then again, even in restaurants you’ll find those asking for the “lighter fare” menu.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not picking on anyone. As I write these words, I am also very conscientious about eating healthy and exercising every day. My husband often says I can even be fanatical about it. But I do it because I feel better when I do, and I am careful about my heart health because of health problems that run in my family.

Still, Brown helps us all realize that weight is just a number on a scale. It is not a barometer for how we feel inside. We can be at peace with ourselves—even have a higher body-mass index—and still love how we look!

If you’ve been striving to look a certain way, it’s time to examine your “why.” I encourage everyone to question the norms. Brown helps us see for ourselves how our relationship with food affects our life. Read Body of Truth, it will enlighten and empower you to love the true you.

Harriet Brown is a regular contributor to the New York Times and also has written for O, Redbook, Psychology Today, and other publications.

Her previous books include Shadow Daughter, Brave Girl Eating, Feed Me!, Mr. Wrong, and The Good-Bye Window.

She also invites you to visit her online at Harriet-Brown.squarespace.com, and follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

BODY OF TRUTH
By Harriet Brown
304 pp. Da Capo Lifelong Books. $16.98

Purchase Body of Truth direct from Jathan & Heather Books or from one of these other fine online retailers: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, Half Price Books, Hudson Booksellers, IndieBound, Powell’s, Target, or Walmart.