When clients come to The CEDRIC Centre, an eating disorder counselling centre in Victoria, BC, the first creature to greet them is invariably a small black and white dog named Runkie.

Michelle Morand, MA founder and director of The Cedric Centre says, "Runkie helps people relax, his presence creates a sense of safety."

In fact, for some clients of The Centre, having Runkie at the office is a major draw.

Sarah Brady age 28, became a client three years ago and enjoyed her experiences with The Centre's unofficial mascot so much, she decided to get a Runkie-sized dog of her own.

Brady says, "Originally, I came to The Centre for counselling because of my relationship with food. I am now recovered and a big reason about why I chose to come to The Centre had to do with the atmosphere, and that includes Runkie."

"It may sound a bit sappy, but when you're sitting there, sharing your deepest emotions, and you have tears running down your face, it's amazing to look down and see a little face staring up at you with unconditional love and the occasionally little wet sneeze", says Brady. "It really helps."

Brady enjoyed her experiences so much she referred her sister. And, got a small dog of her own, Ailey aged 2 years. Brady says, "I no longer need to come to The Centre for help with issues around food, but I still visit now and again for other things, and it's great because I can bring my dog, and just relax, and share about what's going on in my life, at a place where I feel comfortable."

The CEDRIC Centre, (Community Eating Disorder and Related Issues Counselling), specializes in the treatment of clinical eating disorders, sub-clinical disordered eating patterns, and related issues such as anxiety, depression, and distorted body image.

I've recently read a great book and I must share. It's called 'Where to Draw the Line' by Anne Katherine, MA, the author of another very helpful read called 'Boundaries'. She's a one-woman tour-de-force in the boundaries department, and has made this topic a central focus in her work as a mental health counselor, speaker and writer. And, truthfully, I'm glad someone is an 'expert' in this area because I have found the subject utterly confounding at times.

The term 'boundaries' is a much-loved catch phrase in modern therapeutic circles and a matter of on- going debate in spiritual ones. The need for self- protection that personal boundaries provide seems critical in any recovery process, and certainly in the pursuit of living a healthy life in general.

And yet I often feel somewhat murky in my sense of being able to identify these illusive boundaries for myself. Then there's the added confusion of the writings of some spiritual teachers and masters of our time that speak about the need to dissolve the false ego boundaries that we believe separate us from our fellow human and rest peacefully in the 'Oneness' of all that is. Hmmm. Ok, Note to Self: Identify and enforce personal boundaries, then dissolve boundaries and bask in Divine Union with all my fellow brothers and sisters. (ps. Have the spiritually- enlightened minds of our time ridden on public transit at rush hour lately?)

A big thanks to Virginia for writing this review. Virginia is the newest member of The CEDRIC team, she's in the office Wednesday, Thursdays and Saturdays and helps with administrative support.

By, Michelle Morand, Founder and Director of The CEDRIC Centre.

One of the key tools that allows my clients to rapidly get where they want to go in their recovery process is what I call "The Coping Strategy Flow Chart" (csfc for short)- fancy name I know, and it's the basis of all the work I do and of my own personal philosophy of life.

In essence, the csfc allows us to remind ourselves at a glance that all thoughts, feelings and behaviours that are not leading us to a peaceful state in the moment are merely coping strategies.

They are thoughts, feelings, or behaviours that are designed to either: alert us to needs that aren't being met in that moment; or to protect us from the awareness that we have needs that aren't being met. We particularly use the last option if we carry a belief that we are undeserving or unworthy or incapable of getting what we need. It's too painful from that perspective to be conscious that we have a need that isn't getting met when at a gut level we believe there's no way to meet it. So we keep ourselves in the dark through the use of a variety of coping strategies such as old core beliefs (a thought level coping strategy); bad body thoughts (another thought level coping strategy); anxiety, depression, anger; sadness (all feeling level coping strategies); and binging, purging, restricting and isolating (all behavioural level coping strategies). These coping strategy thoughts, feelings and behaviours allow us to be unaware that we even have a need let alone be conscious of what it might be, and for those of us who believe we're undeserving or not good enough to have a need met by ourselves or others, being unconscious feels like the safest place to be.

Our special thank you to Sandy Szwarc RN, BSN, CCP, the writer of this article, for letting us reprint her fabulous work from Tech Central.

With tremendous media fanfare last year, Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson announced that overweight and obesity had killed 400,000 Americans in 2000. The CDC paper making this claim, led by Gerberding and published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, laid the foundation for billions of dollars in government and industry initiatives and an aggressive new national advertising campaign to combat what she called a "tragic and unacceptable" health crisis.

But it has finally been exposed for what it is: a grossly exaggerated and fabricated scare campaign.

A new CDC analysis has just come out which found that overweight and obesity may actually have been associated with only 25,815 extra deaths in 2000. That 400,000 figure was off by 374,185 deaths -- or 1450%!

Why Terri died The story behind the news story: Schiavo had an eating disorder

By Candace Murphy, STAFF WRITER, Inside Bay Area Newspaper

In the days since Terri Schiavo's death, a dialogue has begun.

It started small. A posting on an Internet bulletin board here, a Google for pertinent information there. Sometimes, even a consultation with a physician.

But this dialogue hasn't been about right to life. It hasn't been about compassionate killing. It hasn't been about whether Terri Schiavo's husband or her family really knew what her living will wishes were before she suffered catastrophic brain damage from a heart attack that left her dependent on a feeding tube for 15 years.

Instead, this dialogue has been about what hasn't been a dialogue: eating disorders. Even though some physicians say a side effect of bulimia is why Schiavo had the heart attack, why the oxygen supply was cut off from her brain, why she suffered horrible brain damage and why she had to have that feeding tube simply to live, few are talking about it.

"I remember when it first made the news and there was just the briefest mention that Terri Schiavo was a bulimic," says Dr. Linda Riebel of Berkeley, a specialist with 20 years of experience in treating compulsive eaters, bulimics and anorexics. "I thought, 'Gee, why isn't anyone paying attention to this? Why isn't anyone paying attention to the root cause?' It's such an unforgettable warning."

While Schiavo's family members told CNN earlier this year that they didn't think Schiavo had a "real" eating disorder, the evolution of Schiavo's body shape is startling. In her high school senior yearbook picture and at a weight of about 250 pounds, Schiavo is nothing short of voluptuous. In another picture, a few years later, she's markedly thinner, smiling for the camera in front of a bedecked Christmas tree.

Contributed by Alison M.

I am a very proud person. I have always felt that I could do anything if I needed to, and that I could do it without anyone's help. I am one of those people who never read the instructions because I think I should know how to do everything without having to learn first. This is because I can't stand to admit that I don't know how to do something and that I might have to ask for help. For me, asking for help is admitting that I am stupid, and that I should know better. I grew up being afraid that I would get in trouble for asking for help, and that if I did, I wouldn't get it. This has resulted in my enormous pride.

This same pride is what drives my food obsession. I used food and dieting to cope with all the little things in life that I think I should be able to handle on my own. I ate because I felt tired, angry, sad, happy, confused, excited, or bored, and then I dieted to lose what I thought was excess weight. When that didn't work as well as I thought it should, I ate to ease the loneliness, fatigue, and demoralization brought about by dieting. So, I had many solutions for all of life's problems, and most of them involved turning to food or dieting. I created a little world in which I didn't have to ask anyone for help, where I felt I was safe from judgment, and where I lived with the illusion that I was handling life. I asked the food or the diet for help every day, but the problem was, they didn't help, so instead of admitting that I didn't know what to do, I dieted more, I ate more, and the cycle continued.

OP-ED COLUMNIST Of The New York Times, By JOHN TIERNEY, Published: April 23, 2005

Porkers of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your diets!

But don't start wearing spandex just yet.

For those of us lacking six-pack abs, this week's report that the overweight live longer is the greatest medical news in history. The authors of this study deserve a Nobel, not just for medicine, but for peace, too.

They have taken away the favorite cudgel of the scolds who used the "obesity epidemic" as an excuse to attack the flabby. The supposedly deadly consequences of fat provided the scientific rationale for the last politically correct form of prejudice.

The fatophobes are fighting on, disputing the new study and arguing that it still shows the fatal dangers of being seriously obese. But they have lost the scientific high ground. Not only do people of "normal" weight die younger than the moderately overweight, the study shows, but thin people die even younger than those of normal weight.

Have you been considering joining a group at The Centre?

Now is a great time to sign up. Michelle Morand will be facilitating a Saturday group from 10-12 pm on Saturdays, for 12 weeks in a row.

The groups follow our set program, but with Summer coming, it takes place every week, instead of every other week. Allowing you to move through the process quickly, and, still have time off over the sunny season!

Groups are two hours in length and the cost is $400.00, + GST, ($428.00). You can pay as you go over the course of the 12 weeks, which works out to $36.00 p/session. If you have extended health insurance you can send in your receipts to your insurance company for reimbursement.

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