Women, Food, and Desire: Embrace Your Cravings, Make Peace with Food, Reclaim Your Body

by Alexandra Jamieson

Overview

A holistic health counselor and co-star of award-winning documentary Super Size Me explores women’s cravings—for food, sleep, sex, movement, companionship, inspiration—and teaches them to listen to their bodies for a healthier, fuller life.

Transformational health expert Alexandra Jamieson is a woman on a mission. Having overcome her own food addictions and the weight and health problems these habits caused, she learned something life-altering: when we listen to our cravings, they will lead us onto the path of deep healing. Since her own personal breakthrough more than a decade ago, Alexandra has dedicated her life to helping other women learn to listen to the wisdom of their cravings and make food their greatest ally as they step into their lives with authentic passion.

In this powerfully feminine manifesto, Alexandra dares us to face our cravings head-on, to make the self-commitment to no longer hide out behind food, self-loathing, or the limiting expectations of others. With love, deep compassion, and fearless honesty, she calls upon all of us to boldly use food as a tool to cleanse ourselves of the nutritional, emotional, physical, and mental blocks that limit our ability to live full, meaningful, and joyful lives.

In this book she’ll show us how:
· Our cravings are the gatekeepers of our deepest longings and desires
· Transforming habits set us free
· Detoxing unclutters our bodies and minds so we may engage in our lives with more power and authenticity
· Embracing our sexual selves makes us more powerful
· Trusting ourselves and surrounding ourselves with a nurturing community is essential for a vital, healthy, hot life

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781410477873
Publisher:	Gale Group
Publication date:	04/15/2015
Edition description:	Large Print
Pages:	321
Product dimensions:	5.70(w) x 8.60(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Alexandra Jamieson has been featured on Oprah, CNN, MSNBC, MindBodyGreen.com, Dr. Oz’s Share.com, and scores of other television, radio, and web programs. She travels around the country speaking at conferences and colleges spreading the message about the wisdom of cravings and coaches thousands of people via her webinars, retreats, and one-on-one programs. You can find Alex on Facebook and on her website, AlexandraJamieson.com. She lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her son and partner.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Tapping into Desire 1

Chapter 1 What Do You Crave? 17

Chapter 2 How Habits Happen 35

Chapter 3 The Brain-Body Connection 61

Chapter 4 How to Be in Your Body 79

Chapter 5 Detoxing to Discover Who You Really Are 96

Chapter 6 Making Peace with Food 117

Chapter 7 The Importance of Trusting Your Gut 133

Chapter 8 Relishing Your Body's Capacity for Pleasure 154

Chapter 9 Rest and Rejuvenation 176

Chapter 10 Stepping into the Sun 192

Chapter 11 Beginning Anew with Food 207

Chapter 12 How Desire Will Set You Free 227

Acknowledgments 241

Editorial Reviews

10/06/2014
Holistic nutrition coach Jamieson (Vegan Cooking for Dummies) shares a healthy and healing approach to eating well and listening to the body and heart’s true desires. For women in particular, this involves replacing feelings of “shame, guilt, and discomfort” surrounding food and learning to “dismantle the negative monologue” about body image. Refreshingly, Jamieson denounces typical dieting and abnegation, calling them “too restrictive” and “unsustainable,” and going so far as to state that “sometimes it’s OK to just eat the chocolate.” Instead, she advises making eating an intuitive process and using a hunger-monitoring scale to decide when and how much to consume. The feminist perspective and focus on self-care, as well as Jamieson’s honesty about her own struggles, create a compelling authenticity. This is balanced with information on the neuroscience of cravings, how to break eating habits ingrained since childhood, and smart tactics for food shopping. She offers a version of the familiar elimination diet that involves cutting out six “toxic” ingredients, one at a time, to better judge how each may be affecting you. Other topics include cultivating a fulfilling sex life rather than using food to satisfy desires, getting adequate rest, and taking a pleasure-seeking rather than punitive approach to fitness. Far from another faddish diet guru, Jamieson guides readers into revolutionizing their entire relationship with food and their bodies. Agent: Wendy Sherman, Wendy Sherman and Associates. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

As a physician on the front lines of the sugar wars, I’ve longbeen on the lookout for a book I could recommend to patients who were ready toget off the dieting treadmill and really do the internal work necessary inorder to achieve a new relationship with nutritional healing, food, cravings, andtheir bodies permanently. Look no further, Women, Food & Desire is thatbook.

Dr. Mark Hyman

Like a perfect meal savored over an evening with good friends, Alexandra’s book offers nourishment, laughter, uh-huh moments, and wisdom— not just about how to feed your body — but how to feed your soul. Her insights and stories invite you back to your truest self, beckoning you to listen …listen... to the deeper inner longings that your cravings can reveal. She illuminates the path to making peace with your body and to living your most authentic life. I guarantee that you will find yourself reflected in her words. This book will give you the tools you need to give your overtired willpower a rest, move beyond blame and shame about cravings and food, and find the true fulfillment you are hungry for.

Dr. Aviva Romm

Pleasure and desire take center stage as the soul-nourishment that we need to finally be truly healthy, whole and alive.In Women, Food & Desire Alexandra Jamieson takes a stand for a woman's vibrant health and calls on you to trust your body and listen to what you truly crave.

Christina Rasmussen

Diet industry beware. You are about to be dismantled by the power of self-love. Alexandra Jamieson's approach to women's wellness brings joy and self-acceptance to the thorny issue of desire, that force that makes each of us who we are.

Claire Cavanah

Women, Food and Desire is a beautiful book that above all else, praises women. It’s filled with sweet words, clear advice, deep thoughts, and timeless wisdom. Alex Jamieson has reached into the heart of the feminine experience when it comes to food, and touched the place where transformation and delight can finally happen. If you’d like to go beyond the usual fare when it comes to nutritional advice, then consider this book a worthy feast.

Marc David

"As a theologian, I am intimate with the ways that religious texts have given the body a bad rep. The idea that the flesh is sinful and deceiving has created holy wars for women in their own bodies. Alexandra Jamieson reminds us that Eve was infinitely wise to eat that red apple. Pleasure is a form of soul-nourishment that we need to feel whole, vibrantly alive, and in love with life.This book will detox the shame that has kept you from being in your body. It will let you trust what you truly crave.It will open you to the power of becoming entirely who you are, and it will give you the permission to take action on your deepest desires."

Meggan Watterson

Alex Jamieson understands the complexity of our relationship with food and how we can heal ourselves from a lifetime of self-judgment in regard to it. There is deep knowledge and insight in Women, Food, and Desire, and the best part is we are not alone and we can enjoy our lives by understanding this part of ourselves.

Mariel Hemingway

Get out your highlighter when you read Alexandra's book. Every page is filled with wisdom, wit, and warmth.

Donna Gates

Finally, someone is giving us permission to embrace our cravings and desires! Alex invites us to take a deep-dive within ourselves and use the cravings we try to avoid to create real transformation. This is an absolute must-read for every woman seeking liberation from being stuck in a world where we’ve been taught to hide our deepest desires!

Cynthia Pasquella

Combining humor and candor with a smart, science-based approach, Alexandra Jamieson helps you develop a healthier, sexier, more vital existence in Women, Food and Desire. With practical, easy-to-implement strategies, she shows you how to transcend obstacles and tap into your deepest purpose. Transformative and life-changing!

JJ Virgin

Women, Food, and Desire is a must read! As a physician fully aware of the impact of our thoughts and food on the waistline, I've waited for a book like this: one that brings together the sensual, emotional, and nutritional. Alexandra Jamieson brilliantly empowers women to face their toxic thoughts and food habits to establish a new relationship with their body and cravings. Her functional nutrition experience and vulnerability shine through each page of the book as she simplifies the path women can take to an embodied, pleasurable, and juicy life.

Dr. Sara Gottfried

Desire is the basis for new conception, new growth, new life. We’re born with it. And often talked out of it. When you tap it, you have access to your inner guidance. Women, Food, and Desire will show you how. Sweet.

Dr. Christiane Northrup

"Touching, funny, authentic, scientific and smart! Alexandra Jamieson goes straight to the heart of our hungers in Women, Food and Desire. A refreshingly liberating book to help us better understand our cravings as the drive to live an actualized and soulful life."

Katherine Woodward Thomas

[Jamieson] has healthy food tips galore.

Well + Good

Functional nutritional coach Alexandra Jamieson hopes to offer reliable, knowledgeable and trustworthy support to help women satisfy many forms of hunger…Given her approach, every meal is an opportunity to ask what will lead to feeling good over time. Alexandra Jamieson offers a gentle, non-judgmental approach to embracing all sorts of cravings in a healthy and life-giving way.

ShelfAwareness

[Alex Jamieson] has become a successful public speaker who helps other women eat more healthfully by understanding their cravings.

More Magazine

Her new book, Women, Food, and Desire, tackles what Jamieson calls the four root causes of cravings…The key to living healthy without letting a diet consume you lies in learning to decode your body’s signs. With Jamieson’s help, it’s a piece of cake.

Elle Magazine

Alexandra has a plan to help you let go of your cravings and make peace with food.

Dr. Oz

Writtenby the co-star of Super Size Me, this book explores how desire andemotion underpin our relationship with food—and how we can begin tounravel the concept of craving to understand what we really need.

Goop.com

When you understand how your vices help you, you’ll have a better shot at kicking them to the curb.

O Magazine

2014-10-22
Holistic health counselor and co-star of the award-winning documentary Super Size Me, Jamieson (Vegan Cooking for Dummies, 2010, etc.) tackles the age-old question of what women really want.The author explains food cravings with the intent of helping women understand and overcome their private relationships with food. "It's human nature, after all," she writes, "to yearn, to long, to want, to desire." Jamieson deconstructs how a habit such as stashing a "secret" chocolate croissant in an office desk drawer often becomes part of an unconscious daily routine. She explores the brain/body connection, identifying helpful techniques such as yoga, Pilates, conscious breathing and visualization that can help women better relate to their bodies and help calm their minds. The author also advocates for the practice of detoxing as a route to spiritual enlightenment, as well as a means for healing. "All of this may sound a little bit woo-woo and corny," she writes, "but it's not." Jamieson dips into the science of neurogastroenterology, describing how "trusting your gut" by maintaining a healthy microbiome is a crucial aspect of overall health, and she discusses the importance of healthy sleep patterns and the joys of napping. Jamieson's additional health prescriptions include less time spent sitting, avoiding artificial light when possible and getting more sunshine. The author advises a change of mindset; rather than thinking that you have to exercise, let loose and play like when you were a child. Jamieson weaves her personal reflections together with case studies of clients working on such issues as eliminating unhealthy foods from their diets, off-kilter family relationships, body alienation and sexual pleasure. The author includes links to her website offering helpful tips, interviews and quizzes on a variety of topics, including meditation, detox strategies and recipes for healthful smoothies. Worth a look for those who enjoy self-help books focused on healthy lifestyles.

Kirkus Reviews