Obesity and Psychology
Changing Mental Status to Assist in Weight Loss
Feb 9, 2009 Bradley Allen Ritzenthaler
Not every person who is overweight or obese has a psychological problem, but if repeated attempts to lose weight are unsuccessful, a look into the psychology of the situation may be in order. There are two paths to consider, self help and professional therapy. These methods can usually be learned or accomplished in a matter of months and used for a lifetime.
Self Help Methods to Change Mental Status
The Sedona Method is based on the idea that young children freely let go of events or “release” emotions quickly. As some people age they are taught to suppress emotion (i.e. “big boys don’t cry”) and this bottling up of emotions can cause internal conflict which can result in depression, anxiety, or worse. The Sedona Method teaches people to delve into their emotions, feel them, and then release emotions just as young children would. The releasing of negative emotions allows a person to find strength and freedom within themselves to achieve happiness and goals that are meaningful to them. “The Sedona Method” is a New York Times best seller written by Hale Dwoskin.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is aimed at treating depression, anxiety, and other psychological disorders. The basic principal behind CBT is that if a person can change the self talk in his head then he can change the way he feels about himself and change his behavior. Several self help books have been written using CBT. The top selling CBT self help book at Amazon.com is “Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy” by David D. Burns, M.D. CBT is not only a self help technique. Therapists frequently use CBT and assign CBT self help books as an adjunct to therapy.
Professional Methods for Changing Mental Status
Besides CBT, another therapy being used is Developmental Needs Meeting Strategy (DNMS). Developed by Shirley Jean Schmidt, M.A., LPC, DNMS has been in use since 2002. An extremely brief explanation of DNMS is that it is based on the research of how a child’s brain develops. When events occur that do not meet the needs of the developing child, the child can become emotionally stuck at that level of development. Later in adulthood when a person has something happen to him that taps into the stuck emotion, he repeatedly reacts with the emotions of the level in childhood development where he is stuck, in spite of desires to act differently. DNMS allows a person to define where he is stuck and then meets his needs so he can move on to a healthier, more adult emotional status. This therapy cannot be performed as self help. A trained therapist must guide the patient through the process. DNMS has been shown to be helpful with depression, anxiety, panic disorder, and many other complicated psychological disorders.
These therapies are not aimed directly at the problem of obesity; they work on the whole person. One of the serendipitous effects of these therapies is that they can clear psychological barriers to losing weight.
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