This is a heart wrenching documentary that explores eating disorders. It is beyond sad. I literally cried my eyes out. They follow the treatment of four women at the Renfrew Treatment Center in Coconut Creek, FL. Per HBO’s website, five million people in the U.S. suffer from eating disorders, and more than 10% of those diagnosed with anorexia nervosa will die from the disease. A lot of the women and girls are kicked out of treatment centers before they’re ready because their insurance runs out and they’re no longer covered.

So many things about this documentary saddened me, but the main thing that stood out is just how difficult it is for them to ever truly recover. It broke my heart to hear some of the women describe how this disease has consumed most of their lives as some of them have had it since they were young girls. Because of this, most of their memories revolve around starving themselves or binging and purging rather than enjoying times with friends and family.

I think it is such an important movie for everyone to watch, but especially if you are a parent. It was terrible to hear how some of the women that have this disease got it because of things that happened to them when they were young. For example, one woman was put on a very low calorie diet at 7 years old and then rewarded when she lost weight. Another young girl’s mother has an eating disorder and still does which influences this young girl. Since my daughter was born, I’ve always been careful to not make food an issue, but this just makes me want to be even more careful about what I allow others to say and do around her. It’s so sad that our society is so obsessed with being thin to the point where we’re encouraging young girls to starve themselves to death.

To read more about it, check out: http://www.hbo.com/docs/programs/thin/index.html