I’m glad the Black Swan filmmakers included Nina’s stealing from the older ballerina, Beth. Stealing is often a component of an eating disorder. The person doesn’t steal because she has a criminal mind and seeks to earn her way in the world through theft.
Here you will find articles discussing the various ways culture and media can affect both the development of an eating disorder and eating disorder recovery.
Links to various articles in the news and other websites and blogs representing cultural voices will be posted here along with commentary.
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In the film "Black Swan," the character Nina is portrayed as emotionally and physically trapped in a child-like state, In the film "Black Swan," the character Nina is portrayed as emotionally and physically trapped in a child-like state, heavily dependent on her mother for care and guidance. Their mother-daughter relationship is characterized by a binding pattern where Nina's mother treats her as a child, and Nina, in turn, cannot function as an adult.
To improve their relationship realistically, Nina's mother would need to treat her as an adult, and Nina would have to embrace adulthood. However, this transformation never occurs, and they both remain stuck in their co-created dynamic.
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In the film, The Black Swan, Nina obsesses about being a perfect ballerina. Her dancing in a troupe is inextricably tied to her sense of self. To endanger that activity is an intolerable nightmare. To stop dancing or to lose progress toward unapproachable stardom is equivalent to the death of her identity.
Anorexic and bulimic women in real life go into weeping tantrums, rages, manipulative arguments and pleading when their eating disorder symptoms prompt family or medical advisers to suggest even temporary life changes in support of their health and psychological well-being.
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Leona Gage reaches pinnacle of acknowledged beauty only to lead a sad and difficult life. If you obsess about your beauty, youth and shape, please take heed.
Leona is 18 in this 1957 picture, just crowned as Miss U.S.A. She's pretending to be 21.
Truth behind the photo? She married at 14. At 16 she had two children.
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