I recently went to a lecture on how religious trauma may affect the brain. “Religious trauma occurs when a person’s experience in their faith-based community is stressful, degrading, dangerous, abusive, or otherwise harmful. Many forms of religious trauma are not associated with specific events but instead accumulate over a long period of time through harmful messages enforced by their community.”

Such indoctrination strongly may cause people to fear being greedy and gluttonous,  believe they desire too much, and that they’re undeserving of what they eat as well as of many life pleasures. Some highly religious women starve themselves in order to look perfect (aka culturally acceptably thin) to get or keep a husband. Mary Anne Cohen, LCSW, Director of the New York Center for Eating Disorders, explains that, “in highly religious homes with rigid rules, the best, cheapest, legal, socially sanctioned way of burying feelings is with overeating, bulimia, self-starvation, compulsive dieting and over-exercising.”

According to Recovering from Religion.org, “Most of the major world religions practice some manner of fasting. Lent for Christians, Ramadan for Muslims and Yom Kippur for Jews are all examples of restrictive eating time frames. Under most circumstances, these are engaged in healthfully and without consequence. For someone at risk of developing an eating disorder, however, and for whom religious ideation might be a concern as well, these restrictive periods can push them fully into disordered eating.” 

“Trauma also may occur when a person has no choice about fasting and is shamed and berated into behaving such as eating or not eating certain foods.” In fact, “Patients who present with stronger extrinsic religious beliefs—that is, religion imposed upon them—have a much higher incidence of eating disorders than those with intrinsic belief.” 

Unfortunately, “faith communities can reinforce shame, control, and compliance—and how that intersects with masking, sensory sensitivities, and the drive to ‘be good’” can lead to eating disorders. This is especially true for people who are neurodivergent and trying to fit in to appear “normal” in religious communities. One way they may do this is to use their eating and appearance to become validated and belong. “Religious trauma is real—and for neurodivergent folks, it can leave especially deep marks on body image, food, and self-worth.” 

If you had a highly religious upbringing forced upon you and have an eating disorder, it’s time to look into how the former may have affected the latter.

Best,

Karen